K Parker - Devices and Desires

Miel clicked his tongue. 'Forget about it,' he said.

'And your face.'

'Forget about that too.' Miel's voice tensed up just a little, nonetheless. 'It was pretty comical, actually. Ducked out of the way of one of those bolt things, tripped over my feet, laid myself open on a sharp edge. Of course I'll tell all the girlies it was hand-to-hand combat with the Mezentine champion.'

'You were standing over the crumpled body of the Duke,' Orsea said. 'Outnumbered five to one-'

'Seven.'

'You're quite right, seven to one; and they were all in full armour, and you'd lost your sword, so all you had was a tent-peg-'

'A broken tent-peg, please.'

'Naturally' Orsea sighed. Actually, that's not so far from the truth. In fact, what you did was rather more important. You see, I wouldn't have been able to-'

'Balls.' He heard Miel shift; he was standing up, presumably. A leader's work is never done. 'The doctor says you need to rest. I said, it's what he's best at. Try not to die in the night.'

Orsea pulled a grim face. 'Just to spite you, I will,' he said, 'and then you'll be left with all my messes to sort out on your own.'

Miel frowned at him. 'That joke's still funny this time,' he said, 'but next time it'll just be self-indulgent. While you're in here with nothing to do, you can think of a new one.'

'Seriously.' Orsea looked at his friend. 'I feel really bad about it, you being landed with all of this.'

Miel shrugged. 'It's my job,' he said.

'At least get someone to help you. What about Cordea? He's not the sharpest arrow in the quiver, but he's smarter than me-'He stopped. Miel had turned away, just for a moment.

'Oh,' Orsea said.

'Sorry,' Miel replied. 'My fault, I'd assumed they'd have told you. Blood poisoning, apparently.'

'I see.' For a moment, Orsea couldn't think; it was as though his mind was completely empty. He ought to say something, but he couldn't remember any suitable words. Miel shook his head.

'Get some sleep,' he said. 'It's the most useful thing you can do.'

'Sleep?' Orsea laughed. 'Sorry, but I don't think I can.'

But he could; and the next thing he saw was bright daylight through the open tent-flap, and the doctor prodding his leg with his finger.

'You're lucky,' the doctor said, 'no infection, and it's scarring up nicely. Mind you,' he added, with a kind of grim zest, 'one wrong move and it'll burst open again, and next time you may not be so fortunate. Try and keep your weight off it for now.'

'Thanks,' Orsea replied through a mouthful of sleep, 'but I've got an army to move up the mountain, so I don't-'

'No you haven't. Miel Ducas is handling all that.' He made it sound like the arrangements for a dance. 'You can help best by staying put and not causing any trouble.'

'Fine. Don't let me keep you.'

The doctor grinned. 'I was all finished anyway. I'll look at it again this evening. Remember, nothing energetic. They've put together a litter to carry you.'

The doctor left before he could argue, which was annoying. He wanted to protest; how could he let himself be carried about on a litter when there were wounded men-seriously wounded men-who were going to have to hobble and crawl, and who might well not make it all the way? But, as the tent-flap dropped shut behind the doctor's back, he realised it was pointless. They wouldn't allow it, because he was the Duke and he wasn't allowed to die of impatience and nobility of spirit. If he tried to dismiss the litter-bearers and walk up the mountain, it'd only lead to fuss and delay while Miel and the others told him not to be so bloody stupid; if he protested, he wouldn't impress the doctor, and nobody else would be listening to him. With a sigh, he decided to reclassify himself as a cumbersome but necessary piece of luggage. The galling thing, of course, was that they could manage perfectly well without him; better, probably. After all, he was the one who'd got them all into this appalling situation.

