Paul Thompson - The Middle of Nowhere

No longer the focus of attention, Ezu turned to go. Howland called out, “Master Ezu-a word, if you please.”

The genial traveler paused. “Yes?”

Howland waited until he was nose to nose before saying in guarded tones, “I wonder: Who are you? What are you up to?”

“I told you, Sir Howland. I’m a mere traveler.”

“But no ordinary man.”

Ezu bowed. “You’re very kind-”

Howland caught him by the arm. “How could you have these things? Kender spice candy? Brandy from Saifhum? A book of minotaur poetry? By my Oath, do not tell me these were souvenirs of your sojourns!”

“I can only tell you the truth, good Knight. This one has been to Saifhum, Mithas and Kothas, and Hylo where the kender dwell. All my little gifts tonight could have come from there to here with me.”

“ ‘Could have’?”

“A good juggler leaves his audience guessing, doesn’t he?”

Without any effort, Ezu freed himself from Howland’s grasp and walked away. The old warrior’s fingers closed on air. He blinked in astonishment.

“Ezu! Ezu, your prediction: What is it I shall get?” he cried.

Ezu’s voice drifted back, like the fading notes of his pipe: “Honor. Honor …” His silhouette merged with the black outline of the old well.

Howland ran a few yards after him. In the deep shadows away from the dying bonfire the flower-bedecked, horn-headed stranger was nowhere to be seen.

Work on the defenses came to an abrupt end the next day. The first gilded grains began to fall from the drooping barley stalks. All other considerations were ignored as the ageless signal was seen. It was time to harvest the crop. Amergin and Robien had to disable their many traps in the field. All other work stopped as the villagers devoted themselves to the task. Raika grumbled about the villagers abandoning their drills, but Howland was not displeased.

“It’s sound for them to harvest,” he said. “The food is needed, and it would look suspicious to Rakell’s scouts if they found the crop moldering in the fields. Surprise is still an important element of our success.”

“How can there be any surprise?” Khorr said. “Two of their men disappeared, thanks to Amergin and Robien, and you fought them at the watering ford. Surely Rakell knows armed strangers are in the area?”

“He may, but I’m counting on him not linking the incidents to Nowhere. He must lose men all the time to desertion and small, local skirmishes.”

While the farmers labored over their crop, Howland conducted a tour of their defenses. The trench barred the open end of the village. It was deep enough to stop any charge by mounted men, and the road leading to it was strewn with sharpened stakes and mounded earth. Khorr and thirteen villagers would defend the trench.

“You’ll be the first to fight,” Howland told the minotaur. “Rakell has no respect for the farmers, and the best way to break an enemy’s resistance is to crush them at their strongest point.”

“He will not pass,” vowed Khorr.

“That’s the spirit! Once he realizes your position is strong, he’ll turn away to spare his troops casualties.” Howland put the trench at his back and surveyed the rest of the village. “Next, he’ll try to filter his horsemen in between the houses.”

“And we’ll sting them from above with our whippiks!” cried Carver eagerly. “We’ve made over four hundred darts!”

“That’s good, but take some other missiles to the rooftops with you-stones, wood, baskets of dirt-anything weighty. Understand?”

The kender gave the Knight a sloppy salute.

“Carver and the children will punish them, though they won’t be stopped by youngsters with whippiks,” Howland went on. “The filled huts and disguised fences will confuse them, but if Rakell is any leader at all, they’ll eventually break through.”

“Next we meet them with our spearmen,” said Raika.

“Yes. Each of us will lead a band of villagers to counterattack any raiders who get through.”

“Where do you want me?” asked Robien.

Howland sighed. “With Hume gone, I will need a second-in-command. Will you take the job?”

No one objected, so Robien agreed.

“Stay by me, then. I may have to send you to the others with instructions from time to time.”

“How will it end, Sir Howland? When will we know we’ve won?” Raika asked.

Gripping his sword hilt, the Knight replied, “When there are no more enemies to kill.”

Two peaceful days passed, then three. The barley crop slowly accumulated by the threshing pits, where teams of farmers beat the brown stalks to liberate the grain. Women and old folks tied the battered straw into sheaves, which they returned to the fields in neat, orderly rows. Seeing the bundles of straw gave Howland an idea.

“Make some of the sheaves hollow,” he told Malek. “We can post lookouts inside them to keep watch for the bandits.” Grunting agreement, Malek did as Howland asked.

Since seeing his beloved at the stream, Malek had fallen into a black gloom. At first his brother Nils believed Malek was upset by seeing his bride in servitude, but Raika offered her opinion.

“He’s not sad. He’s furious,” she said sagely. “All he can think about now is burying his blade in Rakell’s chest!”

In four days, all the barley was cut. The formerly lush fields were now patches of stubble, dotted with standing sheaves. Green garden plots, once bounded on all sides by brown grain, now stood out like islands of fertility on the barren plain. The corn would stay green another four weeks, the beans and other small crops only two.

“It’s amazing Rakell hasn’t struck yet,” Howland mused. “How many days left of the thirty he mentioned until his return?”

“Today is the thirtieth day,” Caeta answered.

Howland gave swift orders. “No one is to leave the village alone, or travel more than an hour’s walk away. I don’t want the brigands picking up fresh prisoners they can interrogate.”

“That means no hunting,” Nils said. “No fresh meat.”

Howland was adamant. The enemy was due at any time, and they couldn’t afford to loose a single villager, either as a fighter or an informant.

Amergin, who came and went like a ghost, offered to go on an extended reconnaissance and restore his ring of traps. Howland agreed.

“Don’t get caught!” he said in jest. The idea that Rakell’s idle troopers could catch the elusive Kagonesti seemed ridiculous.

With a new sling made for him by Caeta and a sackful of stones and stars, Amergin slipped away.

The sun was setting. Farmers carried on their threshing by torchlight, and the womenfolk prepared special harvest cakes for everyone. Howland and his little troop sat in a half-circle by the village well, eating hot barley cakes smeared with wild honey and fresh butter.

Raika said, “If I ate like this every day, I wouldn’t mind the low pay!”

“If you ate like this every day, you’d be bigger than Khorr,” Carver quipped.

Raika aimed a kick at the kender, who scooted out of reach. When he made a few more unkind remarks about Raika’s increasing girth, she got up to give him a real blow.

She never delivered it. The half-eaten cake fell from her fingers.

“Hey, don’t waste good food!” Carver protested.

Raika pointed to the horizon. Howland jumped up, shading his eyes against the setting sun.

The low rise south of Nowhere was two miles distant, separated by fields stripped clean by the harvest. Sitting along the ridge were a line of horsemen. By the setting sun’s ruddy light, Howland could see the gleam of steel.

One of the village women saw the horsemen too and let out a shriek. People ran back and forth, snatching up children and dashing to their huts, only to remember they were filled to the rafters with earth.