Soldiers Live (23 page)

The Shadowgate:

The Warlords of the Air
These Voroshk, who actually introduced themselves—as Nashun the Researcher and
the First Father—both spoke the language of Juniper. Nashun the Researcher had
by far the best command. Neither had social skills of a sort likely to put a
smile on the face of many mothers. It was clear that the demonstration of
manners toward persons outside the family was an exercise with which they had
little familiarity.

After the introductions I stated the obvious. “You people sure got yourselves
into big trouble.”

You could feel the Voroshk closing their eyes and sighing inside all that black
material.

“We will survive,” the boss Voroshk declared. He strained to keep anger and
arrogance out of his voice. He had less success with confidence, which made me
wonder if he did not really mean it.

“No doubt. What I saw of your family’s capabilities impressed me. But honestly,

you realize that your family’s survival will require more than just fending off
the shadows.”

Nashun made a dismissive gesture with one gloved hand. “We come to you because
we want our children back.”

He spoke clearly and slowly enough that Lady caught that. She made a surprised
little noise that might have been half a laugh.

“You’re out of luck. They may prove useful. Nor have we any incentive to give
them back.”

Their anger seemed a palpable force.

Tobo felt it. He said, “Warn them that any power they use to try to break
through will bounce back at them. Tell them that the harder they try the worse
they’ll get hurt.”

I translated. Our visitors were not impressed by anything a boy said. Neither
did they experiment. They did recall events at their own shadowgate. The
Researcher said, “We are prepared to make an exchange.”

“What do you have to trade?”

“You still have people on this plain.”

“Go for it. They’re covered. When the dust settles you’ll be picking up dead
family members.” Of that I was confident. Because Tobo trusted Shivetya
completely. “You’re powerful but ignorant. Like an ox. You don’t know the plain.

It’s alive. It’s our ally.”

Smoke should have rolled out of their ears. Goblin sometimes did that in the old
days. But these men had no sense of humor.

Their desperation overcame their anger.

“Explain,” Nashun hissed.

“You know nothing about the plain but you’re arrogant enough to believe that
your power will be supreme there. In a realm of the gods. Evidently you don’t
even know your own world’s history. The people you’re facing, that you believe
you can threaten, are spiritual descendants of soldiers sent out from Khatovar
five hundred years ago.”

“What happened before the Voroshk does not signify. However, you demonstrate
ignorance of your own.”

“It is of consequence. You want something from the last Free Company of
Khatovar. And you don’t have anything to offer in exchange. Except, possibly,

that disdained history and a little contemporary knowledge.”

Neither man commented.

Lady told me, “Ask them why they want these kids back so bad. They’re safe over
here.”

I asked.

“They are family,” the First Father said.

His voice had a quality which made that seem not only plausible but possibly
even true.

I said, “They’re a long way away. They’ve been travelling northward steadily
since they arrived. One is deathly ill.”

“They have their rheitgeistiden. They can get down here in a few hours.”

“I think this guy is for real,” I told Lady. “He’s really got some mad-ass
notion that I’d give those kids their toys and turn them loose, just on his
say-so. They sure don’t have to work to survive in Khatovar.”

The Researcher picked up the one word. “I mentioned your ignorance. Listen,

Outsider. Khatovar is not our world. Khatovar was one city of darkness, where
damned souls worshipped a Goddess of the night. That evil city was expunged from
the earth before the Voroshk arose. Its people were hunted down and
exterminated. They have been forgotten. And they will remain forgotten. Never
will any Soldier of Darkness be permitted to return.”

Once upon a time, on a lazy day, ages before he had become the vessel he was
now, Goblin had told me that I would never get to Khatovar. Never. It would
forever remain just beyond the horizon. I could get closer and closer and closer
but I would never arrive. So I had imagined I had set foot in Khatovar. But I
had only been to the world where Khatovar had existed once upon a time.

“Time itself has evened the score. That which Khatovar sent out came back. And
the world that killed Khatovar will die.”

“Did you catch that?” Lady asked.

“Huh? Catch what?”

“He used the world evil. We don’t hear that much in this part of the world.

People don’t believe in it.”

“These guys aren’t from this part of the world.” I returned to the language of
Juniper. “Given a complete, working breakdown on the construction and operation
of your flying logs, and of the material from which your clothing is made, I’d
say we could give you what you want.”

Lady did her best to keep the others up-to-date on what was being said. She did
not always get it right.

Nashun the Researcher could not grasp the enormity of my demand. He tried
speaking three different times, failed, finally turned to the First Father in
mute appeal. I was sure his hidden face was taut with despair.

