Part 33 (1/2)

”Weapons,” Shoka said. ”Nature and number. What do you have?”

”Bows,” Kegi said. ”Spears. -They took most of our horses, m'lord Saukendar. The mercenaries were down here four days ago, they marched away every man between sixteen and forty, except those I could plead were my guard and my servants; even boys out of the fields, and they-”

”There's a long ride between us and Lungan,” Shoka said quietly. ”And one can cross the Paigji virtually anywhere. But the bridge at Lungan-”

There was profound silence at the fireside, quiet enough that the snap and spit of the fire wore at the nerves. Kegi was sweating. He had that much sense.

”I couldn't prevent them,” Kegi said. ”I sent a message-to Hois.h.i.+ and to Feiyan-”

”It didn't catch up with us,” Reidi said.

Moving too d.a.m.n fast. The statement hung there, for anyone to understand. Ghita knows. He's moving to strip us of support. Does he know yet how close we are?

And how few we are?

”The Hisei and the Chaighin,” Shoka said. ”The two dragons about the walls of Cheng'di, my lords. A barrier and a trap. If they bar that bridge, as well they can, then we're put to swimming the Hisei-or ferrying an army across, an army we haven'tgot , my lords, so we can't rely on it.”

He could see Taizu's hands, that worried a twig to death, white-knuckled. He imagined the thundercloud look on her face, imagined the biting of the lip.

d.a.m.n right, girl. d.a.m.n right we're in a mess. And this-scholar-attacks the guard at the ford, to help us on our way- ”Keep your guard, m'lord. I'd rather a change of horses.”

”M'lord?”

”Jiro's a conspicuous color. He stops here. I can use about ten men, bay horses, mismatched armor, nothing conspicuously good.”

”Nine,” Taizu said under her breath.

A sensible man would have his wifecarried down to Choedri. But small luck for Choedri, he thought, holding onto her.

”Nine men,” he said, and looked at Reidi and at Kegi. ”I'll want my horse back. I value him. The mare too. Bring them to Lungan.”

”Nine men-” Reidi possibly understood what was toward. Perhaps even Kegi did.

”And I want a bird, m'lord Kegi. One of the Emperor's birds ...”

The dovecote, the aviary, the gawky young Emperor tending his birds every morning . . . personally.

”M'lord?”

”Haveyou one of the Emperor's birds, lord Kegi?”

”Yes, my lord,” Kegi said.

”And a writing-kit?”

That, of course Kegi had. The Necessity of Records. Bogi'in had devoted an entire section of his book to that matter.

Shoka rubbed Jiro's bowed nose and got a b.u.t.t in the ribs for his sentiment; but it was hard to walk away, imagining-he told himself he was a fool-that the horse knew desertion when he saw it, that the old lad could smell it in the air, hear it in his voice.

He moved fast when he took up a remount's reins and stepped up into the saddle-last of all their small company. He bade a quick good luck to the men he was leaving and put himself out in front of his company, in the dark of the woods and the night.

Fool, he told himself a second time, because he felt himself that much further from things he knew, too far away now to get back again-too lost to think of home, too much changed, except that rider that came up beside him- Fool for taking her along in a business like this, fool not to send her back, lie to her, give her some charge that would keep her busy long enough-but of the ten he had, she was the one he wanted by him, she was the one who would never cross his moves, never misstep, never leave anything to chance- So they were mercenaries, that was all, dirty and haggard and riding away from the disaster to the south. And it was not the Choedri ford of the Paigji they headed for, it was the one east of there, off the road-no road for wagons or traders, but the sandy Paigji had such places up and down its course, it always had had, and the whole border between Taiyi and Tengu was a sieve as pa.s.sable for Ghita's men to launch an attack south as for them to slip north.

If Ghita did attack-there was no holding Choedri. But what Ghita would come seeking would not be there.

Reidi understood. He had made Reidi understand. Seven days, he had said.

He hoped Reidi understood.

”Ghita?” was all Taizu had asked, before he had explained a thing, by which he knew she guessed what he was doing.

”No basket,” he had said. ”Mercenaries. We need the horses.”

Taizu had nodded soberly and said: ”No ribbons either.”

And, ”No ribbons,” he had agreed, amused despite himself.

Listening to which conversation, any third person had to know they were both crazed.

Sword, bow, and the plain, desperate look of-hired soldiers, Taizu's hair flying loose around her ears, a barbaric topknot tied atop, amulets about her neck, her face smudged with dirt and a mercenary's grimy sheepskin coat over her armor-part of the spoil of the lot at the ferry: no casual glance would find a woman under that mop, or expect more than a wiry, smallish youth in the company of men as disreputable.

The nine were a handful of lord Reidi's men, reliable and steady; and one Jian from Choedri, that Kegi had sent-He knows the roads, Kegi had said.

And thank the G.o.ds Jian, who had a girl the other side of the Paigji, knew the back trails and found them the shallows he had promised them, a solid bottom, an easy belly-deep wade for the horses at the worst, hock-deep in most of it, and a peaceful climb up a game-trail into Tengu province.

Not riding straight north, toward Lungan, in the line of march they had established, but to the ferry in Anogi, two days' ride down the Hisei.

”I'd ask,” Shoka said to Taizu finally, when the morning was breaking, and they were well across the Paigji, ”knowing you wouldn't go back to Choedri-there's a straight ride on west-”

”No,” she said. He sighed. ”Unless you do,” she said after a while.

”No,” he said, from the gut, and thought about it. Again. But there was no way out except a coward's way, for both of them-unacceptable. And he knew that. ”h.e.l.l of a mess, wife.”

”No worse than Hoisan,” she said. His student. The girl with the basket, who had known traps before he taught her, a woman born to times when pig-girls learned ambushes and the bow. Hesaw what had become of Chiyaden: he imagined what growing up for a peasant girl might have been, in these years. ”You were fighting in Hua,” he said, ”-how long ago?”

”At least six years,” she said after a moment. ”Seven, I guess. Everyone hid out, every time the soldiers came over our border. There's a lot of hills in Hua. -Till the soldiers got to burning us out. Then lord Kaijeng-my brothers were with him, mostly-said fight any way we could. And my brothers when they were home, they taught us. When the castle fell, when lord Kaijeng died, my brothers came home then.

But there wasn't much anyone could do then. n.o.body was in charge. The soldiers ran right over us.”

”They had to,” Shoka said, thinking of how Hua sat, a hilly place apt for rebels, touching Angen's borders. ”If they couldn't put you under, they couldn't hold Yijang or Sengu, Mendang or even Taiyi, and without Taiyi, no hope for Hois.h.i.+-everything's connected, all the way up to Yiungei, one great loop they couldn't hold, if little Hua embarra.s.sed them. You were d.a.m.ned important.”

This, for the girl who had never studied maps.

She might be thinking it through. Or she might be thinking about her home. Finally she said: ”Gitu'snot that important. What they were afraid of then, the reason they had to run us over-they've got to be afraid now, don't they, unless they can catch us? If they go attack the lords and their people back south-we're not there. But they'll know where we were. And not where we'll be. They'll try to killyou .