Sometime during the excitement a whole herd of crows had gathered on the merlons, out of the way. They started laughing.
Everybody jumped on the woman before she could do anything. Goblin did some kind of swift magical bind that left her unable to do anything but wiggle her eyes.
One-Eye looked at me and said, "You got any suture with you, Croaker? I got a needle but I don't think I got enough thread."
What? "Some." I always carried some medical odds and ends.
"Gimme."
I gave him.
He whacked Shifter and Bringer again. "Just to make sure they're out. They don't got no special powers when they're out."
He squatted down and started sewing their mouths shut. He finished Shifter, said, "Get him stripped. Whack him if he stirs."
What the hell?
It got gruesome, then more gruesome. "What the hell you doing?" I demanded.
The crows were having a party.
"Sewing all the holes shut. So the devils don't get out."
"What?" Maybe it made sense to him. It didn't to me.
"Old trick for getting rid of evil witch doctors back home." When he finished with the orifices he sewed fingers and toes together. "Put them in a sack with a hundred pounds of rocks and throw them in the river."
Lady said, "You'll have to burn them. And grind what's left into powder and scatter the powder on the wind."
One-Eye looked at her for ten seconds. "You mean I done all this work for nothing?"
"No. It'll help. You don't want them getting excited while you're roasting them."
I gave her a startled look. That was not like her. I turned to Murgen. "You want to get that standard up?"
One-Eye stirred Shifter's apprentice with a toe. "What about this one? Think I should take care of her, too?"
"She hasn't done anything." I squatted beside her. "I remember you now, darling. It took me a while because we didn't see that much of you in Juniper. You weren't very nice to my buddy Marron Shed." I looked at Lady. "What were you figuring on making out of her?"
She did not answer.
"Be that way. We'll talk later." I looked at the apprentice. "Lisa Daela Bowalk. You hear me name your name, the way these others did?" Crows chuckled to one another. "I'm going to give you a break. That you probably don't deserve. Murgen, find some place to lock this one up. We'll turn her loose when we're ready to move out. Goblin, you help One-Eye with whatever he's got to do." I looked at the Company standard, bloodstained once again, flying defiantly again. "You"—pointing at One-Eye—"take care of it right. Unless you want two more of them after us the way Limper was."
He gulped air. "Yeah."
"Lady, I told you. Tonight in Stormgard. Let's go find someplace."
Something was wrong with me. I felt mildly depressed, vaguely let down, once again victim of an anticlimax, of a hollow victory. Why? Two great wickednesses were about to be removed from the face of the earth. Luck had marched with the Company once more. We had added more impossible triumphs to our roll of victories.
We were two hundred miles nearer our destination than we'd had any right to hope. There was no obvious reason to expect much trouble from those troops locked up in that camp south of the city. Their Shadowmaster captain was wounded. The people of Stormgard, for the most part, were accepting us as liberators.
What was to be bothered about?
Chapter Forty: DEJAGORE (FORMERLY STORMGARD)
Tonight in Stormgard.
Tonight in Stormgard was something, though somehow tainted with that lack of satisfaction that haunted me increasingly. I slept well past dawn. A bugle wakened me. The first thing I saw when I cracked my lids was a big black bastard of a crow eyeballing Lady and me. I threw something at it.
Another bugle call. I stumbled to a window. Then streaked to another. "Lady. Get up. We got trouble."
Trouble snaked out of the southern hills in the form of another enemy army. Mogaba had our boys getting into formation already. Over on the south wall Cletus and his brothers had the artillery harassing the encampment, but their engines could not keep that mob from getting ready for a fight. The people of the city poured from their houses, headed for the walls to watch.
Crows were everywhere.
Lady took a look, snapped, "Let's get dressed," and started helping me with my costume. I helped with hers.
I said of mine, "This thing is starting to smell."
"You may not have to wear it much longer."
"Eh?"
"That bunch coming out of the hills has to be just about everybody they've got left under arms. Break them and the war is over."
"Sure. Except for three Shadowmasters who might not see it that way."
I stepped to the window, shaded my eyes. I thought I could detect a black dot floating among the soldiers. "We don't have anybody on our side now. Maybe I shouldn't have been so hasty with Shifter."
"You did the right thing. He'd fulfilled his agenda. He might even have joined the others against us. He had no grudge against them."
"Did you know who they were?"
"I never suspected. Honest. Not till a day or two ago. Then it seemed too unlikely to mention."
"Let's get at it."
She kissed me, and it was a kiss with oomph behind it. We'd come a long way... She put her helmet on and turned into the grim dark thing called Lifetaker. I did my magic trick and turned into Widowmaker. The scurrying rats who people Stormgard—I guessed we should change the name back when the dust settled—stared at us in fear and awe as we strode through the streets.
Mogaba met us. He'd brought our horses. We mounted up. I asked, "How bad does it look?"
"Can't tell yet. With two battles under our belts and two victories I'd say we're the more tempered force. But there'll be a lot of them and I don't think you have any more tricks up your sleeves."
"You're right about that. This is the last thing I expected. If this Shadowmaster uses his power... "
"Don't mention it to the men. They've been warned we might encounter unusual circumstances. They've been told to ignore them and get on with their jobs. You want to use the elephants again?"
"Everything. Every damned thing we've got. This one could be the whole war. Win it, we've got them off Taglios's back and we've opened the road all the way south. They won't have an army left to field."
He grunted. The same went for us.
We got out onto the field. In moments I had messengers flying everywhere, most of them trying to dig my armed laborers out of the city. We were going to need every sword.
Mogaba had sent the cavalry off to scout and harass already. Good man, Mogaba.
The crows seemed to be having a great time watching the show take shape.
The Shadowmaster out there was in no hurry. He got his men out of the hills and into formation despite my cavalry, then had his horsemen chase mine off. Otto and Hagop might have whipped them, but I'd sent instructions not to try. They just came back, leading the enemy, pelting him with arrows from their saddle bows. I wanted them to rest their animals before the main event. We did not have enough remounts to carry a proper cavalry campaign.
I detailed a few men to assemble the former prisoners as they showed and send them off to get in the way of anybody who sallied from the camp. With weapons captured yesterday and during the night more than half were now armed. They were not trained and were not skilled, but they were determined.
I sent word for Cletus and his brothers to move the artillery over where he could give us support and could bombard the encampment gate.
I looked across at the new army. "Mogaba. Any ideas?" At a guess there were fifteen thousand of them. They looked at least as competent as those we'd met at the Ghoja ford. Limited, but not amateurs.