“I do.” Styke waved his finger under Blye’s nose. “I also want you to make sure our boys are on alert tonight – but don’t let them look like they’re on alert. I want those Kez to head out of town and forget about us by tomorrow night. No incidents. Understand?”
Blye put away his pipe and snapped a salute. “Right, sir.” He began heading up toward the fort. Styke stared at the river, wishing he could spend the rest of the day down here. Just him and Rezi, a sheepskin, and a couple bottles of wine.
Maybe next week.
“Blye!” he called
“Sir?”
“Does the name Prost mean anything to you?”
Blye tapped his chin with one finger a couple times before pointing it at the sky. “Major Nons je Prost?”
“That’s right.”
“Major Prost is the governor’s bastard brother. Right son of a bitch, rumor has it.”
Styke felt his stomach clench. That’s where he’d heard the name. Prost was a pariah, even among Kez officers – a sadist and a coward who preferred burning Palo villages to actual combat. Supposedly his company was made up of thieves, cutthroats, and a few unfortunate souls who’d managed to piss off the wrong officer.
And Styke had just invited them to spend the night in Fernhollow.
The last thing Styke needed was a run-in with someone like Prost. Styke knew his own temper well enough to keep his distance, and he stayed busy on the outskirts of town while a handful of trusted men kept a close eye on the Kez. He checked in with his men three times that evening, and then twice again in the middle of the night, waking every few hours from a restless sleep to walk the rounds and speak with members of the town watch.
Kez soldiers could be heard singing inside The Rumbling Sow well into the early hours of the morning, but the town watch reported the streets quiet and everything peaceful. The visit was, Styke decided as he crawled back in bed for the final time that night, a success.
He woke with the sunrise, rolling out of bed and leaning on the thick timbers of Rezi’s four-poster as he pissed into a chamber pot. He heard Rezi stir behind him, and turned to find her sitting halfway up in bed, naked beneath the thin sheet, head cocked, her short, black hair framing a raised eyebrow. She had the hazelnut skin of a half Deliv, with strong, well-defined arms and long legs on a six-and-a-half foot tall frame. She, he decided, could have been a cuirassier, and no one would have argued.
In her midtwenties, she was ten years his junior but already the head constable of Fernhollow, and could back up her position with a truncheon better than most provosts. Another decade, and she’d be a proper police captain in Landfall.
She did not look pleased to see him leaving so early. “Stop worrying,” she told him.
“I’m not.” Styke found his pants and began to dress.
“It’s just a bunch of soldiers. Between my deputies and Blye, they’re under control. They’ll be gone by lunch.”
“Hopefully they’re already on their way out of town. I just want to make sure everything goes smoothly. Where’s my jacket?”
“You left it downstairs,” Rezi said. “Come back to bed.”
Styke grunted. “I’ll be back in an hour. Don’t move, and don’t get dressed.”
“I’ll damn well get dressed if I want. You walk out that door and you’ll miss your chance.”
Styke eyed her for a long moment, wavering in the doorway.
“Why are you so worried about these Kez anyway?” Rezi asked. “You’ve been skulking since you got back from cutting down poor Kros. I’ve never known Ben Styke to be afraid of anything.”
Styke snorted. “I’m not skulking.”
“You are too. Why?”
He finally stepped away from the door, rounding the side of the bed and kneeling down next to her. He playfully bit her thigh, and Rezi gave a full-throated laugh. “You ever hear of Major Prost?” he asked her.
“Doesn’t ring a bell.”
“He’s a Kez cuirassier. Bastard brother of the governor.”
“Ohhhh,” Rezi said, elongating the word. “Yeah, I have heard of him. He’s the one who butchered Blind Rock, isn’t he?”
“He burns villages and kills kids and gets away with it,” Styke confirmed.
Remi eyed him sideways, obviously worried. She knew his temper, too. She knew what set him off. “Stay in bed,” she said quietly.
Styke tapped his fingers on the bed frame. She was right, of course. He didn’t need to go out there. He began to unbutton his shirt, ready to climb under the covers, when there was a sudden pounding on the door.
“Styke!” a voice called. Styke answered. It was Fenrial, one of his colonial lancers. The boy’s face was white. “Sir, you have to come with me right now.”
Styke shared a glance with Remi. She scowled at him, but rolled out of bed and began putting on her own clothes while Styke nodded to Fenrial, then followed him at a run.
They left Rezi’s small house on the outskirts of town and headed down the hard-packed dirt streets. It was a nice day, as far as Fatrastan spring went, and it hadn’t rained for almost a week. The morning was hot without being unbearable, a light cloud cover dotting blue skies. They passed a few farmers out and about in the early hours, who tipped their hats to Styke as they headed out toward their fields.
Styke barely noticed. He began to hear voices from the town square, and he soon spotted the Kez lined up in the street, two hundred or so cuirassiers at attention on horseback, clearly waiting and eager to be gone. He ran along the line, looking for Captain Cardin. He passed an unhappy-looking Sergeant Gracely, who shouted something that was lost to him.
Styke rounded the corner that led to the town square and almost plowed into the back of a crowd of several hundred people. He paused just long enough to take in the scene: the crowd was gathered just outside The Rumbling Sow. They formed a circle around a cordon of men in Kez uniforms, and even as Styke looked on, he heard a few angry shouts.
Townspeople shouting at Kez soldiers was not going to end well.
Behind the cordon of Kez cuirassiers – stone-faced men with carbines at the ready – were three Kez officers. Two of them were obviously drunk, with jackets unbuttoned and shirts soiled, swaying on their feet. They stood over a small man with the red hair and ashen freckles of a Palo, his face and beard streaked with blood, his hands clasped as the two drunks kicked and spat at him.
The third officer – Cardin – stood off to one side, his expression fraught, desperately trying to calm the situation down.
The Palo’s name was Tel-islo, and he was the owner of The Rumbling Sow. Styke’s eyes narrowed, and he took two steps into the crowd. “Out of my way,” he growled, letting townspeople part in front of him as he strode toward the cordon of Kez cuirassiers.
The biggest cuirassier was almost a foot shorter than Styke. He swallowed visibly, eying Styke’s yellow colonial jacket and the silver lance at his lapel.
“Move,” Styke told him.
“Sorry, sir,” the cuirassier said. “I can’t do that. Orders.”
“I am a major,” Styke said impatiently, watching over the cuirassier’s head as an officer who Styke had now decided was Major Prost planted a kick in Tel-islo’s ribs. “Your major is obviously drunk, so I am the ranking officer here. Move, or I will make you move.”
The cuirassier licked his lips and glanced to his left and right, as if wondering if his fellow soldiers would back him up in the face of such a giant. Another blow landed on Tel-islo, and Styke reached forward, jerking the carbine out of the cuirassier’s hands.
“Hey!”
Styke gripped the carbine in both hands and brought it down over his knee, snapping the stock like a matchstick. He handed the pieces back and shoved past the cuirassier, striding toward Major Prost.