‘What do you want me to do?’
‘Take six riders that you know to be loyal.’ A pause. Then, grudgingly: ‘There are many that seem to look to you. I cannot think why. But do not take it as a mark of honour. I can spare you, that is all.’
‘When?’
‘Tomorrow. There is a forest, a river cutting through it. Further than we should go tomorrow, but we shall press on late, into twilight. They will have to follow us or lose us.’
‘And I stay behind.’
‘Just so.’
Kai nodded slowly. ‘There may be many of them.’
‘You fear to fight against the odds?’
‘Just do not think poorly of me if we do not come back.’
A shadow of a smile. ‘No worse than I do already,’ she said. ‘Ride through once, then break away. Do not stand and fight, not even with that pretty Roman sword of yours.’ She rose and walked past him, and as she did so, he felt a touch on his shoulder. ‘Try to come back,’ she said. And then she was gone into the night, and he could hear the foul curses echoing out as she berated one of the sentries.
He sat there for a time, his hand upon the shoulder where she had touched him.
‘Perhaps she has forgiven me,’ he said out loud, testing the weight of the words to see if they felt as though they might be true.
20
It was when they passed the ford close to dusk that Kai knew the time was near.
They had passed many a good spot to make camp, open ground that could be watched and defended. For most of the company there seemed no need to press on into the forest during darkness. To take the cavalry through the trees that stole every advantage they had and risked laming their horses, yet their captain pressed on. But there were those amongst the riders who had another purpose, and as they rode over the ford they were glancing back, mapping the paths between the trees, noting where the thick roots lay like snares, where a branch looped low to hook a horseman from the saddle. They might not get another chance to see it in good light.
Six, there were – Kai and his companions. And as they passed the ford they drifted towards the back of the warband. Some dismounted, feigning to adjust a saddle or retie a leather thong on their gear. Others turned and looped along the side of the line, as though scouting at something half-seen behind them. One by one they fell back, all of them looking to Kai, waiting for the signal.
He had spoken to them throughout the day – Tamura, Saratos, Phoros, Goar, and Erakas, those ones whom he thought might be most trusted. He had told them little enough, to be at the back and follow his lead after they passed the ford. None had questioned him.
And as it turned to dusk and the sun drew close to the horizon, he tapped his spear against Tamura’s, a soft ring of metal against wood. And they turned their horses, formed into a loose skirmish line, and began to trot back towards the ford.
There was no concealing it from the others. But even as Kai’s riders turned away there came the quick-barked orders from his sister, the command to keep silent and keep riding. And yet even so there was a voice from behind, a voice calling his name.
‘Kai!’
It was Bahadur – pale-faced, clutching at his saddle like an old man, panic in his voice. He made to stir his horse towards them, but Laimei was beside him, her hand tangled in his reins to hold him in place. Her head bowed close to his, lips moving, and though Kai was too far away to know what was spoken he could see they were quick sharp words, like the work of a knife in the darkness. And, before they drew deeper into the trees and lost sight of his companions, Kai saw Bahadur bare his teeth and look away.
A pain about Kai’s heart, to think that would be their last parting, as he and his companions rode on in silence, guiding their horses to the softer ground, ducking away from low branches. Now it was that the sounds of the forest came back stronger than those of the men and horses – the low hum of the insects, the sentry calls of the birds against intruders, the creak and groan of the trees as they shifted in the wind. The darkness settled deep. Kai let the reins go slack, trusting more to the horse’s memory than to his own eyes to guide them. And then, soft as the whisper of a lover, he heard the calling of the water in his ears. The river and the ford were but a little way ahead.
He looped his hand in a circle in the air, and the riders drew in close. Hands to one another’s shoulders, as they had gathered by the festival and the fire, the horses touching their noses together in their own silent communion.
‘Those who follow us shall have to cross the water here,’ he said, ‘if they are to come tonight. Wait for my signal. Charge through once, then back through the trees. Keep the Wolf Star at your right hand, until you find the others at the edge of the forest. And stay on this side of the water, by the gods. There shall be no way back for you if you cross to the other side.’
‘They shall be watching for us,’ said Tamura.
‘They shall be watching for more than six. They shall not see us.’
He looked around the faces gathered there, for the moon was out strong enough for him to see them. Most had that strange look of calm that comes before the battle, where the dice are cast in the air and the only thing left to do is see where they fall. Saratos was grinning, the joy of the chosen upon him. Phoros and Goar had the sour look of men tricked at the market, but resigned to the poor trade they had made – he would have to watch them. Only Tamura would not meet his eye.
Each of them found their place. The point where a tall bush met a tree, providing a shape that matched a horse and rider, the fallen log that one might place themselves behind, the low branch that was thick with leaves to screen the rider, and at a soft command their horses drew still as carved sculptures. For they too had hunted in the night before, and knew their lives depended upon the stillness. They waited.
The darkness was complete, save for the light of the moon low in the sky behind them. Soon came the frightening kind of boredom of the soldier lying in ambush, where time seems to still itself entirely. Kai watched the slow passage of a beetle crawling over a leaf, and it seemed to take an hour to cross half a hand’s distance. With the boredom was the sleep that seemed to steal up like a witch’s curse, to be blinked away at the very last moment with a sharp jolt of the heart.
Words came to him from the past, the way they do for those at the borderlands of waking and dreaming – a voice speaking sharp in his ear, Bahadur’s voice.
‘Bad ground for a horseman, a ford. Only a beach would be worse. That is why the heroes in the old stories are always fighting there.’ He remembered the older man’s smile, the eyes narrow and bright like little gemstones. ‘They like to show off.’
He remembered too, then, asking Bahadur how to stay awake on watch, when his back was still raw from a whipping he’d taken. ‘Think about women, lad,’ Bahadur had said.
Kai watched the others as a good captain should, looking for the dull eyes of one frightened to utter stillness, the nervous hands twitching on the reins of one ready to bolt at the least excuse. And perhaps it was that he was so intent on watching the others, that he did not notice what was happening to him.
There was something winding and curling about his neck, like the hard cord of a garrotte. He put his hand to his throat and felt nothing but flesh, and yet still each breath came shorter than the last. His fingers numb, his other hand growing slack upon the spear, and his head bowing down, bowing low.