L. Modesitt - Mage-Guard of Hamor

Taryl had commandeered a corner of the public room and was talking to Commander Muyr. He looked up as Rahl entered. "Rahl… if you'd wait outside, the commander will let you know when we're done."

"Yes, ser." Rahl stepped back and glanced around the foyer outside the public room. There was not even a bench to sit upon, and the space felt uncomfortably warm, perhaps because he was wearing his riding jacket. Besides, waiting there might give the impression he was eavesdropping.

After a moment, he crossed the foyer and pushed open the door to the side porch. Once outside, he took the bench on the right end, the one farthest from the street and closest to the spice garden-as well as across the yard from the inn stable. As he sat there, letting his order-senses gather in impressions, he gained an increasing sense of the two Triads approaching. Could he observe them without being seen or detected… or at least without their realizing what he was attempting?

He tightened his shields and let a certain concern about scouting and what might lie ahead in Sastak swirl about above them. He added a worry about having to wait to meet with Taryl. Before long, Dhoryk and Fieryn strolled beyond the board fence on the back side of the spice garden, heading toward the stable.

Both held firm shields, but Rahl gained impressions of amusement, supreme self-confidence, and concern. He felt that the concern was focused on Taryl, but he had no way of actually determining that, and that feeling might well have been what he thought the concern might be, rather than what it was.

As the two reached the end of the board fence and began to cross the stable yard, Dhoryk's eyes flicked back to Rahl and the porch, but Rahl ignored the glance, as if his thoughts were elsewhere. Then the faintest of order-chaos probes touched him, and he ignored it, letting Dhoryk take in his worries about scouting and about why Taryl was making him wait. After several moments, the probe vanished.

Rahl let his order-abilities extend the sharpness of his hearing.

"He's more worried about Taryl than anything. Not all that many other thoughts in that head…"

"More than you might think, Dhoryk. Taryl has little patience for ignorance or incompetence."

"He's a more-than-competent scout and city mage-guard, and that makes him better than most mage-guards in this force-except for our assistants, of course."

"How could it be otherwise?"

"It could have been," Dhoryk replied, "if Taryl had cared more about himself."

"We're fortunate he didn't, but there's little point in speculating on what might have been…"

At that point, the two Triads had walked beyond Rahl's order-ability to catch their words.

If Taryl had cared more about himself? More about himself than what? The Emperor? The Empress? Hamor?

Behind and to Rahl's left, the door to the inn opened, and Commander Muyr leaned out. "The overcommander is ready to see you, Majer."

"Thank you, Commander." Rahl stood and headed for the inn doorway and the day's scouting assignment, not that it would vary much until they were closer to Sastak-and that was still at least three days away, according to his calculations.

Scouts! Halt!" Just before midmorning on twoday, Rahl's order boomed out from the low crest of the main road that led to the port city of Sastak. He had just reined up, taking in the long ridge ahead and to the left of the road.

He and Third Company had left the marshy lands surrounding the town of Taskyl immediately after morning muster, heading south. They didn't have that far to go, given that Taskyl lay less than ten kays due north of the outskirts of Sastak, and that he'd just passed the kaystone that indicated the edge of the city was but five kays farther to the south. Until just a few moments before, Rahl had not seen or sensed any rebels, although he and the scouts had discovered that, until two days before, the rebels had been commandeering rice from the warehouses in Taskyl as well as other provisions from the holders within fifteen kays of Sastak.

A kay or so to the south, the long ridge ran from the northeast to the southwest, its flattened top a good sixty cubits above the drained rice paddies that stretched along the eastern side of the road for almost two kays and ended directly below the ridge. A grassy slope less than two hundred cubits wide ran from the far side of the drainage ditch bordering the road up to the top of the ridge, a distance of perhaps four hundred cubits. Rahl estimated that the ridge extended a good kay from the top of the grassy approach to a similar slope on the southeastern end. A third of a kay to the southeast, Rahl could make out what clearly had been a narrow watercourse, where some of the exposed stone was damp.

He shook his head. Of course, the rebels had dammed the stream, doubtless from a spring. That might have been another reason for choosing that ridge.

What was of greater concern to him was the sense of hundreds, if not thousands, of rebels located on the ridgetop-that and the three-cubit-high stone-and-earth wall across the top of the grassy slope. He could also sense at least two chaos-mages near the earthworks. Yet the road below and northwest of the earthworks was not barricaded or blocked in any way, although a strong chaos-mage could certainly have splashed a firebolt on anyone using the road.

As he waited for Drakeyt to join him, Rahl surveyed the area to the west of the road, but so far as he could tell, it consisted mainly of scores of rice paddies, many of which had been planted and refilled, and all of which were separated by dikes anchored by trees of a kind whose leaves never shriveled into silver-gray for the winter. He thought he could see the glint of sunlight off the ocean ahead and to his right, but it might have been the sun reflecting off more rice paddies.

Before long, Drakeyt reined up beside Rahl. "I see that they're dug in up there, some of them anyway."

"Close to a thousand, but it could be more." Rahl pointed. "I'd guess that they can reinforce the position from the far end there. I'll have to ride along one of those paddy dikes to get close enough to see about that."

"You'll take a squad with you?"

"It might not be a bad idea. Could you send Quelsyn or a squad leader to look over the paddies to the west? We don't need to find that there's a hidden road there."

"Like Thalye?"

Rahl nodded.

"Lyrn's pretty solid, and he's familiar with wetland growing. I'll send out fifth squad." Drakeyt glanced back at the ridge. "What do you think about the earthworks, Majer?"

"They've fortified the approach, and probably the one at the other end, but it's not as strong as the barricades at Nubyat. Stronger than what they had at Selyma. The north side above the paddies is too steep for a horse and too exposed for troopers on foot-unless we could attack along the entire perimeter, and I don't think we have enough troopers for that, especially if they have more than a few chaos-mages."

"I don't like this," murmured the captain.

Rahl didn't either. They'd seen no opposition for nearly two eight-days, and now they faced a fortified position that didn't even block the main road into Sastak. To Rahl, that suggested great confidence by the rebels. Had the whole campaign just been designed to lure the Imperial forces to this particular battle, well out of the way? Was something else going on in another part of Hamor?

"After I look over the southeastern end of the ridge, I'll see what else is down there. I'd appreciate it if you'd find out what you can from any of the growers around-if you can find any."

"We'll see what we can do." Drakeyt paused. "I trust you'll be careful, Majer?"

"As I can," Rahl replied.

Rahl didn't have to wait long after Drakeyt rode back to the main body of Third Company before Dhosyn and first squad rode forward to join Rahl.