I told my guys, “It might be wise to back away from the shadowgate. These people
are about out of patience.”

I felt wonderfully wicked. I always do when I frustrate overly powerful,

responsible-to-no-one types who think all existence was created only for their
pleasure and exploitation.

I told the Voroshk, “It’ll be dark soon. Then the shadows will come out.” And,

as the Voroshk exchanged glances, I borrowed from Narayan Singh. “When dealing
with the Black Company you would do well to remember: Darkness always comes.”

Lady’s expression was one of less than one hundred percent approval when I
turned away. “That could’ve gone better.”

“I let my feelings intrude. I should know better. But talk wasn’t going to get
us anywhere, anyway. They think too much of themselves and too little of
everyone else.”

“Then you’re giving up the dream of returning to Khatovar.”

The Voroshk made their first furious attempt to bust through the shadowgate.

I did warn them.

They did not want to listen.

It was worse than I had imagined it could be.

It was worse than Tobo had predicted.

The countermagical blast hurled both sorcerers all the way up the slope to the
edge of the plain, bouncing and tumbling all the way. By some miracle neither
broke the barrier protecting the road. Maybe Shivetya was watching over then.

One still had shown no sign of recovering when I gave up watching. I told Tobo,

“I reckon it’s time to go, now. Those guys might have gotten the message this
time.”

I did not look back. The trials the Voroshk faced left me confident that they
would never become a problem to my world.

As we descended the hill I asked, “Anybody think there might be a connection
between the Shadowmasters and the Voroshk? They seem to have gotten their start
about the right time. And the Shadowmasters tried to sever all connections with
the past in Hsien. It was just too big a job. I wonder what we’d find out if we
talked to some ordinary farming stiff over there?”

“I can ask Shivetya,” Tobo said. “And the prisoners.” But he did not sound
particularly motivated.

Nijha:

Place of the Dead
Sahra kept calling for more torches. As though bringing in enough light would
nullify the disaster. By the time the Captain arrived there were fifty torches,

lamps and lanterns illuminating what had been a stable before the Company
arrived.

“Strangled?” Sleepy asked.

“Strangled.”

“I’m tempted to use the word ‘ironic’ but I fear there’s no irony in it at all.

Doj. That white raven of Croaker’s was hanging around outside. Find it. There
were little people hanging around here, some of them supposedly watching Singh.

I want to know what they saw.”

Sleepy had a good idea what she would hear from the Unknown Shadows. It would be
a variation on reports she had had before. She said, “I’ll want to send the news
south, too.”

Nothing happened around the Black Company without some hobyah there to witness
it. The soldiers from Hsien understood that perfectly. They took it for granted.

They tended to be well-behaved. But someone without experience of life in Hsien
would not take the Unknown Shadows as seriously.

A minute later, Sleepy asked, “I don’t suppose anyone’s seen Goblin, have they?

I don’t reckon anyone knows who was supposed to be watching him?”

Riverwalker said, “He was right over there till a minute ago.”

Sleepy looked, considered, muttered, “No doubt right up to the second I decided
to consult the Unknown Shadows about what they saw.” Which would have been the
same moment he would have realized that his recent history was no mystery to
anyone. The moment when he realized that Sleepy had been paying out the
hangman’s rope while seeing what she could learn.

Riverwalker asked. “Want him rounded up? In one piece?”

“No.” Not now. Not when the best wizard she had was an old, old man whose
skills, outside using a sword, were too weak even to put hexes on people and
animals. “But I wouldn’t mind knowing where he is.” Doj could manage that. The
Unknown Shadows communicated with him. Sometimes. When the mood took them. “What
you do need to do right now is get extra guards around the Voroshk. Goblin
showed a lot of interest in them while we were traveling. I don’t want anything
happening to them and I don’t want them wandering off.” It did not occur to her
to reinforce the company responsible for the comatose sorcerer Howler. But
Fortune stood behind her there.

Goblin, it developed, had grabbed a couple of fast horses and some loose
supplies and had gotten himself out of Nijha, headed north, all without
attracting any particular notice. Sleepy very nearly indulged in profanity when
she received the report. Someone pointed out that the little wizard always had
had that knack. Sleepy growled, ’Then somebody should have been watching for him
to take advantage of it.”

Uncle Doj told her, “I can’t stop him or control him but I can make life
miserable for him.”

“How?”

“His horses. The Black Hounds can have a lot of fun with them. And when he tries
to lead them to water . . . ” He chuckled wickedly.

