Cook, Glen - Soldier of an Empire Unacquainted with Defeat
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SOLDIER OF AN
EMPIRE
UNACQUAINTED WITH DEFEAT
by Glen Cook
The empire of the title is Shinsan-The Dread Empire. The soldier is
Tain, disillusioned with his past life and seeking peace and a new
identity. But the difficulties of leaving one's past behind are
insurmountable and Tain must finally accept what he is-a soldier of
an empire unacquainted with defeat. For those of you who have read
and enjoyed Cook's wonderful Dread Empire books, and for those of you
who haven't yet, here is another piece of that world.
I
His name was Tain and he was a man to beware. The lacquered armor of
the Dread Empire rode in the packs on his mule.
The pass was narrow, treacherous, and, therefore, little used. The
crumbled slate lay loose and deep, clacking underfoot with the ivory-
on-ivory sound of punji counters in the senyo game. More threatened
momentary avalanche off the precarious slopes. A cautious man. Tain
walked. He led the roan gelding. His mule's tether he had knotted to
the roan's saddle.
An end to the shale walk came. Tain breathed deeply, relieved. His
muscles ached with the strain of maintaining his footing.
A flint-tipped arrow shaved the gray over his right ear.
The black longsword leapt into his right hand, the equally dark
shortsword into his left. He vanished among the rocks before the
bowstring's echoes died.
Silence.
Not a bird chirped. Not one chipmunk scurried across the slope,
pursuing the arcane business of that gentle breed. High above, one
lone eagle floated majestically against an intense blue backdrop of
cloudless sky. Its shadow skittered down the ragged mountainside like
some frenetic daytime ghost. The only scent on the breeze was that of
old and brittle stone.
A man's scream butchered the stillness.
Tain wiped his shortsword on his victim's greasy furs. The dark
blade's polish appeared oily. It glinted sullen indigoes and purples
when the sun hit right.
Similar blades had taught half a world the meaning of fear.
A voice called a name. Another responded with an apparent "Shut up!"
Tain couldn't be sure. The languages of the mountain tribes were
mysteries to him.
He remained kneeling, allowing trained senses to roam. A fly landed
on the dead man's face. It made nervous patrols in ever-smaller
circles till it started exploring the corpse's mouth.
Tain moved.
The next one died without a sound. The third celebrated his passing
by plunging downhill in a clatter of pebbles.
Tain knelt again, waiting. There were two more. One wore an aura of
Power. A shaman. He might prove difficult.
Another shadow fluttered across the mountainside. Tain smiled thinly.
Death's daughters were clinging to her skirts today.
The vulture circled warily, not dropping lower till a dozen sisters
had joined its grim pavane.
Tain took a jar from his travel pouch, spooned part of its contents
with two fingers. A cinnamon-like smell sweetened the air briefly, to
be pursued by an odor as foul as death. He rubbed his hands till they
were thoroughly greased. Then he exchanged the jar for a small silver
box containing what appeared to be dried peas. He rolled one pea
round his palm, stared at it intently. Then he boxed his hands,
concentrated on the shaman, and sighed.
The vultures dropped lower. A dog crept onto the trail below, slunk
to the corpse there. It sniffed, barked tentatively, then whined. It
was a mangy auburn bitch with teats stretched by the suckling of
pups.
Tain breathed gently between his thumbs. A pale cerulean light leaked
between his fingers. Its blue quickly grew as intense as that of the
topless sky. The glow penetrated his flesh, limning his finger bones.
Tain gasped, opened his hands. A blinding blue ball drifted away.
He wiped his palms on straggles of mountain grass, followed up with a
dirt wash. He would need firm grips on his swords.
His gaze never left the bobbing blue ball, nor did his thoughts
abandon the shaman.
The ball drifted into a stand of odd, conical rocks. They had a
crude, monumental look.
A man started screaming. Tain took up his blades.
The screams were those of a beast in torment. They went on and on and
on.
