Faces turned, soldiers stared. Fiddler and Gesler who had been slapping each other on the back pulled apart and then walked over.
‘Hood’s pecker, Hellian,’ Fiddler said under his breath, ‘what happened to all the townfolk? As if I can’t guess,’ he added, glancing over at the heaped heads. ‘They’ve all run away.’
Urb had joined them and he said, ‘They were all those Indebted we heard about. Fifth, sixth generations. Working on blanks.’
‘Blanks?’ Gesler asked.
‘For weapons,’ Fiddler explained. ‘So, they were slaves, Urb?’
‘In everything but name,’ the big man replied, scratching at his beard from which dangled one severed finger, grey and black. ‘Under all those Edur heads is the local Factor’s head, some rich bastard in silks. We killed him in front of the Indebted and listened to them cheer. And then they cut off the poor fool’s head as a gift, since we come in with all these Edur ones. And then they looted what they could and headed out.’
Gesler’s brows had risen at all that. ‘So you’ve managed what the rest of us haven’t-arriving as damned liberators in this town.’
Hellian snorted. ‘We worked that out weeks back. Never mind the Lurrii soljers, since they’re all perfessionals and so’s they like things jus’ fine so’s they’s the one y’gotta kill no diff ‘rent from the Edur. No, y’go into the hamlets and villages and kill all the ‘ficials-’
‘The what?’ Gesler asked.
Urb said, ‘Officials. We kill the officials, Gesler. And anybody with money, and the advocates, too.’
‘The what?’
‘Legal types. Oh, and the money-lenders and debt-holders, and the record-keepers and toll-counters. We kill them all-’
‘Along with the soljers,’ Hellian added, nodding-and nodding, for some reason finding herself unable to stop. She kept nodding as she said, ‘An’ what happens then is simple. Looting, lotsa sex, then everybody skittles out, and we sleep in soft beds and drink an’ eat in the tavern an’ if the keepers hang round we pays for it all nice an’ honest-’
‘Keepers like the ones hiding in the kitchen?’
Hellian blinked. ‘Hiding? Oh, maybe we’ve gotten a little wild-
‘It’s the heads,’ Urb said, then he shrugged sheepishly. ‘We’re getting outa hand, Gesler, I think. Living like animals in the woods and the like-’
‘Like animals,’ Hellian agreed, still nodding. ‘In soft beds and lotsa food and drink an’ it’s not like we carry them heads on our belts or anything. We just leave ‘em in the taverns. Every village, right? Jus’ to let ‘em know we been through.’ Unaccountably dizzy, Hellian sat back down, then reached for the flagon of ale on the table-needing to twist Balgrid’s fingers from the handle and him fighting as if it was his flagon or something, the idiot. She swallowed a mouthful and leaned back-only it was a stool she was sitting on so there was no back to it, and now she was staring up at the ceiling and puddled whatever was soaking through her ragged shirt all along her back and faces were peering down at her. She glowered at the flagon still in her hand. ‘Did I spill? Did I? Did I spill, dammit?’
‘Not a drop,’ Fiddler said, shaking his head in wonder. This damned Sergeant Hellian, who by Urb’s account had crossed all the way from the coast in an inebriated haze-this soft-featured woman, soft just on the edge of dissolute, with the bright always wet lips-this Hellian had managed to succeed where every other squad-as far as Fiddler knew-had failed miserably. And since Urb was adamant on who was leading whom, it really had been her. This drunken, ferocious marine.
Leaving severed heads in every tavern, for Hood’s sake!
But she had cut loose the common people, all these serfs and slaves and Indebted, and had watched them dance off in joy and freedom. Our drunk liberator, our bloodthirsty goddess-what in Hood’s name do all those people think when they first see her? Endless rumours of a terrible invading army. Soldiers and Edur dying in ambushes, chaos on the roads and trails. Then she shows up, dragging heads in sacks, and her marines break down every door in town and drag out all the ones nobody else has any reason to like. And then? Why, the not-so-subtle cutting away of all burdens for all these poor folk. ‘Give us the bar for a couple nights and then we’ll just be on our way.
‘Oh, and if you run into any Edur in the woods, send somebody back to warn us, right?’
Was it any wonder that Hellian and Urb and their squads had marched so far ahead of the others-or so Captain Sort had complained-with hardly any losses among her marines? The drunk, bright-eyed woman with all the rounded excesses of a well-fed, never sober but still young harlot had somehow managed to co-opt all the local help they’d needed to stay alive.
In a strange kind of floating wonder, the near-euphoria of relief, exhaustion and plenty of admiration that certainly wasn’t innocent of sudden sexual desire-for a damned drunk-Fiddler found a table and moments later was joined by Gesler and Stormy, the latter arriving with a loaf of rye bread, a broached cask of ale and three dented pewter flagons with inscriptions on them.
‘Can almost read this,’ he said, squinting at the side of his cup. ‘Like old Ehrlii.’
‘Maker’s stamp?’ Gesler asked as he tore off a hunk of bread.
‘No. Maybe something like “Advocate of the Year”. Then a name. Could be Rizzin Purble. Or Wurble. Or Fizzin.’
‘Could be that’s the name of this village,’ Gesler suggested. ‘Fizzin Wurble.’
Stormy grunted, then nudged Fiddler. ‘Stop dreaming of her, Fid. She’s trouble and a lost cause too. Besides, it’s Urb who’s all dreamy ‘bout her and he looks too dangerous to mess with.’
Fiddler sighed. ‘Aye to all of that. It’s just been a long time, that’s all.’
‘We’ll get our rewards soon enough.’
He eyed Stormy for a moment, then glanced over to Gesler.
Who was scowling at his corporal. ‘You lost your mind, Stormy? The only rewards we’re going to reap are the crow feathers Hood hands out as we march through his gate. Sure, we’re drawing up here, gaining in strength as we do it, but those Edur on our trail will be doing the same, outnumbering us five, ten to one by the time we run out of open ground.’
Stormy waved a dismissive hand. ‘You do a count, Gesler? Look at Urb’s squad. At Hellian’s. Look at Fid’s and ours. We’re all damned near unscathed, given what we’ve been through. More living than dead in every squad here. So who’s to say the other squads aren’t in the same shape? We’re damn near at strength, and you couldn’t say that about the Letherii and the Edur, could you?’
‘There’s a whole lot more of them than us,’ Gesler pointed out as he collected the cask and began pouring the ale into the flagons.
‘Ain’t made that much difference, though. We bulled through that last ambush-’
‘And left the scene so cut up and bleeding a vole could’ve tracked us-’
‘Sharper scatter, is all-’
‘Mayfly’s back was a shredded mess-’
‘Armour took most of it-’
‘Armour she doesn’t have any more-’
‘You two are worse than married,’ Fiddler said, reaching for his ale.
‘All right,’ Koryk pronounced, ‘there’s no disagreement possible. Those bieckers of yours, Smiles, reek the worst of all. Worse than fingers, worse than ears, worse even than tongues. We’ve all voted. All us in the squad, and you’ve got to get rid of them.’
Smiles sneered. ‘You think I don’t know why you want me to toss ‘em, Koryk? It’s not the smell, oh no. It’s the sight of them, and the way that makes you squirm inside, makes your balls pull up and hide. That’s what this is all about. Pretty soon, none of us will be smelling much at all-everything’s drying out, wrinkling up-’