charge? Extra for use of a bowl?'
The girls did not know to be intimidated. Even the watching Qin soldiers did not frighten them, being, evidently, so common a sight in these days they were considered as unexceptional as passing sheep. 'This is radish, verea, very crisp from my aunt's garden. Oil pressed from olives, verea, very healthy. For you, a special price because we've never seen a woman of your years come out of the south. We would never haggle with an auntie.'
They then named an outrageous sum that made Kesh choke and even Eliar change color, a flush rising in his cheeks. The girls saw him, and they giggled and goggled at the young good-looking Silver in their midst, just as the newly arrived Qin soldiers stared at the girls, although without the lighthearted laughter.
The old woman speared Keshad with her gaze. 'You will obtain a sample of local food so my people may taste what they can expect to eat. It smells awful.'
She swept away with her attendants.
'The hells!' exclaimed the older slip-fry girl. 'That was rude!'
Kesh distributed vey to the first dozen soldiers. 'You pay this much and then return the bowl and leave,' he said to them. 'Make a line. That's how we do things here.'
Mollified by paying customers, the girls got to work.
'This will be interesting,' said Eliar in Kesh's ear.
'Did you ever believe otherwise? Now help me do as she asked. I don't know about you, but I don't want to have to stand before Captain Anji after she's filled his ear with complaints of our service.'
'It must be twenty years since he's seen her. Didn't she send him away?'
'Yes, at the age of twelve, so he wouldn't be murdered in the imperial women's quarters you are so fond of. What's that to you?'
'That the Sirniakans are barbarians isn't my fault! I'm just remarking that it's not as if she raised him after that time. It's the age a boy leaves his mother's care and moves among men into a man's life. Why should he listen to her after all these years beyond the kindly respect any son must show a mother?'
You're an idiot. But Kesh held his tongue, thinking of Miravia. Maybe she had months ago been married off to the old goat, but perhaps there was time, since the roads north still weren't safe. Old goats died, and left the young goats behind. There was no telling what had happened while he was gone. He had to be patient.
'Heya! Heya!' The local guardsmen waved to get his attention.
A party of mounted men were riding up from the track that led west around the Olo'o Sea. The incoming troops were about one third Qin, the rest young local men who dressed and acted as if they wished they were Qin. Kesh was surprised to see Chief Deze at their head.
'Chief?' He hurried to meet them as the wiry soldier dismounted. 'How are you come here so quickly? We left you at the border.'
'The reeves gave me a lift. I'm traveling with you to Astafero.'
'Is that where Captain Anji is?'
Chief Deze had a likable smile, and it slammed like a closed door on a question he had no intention of answering. 'We'll re-supply here and leave at dawn. I'll take charge now.'
Never in his life had Keshad been happier to give up control.
24
'Commander. Incoming with passengers.'
Joss stepped away from the stewards — one from Clan Hall and one from Copper Hall — who had almost come to blows over what should have been a cursed simple inventory of the harness rooms at Horn Hall.
'Kesta.' He beckoned her into the dimly lit chamber, which like the marshal's cote got its best light before noon. 'I'll let you help Tesya and Likard sort this out.'
'Sort what out?' she asked suspiciously, examining their disgruntled faces.
'I didn't-' objected Tesya.
'She said-!' barked Likard.
'You have my full trust,' said Joss as he hurried out. Kesta hissed a few choice words in the direction of his back. As he slipped out under the arched entrance hewn into the stone, he
waggled a hand in an insulting gesture, but she had already turned away to scold the hapless stewards.
'Here we are, in the abandoned shell of a reeve hall whose eagles and reeves were massacred, and all you two can do is argue over tack?-
'If they were massacred,' objected Tesya. 'The commander heard the news from some gods-rotted ghost-'
'Neh,' objected Likard, 'that lad Badinen saw it all!'
Tesya snorted. 'You can understand that fish boy? Anyway, my people need that tack. We lost everything-'
As Joss fled down the corridor, Kesta's voice rang. 'Sit down and shut up!'
He would soothe ruffled feathers later. As a tactic it worked well to allow his most trusted reeves and fawkners to crack down on the ones who complained and bickered, while he could glide in later to coax the difficult temperaments back into good humor, but he was pretty sure it wasn't good strategy over the long haul.
Hirelings swept the eating hall, which was lit through shafts. He crossed the vast entry hall, flooded with brightness from a big hole gaping above. Hirelings hauled sacks of rice over their shoulders toward the kitchens. Three off-duty Clan Hall reeves were laughing with two Copper Hall reeves over a jest. Young Badinen watched their interaction with the expression of a neglected puppy hoping for attention. He'd been a pet of the Horn Hall reeves, Joss had worked out, but to the Clan and Copper Hall reeves he was just a novice no one had time to train. Something would have to be done about that.
Joss emerged through a high cave mouth onto an oval ledge as long and wide as Clan Hall's parade ground. All along the cliff wall were dotted perches and shallow eyries. He crossed the ledge to the rock wall that rimmed it. Squinting into the setting sun, he watched four eagles descend. Two landed on the parade ground at the top of the ridge, out of sight, while the other two thumped down not so far from him. Their passengers and reeves unhooked, and Captain Anji and Tohon joined him at the wall..
'I've come, as you requested,' said Anji, gesturing toward the magnificent peak of holy Mount Aua some fifteen mey distant. 'That's an impressive view.'
Tohon peered over the wall, a significant drop of at least a hundred baton lengths to a slope slippery with scree that marked the base of the cliff. 'Hu! That's a long way down!'
'There's no way up here except on the wing,' said Joss. 'This ridge is the final outthrust of the Ossu Hills. It's all ravines and folds behind us. And we've got a permanent water source. And gardens atop the ridge.'
'Easy to defend,' remarked Anji, 'and yet, according to the report your people brought me, these reeves are all dead.'
'It seems they were specifically lured to an isolated peninsula in the far north called the Eagle's Claws. There, their eagles were poisoned, and the reeves died.'
'Your source of information?'
'The surviving reeve's account strikes me as having the color of truth. He seems too unsophisticated to come up with such an elaborate tale and stick to it, and you can be sure I've run him over that ground many times. But this news didn't come from his lips alone. I heard it first from a Guardian.'
'From a Guardian!' The captain crossed his arms over his chest.
'She brought news of region we call Herelia. There's a town called Wedrewe recently built to house an administrative center, where new cohorts are being trained. There, the masters of the army condemn prisoners and make an accounting of what they've won. It's walled, but not heavily fortified beyond the presence of so many troops.'
'It's a place that might be attacked. Go on.'
'Lord Radas may have as many as fifteen cohorts. And more recruits are being gathered, or forced into the ranks.' Joss swiped a hand over his hair, recently shorn, its bristles like a warning prickle against his palm. He blew