“Send them.” Sleepy beckoned Sahra. “I kept leaning both ways during the
meeting. Looking for a sign. I’ve just had it. We’re not going to rush in
anymore. We’ll move ahead slowly, into more hospitable country, and stop
somewhere where we can support ourselves without much trouble. We’ll wait till
everyone catches up. And issue a call for volunteers willing to support the
Prabrindrah Drah and the Radisha.” If anyone even remembered them.

“Wait especially for my son. Yes.” Sahra was angry and unhappy but too tired to
fight much. “Now that Murgen is no longer the major tool.”

“Especially for Tobo, yes. Tonight it was clear that without Tobo we’re in
trouble bad.”

Sahra said nothing more. She was tired of fighting a battle in which even the
men she wanted to protect refused to honor her concern.

The Taglian Territories:

The Palace
The Taglian field army slowly assembled astride the Rock Road in lightly settled
country midway between Dejagore and the fortified crossings over the River Main
at Ghoja. Another, less powerful force, consisting of troops from the southern
provinces, assembled outside Dejagore. And a third gathered outside Taglios
itself. There seemed no reason to suspect that the force at Dejagore should have
any trouble denying that city to a force such as that the Black Company was
bringing up. Mogaba expected his enemies to swing west once they descended from
the highlands, possibly marching as far as the Naghir River, which they could
follow north, then swing eastward again and try to get over the Main at one of
the lesser downriver crossings. He intended to let them march and march and wear
themselves down. He intended to let them do whatever they wanted till he slammed
the door shut behind them. Once he had them north of the Main he could build a
ring around them and slowly squeeze.

The Great General was feeling quite positive. Taglios was restive but not
rebellious. Even the most remote garrison commanders were bringing their
soldiers to the assembly points with their units at near strength even though
some harvesting would commence in the far south before the end of the month.

Harvest season inevitably precipitated higher desertion rates.

Best of all, the Protector was staying away. Her tinkering and interference
always made his task more difficult. And, of course, it was always his fault
when a bastardized plan fell apart.

The Great General gathered his senior staff and inner circle, which included a
dozen generals as well as Ghopal and Aridatha Singh. He told them, “The plan
appears to be coming together perfectly. With a couple of nudges and timed
withdrawals I think we can lead them to the ford at Vehdna-Bota. I still wish we
had better communications with the Protector. But she can’t find enough crows
anymore. Some plague is wiping them out. I seldom hear from her more than once a
day. And then, often as not, she’ll waste time on weather news or a flu epidemic
in Prehbehlbed.” Nor were there any shadows about, nor any of the Protector’s
lesser spies. Mogaba did not mention that. Taglians were dedicated conspirators.

Let them continue to think that there might be eyes in the corners, watching.

Only his own conspiracy need go forward.

The Great General had more to preoccupy him than how to isolate and destroy his
enemy. He suspected there was a definite question about the identity of Taglios’

most dangerous foe.

Something about this incarnation of the Black Company had Soulcatcher so
concerned that she insisted on focusing all her attention there. Something about
this incarnation of the Black Company had touched almost everyone of substance
within the Taglian empire, though news of their return had barely had time to
spread and there were no eyewitness reports available at all. All customary
enmity and internal friction seemed to be dwindling at a time when, normally,

factionalism should be exploding as old antagonists tried to use the situation
to their advantage.

And Mogaba had found that he was thinking less and less about the practicalities
of eliminating the Protector, more and more obsessively about destroying the
Black Company. Not just defeating them but obliterating them. To the last man,

woman, child, horse, mule, flea and louse.

After decades of unhappy fortune Mogaba was naturally wary of
everything—including his own emotional state.

He had begun keeping a personal journal the day he had made the decision to
betray Soulcatcher, to track his thoughts and emotions during the subsequent,

stressful days. It was a journal he opened only in brilliant sunlight. It was a
journal he would destroy before actually taking action against the Protector
because there were names in it he did not want betrayed if he failed—and was
lucky enough to die before she captured him.

Lately he had noticed an evolution in his thinking about the Company. An
accelerating evolution. A frightening evolution.

He had become suspicious of his own reason.

Following a general meeting to consider policy for the empire the Great General
met with the men responsible for the capital city.

“Kina is active again,” Mogaba murmured. Ghopal and Aridatha listened politely.

He was referencing events from before their time, that they knew only by repute.

“She’s doing that thing where she gradually shapes everyone’s prejudices.”

They offered him blank looks.

“Not history buffs, eh?” Mogaba explained. “The strangest part was, nobody ever
wondered why they were terrified. They just didn’t remember that three years
earlier they’d never heard of the Black Company.”