Tain stepped up onto a boulder, looked down. The shaman writhed below
him. The blue ball finished consuming his right forearm. It started
on the flesh above his elbow. A scabby, wild-haired youth beat the
flame with a tattered blanket.
Tain's shadow fell across the shaman. The boy looked up into brown
eyes that had never learned pity. Terror drained his face.
A black viper's tongue flicked once, surely.
Tain hesitated before he finished the shaman. The wild wizard
wouldn't have shown him the same mercy.
He broke each of the shaman's fetishes. A skull on a lance he saved
and planted like a grave marker. The witch-doctor's people couldn't
misapprehend that message.
Time had silvered Tain's temples, but he remained a man to beware.
Once he had been an Aspirant. For a decade he had been dedicated to
the study of the Power. The Tervola, the sorcerer-lords of his
homeland, to whose peerage he had aspired, had proclaimed him a
Candidate at three. But he had never shown the cold will necessary,
nor had he developed the inalterable discipline needed, to attain
Select status. He had recognized, faced, and accepted his
shortcomings. Unlike so many others, he had learned to live with the
knowledge that he couldn't become one of his motherland's masters.
He had become one of her soldiers instead, and his Aspirant training
had served him well.
Thirty years with the legions. And all he had brought away was a
superbly trained gelding, a cranky mule, knowledge, and his arms and
armor. And his memories. The golden markings on the breastplate in
his mule packs declared him a leading centurion of the Demon Guard,
and proclaimed the many honors he had won.
But a wild western sorcerer had murdered the Demon Prince. The Guard
had no body to protect. Tain had no one to command.... And now the
Tervola warred among themselves, with the throne of the Dread Empire
as prize.
Never before had legion fought legion.
Tain had departed. He was weary of the soldier's life. He had seen
too many wars, too many battles, too many pairs of lifeless eyes
staring up with "Why?" reflected in their dead pupils. He had done
too many evils without questioning, without receiving justification.
His limit had come when Shinsan had turned upon herself like a rabid
bitch able to find no other victim.
He couldn't be party to the motherland's self-immolation. He couldn't
bear consecrated blades against men with whom he had shared honorable
fields.
He had deserted rather than do so.
There were many honors upon his breastplate. In thirty years he had
done many dread and dire deeds.
The soldiers of Shinsan were unacquainted with defeat. They were the
world's best, invincible, pitiless, and continuously employed. They
were feared far beyond the lands where their boots had trod and their
drums had beaten their battle signals.
Tain hoped to begin his new life in a land unfamiliar with that fear.
He continued into the mountains.
One by one. Death's daughters descended to the feast.
II
One ivory candle illuminated a featureless cell. A man in black faced
it. He sat in the lotus position on a barren granite floor. Behind a
panther mask of hammered gold his eyes remained closed.
He wasn't sleeping. He was listening with a hearing familiar only to
masters of the Power.
He had been doing this for months, alternating with a fellow
Aspirant. He had begun to grow bored.
He was Tervola Candidate Kai Ling. He was pursuing an assignment
which could hasten his elevation to Select. He had been fighting for
the promotion for decades, never swerving in his determination to
seize what seemed forever beyond his grasp.
His body jerked, then settled into a tense lean. Little temblors
stirred his extremities.
"West," he murmured. "Far, far to the west." The part of him that
listened extended itself, analyzed, fixed a location.
An hour passed.
Finally, Kai Ling rose. He donned a black cape which hung beside the
nearly invisible door. He smiled thinly behind his mask. Poor Chong.
Chong wouldn't know which of them had won till he arrived for his
turn on watch.
III
Tain rested, observing.
It seemed a calm and peaceful hamlet in a calm and peaceful land. A
dozen rude houses crowded an earthen track which meandered on across
green swales toward a distant watchtower. The squat stronghold could
be discerned only from the highest hilltops Solitary shepherds'
steads lay sprinkled across the countryside, their numbers
proclaiming the base for the regional economy.
The mountains Tain had crossed sheltered the land from the east. The
ivory teeth of another range glimmered above the haze to the north.
