“Whose tower?” she asked, after swallowing a huge lump of beef.
“Andressat’s. Their colors are blue and gold. You’ll see tomorrow.”
“Why didn’t they come out? I thought they hated Siniava.”
“They do. But they’ve only got forty or fifty in there. They don’t want to lose the tower to anyone: not even us.”
Paks nodded as she ate, and walked on to the surgeons’ tent. It had evidently belonged to an enemy officer; it was large and divided by yellow hanging panels into several rooms. Jenits lay on a straw pallet with his shoulders propped up on a frame, his left arm bound in splints. Volya sat beside him with a flask; they both looked pale, but well enough.
“Have you had any food yet?” asked Paks. They both nodded. “Good. I’ll finish my supper.” She squatted beside Jenits. “Did they give you numbwine?”
“Yes—they did.” His voice was slightly blurred.
“I’m sorry I stepped on you,” said Paks. “But that—”
“That’s all right. It was—broken already. That’s why—I fell.”
“It’s a good thing it was your shield arm,” said Paks. “You won’t be fighting for weeks, but it won’t be as hard to retrain. You did well, Jenits. I suppose Stammel told you that—”
“Yes. But I—I forgot which strokes, after awhile—and it was so fast—”
“I forgot too, in my first battle; that’s when I got the big scar on my leg. As Stammel said to me, we’ll just drill you more until you can’t forget.” Jenits managed a shaky grin. Paks turned to Volya. “Volya, you did well too. What I could see of your shieldwork was much better. Now—did the surgeons tell you to stay with Jenits?”
“Yes. They said give him more numbwine if he needed it.”
“I can do that, and let you get some sleep. We’ll all be pulling watch tonight, and fighting again tomorrow, I expect.”
“Oh, I couldn’t sleep. I’m still too excited.” Volya’s eyes were very bright.
Paks sighed. “Volya, you’re tired, whether you know it or not. Go roll up in your cloak, and if you aren’t asleep in a half glass, you can come back and take over for me.” Volya got up reluctantly, and handed Paks the flask of numbwine. “And don’t start talking to anyone; that will keep you awake.” Volya nodded and went out. The surgeon came through from another part of the tent and looked at Paks.
“Is that your blood, or theirs?”
Paks looked at her arm. “Both, I think. Nothing serious, though.”
“But you’ve been on guard, and haven’t had time to clean them. I know the story. Let me see.” With painful thoroughness the surgeon scrubbed the various cuts she’d taken, grumbling the while. “If I could just convince you heroes that cleaning these things out does as much good—no, more good—than a healing spell. It’s cheap. It’s easy. They don’t fester and give you fever if they’re clean—”
“Ouch!” said Paks, as the cleaning solution stung in a slice across her hand.
“Hold still. I have to see if that got into the joint—no—lucky. Maybe we need thicker gloves.”
“I didn’t have mine on,” muttered Paks. The surgeon snorted and went on.
“Are you sure you aren’t hiding something else?” he asked when he had finished wrapping bandages around her hand.
“Nothing else.” She looked down and found that Jenits had followed the whole proceeding with interest. So had others in the room.
“Are you staying with him?” asked the surgeon.
“Do you need me to? I can.”
“Yes. Please. We’ve got Clart and Halveric wounded coming in, and there’ll be more later. You can give him enough numbwine to make him sleep. Three or four swallows more should do it. Same for the others—call if anything goes wrong.” The surgeon passed on to the next room, and Paks lifted Jenits’s head so he could drink more easily. In a few minutes, he was snoring. She glanced around at the others; they all seemed to be dozing. Paks propped the flask nearby and took off her pack to get her cloak. She wrapped it around her shoulders. From the other end of the tent came a sudden flurry that subsided after a few minutes.
When she opened her eyes next, she was stiff as a board and the surgeon was laughing at her in the lamplight. “Some watcher,” he said. “If you were going to sleep, you should have found a pallet and stretched out.”
Paks yawned and tried to focus her eyes. “I didn’t know I was going to sleep. Sorry.” She looked at Jenits, but he slept peacefully.
“No sign of fever,” said the surgeon. “This time get comfortable before you go back to sleep.”
Paks pushed herself up, shaking her head. “I won’t sleep. What watch is it, anyway?”
“Don’t worry. Stammel came by to tell you he wouldn’t need you—”
“And found me asleep.” Paks blushed.
“Well,” said the surgeon, “he didn’t wake you, and told me to let you sleep till dawn. That’s another four hours.”
Paks yawned again. “It’s tempting—” The surgeon turned away. Three years’ experience told her to take sleep when she could find it—but now she was awake, and curiosity kept her so. With a last look at Jenits, she left the tent and headed for the area assigned to her cohort.
Kefer was snoring by the watchfire, but roused when she spoke to the sentry. He confirmed what the surgeon had said, and told her to get what sleep she could.
“We’ll march tomorrow, and if we catch them, we’ll fight.” Kefer yawned. “Clarts got many of ’em, but six hundred or so are loose.”
Paks held her hands to the fire; the night was cold after the surgeons’ tent. “Stammel said our losses weren’t bad—?”
“No—not in our cohort. Three returned veterans. One recruit. Dorrin’s was harder hit—but still not bad, considering. Go on, Paks, get some sleep.” He pointed to a nearby tent; Paks edged in, found an empty space, and slept until day.
Despite Kefer’s prediction, they did not march the next day; instead they dismantled the enemy camp. Several squads went to the battlefield, returning with salvageable weapons and armor. Others cleared the camp itself of supplies: bags of grain and beans, great jars of wine and barrels of ale. One tent held all the gear for a smith’s shop: anvils, hammers, tongs, bellows, and bars and disks of rough iron.
Most of this they carried into the storage cellars of the tower, each load tallied by a scribe from each company. Siger and Hofrin chose weapons to replace those damaged, and reserve supplies to take along. The enemy’s mules were distributed to each company too, along with the feed for them.
From the talk she heard while working, Paks gathered that Siniava’s army had come from the west. Before reaching this tower, they had taken those along the western border, and these were now garrisoned by Siniava’s troops. But a survivor had escaped to warn the commander of the north watch, the Count of Andressat’s son-in-law; when the enemy force arrived, it found the tower sealed and well defended. Clart scouts, riding ahead of the Halverics, had discovered the siege in progress, and the Halverics attacked the besiegers. Though heavily outnumbered, they had held the enemy close under the tower walls, where the Andressat archery could do its worst, until the rest of the Clarts and the Phelani arrived in force.
“They should have got out of here,” said a Halveric corporal as he and Paks dragged sacks of grain across the tower court. “Only they thought they could break us and get rid of us—the fools—and we kept ’em busy enough they didn’t think of anyone else.”
“You had a rough time, then,” said Paks.