Interregnum (7 page)

“The problem with full-time soldiers” he noted coldly as he trod carefully among the viscera, “is you tend to stand there and bluff and bluster when you could be busy actually killing.”

He kicked the half-body out of his way and strode over to the two.

“Another problem is that you’re hampered by certain codes” Kiva said with a feral grin. “I’m not.”

Stepping on the hamstrung knee, causing another scream of pain, he leaned forward and thrust his blade into the second man’s gullet. As he pulled the sword back out, he twisted and a large piece of the soldier’s neck came with it. The gush of dark blood washed over his companion who was now visibly terrified.

“I don’t like leaving a live enemy” he continued as if instructing a new recruit. “They tend to come back to haunt you.”

With a heavy slash, he beheaded the remaining man and, turning, shaded his eyes with his hand, trying to spot the archer. The severed head rolled past his feet and off down the hill. The archer hadn’t got very far, clutching his painful, bleeding leg and stumbling down the slightly treacherous slope toward the stream. Kiva growled. He hated having to chase people down.

“Can we help, sir?”

The captain turned and glanced up at the top of the wall. Three of the company were peering over the parapet at the grisly scene and he could hear the others scrambling across the farmyard now. Athas gestured down the hill.

“I might miss at that distance,” the big sergeant admitted, “but it’s a shot I’d bet the lad could make. He’s more of a huntsman.”

Kiva merely nodded and then set about the job of looting the bodies below the wall. Athas and Quintillian appeared at the top and the lad looked down. He squinted for a moment as he tried to make out the details of the scene below and then the colour slowly drained from his face. Muffled gagging sounds accompanied his desperate attempts to hold in his breakfast. The captain crouched, grey and unconcerned, among the severed pieces of human beings, busily rifling through their pouches. Athas grabbed a handful of the boy’s tunic and hauled him back upright.

“I know it’s not nice when you’re not used to it,” he told the lad soothingly, “but we haven’t got time for this. See that man in green? Down near the river?”

Quintillian continued to stare blankly at the sergeant, his face white.

“Can you hit him or
not
?” Athas queried, his voice more commanding.

The boy turned robotically to look down the hill, trying not to catch the huge splash of red beneath him out of the corner of his eye. The archer had almost reached the stream. It would be a very long shot, but he’d hit worse. He nodded, gulping in air rapidly.

“Then do it.”

Athas stuck three arrows in the wall while the boy unhooked his bow and tested the string gingerly. As the sergeant looked across, he saw some colour returning to Quintillian’s face. The lad plucked one of the arrows from the wall and nocked it, aiming carefully. Steadying his breath, he released the arrow.

The shaft arced up into the sunlit air and curved down, picking up speed as it fell toward the river. Athas realised he too was holding his breath as the arrow narrowly missed the soldier and splashed into the water. The lad let out his breath in a huge rush and slapped his hand on the wall in irritation.

“It’s too far” he shook his head. “He’s almost out of range.”

Athas plucked the second arrow and thrust it towards Quintillian, who accepted it reluctantly. The sergeant gestured to Thalo, who nodded and proffered another bow. In return, Athas held the arrow to him. Thalo stepped up to the wall, stretched out the bow, took the arrow, nocked it and fired with barely a pause to aim. Quintillian’s carefully-aimed shot flew out away from the wall a mere fraction of a second later.

Even Kiva stopped and turned to watch as the two arrows reached their apex and then began their descent. Thalo’s came down first, remarkably accurate considering his lack of aim, punching deep into the man’s calf, splintering the bone and jutting out of his shin. Before the figure even hit the water the second arrow, quintillian’s, struck him in the back, entering just below the shoulder blade. The distant figure crumpled into the stream, quickly staining the slow-running water red. Kiva stood back and looked up at the wall.

“Whoever goes down there to get my throwing knives back gets to keep anything they loot from his body.”

As Kiva stretched and made his way back along the wall toward the gate, Marco and Thalo turned and raced toward the gate in the wall. Athas slapped Quintillian on the shoulder.

“Not too bad” he said admiringly. “That was a hard shot.”

The lad was still very pale and shaky. He smiled weakly and then leaned forward over the parapet and retched convulsively for the best part of a minute, though nothing actually came up. Wiping his mouth with an exceedingly shaky hand, he leaned heavily on the wall, letting the bow fall to the ground, unheeded.

“He… the captain… butchered them all himself, didn’t he?”

“He did, lad” Athas answered mildly. “He’s very good at it. You could be that good one day with enough training and practice. Unfortunately, like me you’ve got a conscience and they tend to get in the way. He hasn’t. Not any more.”

The rest of the company had drifted back toward the main door of the farmhouse. Kiva had continued on round the wall of the house, and Thalo and Marco were racing for the body in the stream. The sergeant and the young man were practically alone. Quintillian looked up at the huge warrior.

“What made him this cold?” he asked with true feeling. “You’ve known him a long time. He must tell you everything, yes?”