Tain grazed his animals and wondered if this might be the land he
sought.
He sat on a hillside studying it. He was in no hurry to penetrate it.
Masterless now, with no fixed destination, he felt no need to rush.
Too, he was reluctant. Human contact meant finalization of the
decision he had reached months ago, in Shinsan.
Intellectually he knew that it was too late, but his heart kept
saying that he could still change his mind. It would take the
imminent encounter to sever his heartlines home.
It was ...scary. . . this being on his own.
As a soldier he had often operated alone. But then he had been
ordered to go, to do, and always he had had his legion or the Guard
waiting. His legion had been home and family. Though the centurion
was the keystone of the army, his father-Tervola chose his
companions, and made most of his decisions and did most of his
thinking for him.
Tain had wrestled with himself for a year before abandoning the Demon
Guard.
A tiny smile tugged his lips. All those thousands who wept on hearing
the distant mutter of drums-what would they think, learning that
soldiers of the Dread Empire suffered fears and uncertainties too?
"You may as well come out." he called gently. A boy was watching him
from the brushy brookside down to his right. "I'm not going anywhere
for hours."
Tain hoped he had chosen the right language. He wasn't sure where he
had exited the Dragon's Teeth. The peaks to the north, he reasoned,
should be the Kratchnodians. That meant he should be in the part of
Shara butting against East Heatherland. The nomadic Sharans didn't
build homes and herd sheep, so these people should be immigrants from
the west. They should speak Iwa Skolovdan.
It was one of four western tongues he had mastered when the Demon
Prince had looked westward, anticipating Shinsan's expansion thither.
"I haven't eaten a shepherd in years." An unattended flock had
betrayed the boy.
The lad left cover fearfully, warily, but with a show of bravado. He
carried a ready sling in his right hand. He had well-kempt blond
hair, pageboy trimmed, and huge blue eyes. He looked about eight.
Tain cautioned himself: the child was no legion entry embarking upon
the years of education, training, and discipline which gradually
molded a soldier of Shinsan. He was a westerner, a genuine child, as
free as a wild dog and probably as unpredictable.
"Hello, shepherd. My name is Tain. What town would that be?"
"Hello." The boy moved several steps closer. He eyed the gelding
uncertainly.
"Watch the mule. She's the mean one."
"You talk funny. Where did you come from? Your skin is funny, too."
Tain grinned. He saw things in reverse. But this was a land of round-
eyes. He would be the stranger, the guest. He would have to remember,
or suffer a cruel passage.
Arrogant basic assumptions were drilled into the soldiers of Shinsan.
Remaining humble under stress might be difficult.
"I came from the east."
"Over the mountains?" Disbelief flavored the boy's tone.
"Yes."
"But the hill people....They rob and kill everybody. Papa said." He
edged closer, fascinated by Tain's swords.
"Sometimes their luck isn't good. Don't you have a name?"
"Steban." The boy relented reluctantly. "Steban Kleckla. Are those
swords? Real swords?"
"Longsword and shortsword. I used to be a soldier." He winced. It
hurt to let go of his past.
"My Uncle Mikla has a sword. He was a soldier. He went all the way to
Hellin Daimiel. That was in the El Murid Wars. He was a hero."
"Really? I'll have to meet your uncle." "Were you a hero when you
were a soldier? Did you see any wars?"
"A few. They weren't much fun, Steban." How could he explain to a boy
from this remote land, when all his knowledge was second-hand,
through an uncle whose tales had grown with the years?
"But you get to go places and see things." "Places you don't want to
go, to see things you don't want to see."
The boy backed a step away. "I'm going to be a soldier," he declared.
His lower lip protruded in a stubborn pout.
Wrong tack. Tain thought. Too intense. Too bitter.. "Where's your
dog? I thought shepherds always had dogs." "She died."
"I see. I'm sorry. Can you tell me the name of the village? I don't
know where I am." "Wtoctalisz."
"Wtoctalisz." Tain's tongue stumbled over the unfamiliar syllables.
