Upland Outlaws Page 18

  Shandie went into a sulk after that. For an hour he said nothing at all, just trailed after Ylo as he scoured the northern half of Newbridge for a vacant bed. When the search at last turned up a grubby little inn, he did not comment on it. The stable was already crowded, and no grooms were available to attend to the horses. Still Shandie said nothing. He dismounted in silence, handed his reins to Ylo, and began pacing up and down, brooding.

  Normally Ylo enjoyed horses, but he was weary and hungry, and would have appreciated some help. The change in his companion frightened him, but it also annoyed him. He detested being thrust into leadership over a man he had followed so faithfully. He had not expected this responsibility, or asked for it, and he resented it strongly. He placed himself in Shandie’s path.

  “Here!” he said, waving the key. “You’d better take possession of the room, or we may find half a cohort asleep in our bed when we get there. Take the packs. Number seven. “

  He stopped in horror, realizing he had just given orders to the imperor. Yet Shandie did not protest. He wandered off, trailing the saddlebags. Snorting with either relief or disgust-he was not sure which-Ylo grabbed up some straw and went back to polishing sweaty horsehide.

  The sun set. When he finally plodded up the creaky stairs, he discovered the key in the door, and the room empty. To be exact, he found no imperors in it. The one bed nearly filled the tiny space, the only other furniture being a very spotty mirror bolted to the wall and a large china chamber pot, equally unprepossessing.

  For a moment he almost panicked. Shandie could not have gone anywhere without the horses, and he had not come out to the yard to use the privy. Could he have been kidnapped?

  The saddlebags had been stuffed down between the bed and the far wall. Underneath them was Shandie’s satchel, containing the king’s letters to Krasnegar and the supply of gold. Obviously Shandie had taken leave of his senses altogether if he had left the gold unguarded. If that was ever lost, everything would be lost.

  After locking the door and looping the satchel over his shoulder, Ylo went clattering back downstairs. The saloon was crammed, noisy, and dim. There were no spare seats, and so many men standing that there was barely room to move. He hunted around, with no success. He went outside and searched the stables, the privies, the yard, even the street. With any other man, he would have suspected a girl and a bed, but not Shandie.

  Now what was he supposed to do? Rouse the city guard to hunt for a missing imperor?

  Fatigue forgotten and fear a bitter taste in his mouth, Ylo went back to the bedroom and began all over again. When he reached the saloon, he set out to quarter it methodically, squeezing around crowded tables and between loud huddles of men locked in argument. Eventually he found his quarry slumped on a solitary stool in a corner, gazing solidly at the wall. He clutched a tankard of bad-smelling beer with both hands. It had to be badsmelling beer if it was the same stuff that made the room stink as it did.

  Ylo managed to ease in beside him and kneel down, almost leaning on him.

  “What’s wrong?” he demanded. “You sick?”

  The imperor looked around slowly and stared at him with an expression of distaste. He muttered, “Uomaya!” and took a leisurely draft from his tankard.

  “What about her?”

  “What about her?” Shandie mumbled. “What sort of man deserts his child and runs away just because a dwarf says to, huh?”

  “Whileboth’s faster,” said a harsh military voice at Ylo’s back.

  “Poor little Maya!” Shandie moaned. “I left my baby!”

  “Whileboth and the Ister valley and then Mosrace.”

  Mosrace?

  That was where Ylo had been telling people he was heading. He choked off what he had been about to say so he could listen. In the clamor of voices all around, he did not make out an answer, but then the nearest man spoke again.

  “Naw, too hilly. And not Lipash township neither. Roads’ll be waist-deep in mud this time of year. “

  Ylo relaxed. Nothing to do with him, just a party of legionaries heading home on Winterfest leave, obviously. Mosrace was a largish place, so its mention was merely coincidence. He returned his attention to Shandie and the wild, bitter look in the coal-black eyes.

  “You left the baggage unattended!”

  “Should have stayed in Qoble, stayed with the legion. Deserted my post. Not fit to be an imperor.”

  “Tell me what I can do to help. “

  Shandie raised his stein to drink. Ylo thought he was not going to get a reply, then it, came. “Tell me what you’ve done so far. “

  “Huh?”

