The Crimson Campaign(The Powder Mage Trilogy)(34)

This was a great risk he was taking, but he had no other choice if he wanted to free Borbador  –  and then Faye.

"I need Privileged Borbador," Adamat said.

"Pardon?" Verundish was just turning to go. She stopped and looked back at him.

"I need you to free him."

Verundish cleared her throat. "That's not happening, Inspector."

"Name your price. Field Marshal Tamas is dead. Let Bo go and you and your men can join the defensive at Surkov's Alley. Or leave the country. That might be the best idea, with what I've heard from the front."

"That"  –  her words were angry, clipped  –  "is treason."

"Please," Adamat said. "Privileged Borbador is my only chance to save my wife  –  maybe even to save this country. Free, he's of value. Under guard, he just ties up you and your men."

"You should go now, Inspector," Verundish said.

Adamat let out a small sigh. He'd half expected her to arrest him right then and there. He should be glad she was letting him go.

"Inspector."

He paused. "Yes?"

"Seventy-five thousand krana. Banknotes. You have a week."





CHAPTER




16




Taniel walked among the corpses on the battlefield and wondered how many had died that day.

A few hundred? A few thousand?

Surgeons, thieves, the families of soldiers  –  they all picked their way among the bodies, finding the wounded first and getting them back to their respective armies before bothering to stack the dead into carts like so much firewood, then taking them to be buried in mass graves.

There were always far more wounded than dead. That's how it always was, even when sorcery was involved. At least, that's how it was immediately after a battle. Over the next week well over half of the wounded would die. Even more would end up crippled for life.

He'd picked a horrid profession, Taniel reflected.

Well. Not so much "picked." There's no picking your profession when Tamas is your father. Taniel couldn't think of a time when he didn't want to be a soldier. Vlora, the girl he'd thought was the love of his life, wanted to be a soldier, too. So Taniel had gone along with his father's wishes and trained to be a powder mage. It was the only life he'd ever known.

And now Tamas, Vlora, Sabon, and everyone else who'd ever influenced Taniel in his youth were all dead and gone.

Taniel tried to shake the weight of that thought from his shoulders and kept walking.

Soldiers weren't supposed to come onto the battlefield after a skirmish like this. The temporary truce after each battle that allowed either side to collect their own dead and wounded was tentative enough without armed, hot-tempered men taking to the field.

That didn't stop some of them from coming. Taniel watched a fistfight break out between a sobbing Kez soldier and a wounded Adran sergeant. It was put down quickly by both Kez and Adran provosts, and the offending parties hauled off.

"How long do you usually stay out here?" Taniel asked.

Ka-poel knelt beside the dead body of an Adran soldier. She looked up at him briefly before lifting the dead man's left hand and using her long needle to pick something out of the man's chewed fingernails. What was it? Hair from a Kez officer? Blood of someone still alive? Only she knew.

Taniel didn't really expect an answer. She'd been less than communicative lately, even for her.

She moved to the next body. Taniel followed, watching as she cut a bit of bloody shirt off a dead Kez officer.

Taniel had left his jacket and weapons back at camp. No need for anyone to know he was out here. Regardless, some of the Adran surgeons gave him respectful nods. Others a respectful distance.

He lifted his eyes to the Kez camp. Where was Kresimir? he wondered, a little thrill of fear working up his spine. The god was lying low. Unseen. Even when Taniel opened his third eye, there was no sign of the overwhelming glow of power that should surround a god.
 
 

 

At this point, Taniel worried more about being killed by the Kez than about falling into the god's hands.

The Kez marched forward every day. Sometimes only a few hundred feet. Other times as much as a quarter mile, but always a little closer to Adopest. Eventually the valley would open up into the Adran basin and the Kez would use their hugely superior numbers to surround the Adran army and strike at several cities at once. They'd ravage the countryside, and Adro would be forced to capitulate.

What would Tamas have done?

Bah. Tamas would have held the damned line. That's all the Adran army needed to do: keep from losing their front every damned day.

All Taniel could do was fight. He couldn't keep the generals from sounding a retreat, even when he felt the Kez about to break and run. He couldn't hold the whole thing by himself.

"That stuff you gather," Taniel asked as Ka-poel rose to her feet, "is it just from men who are alive?"

