Startled, Kather nodded. “Yes, my lord,” he muttered, as he started off.
“You, Terrin,” Sterren said to the next. “Go find the Lord Treasurer and tell him that I need a pound of gold and a dozen of the finest gems in the treasury, no later than dinnertime tonight, by the king’s express order. Arrange a time and place for me to pick them up. If he needs to check with the king first, I have no objection, so long as he’s quick about it. If he doubts your authority, bring him back here to speak to me.”
Terrin, having learned from Kather’s experience, essayed a quick bow, said, “As you wish, my lord,” and departed.
Sterren looked over the remaining four. He knew them all slightly, but only slightly, and did not think much of any of them.
“Gror,” he said, choosing the best of the lot, “I need a party for a voyage to Ethshar, a peaceful expedition, recruiting aid for the coming war. Who would you suggest?”
“Uh...” Gror blinked. “My lord, I... I don’t know.”
“You could call for volunteers,” another soldier, Azdaram by name, suggested.
“I could,” Sterren agreed.
He considered the idea.
He almost immediately saw an obvious drawback and prepared to discard the whole notion.
Then he caught himself.
The problem with calling for volunteers was that he might well wind up with men only interested in a diversion from the tedious life of a Semman soldier. It was entirely possible that some of them would desert at the first opportunity...
He stopped his chain of thought at that point and backed up.
They might desert. The guard intended to keep him from deserting might themselves desert.
That might not be good for Semma, but it would, on the other hand, be a gift from the gods for him, personally. If his escort were to vanish he could easily lose himself in the streets of the city and leave Semma to fend for itself.
It probably wouldn’t do much worse without him than with him, really. He was hardly a great warlord, after all.
He tried to think what would happen if the guards did desert, and he, too, slipped away.
What would Lady Kalira do? What would the others, back here in Semma do, the king, the queen, the princesses, his officers and men, even Agor the theurgist?
Well, the officers and men would presumably go out, fight, and lose. Some would die, the rest surrender. Semma would probably be divided up between Ophkar and Ksinallion, and the royal family sent off into exile somewhere. Agor would almost certainly find employment elsewhere, without much difficulty.
That wasn’t so awful, was it? It seemed that a few soldiers were going to die anyway, no matter what happened, so he refused to worry about that. As for exiling the royal family, it was hard to imagine King Phenvel in exile, but on the other hand, it was hard to imagine him doing much of anything. He seemed born to be an incompetent monarch; the only way he could survive the way he was seemed to be if other people had no choice about putting up with him.
Princess Shirrin would find exile terribly romantic and exciting, Sterren was sure. Princess Lura would think it was fun. Princess Nissitha would be mortified. Queen Ashassa would take it calmly in stride.
The young princes he didn’t know well enough to say, but he suspected they would rather enjoy a change of scene.
As for divvying up Semma, would anyone but the deposed aristocrats care? In his sixnights in Semma he had never seen any sign that the peasants cared a whit which king they paid taxes to.
There might be practical problems in slipping away, though. Lady Kalira would be in Ethshar when he deserted and she would probably try to track him down. She might even succeed, eventually, though surely not before the war was lost. What if she found him?
Well, it was obvious that the aristocracy of Semma would not be at all happy with Sterren, Ninth Warlord. He would, beyond question, be guilty of treason under their laws. In all probability, any Semman noble who ever found him would try to kill him on sight.
That was not really a very appealing long-term prospect, but then, he didn’t have to stay in Ethshar of the Spices. He could move on to Ethshar of the Sands or Ethshar of the Rocks, or even head north to the Baronies of Sardiron. The nobility of Semma would not be likely to find him; the World was a big place.
The Small Kingdoms would be too dangerous, though; the Semman aristocracy, all two or three hundred of them, were likely to scatter through the region, sponging off various relatives and allies.
He’d want to take a new name, of course.
It occurred to him that the Semmans knew his true name. That was awkward. That meant that they would always be able to find him if they could afford a good wizard, or even a very good witch. Warlocks didn’t use true names; neither did sorcerers, so far as he knew.
Theurgists sometimes did, and the Semmans were familiar with theurgy. That was how they had found him in the first place.
And worse, couldn’t demonologists use true names?
If the Semmans were determined to track him down and kill him, and had the sense to hire magicians, they could do it.
Desertion looked considerably less appealing than it had a moment before.
On the other hand, Semmans weren’t accustomed to magic, and if Sterren could keep the gold and gems with him when he slipped away, perhaps he could buy himself some decent magical protections.
Could a true name be changed?
He didn’t really think it could, but he didn’t know.
He realized he was standing there looking stupid in front of his four men, so he cut off his thoughts abruptly.
“All right, then, I’m calling for volunteers, do any of you four want to sail to Ethshar?”
The four looked at each other and then one by one, answered.
“No.”
“No, my lord.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Not really. Not sail. I don’t trust boats.”
Sterren was not surprised.
“All right, then, I want all four of you to separate and go find my other soldiers, all of them, and ask for volunteers. Then meet me back here, with the volunteers. And if you don’t find enough volunteers, I’ll take you four, instead. Understood?”
“Yes, my lord,” they chorused raggedly. One by one, they straggled away on this unwanted errand. One of them, Arra Varrins’s son, thought to bow as they headed for the stairs.
Sterren watched them go and pretended, not to hear the grumbling that began as soon as they were out the door.
When they were out of sight, he sank down onto a convenient bed and began thinking, planning, and weighing possibilities.
Could he really slip away in the streets of Ethshar?
Did he want to?
Which death was more certain, commanding a grossly outnumbered army, or being an escaped traitor?
That was a very hard question to answer and it was one he had to consider carefully. He had no interest in dying.
He had plenty of time to consider the question, of course. He would have the entire journey to Akalla, then the voyage across the Gulf of the East, to decide what to do and make his plans.
Of course, he knew he might never have a chance to slip away, his soldiers might not desert, he might be closely watched at all times. Still, he also knew he would be thinking about an escape all the way to Ethshar.