He grinned. Steban grinned back. He edged closer, eying Tain's
swords. "Can I see?"
"I'm sorry. No. It's an oath. I can't draw them unless I mean to
kill." Would the boy understand if he tried to explain consecrated
blades? "Oh."
"Are there fish in the creek?" "What? Sure. Trout."
Tain rose. "Let's see if we can catch lunch." Steban's eyes grew
larger. "Gosh! You're as big as Grimnir." Tain chuckled. He had been
the runt of the Demon Guard. "Who's Grimnir?"
The boy's face darkened. "A man. From the Tower. What about your
horse?" "He'll stay."
The roan would do what was expected of him amidst sorcerer's
conflicts that made spring storms seem as inconsequential as a
child's temper tantrum. And the mule wouldn't stray from the gelding.
Steban was speechless after Tain took the three-pounder with a casual
hand-flick, bear fashion. The old soldier was fast.
"You make a fire. I'll clean him." Tain glowed at Steban's response.
It took mighty deeds to win notice in the Dread Empire. He fought a
temptation to show off.
In that there were perils. He might build a falsely founded, over-
optimistic self-appraisal. And a potential enemy might get the
measure of his abilities.
So he cooked trout, seasoning it with a pinch of spice from the trade
goods in his mule packs.
"Gosh, this's good." As Steban relaxed he became ever more the
chatterbox. He had asked a hundred questions already and seldom had
he given Tain a chance to answer. "Better than Ma or Shirl ever
made."
Tain glowed again. His field cooking was a point of pride. "Who's
Shirl?"
"She was my sister." "Was?"
"She's gone now." There was a hard finality to Steban's response. It
implied death, not absence.
IV
Steban herded the sheep homeward. Tain followed, stepping carefully.
The roan paced him, occasionally cropping grass, keeping an eye on
the mule. For the first time Tain felt at ease with his decision to
leave home.
It was unlikely that this country would become his new home, but he
liked its people already, as he saw them reflected in Steban Kleckla.
He and the boy were friends already.
Steban jerked to a stop. His staff fell as he flung a hand to his
mouth. The color drained from his face.
That Aspirant's sense-feel for danger tingled Tain's scalp. In thirty
years it had never been wrong. With the care of a man avoiding a
cobra, he turned to follow Steban's gaze.
A horse and rider stood silhouetted atop a nearby hill, looking like
a black paper cutout. Tain could discern little in the dying light.
The rider seemed to have horns.
Tain hissed. The roan trotted to his side. He leaned against his
saddle, where his weapons hung.
The rider moved out, descending the hill's far side. Steban started
the sheep moving at a faster pace. He remained silent till the
Kleckla stead came into view.
"Who was that?" Tain hazarded a second time, when he reckoned the
proximity of lights and parents would rejuvenate the boy's nerve.
"Who?"
"That rider. On the hill. You seemed frightened." "Ain't scared of
nothing. I killed a wolf last week." He was evading. This was a tale
twice told already, and growing fast. First time Steban had bragged
about having driven the predator away. Then he had claimed to have
broken the beast's shoulder with a stone from his sling.
"I misunderstood. I'm sorry. Still, there was a rider. And you seemed
to know him."
The lights of Steban's home drew nearer. Boy and sheep increased
their pace again. They were late. Steban had been too busy wheedling
stories from his new friend to watch the time closely.
"Steban? That you, boy?" A lantern bobbed toward them. The man
carrying it obviously was Steban's father. Same eyes. Same hair. But
worry had etched his forehead with deep lines. In his left hand he
bore a wicked oaken quarterstaff.
An equally concerned woman walked beside him. Once. Tain suspected,
she had been beautiful. In a round-eye sort of way. Doubtlessly, life
here quickly made crones of girls. "Ma. Papa. This's my new friend.
His name is Tain. He used to be a soldier. Like Uncle Mikla. He came
across the mountains. He caught a fish with his hands and his horse
can do tricks, but his mule will bite you if you get too close to
her. I told him he should come for supper."
