“What it comes down to, you don’t trust me.”
The cluster of ragged men and women said nothing. He hadn’t expected them to admit it. No one met his eyes. Behind him, his cohort, even more ragged than the peasants from the village. He could hear their breathing, the rasp of pebbles under their feet when they shifted in place. He could feel, as if it were a hot iron, their rapt attention on the back of his neck. His own belly knotted with hunger; he knew theirs were empty too.
Gird tried again. “You agreed with us last year, you remember that?” He stared right at the headwoman, who stared at her feet. But she nodded, slowly. “Yes—you said you’d share your harvest with us, feed us, to help us win against the lords—”
“You didn’t win.” That voice was bitter, but low, from the back of the group. Gird could not tell which dark-wrapped head it had been, or whether man or woman.
“We haven’t won yet,” said Gird. “But we’re a lot closer—Lady’s tears, did you think it would be all one battle? We told you—”
“ ’Twas a bad winter,” said the headwoman, still avoiding his eye. “And them folokai got after flocks, near took the whole lamb crop.”
“Tell ’em all, Mara,” said the same bitter voice, louder this time.
“The lords come,” the woman said. Now she looked up, and Gird could see a fresh scar across her face, the mark of a barbed lash that had almost taken her eye. “They said we had to have more than we could show. They said we’d been giving it to rebels, and they said they’d have no more of it. They took a child from every hearth—they come here, and where was you? Away, is all we know. No help. Help for help, that’s what we say, and you’ve given no help.”
“I’m sorry,” said Gird. Now all the faces looked at him, all scarred one way or another, all bitter. All betrayed. He wanted to say It’s not my fault, but knew that wouldn’t help. They had protected many of the villages, in the past year: he thought of all those skirmishes and battles, the cost of it to his army. This year, given supplies enough, they’d control more territory, and fewer villages would suffer. But here they had not protected the people, and the people had changed their minds.
“They come oftener,” the woman went on. “Check the fields, check the stores. Leave us bare enough for life, they do, and destroy the rest. Threaten the fields, if we give aught to rebels.”
Could he promise they would not come again? Did he have the strength yet? Gird tried to think, but he wasn’t sure. And a false promise would be worse than no promise. And if he told them how close he was to moving his lines on another league or so to the hills, would these betray him to their lords? Were they lost to him entirely?
“Gird?” That was Selamis, as usual. He had, no doubt, come up with some clever idea for saving the situation. Gird wished he could be properly grateful. He waved the man forward. Selamis muttered “The Marrakai gold?” in his ear. Well, it was a clever idea. Probably not what the Marrakai agent had intended the gold to be used for, but it might work. Although—if they went buying food, to replace what he bought, their lords would surely notice that, too.
But he had to try. His mouth dried, thinking of all possible consequences. “We have a bit of gold we found—”
“Found!” That was not a promising tone. Someone spat juicily; it splatted on the rock a bare handspan from Gird’s boots. “They told us you brigands’d have gold—and what they’d do if we come to market with it. You’re no better than they are, that’s a fact. Take our food for your army—they do the same. Both raids us, neither protects—not them from you, nor you from them, and there’s not a hair of difference.”
He could not, even hungry as he was, drive these folk farther. Like it or not, they were the reason for his fighting, and he could not harm them—yet. Could they use the gold at some market? One of them might pass for a trader, perhaps—someone robbed on the road? That was common enough. Would that pesky priest wreathe his magicks for them, make someone safe in the towns? He might, but he would want something for it, and Gird did not yet trust him.
“We’re not the same, and I think you know it. But you’ve had more trouble than you could stand; I understand that. We won’t take it by force, but you think of this—one child from each hearth now—do you think that will satisfy them? I lost more than that, before I broke free. You need not be as stupid as I was.”
“You lost children?” Others shushed that voice, someone in a leather cloak, but Gird answered it, counting them on his fingers.
“My first two sons died of fever; the lord refused us herb-right in the wood. My wife lost two babes young, one from hunger and one from fever. My eldest daughter they raped; killed her husband. The babe died unborn. My youngest son they struck down; he lives. Another daughter they struck down, breaking her arm; I know not if she lives or dies. And my brother’s children, that I’d taken in: two of them dead, by the lords’ greed. And that’s children. I lost friends, my parents, my brother. You ask yourselves: if they can take one child, will they stop there? Will all your submission, all your obedience, get you peace and enough food? Has it ever worked? You can sit here and let them take you one by one, or you can decide to fight back.”
And he turned, glared at his own unhappy men, and marched them away. No one called him back, but he was not surprised to find three of the villagers following his cohort when they had gone some distance—and ready to join him.
Still, such incidents made him touchy. He was trying to stretch a small bowl of gruel one day, when two of his marshals reported that the villages to which they’d applied had refused to give or sell supplies, on the grounds that they’d been raided by brigands. His patience snapped.
“I am so sick of this!” It came out louder than he meant, and he’d meant it loud enough. Everyone fell silent, watching him, which only made him angrier. He lowered his voice to a growl, all too aware that his growl was audible farther than some men’s shouts. “All this dickering, like a farmer trying to work down the price of a bull. All this haggling with thieves and bullies, craft guilds and village councils. Any idiot should be able to see what we’re doing, and the worth of it. You’d think they liked being yoked and driven by the magelords, the way they kick and snap when we free them. The Lady of Peace herself would be driven to fury, the way they are. By the gods, we’re trying to make them free, and make things fair, and they won’t see it!”
“We might as well be brigands,” said Herrak. It was not the first time he’d said something like that, and Gird disliked the whine in his voice. “The way they are, what difference does it make?”
“It makes a difference to us,” said Gird. “There were brigands before; they never helped the farmers. If we’re only robbers, all should be against us. What I can’t see is why they don’t see the difference.”
“We need to win,” said Selamis, smiling. He had the honeysweet lilt to his voice that Gird hated; it worked on the crowds, most times, but it was not plainspeaking.
“What do you think, I should go to the brigands and recruit them?” He meant it as a jest, but the quality of the silence told him the others had thought of that before. Seriously. Selamis was paring his nails with a knife; he gave Gird that sideways look that Gird disliked.