He stood, groaning and stretching, and kicked May's sandalled foot. The slight woman sprang up into a fighter's crouch, a belt-knife in her hand. More than just beat on by her da, most likely. He waved for her to follow him. She picked up her padded gambeson and weapons to follow.
‘Finally worked up the guts to run off?’ she said as they crossed the encampment.
‘Kept us all alive so far,’ he answered from the side of his mouth.
‘Well, I haven't decided whether we'd all be better off with or without you, frankly.’
‘Well, you're corporal, so you are officially now part of the problem.’
‘Thank you so much.’
They came to a crowd of officers and noncoms — a general briefing for Braven Tooth's command, now 7th Battalion. Nait pushed his way into the circle. He searched for familiar faces — saw Least and Lim Tal, and Heuk with two very nervous-looking old gaffers he presumed to be the sum total of the company's mage cadre. Poor bastards — soon to be smeared by the Guard Avowed.
Braven Tooth, his hair a black and curly tangle standing in all directions, was talking: ‘So, a new kind a battle so a new strategy. Truth is, it's an old strategy — one we used to use when confronting mage-heavy enemies. Been a while since we faced such so it must seem new to everyone here.’ He cracked his hairy knuckles, scanned their faces. ‘Main order of battle is this: no concentrations of forces! Any big mass is an invitation to the mages. Stay broke up in small units, companies and squads ideally. Circle yourselves, watch all directions. Keep any eye on the flow of the field — move towards any strong resistance to blunt it — but don't bunch up! Wait your turn!’
‘What's to stop them from overwhelming, encircling?’ one officer asked.
‘Because we'll be moving within the screen of our own skirmishers try in’ to do the exact same thing to them, only we'll succeed! That's why, right? OK. Now, the Guard veterans will be doing the same — moving in small units, their “Blades”. The new recruits they'll probably have form line and flanking phalanx. OK?’
‘What about the Kanese in the south? They helpin'?’ asked another officer Nait didn't know. In fact Nait knew none of them, only his own, Tinsmith, who was keepin’ quiet and not asking any damn-fool questions that Braven Tooth would be getting to answering anyway, in good time.
‘Right, the Kanese,’ said Braven Tooth with a look that said the same thing Nait was thinking. ‘If we can be said to have an objective — that's it. We want that bridge! There's twenty thousand Kanese infantry on the other side just wettin’ themselves to prove how loyal they are to the Empress. We want to let them through and the Guard wants to stop us. Simple as that. All right? OK.’ The commander adjusted the soft leather shirt that served as an armour under-layer, crossed his arms tucking his hands up under his armpits. ‘Dismissed! Except for you saboteur sergeants. Want a word with you.’
Nait waited for the crowd to thin. Lieutenants and captains passing gave him a nod of approval — some a shake of their heads — in acknowledgement of last night's action. Apparently, word going around was that he'd snuck out with his men to try to ambush Ryllandaras. Come on! How could anyone be so stupid?
Not that he was gonna disabuse them.
Least passed, cuffed his shoulder in a gesture of consolation; Nait was surprised and touched — he didn't think his past behaviour warranted anything like that. It must have been damned ugly in that phalanx.
Braven Tooth cast a gimlet eye over the slouching, grimed, disreputable assortment left behind. Nait knew none of them. One greasy fellow was slumped under a dirt-smeared wool cloak; a fat Dal Hon wore a rusted iron pot helmet and a shirt of rent mail that was nothing more than a ragged patchwork of wire, leather ties and cloth knots. The last was a swarthy, skinny woman who had the look of a constipated stork.
‘Introductions, I suppose,’ Braven Tooth rumbled. He waved to the fellow in the cloak, ‘Gant,’ the Dal Hon, ‘Bowl,’ the woman, ‘Urfa. This here's Sergeant Jumpy.’
‘So you're the guy,’ Urfa said, studying him like he was something she'd found growing inside a damp felt boot.
‘The guy who what?’
‘Stupid enough to go after Ryllandaras.’
‘I ain't that stupid.’
She nodded, squinting cross-eyed. ‘Good. I hoped you weren't.’
‘Naw,’ Gant opined, leaning back. ‘You was just out hunting dropped munitions, weren't cha? An’ Ryllandaras jumped ya…’ and he winked.
‘Yeah. Something like that.’
Bowl's bulging eyes narrowed to slits. ‘How many did you find…?’
‘All right,’ Braven Tooth cut in. ‘You'll all get your fair share. But I have to warn you — the Gold keep most of it. They know it best. Now, as to you sorry-assed excuses. We're short on mages — that's no secret — so you're going hunting. That's your assignment and the assignment of the saboteur squads in all the other companies. You keep your heads down and wait for an Avowed to show him- or herself then you let them have it. You got it?’
Nods all around. A chorus of slovenly ‘Ayes’.
Braven Tooth scowled his disappointment from under his matted tangled brows. ‘All right. Dismissed — all except you, Jumpy. A word.’
The other saboteur sergeants sauntered off, Gant offering a mocking laugh to Nait. Braven Tooth waved him close. ‘Met someone out there, did you?’ he said, his voice low. So close was the man Nait flinched back — he stank of rancid animal fat, old sweat and stale beer. Gods! Has he never washed?
‘Yeah. Met the master sergeant, Temp.’
‘No, you didn't, right?’
‘That's what no one out there told me.’
‘Good… Now, what was he doin’?’
‘He met up with some old Seti veteran he knew from before.’
Braven Tooth's bhederin-like brows climbed his blunt forehead to his greasy tangled mane. ‘This Seti,’ he rumbled, his voice oddly faint, ‘what did he call him?’
‘Called him his “sword-brother”.’
The commander stepped backwards as if reeling. ‘Hood's bony prang!’ he breathed, awed. ‘Two! Two of Dassem's old bodyguard here with us now! The Avowed have no idea what they're facin’.’
‘What's that?’ Nait asked.
The man's faced clouded over. ‘Nothin’. You saw nothin’- heard nothin’. Clear?’
Nait shrugged his indifference. ‘Fine. Anything else?’
‘Yeah. You've got munitions. They're all supposed to be handed in for distribution. Return ‘em.’
‘I'll return half.’
‘Half!’
‘Deal?’
Nait swore he could hear his commander's teeth splintering and grinding. ‘Deal,’ Braven Tooth spat. ‘Now get outta my sight before I throw you in the brig.’
Nait saluted and sauntered away. Out on the compound grounds May edged up and said aside: ‘I'm comin’ around to thinking maybe you're not so bad for the unit after all.’
‘All this lovin's making me just dippy,’ Nait grumbled. ‘Now let's take a look to the south.’
They climbed the south palisade wall. Far out of sight beyond the gently rolling hills the Guard were deploying. Within the compound horns blared to sound formation. Laseen's combined forces, the remaining Talian, Moranth and Falaran soldiery all now serving beneath the Imperial sceptre, were gathering to march south.