Glen Cook - Shadow Games

“Singe me to a crisp in the fire of your enthusiasm. All right. But we won’t tell anybody till it’s time. And Jahamaraj Jah not at all. He’ll try harder if he don’t know help is coming.”

“All right.”

“Any other news from our seldom-seen friend?”

“No.”

“Who is that woman he’s dragging around?”

She hesitated a moment too long. “I don’t know.”

“Odd. Seems like I’ve seen her somewhere before. But I can’t place her.”

She shrugged. “After a while everybody gets to look like somebody you’ve seen before.”

“Who do I look like?”

She didn’t miss a beat. “Gastrar Telsar of Novok Debraken. The voice is different, but the heart could be the same. He moralized and debated with himself, too.”

How could I argue? I’d never heard of the guy.

“He moralized once too often. My husband had him flayed.”

“You think I moralized about Ghoj?”

“Yes. I think you put yourself through hell after the fact. A net gain. You’ve gotten smart enough to get them first and cry later.”

“I don’t think I want to play this game.”

“No. You wouldn’t. I need some of your time for tailors to take your measurements.”

“Say what? I got me a flashy uniform already.”

“Not like this one. This one is for boggling the minions of the Shadowmasters. Part of the showmanship.”

“Right. Whenever. I can work while I’m being measured. Is Shifter going to be there for the show at Ghoja?”

“We’ll find out the hard way. He didn’t say. I told you, he has his own agenda.”

“Wouldn’t mind having a peek at that. He give you one?”

“No. Mogaba is staging a mock battle between legions today. You going?”

“No. I’m going to be sucking up to the Radisha for more transport. I got the charcoal. Now I got to get it down there.”

She snorted. “Things were different in my time.”

“You had more power.”

“That’s true. I’ll send the tailors and fitters.”

I wondered what she had in mind... What? Did I see that? What was that? Did she shake her tail as she was going out? Damn me. My eyes must be starting to go.

Weekly assessment session. I asked Murgen, “How’s the bat situation?”

“What?” I had caught him from the blind side.

“You brought the bat problem up. I thought you were keeping track.”

“I haven’t seen any for a while.”

“Good. That means Goblin and One-Eye got the right people out of the way. From where I sit everything looks like it’s going smooth. Probably faster than we had reason to expect.” I’d had no individual complaints for a while. Lady had found time to help Otto and Hagop put the fear into their snooty horsemen. “Mogaba?”

“Twelve days left on the worst-case estimate. It’s time to put teams out to watch the river stages. Worst case might not be absolutely worst.”

“The Radisha is ahead of you. I talked to her yesterday. She’d just grabbed off half the post riders for that. Right now the river is running higher than expected. That may not mean anything. We’ll have plenty of weather yet.”

“Every day we get is another hundred men I can take into each legion.”

“Where are you at now?”

“Thirty-three hundred each. I’ll stop at four thousand. Be time to move out then, anyway.”

“Think five days is enough to get down there? That’s twenty miles a day for guys who aren’t used to it.”

“They’ll be used to it. They do ten a day with field pack now.”

“I’ll get out to look them over this week. Promise. I’ve got the political end pretty well whipped. Hagop. You guys going to be ready?”

“It’s coming together, Croaker. They’ve started to realize we mean it when we say we’re trying to show them how to stay alive.”

“It’s getting close enough that they have to think about it as more than a game. Big Bucket. How about you guys?”

“Get us fifty more wagons and we can roll tomorrow, Captain.”

“You look at the sketches of that town?”

“Yes sir.”

“How long to set it up?”

“Depends on materials. For the palisade. And manpower. Lot of trenching. The rest, no problem.”

“You’ll have the manpower. Sindawe’s bunch. They’ll go down with you and move on later, as our reserve. I’ll tell you, though, the resource situation is bleak. You’ll end up depending on the trench more than the palisade. Cletus. What about artillery?”

Cletus and his brothers grinned. They looked proud of themselves. “We got it. Six mobile engines for each legion, already built. We’re working the crews on them now.”

“Great. I want you to go down with the quartermasters and engineers and get a look at that town. Put some of the engines in there. Big Bucket, you guys better head out as soon as you can. The roads are going to be miserable. If you really need more wagons mooch them from the citizens. Be quicker than me trying to gouge them out of the Radisha. So. Can’t anybody come up with anything I can fuss myself about? You know I’m not happy unless I’m worrying.”

They looked at me blankly. Finally, Murgen blurted out, “We’re going to meet their ten thousand with our eight? Isn’t that worry enough? Sir?”

“Ten thousand?”

“That’s the rumor. That the Shadowmasters increased the invasion force.”

I glanced at Lady. She shrugged. I said, “We have unreliable intelligence to that effect. But we’ll be more than eight thousand with the cavalry. With Sindawe we’ll actually outnumber them. We’ll have the field position. And I have a trick or two up my sleeve.”

“That charcoal?” Mogaba asked.

“Among other things.”

“You won’t tell us?”

“Nope. Word has a way of getting around. If nobody but me knows I can’t blame anybody but me if the other side finds out.”

Mogaba smiled. He understood me too well. I just wanted to keep it for myself.

We commanders are that way, sometimes.

My predecessors never told anybody anything till it was time to jump.

Afterward, I asked Lady, “What do you think?”

“I think they’re going to know they were in a fight. I still have grave doubts about winning, but maybe you’re a better captain than you want to admit. You put every man where he can do the most good.”

“Or least harm.” Wheezer and Hagop’s nephew still had not shown me they were good for anything.

Seven days till deadline. The quartermasters and engineers and Sindawe’s reserve legion were two days gone. Incoming post riders reported their progress as disappointing. The roads were hopeless. But they were getting help from people along the way. In places the troops and locals backpacked the freight while the teams dragged the empty wagons through the mud.

We were going to get some grace. We were still getting drizzle when that should have ended a week ago. Reports had the fords way too high to cross. The watchers guessed we had at least five extra days.

I told Mogaba, who needed time more than anyone else. He grumbled that his main accomplishment to date was that he had taught his troops to march in straight lines.

I thought that was the critical lesson. If they could maintain order on the battlefield...

I was not comfortable with the gift of time. As each day perished in turn, and I had more reports of the trouble the advance party was having, I grew ever more antsy.

Two days before our originally planned departure I summoned Mogaba. “Have you relaxed any because of the extra time?”

“No.”

“Not easing up at all?”

“No. If we leave five days later, they’ll be five days more prepared.”

“Good.” I leaned back in my chair.

“You’re troubled.”