They came and dismantled the tent around him; brisk, efficient men in muddy clothes who seemed to have the knack of not seeing him. They left him on his pile of cushions and sacks under a clear blue sky, in a landscape crowded with activity. He watched them loading the carts with folded tents, barrels, sacks, unused arrows still in their sheaves, boxes of boots, belts and spare side-plates for helmets, trestle tables and wounded men. Finally his litter came. Two Guards captains hauled him on to it; the porters lifted it on their shoulders like a coffin, and joined the queue of slow-moving baggage threading its way on to the narrow path. From his raised and lordly position he could see a long way over the heads of his people (wasn't there an old saying about that, how we're all dwarves on the shoulders of giants; we're lesser men than our fathers, but because we inherit their wisdom and experience, we can see further). First he looked back in case there were any signs of pursuit. It was impossible to make out much on the featureless plain, but he convinced himself he could see the battlefield and the thorn hedge. The grey blur in the air; would that be a huge flock of crows picking at the dead, or smoke from fires where the tidy Mezentines were burning up the litter? He could see the heads of the army, flashes of light on helmets that were beginning to rust, since nobody could be bothered with scouring them down with sand twice a day. On the way out they'd marched in ranks and files, smart and neat as the hedges round formal gardens. Now they trudged in knots and bunches, and the gaps between each group looked like bald patches in a frayed coat.

(Invade Mezentia, they'd told him; clever men who'd chafed at the old Duke's timid caution, because they knew that the longer the job was left, the harder it would be. Attack them now, while there's still time. It's us or them; not aggression but simple, last-ditch self-defence. The old Duke had had the perfect excuse: the long, bitter, unwinnable war against their neighbours, which drained away every spare penny and every fit man. But that war was over now. They'd had to grin and bear painfully humiliating terms-land and water-rights and grazing-rights on the eastern mountains given away instead of fought over to the death-but it had been worth it because it made possible the pre-emptive strike against the real enemy, and thanks to the last fifty years of relentless campaigning and slaughter they had an army of hardened veterans who'd drive the Mezentine mercenaries into the sea. The alternative, biding still and quiet while the Republic strangled them to death at their leisure, was simply unthinkable. Besides, with an army of twenty-five thousand, how could he possibly lose?)

They were taking the Butter Pass up the mountain. Not through choice. They'd come down into the plain, five days ago, by way of the main cart-road, a relatively gentle gradient and firm going for the horses. But they were a whole day east, thanks to the fear of the Mezentine cavalry, and they didn't have enough water left to go round the foot of the mountain. The Butter Pass was a different proposition altogether. It was adequate for its purpose; once a month, hundreds of hill-farmers' sons trudged down it with yokes on their shoulders, each carrying a hundredweight of butter and cheese to the cluster of tents where the Mezentine buyers were waiting for them. Going back up the mountain, they had a much lighter load: a few copper pennies or a roll of cotton cloth (third or fourth quality), at most a keg of nails or a rake and a hoe. Taking an army up the Butter Pass was the sort of stupid thing you only did if you had to. It was slow going. To get the carts up without smashing wheels or shearing axles, they had to stop every fifty yards or so to shift boulders, fill in potholes, cut away the rock or improvise embankments to widen the path. Boulders too big to lever aside had to be split, with hammers and wedges or by lighting a fire to heat them up and then quenching them with buckets of precious, scarce water. It was a vast, thankless expenditure of effort and ingenuity-no praise or glory, just a sigh when the obstacle was circumvented and a grim shrug as the next one was addressed-and all Orsea could do was watch, as his bearers lowered him to the ground, glad of the excuse for a rest. It was all wrong; he should be paying off his debt by leading the way. In his mind's eye he saw himself, dusty and bathed in sweat, leaning on a crowbar or swinging a big hammer, exhausted but cheerful, first man to the job and last man off it, and everyone feeling better for knowing he was there with them-instead, he watched, as if this was all a demonstration by the corps of engineers, and he was sitting in a grandstand, waiting to award prizes. Miel Ducas was doing his job for him, and doing it very well. He thought about that, and felt ashamed.