“So how many defending this Altene residence?” Sasha pressed.
“The Altene,” Arken corrected. “That's what it's called. Perhaps two hundred.”
Sasha's eyebrows raised. “That's a lot of defence for a united people at peace with themselves.”
Arken snorted. “They're scared of the Steel, and they're scared of Saalshen. The talmaad don't always fight fair, and they can infiltrate Ilduur's high roads by night, and attack from the shadows.”
Sasha nodded. “I saw plenty of that in Petrodor. But I learned how to do it too. And unlike the talmaad, I now know where to attack. Can you gather some men, without raising an alarm? Trustworthy men?” Arken looked uncertain. “What's the problem?”
“The Altene is a very hard target,” said Arken. “There is only one road, and high cliffs surrounding.”
“That means we have them trapped,” Sasha retorted. “What really troubles you?”
“What if we succeed? What then?”
“We expose the Remischtuul for the frauds and liars they are. We show that they don't truly believe in Ilduuri independence, that they're prostituting Ilduur to the Meraini for fear of fighting a war they aren't sure they can win.”
“Destroy the Remischtuul?”
Sasha shrugged. “Your decision, not mine. Expose them, for certain. Let the Ilduuri people decide.”
“The Ilduuri people will not want this war regardless of what happens to the Remischtuul,” Arken said. “I warn you, do not hope to win the love of the people for your cause, you won't get it.”
Sasha folded her arms. She wasn't here to make friends. Arken was wondering where this would lead, and where she would lead them. Or if he was crazy to help her to take charge of anything. She was a foreigner, as the Remischtuul charged, and had foreign interests foremost in her heart. But if the Steel's leadership was purged, and none other amongst their ranks here in Andal could motivate them…
“Look,” she said, “there are costs to every action. I can't promise that you'll like the outcome of this action. I can't promise that all will end well for Ilduur. I have no idea what will happen should the Remischtuul be exposed. I have no idea what will happen should the Steel march away to war. Quite possibly nothing good, for the odds are not with us. All any of us can do is what we are certain is right. And we can hope that if there is any foundation that makes a nation and a people worthy of a decent future, it is that its leaders are men and women who do the right thing when it needs to be done. I'm not naive enough to think that that is any guarantee of a happy future, but there are far worse foundations to build upon. And right now, it's all I have to offer you.”
Arken considered her for a moment. Then he nodded, curtly. I'll gather some men. We must be plainclothed. We cannot move on the Altene in force and in Steel uniform before we have exposed them, or it will be us making the first move in civil war. That way lies ruin.”
Sasha nodded. “I agree. But we'll need a way to get up the mountain, as high as possible, without being seen. Is it far?”
Arken shook his head. “Down the valley and turn right. Two days if on foot all the way, less if we have transport to the base of the trail.”
Sasha blinked. “There's a trail? You said there was only one road?”
“I wanted to see that you were serious,” Arken said with a faint smile. “It seems that you are.”
“Lad,” said Bergen, “you have no idea.”
There were no Stamentaast away from the town centre, and Rhillian rode through the ramshackle outskirts of Andal at a trot. She headed for the southern valley slope, where she thought she could gain a vantage across the southern edge of the city, and see a line of wagons along one of the valley roads. There was a full moon, and the east-west orientation of the valley meant that there were only two directions the wagons could go.
Certainly they were headed out of the city. If the Stamentaast were intending what she thought they were, they could not do it in the city, surrounded by witnesses and with no place to dispose of the bodies.
Andal's buildings ended, and Rhillian rode upslope amidst the paddocks of outskirt farms. Upon a hillock, she stopped. Probably the column would come this way, to the east, as westward along the lakeside was narrow, with fewer options. One could not dispose of many bodies in Lake Andal. Bodies floated, and the lakeshore was well populated. The Remischtuul could not be so sanguine of the goodwill of the Ilduuri population as to let the bodies of murdered serrin come bobbing along the lake in their hundreds over the next few days.
Rhillian could see small roads emerging from the city, winding their way up and along the southern slope. There was not even a single traveller out in the night. The few fires in the city had not spread, small orange glares and climbing trails of smoke, most of them clustered together in the tight serrin neighbourhoods.
She looked away from the lake, to the east, where the valley forked in two. One fork went northeast, and that way she could glimpse a town about the inflowing Andal River. That was Andal Garrison, home of the Ilduuri Steel. It would be barely an hour's march, once mobilised. But the road looked clear, with no glint of massed armour beneath the glare of the moon. Beyond the garrison, Aaldenmoot rose like a white tooth in the pale night sky, highest of the ragged northern range.
Then she saw it. A column of wagons, emerging from trees on the southern outskirts. A larger column than she had seen at the Rontiis' House-possibly it had detoured to add more prisoners. Rhillian watched it come, inching its way upslope, now disappearing behind a fold. She would not despair. She did not know what one serrin alone could do.
The wagons reappeared, closer now. The road would pass above her on the slope, she realised. No more than a hundred paces, but there were trees here, and she would not be seen. Between herself and that road was a small park, and a pillar monument to the fallen heroes of the Ilduuri Steel, crossed swords emblazoned on its side. Rhillian wondered if the Stamentaast would appreciate the irony.
Soon the wagons did pass, a rattle of wheels and hooves. When they were far enough ahead, she followed. She held to the lower road for a while, past grand houses, gates locked and window shutters firmly fastened. This way, the column would progress along the eastern valley fork, its land rising all the time, up into the eastern ranges. Across those lay Saalshen.
She spurred the horse up a grassy hillside onto the higher road, then found another way to climb up to a trail higher still. Houses here were fewer, replaced by farmers' shacks and pens for sheep or cattle. Looking down from her high trail, Rhillian could see the entire column-twelve wagons, each crowded with perhaps twenty prisoners; some guards riding on the wagons, others riding horses alongside.
As the column neared the trees, she thought she glimpsed movement behind a farmhouse just upslope of the road. Something glinted in the moonlight, like steel. Her trail began a bend where she lost sight of the column, and she pressed her horse to a reluctant canter. Out of sight, she heard yells from the column. Then screams.
Finally she reached a part of the trail that afforded a good view. The wagons were stopped, one now careening down the hillside, scattering bodies off the back, others pulled aside, men leaping from the back. Horsemen from the column were galloping uphill, skirting the ambush point, which seemed to be focused upon the farmhouse. Rhillian kicked her horse's flanks, and galloped on the diagonal down the grassy hillside, fighting to control the protesting animal.
As she drew closer, she could see archers firing from the farmhouse and from amongst the trees. Dead Stamentaast were lying on the road, others sheltering behind their wagons, others still trying to grasp control of the wagons and turn them about…but rutted roads, precision arrow fire, and the confusion of jammed and now colliding wagons made that difficult.