Django Wexler - The Thousand Names

Paperwork. A mountain, a torrent of paper, a stack of things to read and sign that never shrank or ended. And, lurking behind, on, and around every sheet, the looming anxiety that while this one was just the latrine-digging rota, the next one might be important. Really, critically important, the kind of thing that would make future historians shake their heads and say, “If only d’Ivoire had read that report, all those lives might have been spared.” Marcus was starting to wonder if perhaps he’d died after all and hadn’t noticed, and whether he could apply for time off in a neighboring hell. Spending a few millennia being violated by demons with red-hot pokers was beginning to sound like a nice change of pace.

What made it worse was that he didn’t have to do it. He could say, “Fitz, take care of all this, would you?” and the young lieutenant would. He’d smile while he was doing it! All that stood in the way was Marcus’ own stubborn pride and, again, the fear that somewhere in the sea of paper was something absolutely vital that he was going to miss.

Fitz returned from escorting another newly frocked sergeant out of the office. Marcus leaned back, stretching his long legs under the desk and feeling his shoulders pop. His right hand burned dully, and his thumb was developing a blister.

“Tell me that was the last one,” he said.

“That was the last one,” Fitz said obediently.

“But you’re just saying that because I told you to say it.”

“No,” the lieutenant said, “that was really the last one. Just in time, too. Signal from the fleet says the colonel’s coming ashore.”

“Thank God.”

One year ago, before Ben Warus had gone chasing one bandit too many, Marcus would have said he wanted to command the regiment. But that had been in another lifetime, when Khandar was just a sleepy dead-end post and the most the Colonials had been required to do was stand beside the prince on formal occasions to demonstrate the eternal friendship between the Vermillion Throne and the House of Orboan. Before a gang of priests and madmen-more or less synonymous, in Marcus’ opinion-had stirred up the populace with the idea that they would be better off without either one.

Since then, Khandar had become a very unpleasant place for anyone wearing a blue uniform, and Marcus had been living right at the edge of collapse, his mouth dry and his stomach awash in bile. There was something surreal about the idea that in a few minutes he was going to become a subordinate again. Hand over the command of the regiment to some total stranger, his responsibilities reduced to carrying out whatever orders he was given. It was an unbelievably attractive thought. The new man might screw things up, of course-he probably would, if Marcus’ experience with colonels was any guide-but whatever happened, up to and including the entire regiment being massacred by screaming Redeemer fanatics, it would not be his, Marcus’, fault. He’d be able to turn up for heavenly judgment and say, “Well, you can’t blame me. I had orders!”

He wondered if that carried any weight with the Almighty. It was something to tell the Ministry of War and the Concordat, at any rate, and that was probably more important. Of the two, the Almighty was a good deal less frightening. The Lord, in his infinite mercy, might forgive a soldier who strayed from the path, but the Last Duke certainly would not.

Fitz was saying something, which Marcus had missed entirely. His sleep lately was not what it ought to have been.

“What was that?” he said.

The lieutenant, well aware of his chief’s condition, repeated himself patiently. “I said that the troops are almost all ashore. No cavalry, which is a pity, but he’s brought us at least two batteries. Captain Kaanos is sending the companies up the bluff road one at a time.”

“Will there be room for everybody inside the walls?”

Fitz nodded. “I wouldn’t want to stand a siege, but we’ll be all right for a few days.”

This last was something of a joke. Fort Valor itself was a joke, actually. Like a strong lock on a flimsy door, it was effective only as long as the intruder remained polite. It had been built in the days when the most dangerous threat to a fortress was a catapult, or maybe a battering ram. Its walls were high and unsloping, built of hard native limestone that would crumble like a soft cheese once the iron cannonballs started in on it. They wouldn’t even need a siege train-you could take the place with a battery of field guns, especially since there was no way for the defenders to emplace their artillery to shoot back.

Fortunately, no siege seemed to be in the offing. The Vordanai regiment had scuttled away from Ashe-Katarion, the prince’s former capital, and as long as they looked like they were leaving, the Redeemers had been content to watch them go. Still, Marcus had bitten his fingernails to the quick during the weeks of waiting for the fleet to arrive.

“Well,” Marcus said, “I suppose we’d better go meet him.”

The lieutenant gave a delicate cough. Marcus had been with him long enough to recognize Fitz-speak for “You’re about to do something very stupid and/or embarrassing, sir.” He cast about the room, then down at himself, and got it. He was not, technically, in uniform-his shirt and trousers were close to regulation blue, but both were of Khandarai make, the cheap Vordanai standard issue having faded or torn long ago. He sighed.

“Dress blues?” he said.

“It would certainly be customary, sir.”

“Right.” Marcus got to his feet, wincing as cramped muscles protested. “I’ll go change. You keep watch-if the colonel gets here, stall him.”

“Yes, sir.”

If only, Marcus thought, watching the lieutenant glide out, I could just leave this colonel entirely to Fitz. The young man seemed to have a knack for that sort of thing.

• • •

The dress uniform included a dress sword, which Marcus hadn’t worn since his graduation from the War College. The weight on one hip made him feel lopsided, and the sheath sticking out behind him was a serious threat to anyone standing nearby when he forgot about it and turned around quickly. After five years at the bottom of a trunk, the uniform itself seemed bluer than he remembered. He’d also run a comb through his hair, for the look of the thing, and scrubbed perfunctorily at his face with a tag end of soap.

“Why, Senior Captain,” Adrecht said, coming through the tent flap. “How dapper. You should dress up more often.”

Marcus lost his grip on one of the dress uniform’s myriad brass buttons and swore. Adrecht laughed.

“If you want to make yourself useful,” Marcus growled, “you might help me.”

“Of course, sir,” Adrecht said. “Anything to be of service.”

References to Marcus’ rank or seniority from Captain Adrecht Roston were invariably mocking. He had been at the War College with Marcus, and was the “junior” by a total of seven minutes, that being the length of time that had separated the calling of the names “d’Ivoire” and “Roston” at the graduation ceremony. It had been something of a joke between them until Ben Warus had died, when that seven minutes meant that-to Adrecht’s considerable relief-command of the Colonials settled on Marcus’ shoulders instead of his.

Adrecht was a tall man, with a hawk nose and a thin, clean-shaven face. Since his graduation from the War College, he’d worn his dark curls fashionably loose. Keen, intelligent blue eyes and a slight curve of lip gave the impression that he was forever on the edge of a sarcastic smirk.

He commanded the Fourth Battalion, at the opposite end of the marching order from Marcus’ First. He and his fellow battalion commanders, Val and Mor, along with the late Ben Warus and his brother, had been Marcus’ official family ever since he’d arrived in Khandar. The only family, in fact, that he had left.