“So we’re all going?”
“Yes. The question is what to do with those guards.” He nodded to the little group under the tree. “Very likely one or more of them are part of the conspiracy, told to watch the merchant for any attempt to inform on it. The others may be honest or may not. I do not like killing men without cause just because they work for someone dishonest. Hunger drives men to many deeds they would not do if they were not ruled by their bellies. But the cohort is my first responsibility; a traitor among them puts all at risk.”
“Are you asking me?” Burek said.
“I am thinking aloud,” Arcolin said. “And you may have some ideas I have not thought of.”
“Disarm them, bind them in the wagons?” Burek said.
“Disarm them, of course. Bind them … I had thought to have them walk, but then they could still call out to the brigands, if that was their intent. I don’t want them in the wagons; they know where the secret compartments are, and they could rearm themselves.”
“Wait—the poison they used on my horse—a little of that would make a man weak and slow, the surgeon said. Would a little of it in food do the same for them? Make them drowsy, even put them to sleep?”
“It might.” Arcolin nodded slowly. “I’ll speak to the surgeon on the way. We need to get these wagons reloaded and make a start—the longer we wait, the more chance of attack. I’ll speak to the village headman.”
The headman in this village was a stout gray-haired woman with arms that looked strong enough to handle a pike. Arcolin introduced himself.
“I thought you lot were the tax collector again, and we just paid the spring tax three hands of days ago,” she said.
“No, we’re here to deal with brigands, give you some value for that tax you paid.”
She spat sideways into the street. “Value! The only value them in Cortes Vonja cares about is what lines their pockets.”
“Tell you what,” Arcolin said. “I must take the contraband with me, but I think some of it might spoil by the time it would reach Cortes Vonja. It’s my choice, under my contract. Could you make use of some salt pork and a sack of grain?”
“We could make use of all of it,” she said, staring at the stack of grain sacks and meat.
“I’m sure you could,” Arcolin said, “but so could my men.”
“What you want for it?” she asked.
“Nothing more than you’ve done,” Arcolin said. “Maybe, some other day, some information on brigands in your area.”
“What’ll they do if they finds we tooken it?”
“I don’t know,” Arcolin said. “If you want, we can take it all with us.”
She looked around at her villagers, whose expressions made it clear what they thought.
“We’ll take it and thank you,” she said at last.
Arcolin put two sacks of grain and most of the meat aside. “If I were you,” he said, “none of this would look like what it is, by dark.”
“Trust me for that,” she said. Then, to his surprise, she bent and kissed his hand.
Soon the reloaded wagons were on their way north at the best pace the mules could manage on the soft road, the unhappy merchant perched on the driver’s seat of the second. For the time being, the five guards, disarmed and hands bound, walked behind the wagons, closely followed by the rear guard.
Four wagons, two of them heavily loaded, made a mess of the road, which here was scarce more than a lane. At every turn of the glass, they had to rest the mules and horses. By nightfall they were abreast of the previous night’s campsite. Arcolin shook his head and pushed on. That open field was too easy, when the brigands now knew its secrets. A few hours north, the road would firm again, even after the rain, and he hoped the brigands would be waiting, instead, at the place they usually got their supplies.
The jingling harness and grunts of the mules and horses, and the creak of wagon wheels made more noise than the soldiers afoot; Arcolin blessed the sharp breeze that came up just after sunset and blew the sound away west, where he hoped the main mass of brigands weren’t. Moving at night was risky, but it was as risky for the brigands, and every distance he made north improved their chances of reaching Cortes Vonja without an attack.
Before the middle of the night, he halted them on the road, now firmer, to rest until dawn. Stammel came to him after they halted.
“Captain, that tall caravan guard, Kory—”
“What about him?”
“I think I know him; I think he’s that bad recruit who poisoned Corporal Stephi, the one Captain Sejek had branded and whipped. That scar on his forehead could’ve been a brand. His name was Korryn then. Kory’s close enough.”
Arcolin had never seen the man; he started to say that there were many tall, lean black-haired men with scars, but this was Stammel. “Are you sure?”
“Almost, sir. None of ’em talked much, but he said nothing at all. He never looked straight at me, but little glances out the side of his eyes, like.”
“Well … after he left he’s none of our concern. If he’s satisfied his employers—”
“That’s true, sir, but I wonder who his employer really is. Not that merchant, I’ll wager.”
“He harmed Paks, I remember that—but now we think it was Venner who gave Stephi the drugged ale, not Korryn.” Stammel said nothing. Arcolin sighed finally. “What do you think he’s doing, then?”
“Nothing good, sir. And loose, he’ll be eager to hurt us, for that punishment. There’s hate in his eyes when he looks at me. Devlin thinks the same.”
“He was there too, wasn’t he?” Arcolin sighed again. “We can tell the Vonjans what we know of him, but we’ll need proof. It’s been—what?—five years or so?”
“Sejek used the sea-ink dye on the stripes, sir. Made sure it was in deep. It should show.”
“Well. I’ll tell the Vonjans, when we get to the city.”
29
Dawn revealed familiar country, thickets and brush to the east along the line of the stream, and rising ground, rough pasture, to the west. Arcolin allowed the cooks to make a hot breakfast; he drank his sib in the saddle, watchful. The five guards had caused no trouble so far, making no attempt to escape when taken to the jacks; they ate their porridge without comment. The surgeon had advised against dosing them, so Arcolin had their hands bound again for the day’s march.
On the firmer ground, and after a rainless day, the road withstood the wagons’ passage reasonably well; they passed the old night shelter by midmorning, and came to the village outside which they’d first camped. Suddenly a figure appeared, running for the woods; Arcolin waved his mounted scout on and sent Burek to follow. Shortly they came back with a bound captive, blood running down his face from a clout on the head.
“You criminals!” the man said. “You can’t do this!”
“Evidently, we can,” Arcolin said. Up close, he recognized the village headman. “You know who we are; you had no business to run from us—except to signal the brigands in those woods over there.”
“I wasn’t—I just saw a—a loose cow.”
The scout—Arñe, today—sniggered audibly. “Didn’t see a cow, Captain.”
“You scared it into the bushes with that horse,” the man said.
Arcolin dismounted, walked up to the man and leaned into him; the man flinched. “You are a liar,” he said. “I have authority from Cortes Vonja to depose any village official I find in league with brigands. You lied to me before; I let it go, out of mercy, but this time—no. To Cortes Vonja you go for trial, and I do not think you will return.”
“My—my wife—my children.”
“You should have thought of them before,” Arcolin said. “You have put your whole village in peril.”
“They gave us half a ham once,” the man said, hanging his head.