She nodded, depositing something into one of the tiny leather bags in her satchel.

Even the living left a bit of themselves behind on the battlefield. Blood, hair, nails. Sometimes a finger or bit of skin. Ka-poel gathered it all up and stored it for later.

Taniel jumped a little at the sudden crack of a musket, but it was just the sound of a provost shooting a looter. He licked his lips and looked at the Kez camp again. What if Kresimir was out here, walking among the dead? What if he saw Taniel? Knew who he was? What he'd done?

"I'm going back to camp," Taniel said. He looked over his shoulder several times on the long walk back, watching Ka-poel continue to pick her way among the bodies.

Dinner was being served as Taniel worked his way through the camp. Quartermasters were returning to their companies with rations of meat, kettles of soup, loaves of bread. Far better fare than soldiers usually saw on the battlefield. Taniel could smell the food, making his mouth water. This chef, Mihali, god or not, created incredible dishes. Taniel didn't know that bread could have the swirls of flavor and buttery softness that this stuff did.

Taniel stopped at his room. General Hilanska had found him a shed to bed down in. It wasn't much, but it was private. He snatched his jacket, slipping a few powder charges into his pocket, then hesitated at his belt. He should be able to wander his own camp without fear, but something told him to go armed. Perhaps just paranoia. Or maybe it was the idea that General Ket's provosts were still looking for him. Why they'd not found him yet was anyone's guess.

Taniel buckled the belt, with two pistols, around his waist.

He'd only taken a few steps from his tent when a soldier accosted him.

"Sir!"

Taniel paused. The soldier was a young man, maybe twenty-five. Still older than Taniel himself. A private in the Eleventh Brigade, by his insignia.

When Taniel didn't answer, the soldier went on hesitantly. "Sir, the fellows and I, we were wondering if you'd do us the honor of joining us for dinner. It's all the same food, sir, and the company is good." He held his flat-top forage cap in both hands, wringing it.

"Where?" Taniel asked.

"Just right over there, sir." The soldier perked up a little. "We've got a fifth of Doubin rum, and Finley plays the flute something fierce."

Taniel couldn't help but feel suspicious. He set a hand on one of his pistols. "Why are you so nervous, soldier?"

The soldier ducked his head. "Sorry, sir, I didn't mean to bother you." He turned to slink away, obviously distraught.

Taniel caught up to him in just a few quick steps. "Doubin rum, you say?"

"Aye, sir."

"Horrid shit. That's the stuff sailors drink."

The soldier's forehead wrinkled in a frown. "It's the best we can do, sir." There was a flash of anger in his eyes.

They both stopped in the middle of the path, the soldier still holding his hat. He glared at Taniel now. Taniel could imagine what was going through his head: Damned officers. Think they're so high and mighty. Plenty of good stuff to drink at the officers' mess. Won't sit with a soldier, not for a moment.

"What's your name, soldier?"

"Flint."

No "sir" on the end of that. Taniel nodded, as if he'd not noticed. "I got a taste for Doubin rum on the ship from Fatrasta. Haven't tasted it all summer. I'd be honored, if you'd have me."

"You mocking me?"

"No," Taniel said. "Not a bit. Lead on."

Flint's frown slowly began to slide. "This way, sir."

It wasn't more than twenty yards to Flint's fire. There were two men beside the fire, keeping Mihali's soup warm in an old iron pot. One had a large nose, crooked off to the side from not being set after breaking, while the other was a short, round man practically bursting from his uniform. The one with the nose froze at the sight of Taniel, a spoon lifted halfway to his mouth.

"Captain, sir," Flint said, gesturing to the two men by the fire. "The one with the nose there is Finley. Ugliest man in the Eleventh. And that round bit of meat there is Faint, on account that she fainted the first time she fired a musket. Finley, Flint, and Faint. We're the fellows of the Eleventh Brigade."

Taniel lifted his eyebrows. He'd not in a hundred years have guessed that Faint was a woman.

"Fellows, this is Captain Taniel Two-Shot, hero of the Fatrastan War and the Battle for South Pike."

Faint seemed skeptical. "You sure this is Taniel Two-Shot?"

"That's him, all right," Finley said. "I was with Captain Ajucare when we went after the Privileged at the university."