  The dark eyes narrowed. “What’s in this for you, Signifer? You’ve never been an idealist before. You only care about the itch in your crotch. Why should you suddenly start acting hero?”

  For a moment Ylo wanted to make a stupid retort about being the only man in the army entitled to wear a white wolfskin. Then he remembered that he had earned that honor by accident, and Shandie knew that. All right, so he wasn’t a hero. He’d never said he was.

  And Shandie went on. “Who bought you, Signifer? What were you promised?”

  “I don’t have a clue what you’re talking about!”

  “Don’t you? You expect me to believe all this puke about covins and almighty sorcerers?”

  “You don’t? “

  Shandie smiled slyly into his tankard. “No, I don’t! Not now. Oh, they fooled me to start with, that dwarf, that faun. Now I see it was all a plot! They’ve stolen me away from my throne with their feathery tales of millennia and votaries! And I don’t think you believe it, either-I think you’re one of them! “

  God of Madness! The Covin was winning, distance had not helped.

  “Er, your wife believed in it.”

  “Ha! What do women know of politics, huh?”

  Plenty, in Ylo’s extensive experience of pillow talk, and they were usually a great deal more astute at judging men. For him to bring Eshiala into the conversation with Shandie in his present mood might provoke all sorts of unfounded suspicions. So”Maybe you’re right! What do you think we ought to do?” Shandie blinked at this sudden capitulation. Odd twitches of expression flickered uncertainly over his face. Then he drained his tankard and lowered it with a gasp. He wiped his lips on his sleeve. “Go home, of course! Go back to Hub and do my duty. Catch all the liars and hang ‘em from the flagpole.”

  Ylo needed a sorcerer, quickly. He needed help and he certainly needed advice. If Shandie persisted in these delusions, he might take off back along the Hub road like a madman. He might do worse-he might just give himself up to the local authorities. Why had the faun or the warlock not foreseen that this might happen? Just as it had in inventing the imposter imperor now reigning in Hub, the Covin had pulled a trick the godly had not anticipated. What evilish horror might it play next?

  If Shandie could be taken into a shielded refuge like White Impress, then he might recover. Maybe. But a mundane like Ylo had no means to locate such shielding. If he could lay his hands on the magic scrolls he could ask the sorcerers for advice, but the scrolls were in Shandie’s pocket. To ask for them would only fan the madman’s suspicions-perhaps he could try to steal them in the night. A reply might not come for days, though.

  “Can’t go anywhere tonight,” Ylo said, smitten with sudden inspiration. “They close the bridge at sunset.”

  Shandie grunted. He was still staring at his companion with undisguised suspicion. The legionaries’ ‘geographical dispute was growing louder in the background.

  “I don’t think we’ll get any food here,” Ylo continued. “And it would be old and ill-treated if we could. We’ve still got some apples and stuff in the packs. Why don’t we go and have a snack and then make an early night of it?” He was talking too fast, almost babbling.

  “What, no wench tonight?”

  “Same argument as the food. “

  “It’s never stopped you before.” Shandie was not so far out of his mind that he
had lost his shrewdness. If anything, his crazy suspicions would make him even harder to deceive than usual, and marble was malleable compared to Shandie.

  “I’ll have two tomorrow to make up,” Ylo said, wishing he could wipe the sweat off his face without drawing attention to it. “Come on. This place makes me ill.”

  Shandie reluctantly put his tankard down among the boots around him and rose to his feet. He swayed, steadying himself with a hand on the wall. “You’re right,” he muttered. “Hard day.”

  It had not been a hard day at all. They had covered less than fifteen leagues, which was as much as they dare ask of the horses on these roads. Shandie had been known to ride three times that far in a day, often.

  Then he sat down again, heavily. “Get me ‘nother beer.” This unshaven, unkempt wastrel was a far cry from the dapper prince Ylo had served so long. He was either a very sick man or he was drunk. The idea of Shandie drunk was unthinkable, but then this whole experience was unthinkable.

  “You’ve had enough beer, Yshan.”