Ghopal said, “What you’re saying is, the Strangler Goddess has a particular fear
of the Black Company. She wants the whole world to climb all over them and
destroy them. Even if blood has to be spilled.”

“Isn’t this an interesting quandary,” Aridatha said. “If we can overcome the
Black Company, we’ll still have to deal with the Protector. If we knock her
down, too, then we’ll still have to handle the Stranglers and Kina, in order to
prevent the Year of the Skulls. Wave after wave. No end to it.”

“No end to it,” Mogaba agreed. “And I’m getting to be quite an old man.” He had
begun to nurture an outrageous notion almost as soon as he had determined that
he was being manipulated. “There are a couple of old records I want to check. I
want you both back here same time tomorrow.”

The Great General did not lack courage. The next evening he led Ghopal and
Aridatha into the brightly lit room. He presented a more convincing case for his
belief that Kina had awakened, drawing heavily upon excerpts from copies of
Black Company Annals residing in the national library.

Aridatha Singh said, “I believe you. I just wonder what happened to wake her up
again.”

“Ghopal?”

“I’m not sure I understand. But I don’t think I have to. Aridatha does. I trust
his wisdom.”

“Then I’ll talk to Aridatha. But you listen.” Mogaba chuckled.

Aridatha listened to his idea, the reasoning behind it, frowning all the while.

Ghopal seemed aghast. But he kept his mouth shut. Aridatha went off alone with
his thoughts. After a while he nodded reluctantly and said. “I have a brother in
Dejagore. I’ll find a reason to go visit. I know some people who might listen to
what you have to say if it’s me doing the talking.”

“What?”

Aridatha said, “You recall a few years ago when the Company underground here
started kidnapping people? Willow Swan, the Purohita, and so on? I was one of
the people they snatched.”

Ghopal wanted to know why, and Mogaba wondered how he had gotten away.

“I got away because they let me go. They only picked me up because they wanted
to show me off to somebody they were holding already.” Aridatha took a long,

deep breath and revealed his great secret. “My father. Narayan Singh. They were
showing him their power.”

“Narayan Singh? The Narayan Singh? The Strangler?” Ghopal asked.

“That Narayan Singh. I didn’t know. Not till then. Our mother told us our father
was dead. She believed it, I think. The Shadowmasters conscripted him into their
labor battalions during their first invasion, before the Black Company ever
arrived from the north. I was the youngest of four children. I’m pretty sure the
older ones knew the truth. My brother Sugriva moved to Dejagore and changed his
name. My sister Khaditya changed hers, too. Her husband would die of
mortification if he knew.”

“You’ve never mentioned this before.”

“I think you can understand why.”

“Oh. I do. That’s a cruel burden to bear.” Mogaba already found himself
responding to the Deceiver connection. With exactly the sort of paranoid fear
everyone did to any Deceiver connection. It was inevitable. Aloud, he said, “I
wonder how those people ever trust each other?”

Aridatha replied, “I suspect you’d have to be inside and a part of it all to
understand. I think the biggest part of it, though, would be their faith in
their Goddess.”

The Great General looked at Ghopal Singh. “If the Greys have objections I need
to hear them now.”

Ghopal shook his head. “Only one Grey is going to know about this. For now. The
others wouldn’t understand.”

“Aridatha. You have someone you trust to take charge while you’re gone?” The
City Battalions did not know they were part of a conspiracy to free Taglios from
its protector. It was necessary to keep firm control there.

“Yes. But no one in the know. If you have unusual requests you’ll have to
justify them based on what’s going on in the city.” The soldiers understood that
their role was to keep the peace if the population became too restive for the
Greys alone.

Mogaba asked, “Are there enough provocations to make any excuses sound good?”

Ghopal showed a large array of teeth. Shadar were proud of their well-kept
teeth. “That’s almost amusing. Since the news reached the street that the Black
Company really is back, there’s actually been less related graffiti. As though
real Company sympathizers don’t want to risk identification and the non-Company
vandals responsible for most of it suddenly don’t want to be identified with any
terror that’s for real.”

“Terror?”

“You were right, what you said last night. There’s a growing fear of the Company
out there. Like you said, it was in olden times. I don’t understand but it’s
helping keep the peace just when I expected a lot more trouble.”

“If you need provocations and the villains don’t provide them, feel free to
create your own. Aridatha, you know what needs doing. Do it. As quickly as
possible. Before events move so fast they rob us of more chances.” Though it
could happen almost momentarily, Mogaba had abandoned any real hope of catching
the Protector unaware as she returned to the city.

At the moment it seemed she did not plan to return until the Black Company
invasion was settled.