‘You can take it to him now if you please!’ Cosca pointed with a clawing finger. ‘It’s in…
The fortified wagon that had been Superior Pike’s gift, the wagon in which the fire tubes had been carried, the wagon in which the Dragon People’s vast treasure had been safely stowed…
The wagon was gone. Beside the fort there was only a conspicuously empty patch of darkness.
‘Where is it?’ Cosca shoved Sworbreck out of the way and ran to where the wagon had stood. Clearly visible in the snowy mud among the trampled hoof-prints were two deep wheel-ruts, angling down the slope towards the Imperial Road.
‘Brachio,’ Cosca’s voice rose higher and higher until it was a demented shriek, ‘find some fucking horses and
The Styrian stared. ‘You wanted all the horses corralled together. They’re stampeded!’
‘Some must have broken from the herd! Find half a dozen and get after those bastards! Now! Now! Now!’ And he kicked snow at Brachio in a fury and nearly fell over. ‘Where the hell is Temple?’
Friendly looked up from the wagon-tracks and raised an eyebrow.
Cosca closed his hands to trembling fists. ‘Everyone who can, get ready to
Dimbik exchanged a worried look with Lorsen. ‘On foot? All the way to Crease?’
‘We’ll gather mounts on the way!’
‘What about the injured?’
‘Those who can walk are welcome. Any who cannot mean greater shares for the rest of us. Now get them moving, you damned idiot!’
‘Yes, sir,’ muttered Dimbik, pulling off and sourly flinging away his sash which, already a ruin, had become thoroughly besmirched with dung when he dived for cover.
Friendly nodded towards the fort. ‘And the Northman?’
‘Fuck the Northman,’ hissed Cosca. ‘Soak the building with oil and burn it. They’ve stolen our gold! They’ve stolen my dreams, do you understand?’ He frowned off down the Imperial Road, the wagontracks vanishing into the darkness. ‘I will
Lorsen resisted the temptation to echo Cosca’s sentiments that fate is not always kind. Instead, as the mercenaries scrambled over each other in their preparations to leave, he stood looking down at Conthus’ forgotten body, lying broken beside the fort.
‘What a waste,’ he muttered. In every conceivable sense. But Inquisitor Lorsen had always been a practical man. A man who did not balk at hardship and hard work. He took his disappointment and crushed it down into that little packet along with his doubts, and turned his thoughts to what could be salvaged.
‘There will be a price for this, Cosca,’ he muttered at the captain general’s back. ‘There will be a price.’
Nowhere Fast
Every bolt, bearing, plank and fixing in that monster of a wagon banged, clattered or screeched in an insane cacophony so deafening that Temple could scarcely hear his own squeals of horror. The seat hammered at his arse, bounced him around like a heap of cheap rags, threatening to rattle the teeth right out of his head. Tree-limbs came slicing from the darkness, clawing at the wagon’s sides, slashing at his face. One had snatched Shy’s hat off and now her hair whipped around her staring eyes, fixed on the rushing road, lips peeled back from her teeth as she yelled the most blood-curdling abuse at the horses.
Temple dreaded to imagine the weight of wood, metal and above all gold they were currently hurtling down a mountainside on top of. Any moment now, the whole, surely tested beyond the limits of human engineering, would rip itself apart and the pair of them into the bargain. But dread was a fixture of Temple’s life, and what else could he do now but cling to this bouncing engine of death, muscles burning from fingertips to armpits, stomach churning with drink and terror. He hardly knew whether eyes closed or eyes open was the more horrifying.
‘Hold on!’ Shy screamed at him.
‘What the fuck do you think I’m—’
She dragged back on the brake lever, boots braced against the footboard and her shoulders against the back of the seat, fibres starting from her neck with effort. The tyres shrieked like the dead in hell, sparks showering up on both sides like fireworks at the Emperor’s birthday. Shy hauled on the reins with her other hand and the whole world began to turn, then to tip, two of the great wheels parting company with the flying ground.
Time slowed. Temple screamed. Shy screamed. The wagon screamed. Trees off the side of the bend hurtled madly towards them, death in their midst. Then the wheels jolted down again and Temple was almost flung over the footboard and among the horses’ milling hooves, biting his tongue and choking on his own screech as he was tossed back into the seat.
Shy let the brake off and snapped the reins. ‘Might’ve taken that one a little too fast!’ she shouted in his ear.
The line between terror and exultation was ever a fine one and Temple found, all of a sudden, he had broken through. He punched at the air and howled, ‘Fuck you, Coscaaaaaaaa!’ into the night until his breath ran out and left him gasping.
‘Feel better?’ asked Shy.
‘I’m alive! I’m free! I’m rich!’ Surely there was a God. A benevolent, understanding, kindly grandfather of a God and smiling down indulgently upon him even now. ‘Sooner or later you have to do something, or you’ll never do anything,’ Cosca had said. Temple wondered if this was what the Old Man had in mind. It did not seem likely. He grabbed hold of Shy and half-hugged her and shouted in her ear, ‘We did it!’
‘You sure?’ she grunted, snapping the reins again.
‘Didn’t we do it?’
‘The easy part.’
‘Eh?’
‘They won’t just be letting this go, will they?’ she called over the rushing wind as they picked up pace. ‘Not the money! Not the insult!’
‘They’ll be coming after us,’ he muttered.
‘That was the whole point o’ the exercise!’
Temple cautiously stood to look behind them, wishing he was less drunk. Nothing but snow and dirt spraying up from the clattering back wheels and the trees to either side vanishing into the darkness.
‘They’ve got no horses, though?’ His voice turning into a hopeful little whine at the end.
‘Sweet slowed ’em down, but they’ll still be coming! And this contraption ain’t the fastest!’
Temple took another look back, wishing he was more drunk. The line between exultation and terror was ever a fine one and he was rapidly crossing back over. ‘Maybe we should stop the wagon! Take two of the horses! Leave the money! Most of the money, anyway—’
‘We need to give Lamb and Savian time, remember?’
‘Oh, yes. That.’ The problem with courageous self-sacrifice was the self-sacrifice part. It had just never come naturally to him. The next jolt brought a wash of scalding vomit to the back of Temple’s mouth and he tried to swallow it, choked, spluttered and felt it burning all the way up his nose with a shiver. He looked up at the sky, stars vanished now and shifting from black to iron-grey as the dawn came on.
‘Woah!’ Another bend came blundering from the gloom and Shy dragged the shrieking brakes on again. Temple could hear the cargo sliding and jingling behind them as the wagon bounded around the corner, the earnest desire of all that weight to plunge on straight and send them tumbling down the mountainside in ruin.
As they clattered back onto the straight there was an almighty cracking and Shy reeled in her seat, one leg kicking, yelling out as she started to tumble off the wagon. Temple’s hand snapped closed around her belt and hauled her back, the limb of the bow over her shoulder nearly taking his eye out as she fell against him, reins flapping.
She held something up. The brake lever. And decidedly no longer attached. ‘That’s the end of that, then!’