  “Am not Yshan!” Shandie roared, coloring. “I’m done with your stupid games! From now on I’m not hiding who I am, and I’m going back to my palace, and I’m not going to Mosrace, and I’ll not believe all that evilish nonsense about threats to the Impire! “

  God of Mercy!

  What was Ylo to do? The fate of the world had suddenly been dumped in his unwilling hands. He didn’t want it. He didn’t know what to do with it. He could still think of no solution except to get Shandie as far away from Hub as quickly as possible, in the hope that the sorcery might yet weaken with distance and let him recover his wits.

  For a moment he considered taking the imperor along by force, but that was obviously impossible. Tie him to the saddle? Shandie was probably as strong as he was, and could shout for help. Get him up to the room and stun him with the chamber pot? Stun the imperor? Keep him stunned for weeks? Ylo had seen too many men crippled by head wounds to consider that fantastic solution.

  Then he realized that a local cloud of silence had settled over the table at his back. He looked around, and up, into the inquisitive stare of the man he had heard earlier. Beyond him, behind a forest of tankards, his three companions were watching-They had heard Shandie shouting about Mosrace, and other things, dangerous things.

  They wore civilian clothes. They were all about the same age, old to be soldiers, and yet their steady gaze held the unmistakable look of legionaries-tough, hardened, self-reliant. The nearest one bore a jagged old scar across his nose. Four men in their middle forties … Without a doubt, these were veterans, legionaries who had completed their twenty-five-year stint and were heading home with their requital in their pockets to find themselves wives and farms. They might be honest, or they might not. They might cherish a virulent dislike for aristocrats like the officers who had ordered them around for a generation, or they might hold to the instinctive respect and obedience that had been hammered into them so painfully in their youth and reinforced every day of their manhood.

  Ylo was still staring up at the scarred man staring down at him, and he seemed to be the leader. He was not unlike Hardgraa in appearance. In fact, he had centurion written all over him.

  A sudden germ of an idea …

  “Perhaps you can tell us,” Ylo said, “how many days’ ride to Mosrace?”

  “Too Evilish many. What of it?”

  Shandie registered the conversation and twisted around on his stool to see. He scowled. “I told you we’re not going to Mosrace. We’re going back to the palace!”

  Four pairs of eyes blinked.

  Ylo rose to the occasion. “My name’s Yyan-cohort signifer with the XIVth.” He indicated Shandie. “Tribune Yshan. We’re on our way to Mosrace-“

  “I am not a tribune! I’m the imperor.”

  The four faces inspected one another and then came back to their previous direction.

  “Had a little too much, has he?” the centurion inquired. “It’s worse than that, I’m afraid,” Ylo said sadly. “He’s been prone to these attacks ever since Nefer Moor. I’m his brother. I’m trying to get him home, you see. He was all right when we started out, but-“

  Shandie barked, “Ylo!”

  “Ylo?” another man said. “Nefer Moor? He was at Nefer Moor?”

  “We both were,” Ylo said with becoming modesty. “The stories don’t really do it justice, though. Ever since then, he’s had these odd notions. Not all the time, just-“

  Shandie bellowed, “Ylo!” He lurched to his feet, but he was penned in the corner by the crowd.

  Ylo twitched eyebrows meaningfully, and the other men nodded in silent sympathy. Veterans knew what battle could do to a man.

  “At times he thinks he’s the imperor and I’m-“

  “Ylo!”

  “Ylo,” Ylo said touchingly. “I am his signifer, you see. He sometimes thinks I’m that other one.”

  The whole army knew of Shandie’s defeat by dragons at Nefer Moor, and how his heroic Signifer Ylo had saved the legionary standard in the rout. The situation definitely showed promise.

  “Here, your Majesty,” the centurion growled, like a bear trying to make friends. “Pull over your seat and quaff some ale with us.”

  Bodies squirmed. Shandie’s stool was drawn up to the table, and heavy hands pulled him down on it. Two of the other men were sharing a bench and somehow made room for Ylo.

  In the dim light, the imperor’s face was dark with fury and frustration. Whatever vile plot had been suggested to his mind by Zinixo’s sorcery and whatever part he thought Ylo was playing in it, he had enough wit left to see that anything he said now was only going to sink him deeper into the morass. As imperor or as tribune, in every way, he was pinned.