Tain inclined his head. "Freeman Kleckla. Freelady. The grace of
heaven descend." He didn't know an appropriately formal Iwa Skolovdan
greeting. His effort sounded decidedly odd in translation.
Man and wife considered him without warmth.
"A Caydarman watched us," Steban added. He started coaxing the sheep
into pens.
The elder Kleckla scanned the surrounding darkness. "An evil day when
we catch their eye. Welcome, then. Stranger. We can't offer much but
refuge from the night."
"Thank you. Freeman. I'll pay, that your resources be not depleted
without chance of replacement." There was a stiffness about Kleckla
which made Tain feel the need to distance with formality.
"This is the Zemstvi, Stranger. Titles, even Freeman and Free-lady,
are meaningless here. They belong to tamed and ordered lands, to Iwa
Skolovda and the Home Counties. Call me Toma. My wife is Rula. Come.
I'll show you where to bed your animals."
"As you will.. .Toma." He bowed slightly to the woman. "Rula." She
frowned slightly, as if unsure how to respond.
This would be harder than he had anticipated. At home everyone had
positions and titles and there were complicated, almost ritualized
protocols and honorifics to be exchanged on every occasion of
personal contact. "They'll need no fodder. They grazed all
afternoon."
One bony milk cow occupied Kleckla's rude barn. She wasn't pleased by
Tain's mule. The mule didn't deign to acknowledge her existence.
Toma had no other stock, save his sheep. But he wasn't poor.
Possessing cow and flock, he was richer than most men. Richer, in
some ways, than Tain, whose fortune was in metal of changeable value
and a few pounds of rare spice. Which would bring more in the
marketplace of the heart?
"You'll have to sleep out here," Toma informed him. "There's no room.
. . ."
Tain recognized the fear-lie. "I understand." He had been puzzling
the word zemstvi, which seemed to share roots with frontier and
wilderness. Now he thought he understood.
"Are you a new Caydarman?" Toma blurted. He became contrite
immediately. "Forget that. Tell me about the man you saw."
Because Toma was so intent, Tain cut off all exterior distractions
and carefully reconstructed the moment in the manner he had been
taught. A good scout remembered every detail. "Big man. On a big
horse, painted, shaggy. Man bearded. With horns."
"Damned Torfin." Toma subliminated anger by scattering hay.
"He didn't have horns. That was his helmet." There was a lot to
learn. Tain thought. This was an odd land not like the quiet,
mercantile Iwa Skolovda he had studied at home.
He considered the little barn. Its builders had possessed no great
skill. He doubted that it was two years old, yet it was coming apart.
"Might as well go eat. Isn't much. Boiled mutton with cabbage and
leeks."
"Ah. Mutton. I was hoping." Responding to Toma's surprise. "Mutton is
rare at home. Only the rich eat it. We common soldiers made do with
grain and pork. Mostly with grain."
"Home? Where would that be?"
"East. Beyond the Dragon's Teeth."
Toma considered the evasion. "We'd better get inside. Rula gets
impatient."
"Go ahead. I have a couple of things to do. Don't wait on me. I'll
make do with scraps or leftovers."
Toma eyed him, started to speak, changed his mind. "As you will."
Once Toma departed. Tain pursued the Soldier's Evening Ritual,
clearing his heart of the day's burdens. He observed the abbreviated
Battlefield Ritual rather than the hour of meditation and exercise he
pursued under peaceful circumstances. Later he would do it right.
He started for the house.
His neck prickled. He stopped, turned slowly, reached out with an
Aspirant's senses.
A man wearing a horned helmet was watching the stead from the grove
surrounding the Kleckla's spring. He didn't see Tain.
Tain considered, shrugged. It wasn't his problem. He would tell Toma
when they were alone. Let the Freeman decide what ought to be done.
V
The sun was a diameter above the horizon.
Tain released the mule and roan to pasture. He glanced round at the
verdant hills. "Beautiful country." he murmured, and wondered what
the rest of his journey would bring. He ambled a ways toward the
house. Rula was starting breakfast.
