“There’s a problem, Ambassador,” Campas said. “The Abessu-Denorru would like to see you, if it’s convenient.”
“Of course.” She picked up her rucksack and slung it over one shoulder. “What’s the nature of the problem?” she asked.
“Some strangers have arrived, with a bargeful of goods. From a country far off, to the south. Necias wonders if you might know them.”
Fiona frowned. “I don’t know everyone from the south, just because I traveled there.”
Campas grinned. “I don’t think Necias quite understands what being from another planet truly means,” he said. “He just thinks it means from far away. You’re from a far country; this other man is from a far country: therefore you might know one another. This man is dark, also, like you.” He shrugged, and immediately winced at the chafe of the mail shirt on his neck. He sighed. “I was relaxing in Necias’ bath house,” he complained, “up to my neck in nice hot water, and now these people have showed up.”
She followed Campas toward where Necias had pitched his pavilion on the banks of a canal, half a mile into the lines. Campas glanced over his shoulder and frowned. “Necias isn’t in a good mood today,” he said. “There were dispatches from the city. Some of the weavers’ apprentices and journeymen rioted, burned down the workshop of Nalsas — he was a real slavedriver anyway, so it’s no great loss, but the Denorru-Deissin is terrified Tastis’ agents were behind it.”
“Were they?” She glanced back at the banners on the grey walls. Tastis had exploited the cities’ weaknesses well, she thought; he had allied himself with those who had always been on the edge of power, but never had a chance to grasp it. Could it be that he was allying himself with the future? she wondered, the forces that would inevitably succeed? Fervently, she hoped not.
Campas, in answer to her question, started to shrug, remembered his mail shirt, and threw up his hands instead. “I don’t know. I’m sure Tastis has agents aplenty in Arrandal — he had enough time to send them out. And he’s been sending some into our camp, disguised as sutlers with goods to sell, trying to seduce the mercenaries and the soldiers, but we cut off a few heads and sent the rest packing.’’ His voice grew reflective. “And of course we’ve agents aplenty in Neda-Calacas,” he said, then cocked an eye at the barred enemy gates, above which a dozen heads rotted, grimacing at the besiegers, “but they have a harder time getting in and out.” He grinned. “I hear you’ve been talking to the mercenaries,” he said.
“Yes.” She had assembled a lot of raw data: individuals in the mercenary companies had come from half a world away, from half a hundred nations. She frowned. “Many of them aren’t very nice people.”
“No. They enjoy their work too much.” He paused. “Have you given up on the Brodaini, then?”
Fiona shook her head. “It’s just that the mercenaries were here, and I don’t know when I’ll get another chance to speak to so many of them.” She glanced up at the hot midsummer sun, wishing she’d thought to bring a hat.
“Your poetry goes well?” she asked.
“Well enough. I’d thought the hours on horseback would have been a good time to work out the patterns, but Necias keeps me up half the night doing his correspondence, and I use the horseback journeys to catch up on my sleep. I’ve learned the trick of it, and the beast keeps to the track.’’
He looked at her with a half smile. “But what I’ve done is good, yes. I’m pleased.”
“I’m glad it’s working. I’d like to see it.”
“Not till it’s done. I’m strict about that.”
“I understand.” They reached the pavilion, and Fiona saw at once the strangers outside. There were half a dozen of them, dressed mostly in travel-stained leather. Fiona felt a sudden pang of homesickness as she saw the dark, elaborately-folded cloth over their heads, a sundrape, practical in a hot homeland, almost identical to the one her own people wore.
“Came up on a barge this morning,” Campas said. “Were going to deliver their goods to Calacas on contract, and ran into the war instead. He’ll try to sell them to Necias.”
Fiona shook off the treacherous stab of memory. In this alien world, even a superficial familiarity could awaken a longing ache she preferred not to recognize.
“I see,” she said.
“You don’t know him?” Campas’ voice seemed to hold out some vestige of hope.
“No.” She shrugged.
“I’ll tell the Abeissu.” He started to step toward the tent, then hesitated. He turned back to her. “Would you like to share luncheon with me?” he asked. “I have the afternoon free — I’ve packed my meal in a haversack and was going to take it out in front of the lines and enjoy the sun.”
Fiona nodded. “I’d be happy to.”
Campas gave a quick grin. “Good. Let me speak to Necias for a moment, then I’ll be out.”
Campas took longer than a moment. The strangers in their sundrapes scowled at her and muttered to one another in their own language. She moved a distance off, sat down on a block that had been used to chop Necias’ wood, and took out her deck, the cards flicking through her fingers. She tried to snap a card out and it hung in the deck, a clumsy, amateurish move, and she frowned.
Campas, a rucksack on his shoulder, came out of Necias’ tent, and the leader of the foreign traders was allowed in amid a moving rectangle of guards. She stood, glancing automatically at the enemy towers again, her hands instinctively sorting the cards. Campas’ question came as a blow.
“Why do you hate them so much?”
Her hands froze on the cards as she stared blankly ahead in shock; she recovered, not quickly enough, and turned to Campas. “Why do you ask that?”
“You look at the city with such hatred.” Reasonably. “I saw you the morning after the battle, too, and I remember the expression on your face. You hate them. What happened to your embassy there?” He looked away, frowning uneasily. “It’s not my business, of course.”
“No.” Tartly. “It’s not.”
She had told them the Igaran embassy to Neda-Calacas had been refused; she hadn’t told them what had happened, fearful they’d try to recruit her for their war. She hadn’t wanted to be recruited.
But she had, she knew, instead volunteered.
She looked at Campas again, resenting both the question and the compulsion that wanted her to answer — to clear up at least one of the misunderstandings between herself and someone else.
She turned to the city again, feeling her eyes narrow, the words, buried so long, coming out of her slowly, with deliberate anger. “They killed her,” she said. “They wanted her to give — to give what she had — to them alone.” She breathed out deliberately, letting the anger out with the breath. “There was threat of torture, too,” she said, then looked up at Campas, seeing his steady glance, his sympathy. “That’s why I’m here,” she admitted. “I wanted to have — have revenge, I suppose. Not a very good reason. As my people have been telling me.”
She looked down at her hands as they busied themselves sorting the cards, then put them in her pack.
“I’m sorry, Ambassador,” Campas said evenly. “It’s never easy to be caught in the middle of a war.” He turned his head, looking thoughtfully at the enemy walls. “I would have thought Tastis was more clever than that. Perhaps they were panicked, somehow.”
Oh, yes, Fiona thought with a flash of anger. It was Kira’s fault, of course. She frightened them, the poor simple savages. Those dear renegades are far too unsophisticated to practice deliberate cruelty, deliberate terror, deliberate murder.
Campas turned back to her. His tone was puzzled. “They’ve killed one of your ambassadors and you haven’t responded?” he asked. “Not declared war yourselves?”
Fiona shook her head. She could feel the resentment in her tone but couldn’t halt it. “No. We’re not allowed to meddle in your affairs: if we didn’t hold to that firmly, you’d never trust us. We’re permitted self-defense, but we can’t take part in your wars. Military involvements are beyond our capabilities, anyway.” She looked up at him. “You’ve seen the announcements that I asked Necias to distribute. You know this.”