  “We’re hoping a few peaceful months at home with the family will do the trick,” Ylo said, wiping foam from his lips. He felt much better already. “He finds the road tiring. I was thinking of hiring an escort to help, er, protect, er … you follow me?” Again the men exchanged glances.

  Shandie paled suddenly and made a choking noise.

  “Well, now,” Scarface said, “it so happens my friends and me’s heading up Mosrace way.”

  “How about a crown per day?” Ylo contrived to jingle his satchel.

  Four pairs of eyes gleamed in the shadows.

  “Each?”

  “Yes. It must be done discreetly, you understand. “

  “You just hired yourself a legion, Signifer Yyan!” The centurion pushed away his beer. “Name’s Eemfume. Iggi and me’ll take first watch. Bull, Squint, you go eat and get some sack time. Now, your Majesty, tell us about Nefer Moor.”

  When in doubt, delegate, Ylo thought happily. He would be able to go wenching tonight after all.

  Stormy clouds:

  O doubting heart!

  The stormy clouds on high

  Veil the same sunny sky,

  That soon, for spring is nigh,

  Shall wake the summer into golden mirth.

  — Adelaide Anne Proctor, A Doubting Heart

  INTERLUDE

  At the dying of the year came Winterfest.

  Within the Impire it was a bittersweet celebration, a time for telling tales of the beloved old imperor now gone, and for hopeful prayers for the new one. Without all the traditional merrymaking, a surprising number of people discovered the festival dragging on rather longer than usual; many found themselves becoming unimpishly sick of their relatives before it was over.

  Hub itself seemed strangely subdued without the great balls and banquets. Small gatherings of friends and family took their place. The rotund form of Lord Umpily appeared unannounced and uninvited at an astonishing number of those-gossiping, inquiring, listening, and soon disappearing as mysteriously as he had come.

  In remote Krasnegar the customary revelry was as boisterous as ever. Yet even there the usual sparkle was oddly dimmed by a sense of someone missing. The royal ball was less riotous than usual, with very few serious injuries. Of course
only a small fraction of the population could ever attend court functions, but the humble folk were not neglected. Traditionally, anyone planning an affair of any size notified the palace in advance, and either king or queen would drop in for a few minutes. Rap held the current record of eighteen parties in one day, although Inos’ great-great-grandfather was reputed to have managed twentynine once and almost died in consequence. This year the queen had to manage on her own, despite her elder daughter’s earnest offers of assistance.

  In the little speech she repeated over and over, her majesty made her first public reference to the king’s absence. “My husband and I,” she said, “have always taken great joy in these Winterfest celebrations, and regarded them as an occasion to reaffirm the bonds of loyalty and service which bind us to you, and you to our family. He will be truly regretful that he cannot be here with you this morning/ afternoon/evening. As you know, he has been gone for some time now on a mission of great secrecy, a mission vital to all our well-beings. I am sure that you look forward to his return with almost as much anticipation as do his children and I …” And so on. She did not explain where he was or what he was doing, though.

  To the south, on the far side of the taiga, the impish garrison at Pondague stood to arms all through the festive season, for a goblin attack at that time had become traditional. That year nothing happened. The forests remained quiet-eerily so.

  So began the year 2999, and the peoples of Pandemia hunkered down to endure the long dark in expectation of better days to come. Even the rich, who could afford candles, found winter tedious.

  In Malfin, Sir Acopulo fretted and fumed, hunting in vain for any ship willing to set sail in the continuing stormy weather.

  In the southern provinces of Pithmot, a somewhat roadworn coach meandered on its way, frequently detouring from one country house to another as Thinal befriended local worthies. Whenever his cheating, embezzling, or filching became dangerously occult, Rap would quietly intervene to stop it. As the weeks went by, though, the little scoundrel perfected his technique to the point where he could elicit sizable gains without rippling the ambience hardly at all. He no longer talked of abandoning ship, even when Rap made him replace his loot where he had found it. He was using the journey as a training course.