These people rose late and started slowly. Already he had performed
his Morning Ritual, seen to his travel gear and personal ablutions,
and had examined the tracks round the spring. Then he had joined Toma
when his host had come to check the sheep.
Toma had first shown relief, then increased concern. He remained
steadfastly close-mouthed.
Tain restrained his curiosity. Soldiers learned not to ask questions.
"Good morning, Steban."
The boy stood in the door of the sod house, rubbing sleep from his
eyes. "Morning. Tain. Ma's cooking oats."
"Oh?"
"A treat," Toma explained. "We get a little honeycomb with it."
"Ah. You keep bees?" He hadn't seen any hives. "I had a friend who
kept bees. ..." He dropped it, prefering not to remember. Kai Ling
had been like a brother. They had been Aspirants together. But Ling
hadn't been able to believe he hadn't the talent to become Tervola.
He was still trying to climb an unscalable height.
"Wild honey," Toma said. "The hill people gather it and trade it to
us for workable iron."
"I see." Tain regarded the Kleckla home for the second time that
morning. He wasn't impressed. It was a sod structure with an interior
just four paces by six. Its construction matched the barn's. Tain had
gotten better workmanship out of legion probationaries during their
first field exercises.
A second, permanent home was under construction nearby. A more
ambitious project, every timber proclaimed it a dream house. Last
night, after supper, Toma had grown starry-eyed and loquacious while
discussing it. It was symbolic of the Grail he had pursued into the
Zemstvi.
Its construction was as unskilled as that of the barn.
Rula's eyes had tightened with silent pain while her husband
penetrated ever more deeply the shifting paths of his dreams.
Toma had been an accountant for the Perchev syndicate in Iwa
Skolovda, a tormented, dreamless man using numbers to describe the
movements of furs, wool, wheat, and metal billets. His days had been
long and tedious. During summer, when the barges and caravans moved,
he had been permitted no holidays.
That had been before he had been stricken by the cunning infection,
the wild hope, the pale dream of the Zemstvi, here expressed rudely,
yet in a way that said that a man had tried.
Rula's face said the old life had been emotional hell, but their
apartment had remained warm and the roof hadn't leaked. Life had been
predictable and secure.
There were philosophies at war in the Kleckla home, though hers lay
mute before the other's traditional right. Accusing in silence.
Toma was Rula's husband. She had had to come to the Zemstvi as the
bondservant of his dreams. Or nightmares.
The magic of numbers had shattered the locks on the doors of Toma's
soul. It had let the dream light come creeping in. Freedom, the
intellectual chimera pursued by most of his neighbors, meant nothing
to Kleckla. His neighbors had chosen the hazards of colonizing Shara
because of the certainties of Crown protection.
Toma, though, burned with the absolute conviction of a balanced
equation. Numbers proved it impossible for a sheep-herding, wool-
producing community not to prosper in these benign rolling hills.
What Tain saw, and what Toma couldn't recognize, was that numbers
wore no faces. Or were too simplistic. They couldn't account the
human factors.
The failure had begun with Toma. He had ignored his own ignorance of
the skills needed to survive on a frontier. Shara was no-man's-land.
Iwa Skolovda had claimed it for centuries, but never had imposed its
suzerainty.
Shara abounded with perils unknown to a city-born clerk.
The Tomas. sadly, often ended up as sacrifices to the Zemstvi.
The egg of disaster shared the nest of his dream, and who could say
which had been insinuated by the cowbird of Fate?
There were no numbers by which to calculate ignorance, raiders,
wolves, or heart-changes aborting vows politicians had sworn in
perpetuity. The ciphers for disease and foul weather hadn't yet been
enumerated.
Toma's ignorance of essential craft blazed out all over his
homestead. And the handful of immigrants who had teamed their dreams
with his and had helped, had had no more knowledge or skill. They,
too, had been hungry scriveners and number-mongers, swayed by a wild-
eyed false prophet innocent of the realities of opening a new land.
