"I have been travelling in Nekutta, on business of my own. What are you doing here on human land with this warbeast?"
"We have Skelleth under siege; I am assigned to guard this road." There was a note of pride in his tone.
"Siege?" Garth looked out across the empty plain stretching away in all directions, broken only in the northeast where Skelleth stood. There was no sign of an army, siege engines, or even other guards.
"Oh, yes. We have insufficient numbers to surround the town completely, so we are using sentries such as myself in a ring around the walls, with orders to summon others wherever they might be needed. The humans are so weak that they haven't even attempted to break out yet."
Garth suppressed a derisive smile; he did not care to insult a fellow overman, but the absurd inadequacy of such a "siege" was very obvious to him. If the humans had not yet broken out, it was not due to weakness, but either because they had not yet gotten around to it-probably because of poor organization-or did not choose to do so. He wondered what fool had contrived such a strategy even more than he wondered why his people had suddenly seen fit to take military action. "Who devised this scheme?" he asked.
Thord smiled. "Your wife, Kyrith."
"What? Kyrith?" All mockery was forgotten in Garth's astonishment.
"Yes. She and Galt the master trader are our co-commanders, appointed by the City Council."
Garth was momentarily dumbfounded. When he could speak coherently again, ignoring the plaintive questions Frima was asking, he demanded, "What is going on here? Explain this!"
Thord was taken aback at Garth's fiat and dangerous tone, but replied, "Kyrith was concerned about your safety, Garth. She thought that the Baron of Skelleth must have abducted you when you did not return with the others from your trading mission. Galt told her that you had been exiled and had gone off on your own rather than return home ignominiously, but she didn't believe it. She petitioned the Council for permission to raise a company of volunteers to march down here, confront this Baron, and demand your safe return. The Council agreed; the story is that, though they believed what Galt said, they thought such a threat might frighten the Baron of Skelleth and the other humans into treating us better in the future. They insisted, though, that Galt share the command, since Kyrith knew nothing of Skelleth or of human ways and might behave rashly in her anger."
Garth interrupted. "They might have done well to include a commander who knew something of military matters. This so-called siege cannot possibly have cut off communication between Skelleth and the rest of Eramma, and we, can only hope that no one in town has seen fit to summon reinforcements from the south as yet."
It was Thord's turn to be struck dumb. "Reinforcements?" he asked at last.
"Yes, reinforcements! Decayed as it may be, Skelleth is still an outpost of the Kingdom of Eramma, the nation that defeated ours in the last of the Racial Wars. They could probably have ten thousand men here within a week, to flay us all alive." He had no real idea how large a force Eramma's High King could muster, or how quickly it could reach Skelleth; his figures were sheer guesswork. He had no doubt at all, however, that the Erammans would have no trouble in obliterating a force of overmen too small to lay a proper siege.
"Oh." Thord's face remained impassive, but his discomfiture was plain in his stiff silence. Garth heard Frima suppress a giggle. He hoped that Thord hadn't noticed. He would undoubtedly be mortally offended to know that a human was laughing at him. Garth himself was slightly irritated at the girl's lack of respect and was equally annoyed at the stupidity of Thord and his comrades who had volunteered for so asinine and dangerous a scheme.
"Go on, then; you just explained how the Council came to grant their permission for this venture."
"Oh, yes. Well, Kyrith had no trouble in finding sixty volunteers, and was allowed a dozen warbeasts as well. We marched down and arrived yesterday morning, but the Baron refused to see us; one of his guards told us he was sick in bed. Galt thought that we should just set up camp somewhere to the north, in the hills, and wait, but Kyrith didn't want to do that; she was afraid that the Baron might slip out unnoticed, I think. There was a vote, and Kyrith won, and we laid siege to the town yesterday afternoon."
That was a relief, Garth thought; it was too soon for any messages to have reached the cities of Eramma. It was possible that Skelleth's people had not yet even noticed that they were besieged; things could still be handled peacefully.
"All right;" he said, "you've done your duty, but I'm relieving you now. You go back and tell my wife to call off this ridiculous siege. I'm safe and well and I'll come and find her as soon as I've finished a little business of my own in town. Where is she camped?"
"The main encampment is on the Wasteland Road to the north, but I can't leave my post yet."
"Nonsense. You go tell her I'm here." Garth was in no mood to argue; if he left Thord standing guard here on the main highway, the fool might attack a caravan or an innocent traveler, should one happen along.
"I have my orders, my lord."
"Forget your orders. I outrank whoever gave them and I'm countermanding them. This siege will end immediately; as a member of the City Council, the Prince of Ordunin, and a lord of the overmen of the Northern Waste, I am assuming command. Now, go tell that to Kyrith and tell her to wait for me and do nothing hostile toward the humans until I arrive. Is that clear?" Without his intending it, his right hand crept down toward the hilt of the great two-handed broadsword; the gem in the pommel gleamed blood-red.
Thord hesitated a moment longer, trying to decide whether Garth did in fact have the authority to overrule a commander appointed by a quorum of the City Council. Garth was here and annoyed; the Council was not. That decided him. "As you wish," he said, as he turned his warbeast's head northward.
Garth watched him go; he was growing angrier as he thought about the stupidity of the overmen who could plan and execute such an inept maneuver-his own chief wife among them? A siege was a delicate and sometimes dangerous operation, not a casual lark. It would serve the lot of them right if someone did happen along and take them in the rear. It would be only just and fitting if the entire sixty were slaughtered. For half a silver bit he'd go up there himself and teach them all something about war-teach them at swordpoint!
"Garth?" Frima's voice was not entirely steady.
The human had interrupted his chain of thought-the insolent creature! He almost snarled as he asked, "What do you want?"
"The jewel's glowing again." She pointed.
It was, indeed, and glowing relatively brightly. He looked at it and told himself that the anger he felt was not his own. There was no reason to be angry with the girl, who had acted as she thought best. There was no reason to be angry with Kyrith and her volunteers-at least, not reason enough for him to take action. They didn't know any better.
It took several minutes of effort to force himself back to a state of comparative calm. When he had managed it, he told himself that he would really have to get rid of the sword as soon as he possibly could.
Well, that was part of the personal business he wanted to attend to here in Skelleth; he intended either to deliver the loot he had brought from Dыsarra to the Forgotten King or dispose of it someplace where it wouldn't endanger anyone in the future.
With that in mind, he urged Koros forward toward the town's southwestern gate.