Paul Thompson - The Middle of Nowhere

All morning Raika stormed up and down, waving her hands and shouting at anyone out of place. When she finally let her inept troops rest, Raika went to the well to rinse dust and disgust from her mouth. Robien sat there, watching the maneuvers. He perched on the surrounding wall, feet dangling on either side of the Ancestor. The lower half of the broken sandstone block had almost changed from red to blue, owing to the stain spreading down from the crack.

“Traps all laid?” she said, dropping the bucket into the cool, stone-lined shaft.

“Not all,” replied the elf. “Some must be done after dark.”

She hauled on the rope to bring the bucket back up. “Why after dark?”

“Some of the triggers must be set in darkness. After they’re in place, a single miscast shadow can set them off.”

The Saifhumi woman regarded him skeptically. Unlike most mainlanders, she had never stood in awe of elves. All the ones she ever met were clever and cultured, but they didn’t seem any wiser than anyone else.

“Your troops are shaping up,” Robien said politely.

“Shaping up to be killed.” Raika hoisted the full bucket over her head and dumped the water over her. She spat grit, and added, “They don’t stand together, they don’t think together, and they don’t fight together. The bandits will have them for supper.”

“Maybe you’re not going about it the right way.”

“Oh? How would you train these yokels?”

“Having them run around charging is pointless. Not one of them has the fortitude to attack mounted men. That’s as well. All they need to do is defend, not attack.”

“I had no idea you were such a general,” Raika said, wiping her face with her turban.

“I’ve lived a long time and done many things. Many years ago, I was a soldier.”

Raika slouched against the well wall. “Then you teach them, master!”

Robien did not reply but strolled out into the hot sun. Raika’s villagers were marching in circles inside the row of houses, shoulder to shoulder. Robien stood in front of them and waited. When the farmers came abreast of him, he held up a hand to stop them.

“Hold,” he said mildly. He took the spear from the nearest man, Malek’s cousin Fayn. He was a rangy fellow five years’ Malek’s senior, with rusty red hair all over his body and a multitude of freckles.

“Any of you ever speared a man before?”

The farmers shook their heads.

“How about a horse?”

No again.

Robien nodded. “Follow me,” he said.

They looked to their nominal commander for guidance. Raika shrugged and waved them away. Let the elf drill the fools if he wants, her gestures seemed to say.

Robien shouldered the borrowed spear and led the farmers to a gap between two of the houses. Both huts had been filled with dirt, and the rattan fence between them, meant only to keep chickens out of the root cellars beneath each house, had been reinforced with concealed piles of cordwood and stones. It was no real impediment to a determined attacker, but the strength of the fence would certainly surprise and perhaps unhorse unwary riders.

“Here,” said Robien, halting. “Five of you defending this gap ought to be able to hold off any number of horsemen.”

“How?” asked Fayn.

Robien took the three biggest men and arrayed them between the huts. Two women knelt between them, spears braced against their feet.

“You must keep your nerve above all,” Robien told them. “If you break, the riders will slaughter you, but if you hold your line and keep points out, the enemy will turn away, I promise.”

One of the women laughed nervously. “Why should they break before us?”

“No one wants to get speared,” Robien replied dryly. “They’ll ride at you, screaming dire threats, but they won’t charge home. What they really want is to scare you into running.”

Robien held out his arms. The huts were far enough apart that he couldn’t quite touch them.

“Only one horse can get through here at a time,” he said. “Two, in a pinch. If you see two or more riders bearing down on you, stand fast! They’ll turn away or else collide trying to fit between the houses. When they do, you’ll have them.”

A shower of short arrows fell on Robien and the farmers, followed by gales of childish laughter. The elf picked up one of the missiles. It was blunt and fletched with stiff green leaves.

“You must also beware of enemy archers,” the bounty hunter said.

More laughter from above, and Carver appeared on the roof of the left-hand hut, surrounded by a gang of scruffy, bright-eyed children.

“You are all victims of the Nowhere Whippik Corps!” Carver said.

“I hope you’ll use sharper ones on the raiders,” Robien replied.

“To be sure! They’re being made even now.”

Robien nodded. “It is a sound tactic to put missile-throwers on the high ground.”

Thinking of missile-throwers reminded him of Amergin, his sling-toting quarry.

“Has anyone seen Amergin today?”

“Not since he left with you this morning,” said Fayn.

“He was supposed to be laying traps in the northeast approaches,” Robien mused. “I wonder if he’s come back?” He dismissed the farmers and made for the west end of the village where Khorr and some men still labored hard on the trench.

The open end of Nowhere was abuzz with activity. Outside the growing trench, pairs of village men and women pounded heavy stakes into the ground. Good-sized trees were hard to come by on the high plains, so these stakes were rafters or center posts taken from their houses. Once the posts were driven in half their length, a farmer with a hatchet whittled the ends to a formidable point.

Behind the row of stakes, the trench cut into the soil like a fresh wound. Beneath the yellow topsoil was clay, thick gray earth too heavy in which to grow crops. Elderly villagers hauled the clay away in baskets to fill emptied houses. The trench already stretched across the open end of Nowhere. Now Khorr and his diggers were hurrying to deepen it.

The minotaur made a tremendous impression as he stood hip deep in the earth, his broad shoulders sheened with sweat, his naturally bronze skin gone copper in the hot sun. He’d broken two ordinary mattocks before Wilf made him a tool worthy of his size, lashing three ordinary handles to the only iron-headed pick in the village.

Robien stood to one side, keeping clear of the urgent bustle. He called out to Khorr.

The sweat-soaked poet leaned on his implement and palmed his face dry with a colorful kerchief.

“What is it?”

“Have you seen Amergin?”

“Not since yesterday. Is he missing?”

Robien felt his jaw tighten. “No. I just need to find him.”

“Perhaps you should engage the services of a good tracker!”

The minotaur was wittier than he looked. Robien ruefully waved his thanks. Khorr called for water and downed an entire bucket fetched by two village women. The bounty hunter moved on.

He crossed on a plank laid over the open trench and slipped between the slanting stakes. From there he looked back over the entire village. Carver and the children clambered over the thatched rooftops, launching blunt darts at each other. Raika’s hoarse shouting rose over the cloud of dust where her spearmen were still drilling. Sir Howland and Hume were out on reconnaissance. The strange Ezu had spent the past two days collecting rocks and plants from the countryside, but it was unclear if he was doing anything of real value. Khorr slaved away, digging by day and reciting minotaur epics to his crew at night.

That left the missing Amergin. Robien didn’t believe his fellow Kagonesti would have run away. Howland’s odd company had gotten Amergin out of Robann, and saved him from the Brotherhood of Quen. He would not abandon those to whom he owed a debt. So where was he?