All but black sheep Mikla, who had come east to keep Toma from being
devoured by his own fuzzy-headedness.
Rula-thinking had prevailed amongst most of Toma's disciples. They
had admitted defeat and ventured west again, along paths littered
with the parched bones of fleeting hope Toma was stubborn. Toma
persisted. Toma's bones would lie beside those of his dreams.
All this Tain knew when he said. "If you won't let me pay, then at
least let me help with the new house." Toma regarded him with eyes of
iron. "I learned construction in the army." Toma's eyes tightened. He
was a proud man. Tain had dealt with stiff-necked superiors fur ages
He pursued his offer without showing a hint of criticism. And soon
Toma relaxed, responded. "Take a look after breakfast." he suggested.
"See what you think. I've been having trouble since Mikla left." "I'd
wondered about that," Tain admitted. "Steban gave the impression your
brother was living here. I didn't want to pry."
"He walked out." Toma stamped toward the house angrily. He calmed
himself before they entered. "My fault. I guess. It was a petty
argument. The sheep business hasn't been as good as we expected. He
wanted to pick up a little extra trading knives and arrowheads to the
tribes. They pay in furs. But the Baron banned that when he came
here."
Tain didn't respond. Toma shrugged irritably, started back outside.
He stopped suddenly, turned. "He's Rula's brother." Softly, "And that
wasn't true. I made him leave. Because I caught him with some
arrowheads. I was afraid." He turned again. "Toma. Wait." Tain spoke
softly. "I won't mention it." Relief flashed across Kleckla's face.
"And you should know. The man with the horns. The ... Caydarman? He
spent part of the night watching the house from the grove."
Toma didn't respond. He seemed distraught. He remained silent
throughout breakfast. The visual cues indicated a state of extreme
anxiety. He regained his good humor only after he and Tain had worked
on the new house for hours, and then his chatte was inconsequential.
He wouldn't open up.
Tain asked no questions.
Neither Toma nor Rula mentioned his departure. Toma soured with each
building suggestion, then brightened once it had been implemented.
Day's end found less of the structure standing, yet the improvement
in what remained had Toma bubbling.
VI
Tain accidentally jostled Rula at the hearth. "Excuse me." Then. "Can
I help? Cooking is my hobby."
The woman regarded him oddly. She saw a big man, muscled and corded,
who moved like a tiger, who gave an impression of massive strength
kept under constant constraint. His skin was tracked by a hundred
scars. There wasn't an ounce of softness in or on him. Yet his
fingers were deft, his touch delicate as he took her knife and pan.
"You don't mind?"
"Mind? You're joking. Two years I haven't had a minute's rest, and
you want to know if I mind?"
"Ah. There's a secret to that, having too much work and not enough
time. It's in the organization, and in putting yourself into the
right state of mind before you start. Most people scatter themselves.
They try everything at once."
"I'll be damned." Toma, who had been carrying water to the sheep
pens, paused to watch over Tain's shoulder.
Turning the browning mutton. Tain said. "I love to cook. This is a
chance for me to show off." He tapped a ghost of spice from an
envelope. "Rula, if we brown the vegetables instead of stewing
them...."
"I'll be damned." Toma said again. He settled to the floor to watch.
He pulled a jar of beer to his side.
"One should strive to achieve the widest possible competence," Tain
remarked. "One may never need a skill, but, again, one can't know the
future. Tomorrow holds ambushes for the mightiest necromancers. A new
skill is another hedge against Fate's whimsey. What happens when a
soldier loses a limb here?"
"They become beggars," Rula replied. "Toma, remember how it was right
after the war? You couldn't walk a block...."
"My point made for me. I could become a cook. Or an interpreter. Or a
smith, or an armorer, according to my handicap. In that way I was
well-served. Where's Steban? I asked him to pick some mushrooms.
They'll add the final touch. But don't expect miracles. I've never
tried this with mutton.... Rula? What is it?"
Toma had bounced up and run outside. She was following him.
