Glen Cook: Shadow Games

He was doing nothing apparent. Goblin was busy, too.

“What if they don’t come?” Murgen asked.

“Then we guessed wrong. They’re not bandits. I’ll send them an apology on the wind.”

Nothing got said for a while. When next I moved forward to check the road One-Eye was no longer alone. A half-dozen horsemen backed him. My heart twisted. His phantoms were all men I had known, old comrades, long dead.

I retreated, more shaken than I had expected. My emotional state did not improve. Sunlight dropped through the forest canopy to dapple the doubles of more dead friends. They waited with shields and weapons ready, silently, as befit ghosts.

They were not ghosts, really, except in my mind. They were illusions crafted by One-Eye. Across the road Goblin was raising his own shadow legion.

Given time to work, those two were quite the artists.

There was no doubt, now, even who Lady was.

“Hoofbeats,” I said, needlessly. “They’re coming.”

My stomach turned over. Had I bet to an inside straight? Taken too long a shot? If they chose to fight... If Goblin or One-Eye faltered...

“Too late for debate, Croaker.”

I looked at Lady, a glowing memory of what she had been. She was smiling. She knew my mind. How many times had she been there herself, albeit on a grander game board?

The brigands pounded down the aisle formed by the road. And reined in in confusion when they saw One-Eye awaiting them.

I started forward. All through the woods ghost horses moved with me. There was harness noise, brush noise. Nice touch, One-Eye. What you call verisimilitude.

There were twenty-five bandits. They wore ghastly expressions. Their faces went paler still when they spied Lady, when they saw the specter-banner on Murgen’s lance.

The Black Company was pretty well known.

Two hundred ghost bows bent. Fifty hands tried to find some sky-belly to grab. “I suggest you dismount and disarm,” I told their captain. He gulped air a few times, considered the odds, did as directed. “Now clear away from the horses. You naughty boys.”

They moved. Lady made a gesture. The horses all turned and trotted toward Goblin, who was their real motivator. He let the animals pass. They would return to the inn, to proclaim the terror ended.

Slick. Oh, slick. Not even a hangnail. That was the way we did it in the old days. Maneuver and trickery. Why get yourself hurt if you can whip them with a shuffle and con?

We got the prisoners into a rope come where they could be adequately controlled, then headed south. The brigands were greatly exercised when Goblin and One-Eye relaxed. They didn’t think it was fair of us.

Two days later we reached Vest. With One-Eye and Goblin again supporting her grand illusion, Lady remanded the deserters to the justice of the garrison commander. We only had to kill two of them to get them there.

Something of a distraction along the road. Now there was none, and Charm drew closer by the hour. I had to face the fact that trouble beckoned.

The bulk of the Annals, which my companions believed to be in my possession, remained in Imperial hands. They had been captured at Queen’s Bridge, an old defeat that still stings. I was promised their return shortly before the crisis in the Barrowland. But that crisis prevented their delivery. Afterward, there was nothing to do but go fetch them myself.

Willow scrunched a little more comfortably into his chair. The girls giggled and dared one another to touch his cornsilk hair. The one with the most promising eyes reached, ran her fingers down its length. Willow looked across the room, winked at Cordy Mather.

This was the life-till their fathers and brothers got wise. This was every man’s dream-with the same old lethal risks a-sneaking. If it kept on, and did not catch up, he’d soon weigh four hundred pounds and be the happiest slug in Taglios.

Who would have thought it? A simple tavern in a straitlaced burg like this. A hole in the wall like those that graced every other street corner back home, here such a novelty they couldn’t help getting rich. If the priests didn’t get over their inertia and shove a stick into the spokes.

Of course, it helped them being exotic outlanders that the whole city wanted to see. Even those priests. And their little chickies. Especially their little brown daughters.

A long, insane journey getting here, but worth every dreadful step now.

He folded his hands upon his chest and let the girls take what liberties they wanted. He could handle it. He could put up with it.

He watched Cordy tap another barrel of the bitter, third-rate green beer he’d brewed. These Taglian fools paid three times what it was worth. What kind of a place never ran into beer before? Hell. The kind of place guys with no special talents and itchy feet dream of finding.

Cordy brought a mug over. He said, “Swan, this keeps on, we’re going to have to hire somebody to help me brew. We’re going to be tapped out in a couple days.”

“Why worry? How long can it last? Those priest characters are starting to smolder now. They’re going to start looking for some excuse to shut us down. Worry about finding another racket as sweet, not about making more beer faster. What?”

“What do you mean, what?”

“You got a grim look all of a sudden.”

“The blackbird of doom just walked in the front door.”

Willow twisted so he could see that end of the room. Sure enough, Blade had come home. Tall, lean, ebony, head shaved to a polish, muscles rippling with the slightest movement, he looked like some kind of gleaming statue. He looked around without approval. Then he strode to Willow’s table, took a seat. The girls gave him the eye. He was as exotic as Willow Swan.

“Come to collect your share and tell us how lousy we are, corrupting these children?” Willow asked.

Blade shook his head. “That old spook Smoke’s having dreams again. The Woman wants you.”

“Shit.” Swan dropped his feet to the floor. Here was the fly in the ointment. The Woman wouldn’t leave them alone. “What is it this time? What’s he doing? Hemp?”

“He’s a wizard. He don’t need to do nothing to get obnoxious.”

“Shit,” Swan said again. “What do you think, we just do a fade-out here? Sell the rest of Cordy’s rat piss and head back up the river?”

A big, slow grin spread across Blade’s face. “Too late, boy. You been chosen. You can’t run fast enough. That

Smoke, he might be a joke if he was to open shop up where you came from, but around here he’s the bad boss spook pusher. You try to head out, you’re going to find your toes tied in knots.”

“That the official word?”

“They didn’t say it that way. That’s what they meant.”

“So what did he dream this time? Why drag us in?”

“Shadowmasters. More Shadowmasters. Been a big meet at Shadowcatch, he says. They’re going to stop talking and start doing. He says Moonshadow got the call. Says we’ll be seeing them in Taglian territory real soon now.”

“Big deal. Been trying to sell us that since the day we got here, practically.”

Blade’s face lost all its humor. “It was different this time, man. There’s scared and scared, you know what I mean? And Smoke and the Woman was the second kind this time. And it ain’t just Shadowmasters they got on the brain now. Said to tell you the Black Company is coming. Said you’d know what that means.”

Swan grunted as if hit in the stomach. He stood, drained the beer Cordy had brought, looked around as if unable to believe what he saw. “Damned-foolest thing I ever heard, Blade. The Black Company? Coming here?”

“Said that’s what’s got the Shadowmasters riled, Willow. Said they’re rattled good. This’s the last free country north of them, under the river. And you know what’s on the other side of Shadowcatch.”