Once again, Athas raised an eyebrow. The boy was always prying; probing for information. In another man it might be indicative of a spy, but for some reason Athas was sure of the lad’s trustworthiness. The sergeant rarely pried too deeply into peoples’ lives, tending to rely mostly on gut instinct. He sighed; gut instinct was good, but some things weren’t his to tell.

“I’ll tell you a lot of things you need or want to know lad, but not things like that.” Turning, the big sergeant fixed Quintillian with a direct glance. “You want to know about the captain, you’ll have to ask
him
. And I’d recommend you get to know him a lot better first. D’you drink?”

Quintillian smiled. “I’ve been known to have a few glasses of wine after lunch.”

“Hah. Well never mind.” Athas grinned and proffered a flask. The boy took it curiously, unplugged the lid, and sniffed delicately at the contents. He recoiled in horror.

“What in the name of … What
is
that?”

The sergeant grinned.

“It’s something they make in the northlands” he laughed. “The captain introduced me to it many years ago. It tastes like someone scraping their boot on your tongue, but it grows on you and there’s nothing better for hiding the smell of fresh carnage and the taste of bile.”

Quintillian took a slight pull at the tip of the flask and the look of horror intensified. He made a hollow throaty noise, reminiscent of his earlier retching.

“That’s foul!”

“Isn’t it though?” Athas beamed. “Have more. It’ll do you good.”

The sergeant glanced down once more at the scene below the wall.

“Come on” he sighed. “Let’s get back to the house.”

The two of them wandered along the farmyard until they reached the front gate, where Athas collared Brendan.

“Can you take someone and dispose of the mess below the wall. I don’t think we want the kind of attention that brings. Let’s not leave a trail for anyone to follow.”

Brendan rubbed his shaved head unhappily, but nodded nonetheless.

“Aye” he said reluctantly. “S’right. We’ll sort it sarge.”

Kiva wandered back in through the gate as two of the soldiers left to deal with the mess. He eyed Athas and the boy thoughtfully.

“They were pretty good shots” he said to the boy. “Care to get up in one of those windows and keep watch for us? Four of Celio’s men were looking for our unit, so I’d bet there’ll be more out there.”

Quintillian looked up at Athas questioningly, and the sergeant nodded. The boy frowned.

“I don’t mind keeping watch sir, but I’m not sure I’m the right man for shooting people. I’ve never shot anything animate before other than rabbits and birds. I’m not really sure how I feel about what I’ve just done.”

Kiva narrowed his eyes.

“What you just did helped save the company” he replied, his voice firm but understanding. “Get used to it. There’ll be times in your life when you’ll need to be capable of acts of brutality.”

His frown deepened as his thoughts raced and the monologue continued inside his head ‘…and your family carry the most brutal of all madnesses.’

Instead, he forced a smile and slapped Athas on the shoulder.

“You’d best go with him and talk” he added. “You’re the sensitive sort. I just border on ‘don’t give a shit!’”

As Kiva wandered off to sit in the shade of an old haywain, Athas escorted the young man up the staircase to the top floor of the farmhouse. The wide balcony let in a great deal of light, though the window on the far wall stood shuttered, blocking the worst glare of the sun. Athas gestured to the balcony and the two chairs that sat there. The pair wandered over and made themselves comfortable, the sergeant with his feet up on the worryingly rickety balcony. He shifted his weight and dust and fragments of worm-eaten wood drifted down into the farmyard.

Quintillian glanced out of the corner of his eye at the now relaxed-looking sergeant. Athas rubbed his nose and then drew out his flask of brew. Taking a slug, he recorked it and returned it to its accustomed place on his belt.

The young man cleared his throat nervously and Athas realised another difficult question was looming over him.

“What now?”

Quintillian sat up straighter in the chair and turned to face the older man.

“Your flask” he said, “has some engraving on it, yes?”

“Mmm. So?”

“A wolf’s head and some writing?” pushed the boy.

Athas narrowed his eyes. “What are you getting at lad?”

The boy shuffled uncomfortably.

“I saw the same markings on the captain’s flask. The wolf and the lettering. Does it have meaning for the Grey Company? The flask you issued me doesn’t have it on.”

Athas let out a long sigh.

“You’ve got to stop asking questions” he implored. “They make everyone feel uncomfortable. We’re a mercenary unit and that means that there isn’t a single man here that doesn’t have
something
to hide; usually something he’s ashamed of in his past.”

Quintillian smiled.

“Just one more, then.”

“What?” replied the sergeant.

“Was the captain ever married?” the boy asked, one eyebrow raised questioningly.

Athas growled and turned to face him.

“All right,” he answered, “but this is the last time you ever mention that subject, and I’m only telling you so you don’t make a mistake and ask him. Yes, he was. She died just after the collapse. It’s not a very nice or happy story and it’s one I
never
want to hear you ask the captain. Understood?”

Quintillian nodded and shuffled back to face the countryside over the balcony. The sun was glorious, lighting the green and gold fields as far as the eye could see.

“I’m just interested in what makes him what he is” the boy continued. “I’ve never met anyone who seems so bitter and yet I can’t get over the feeling that that’s not really him. D’you know what I mean?”