"It's Steban. He's worried about Steban."
"Can you tell me?"
"The Caydarmen...." She went blank, losing the animation she had
begun showing.
"Who are they?"
"Baron Caydar's men." She would say no more. She just leaned against
the door frame and stared into the dusk.
Toma returned a moment later. "It's all right. He's coming. Must have
spent the day with the Kosku boy. I see his flock, too."
"Toma. . ." Fear tinged Rula's voice.
"The boy can choose his friends, woman. I'm not so weak that I'll
make my children avoid their friends because of my fears."
Tain stirred vegetables and listened, trying to fathom the situation.
Toma was scared. The timbre of fear inundated his voice.
He and Rula dropped the subject as if pursuing it might bring some
dread upon them.
Steban had collected the right mushrooms. That had worried Tain. He
never quite trusted anyone who wasn't legion-trained. "Good, Steban.
I think we'll all like this."
"You're cooking?"
"I won't poison you. The fish was good, wasn't it?"
Steban seemed unsure. He turned to his father. "Wes said they were
fined five sheep, five goats, and ten geese. He said his Dad said
he's not going to pay."
Dread and worry overcame his parents' faces.
"Toma, there'll be trouble." Rula's hands fluttered like nervous
doves.
"They can't afford that," Toma replied. 'They wouldn't make it
through winter."
"Go talk to him. Ask the neighbors to chip in."
"It's got to end. Rula." He turned to Tain. "The Crown sent Baron
Caydar to protect us from the tribes. We had less trouble when we
weren't protected."
"Toma!"
"The tribes don't bother anyone, Rula. They never did. Hywel goes out
of his way to avoid trouble. Just because those royal busybodies got
themselves massacred.... They asked for it, trying to make Hywel and
Stojan bend the knee."
"Toma, they'll fine us too."
"They have to hear me first."
"They know everything. People tell on each other. You know...."
"Because they're scared. Rula, if the bandits keep pushing, we won't
care if we're afraid."
Tain delivered the meal to table. He asked, "Who are the Caydarmen?
The one I saw was no Iwa Skolovdan."
"Mercenaries." Toma spat. "Crown wouldn't let Caydar bring regulars.
He recruited Trolledyngjans who escaped when the Pretender overthrew
the Old House up there. They're a gang of bandits."
"I see." The problem was taking shape. Baron Caydar would be, no
doubt, a political exile thrust into an impossible position by his
enemies. His assignment here would be calculated to destroy him. And
what matter that a few inconsequential colonists suffered?
Tain's motherland was called Dread Empire by its foes. With cause.
The Tervola did as they pleased, where and when they pleased, by
virtue of sorcery and legions unacquainted with defeat. Shinsan did
have its politics and politicians. But never did they treat citizens
with contempt.
Tain had studied the strange ways of the west, but he would need time
to really grasp their actuality.
After supper he helped Toma haul more water. Toma remarked, "That's
the finest eating I've had in years."
"Thank you. I enjoyed preparing it."
"What I wanted to say. I'd appreciate it if you didn't anymore." Tain
considered. Toma sounded as though he expected to share his company
for a while.
"Rula. She shouldn't have too much time to worry."
"I see."
"I appreciate the help you're giving me...." "You could save a lot of
water-hauling with a windmill." "I know. But nobody around here can
build one. Anyway. I couldn't pay much. Maybe a share on the sheep.
If you'd stay...." Tain faced the east. The sunset had painted the
mountains the color of blood. He hoped that was no omen. But he
feared that legionnaires were dying at the hands of legionnaires even
now. "All right. For a while. But I'll have to move on soon."
He wondered if he could outrun his past. A friend had told him that a
man carried his pain like a tortoise carried his shell. Tain
suspected the analogy might be more apt than intended. Men not only
carried their painshells, they retreated into them if emotionally
threatened.
"We need you. You can see that. I've been too stubborn to admit it
till now...."
"Stubbornness is a virtue, properly harnessed. Just don't be stubborn
against learning."
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