Little did he know that Tremane didn't care. Of course the mice would have nibbled the crust; most of the loaf was still there, and that was what mattered.
He had his own reason for wanting to be rid of the clerks. When—or if—the authorities did descend on this place, if there was no one here, that would confuse the situation still further. Somehow the authorities would have to decipher where the clerks had gone before they could find out whose seal was on the pay packets—assuming that the clerks kept the packets. He intended to take his papers with him when he left. All the authorities would have was a looted warehouse, but no idea who was responsible. Unless, of course one or more agents managed to get "left" behind.
Even if that happened, it would still take the agents a long time to reach the capital and the Emperor. They might not make it. Conditions could be bad enough here to prevent even an experienced agent from reaching his contact. All of the spy masters relied on Portals and mage-crafted messengers to get information to and from their agents. Without those, an agent might not even know who his contact was!
Meanwhile, his guards were taking the gold through and handing it over to the custody of his other guards, to be placed under double guard and lock in the strong room. Gold was heavy; the men could not move much at a time. But, as he had hoped, there was enough there to pay his entire army for a year. That would give him the time he needed to win their personal loyalty.
Once the gold was all across, he directed his two guards to join the rest of the men in stripping the warehouse to the bare floor, walls, and ceiling. There were even stores of lumber here, and if he got the chance, if the Gate held long enough, he'd take those.
They had been at this task for long enough that the vital supplies were all through; now the men just made a human chain, passing boxes, bundles, crates, and barrels through without bothering to check what was in them. He had clerks of his own that could inventory the mass of supplies at leisure.
While they worked, Tremane helped himself to the warehouse records. What he found there confirmed his fears and his hopes; the personnel here had been in disarray for weeks, without orders, contact from their superiors, or any sign that the Empire still existed. They had no idea what was going on; all they knew was that the Portals suddenly went dead, and that there were strange things going on outside the safe walls of the fortified depot. What he found indicated a certain amount of panic on their part, and he didn't blame them. In their place, he'd have been panicking, too.
The huge warehouse echoed strangely as the contents were emptied; the torches his men placed to light their way made oddly-moving shadows among the racks and shelves. He wished there might be time to loot the small stable that was surely attached to this post—but on the other hand, the four clerks would probably need every beast there, just to get themselves and their own goods home safely. It wouldn't do to be greedy, he chuckled inwardly.
The Portal showed no signs of deteriorating, and this warehouse was more than half emptied. As he checked on the progress of his men, he caught sight of another door where he had not expected one, and he stopped dead to stare at it.
Another door? Could it be possible that this depot was a complex of warehouses?
He ran across the dusty floor and wrenched the door open. Enough light came from the torches behind him to show him a sight to make his heart leap.
Grain. Tin barrel after barrel of grain—meant for horses, for cavalry, but perfectly edible by humans.
And here was the answer to the dilemma of how to keep both town and garrison alive. This would buy him the loyalty of the town, especially if the winter ran long and hard and supplies ran short. The farmers had been complaining that the weather had been bad and the harvest poor, and he had been assuming their complaints were nothing more than the usual. Every farmer he had ever known had complained about the weather and the harvest—they always did, and never would admit to having a good year.
But what if this time the complaints were genuine? He had seen the weather and the state of the fields for himself. How could he have thought that the harvest would be normal?
Because I didn't dare think otherwise, or I would have given up.
Quickly he hailed half of the men over to this new storehouse, telling them to haul the grain but leave the hay bales that would also be here for the very last. Hay was not a priority, but if there was time, why not take it, too?
I need more men. It was a risk, bringing still more men—men who had not been checked beforehand—across an unstable Portal, but the gain was worth the risk. Almost certainly some of these would arrange to be left behind. There would be agents among them. He didn't care.
He ran out to the Portal and sent a message across with one of the guards; Sejanes was no fool and he should know how many more would be safe to send across.
He went back to the men—but now it was to join them in a frenzy of hauling. He joined the line, working side-by-side with one of his own bodyguards and a man whose name he didn't even know for certain. When the man cursed him for clumsiness when he dropped a box, and cursed him again for being slow, he kept silent. It was more important to get one more box across that Portal than it was to maintain the distinction of Commander and subordinate. He sensed, rather than saw, more men making a second line; at the time he had his own hands full and sweat running into his eyes.
He had never done so much hard physical labor in his life. His muscles and joints begged him for the mercy of a rest, his lungs burned, and his throat and mouth were as parched as if he were crossing the desert. There was no rest; his line was down to transporting the lumber at the back of the warehouse, but the other line still had grain to move.
There was light outside now; at some point dawn had arrived, and he had missed it. How had Sejanes managed to hold the Portal up so long? The poor mages would be only semiconscious for a week after this!
His line broke up at that point; there was nothing more to move. Half of them went to the sides of the warehouse to try to get the few large objects—dismantled siege engines—that could not be hauled by a single man. The rest joined the grain line, but now the grain line was actually hauling hay bales!
At just that moment, a whistle shrilled from the Portal; the signal that the mages had held it as long as they could. Tremane had drilled his men in this, too; every one of them dropped what he was holding and sprinted for the Portal at a dead run. The new men who had not been drilled took their cue from the rest. He joined them; as they reached the outside they formed into four running ranks, since the Portal was only large enough for four abreast to cross at once. Those four ranks continued to race for the stone arch that marked this side of the Portal.
Despite his care, he knew that when he called for more men, he had allowed many agents to cross over, and now some of the men would deliberately lag behind, to remain when the Portal collapsed. There would be agents of the Emperor and of his own personal enemies among them. That would be fine; no one else knew that his orders were forged.