Almost exactly a glass later, at least by the sand-glass on the top of the bookcase, Zeldyan finished by saying, “I don’t know how much of that will prove useful, but that is what I know.”
“I think all of it will be useful in one way or another. It’s always what you don’t know that causes trouble.” Saryn rose. “I’d best start getting the guards ready.”
As she stepped out of the study and started down the steps, she found Undercaptain Maerkyn headed up. The undercaptain stopped and stepped to the side of the staircase.
“Undercaptain,” said Saryn in greeting, “a word with you, if you please.”
“I’d be most happy, if I can be of assistance, Commander.”
“What do you know about Lord Jaffrayt?”
“Besides the fact that he’s said to be a direct descendant of the Pantarans, not much.” Maerkyn shook his head.
“The Pantarans?”
“Oh…you wouldn’t know that, Commander. There aren’t any Pantarans. They don’t exist. Whenever the old-timers wanted to blame someone, they blamed it on the Pantarans…”
“You’re saying that he’s a nobody? Or that his family came from nowhere?”
Maerkyn nodded. “That’s what they say when they talk about people who claim to be more than they are.”
Saryn wondered how many more expressions she’d either missed or had to learn. “Is there anything else?”
“They say he doesn’t pay his armsmen very well.”
That figures. “And?”
“Other than that…I don’t know. I’m from the north, near Carpa.”
“Thank you.” Saryn nodded and continued down the steps, then out across the courtyard.
Hryessa had to have been watching, because she said something to Shalya, who stepped forward to take over the drills as Hryessa moved away from the guards and met Saryn.
“Were you right, ser?”
“Close enough. We’re going to a place called Nuelda, and we need to leave after dark tonight, as quietly as possible. Deryll-he’s the Jeranyi lord or chief or whatever-he’s sending raiders there. Lord Jharyk is one of the few southern lords supporting the regency, and he’s not equipped to deal with them.”
“The weakest hen house is the one that always wants guard dogs. They usually don’t want to feed them, either.”
“Something like that. Nuelda is a hundred kays southwest of here. It might be more. I don’t trust anyone’s distance estimates. Lady Zeldyan is sending one squad of her armsmen, under my command, and I’ll take first squad and whichever recruit squad…”
“Second squad. I’ve moved Yulia from fourth squad to be squad leader, and put two of the recruits in fourth squad as replacements.”
“Can you handle any more recruits?” Saryn asked.
“We’re still getting a few. Not so many as before. That might change if word gets around to the other towns. You think we’ll need them?”
“We’ll need every blade we can train. And every one Daryn can forge.”
“I’ve told him that. He grumbles, but he works hard. Dealdron has been talking to the other ostlers. He might be able to get ahold of a few more horses…ones that he can work with.”
“Ones that are trouble but that he can train? We can’t afford many others.”
“Just capture as many as you can, ser.” Hryessa grinned. “We’ve done pretty well that way.”
Saryn shook her head. “We need to go inside and go over the supplies.”
The two walked toward the barracks and the small space that served as Hryessa’s study.
LXVII
By oneday morning, Saryn and her detachment had ridden for two days over low, gently rolling rises that held more meadows than tilled fields, and more than a few cattle and sheep. They passed orchards, but the trees were generally low, either olives or apricots, according to Saensyr, the older armsman who was acting as their guide.
“They look to be even poorer than those in the flats of Gallos,” observed Shalya, the first squad leader, riding for the moment beside Saryn. “They’re overgrazing the meadows.”
“You’re from Analeria, aren’t you? Did you have raiders like the Jeranyi?”
Shalya laughed. “Our ancestors were the raiders. They settled down to become herders.”
“So how do you deal with raiders?”
Shalya shrugged. “You can only kill them. They won’t stay bought or bribed.”
“Do you think the Jeranyi are like that?”
“Worse, from what we’ve heard. Even Lorn the Mighty couldn’t do anything but slaughter them. That was almost a thousand years ago, and they haven’t changed much.”
A bit past noon, she rode back to talk with Caeris, the squad leader of the palace armsmen.
“Have you ever fought the Jeranyi, squad leader?”
“Not since I was first in service, ser. We didn’t so much fight them as guard Lord Sillek’s mages while they picked off the Jeranyi one at a time. Except once when they charged, and they didn’t fare so well.”
“We should be able to hit them with arrows from a distance…” mused Saryn.
“The way you hit the Suthyan raiders up north?” asked the squad leader. “You’d have to be out of sight. They don’t even come close to formations. One of their tricks was to string out a company, then swarm in from all sides. Leastwise, that was what the locals told us.”
“I’ll have to keep that in mind. Do they use spears or bows?”
“They had short bows, but they didn’t carry as far as yours.”
While she talked with Caeris for a time, she didn’t learn all that much more.
Then she joined up with Yulia.
“What do you think about the squad?”
“They want to be guards. They work hard. Hryessa weeded out those who didn’t.” Yulia laughed.
“You meant that, didn’t you? She had them dig or pull out all the grass in the courtyard?”
“The captain wouldn’t let anyone eat until they finished a section each day. She didn’t eat, either. She told them that what she was making them do was but a fraction of what the guards on the Roof of the World endured. Only four or five quit.”
That just confirmed what Saryn thought about how women-or many women-were treated in Lornth and how desperate some were to escape.
“How are they with blades on horse back?”
“They’ll be all right in making or taking a charge. I wouldn’t like to have them in an all-out melee, though, not yet. We’ve practiced breaking in unison on command. They should be able to execute it well enough not to get spitted, if the locals have pikes.”
Should is one of those words commanders hate, and this just reminds me why. But Saryn just nodded and kept questioning Yulia…and making a suggestion or two.
Clouds began to appear in the sky to the south by midmorning. By noon, a mass of darkness loomed across the southern sky. The land the three squads were traveling was less cultivated, with more open pastures, if with scattered stands of trees, although she didn’t think that the woods were anything close to original growth. They just didn’t feel that old.
She turned in the saddle toward Saensyr. “I take it that there’s no town nearby?”
The older armsman shook his head. “Just herders for another ten kays, as I recall.”
Saryn gestured to Shalya. “Squad leader…send out a pair of scouts to see if there’s anywhere ahead that might offer shelter.”
“Yes, ser.” Shalya glanced toward the darkening sky. “Looks like we’ve got a solid storm moving in.”
In moments, on Shalya’s orders, two guards urged their mounts away from the main body, then, after another half kay, past the outriders. A half glass later, a misty drizzle began to fall, but there was nowhere in sight that would have offered any real respite from the heavier rain to follow-just open fields with grain and maize looking close to harvest, and pasture, although Saryn could see woods to the west, ahead along the right side of the road.