He was approaching one clump like any other, thinking he must ask again, when he recognized the breadth of shoulders beneath the shrouds of a hunched figure. One of the Lepers nudged another and all who were round that fire stood up to face him.
‘Master,’ said one with Lily’s husky voice.
Carnelian saw the smoulder in their midst that turned it into a hearth. It made him feel he was intruding. He touched the metal over his face and had a desperate urge to unmask.
‘That’s not the Master, it’s Carnie.’
The voice came from a slim figure, Poppy. All of them save Lily pushed back their cowls: Poppy, Krow beside her, Fern. It was the latter who was regarding Carnelian as if he were an enemy. ‘What do you want, Master?’
Shock made Carnelian unable to speak. Perhaps he should have anticipated Fern’s reaction. What did he know of what his life had been since last he saw him? Raising his hands in appeasement, he was startled by how alien they seemed, sheathed in their pale leather. ‘You’re not warriors-’ He sensed anger in a shifting of Lily’s weight. ‘I’ve come to offer my help to train you.’
Fern’s eyes became a hawk’s. ‘Has the Master given you permission to make this offer?’
Carnelian was stung by that, but chose not to justify himself. ‘I am here,’ he said, simply.
Fern’s contempt spread to his lips. ‘So you want to help us so that we can fight for the Master… train us as you once trained the Marula…?’
Carnelian felt anger burn his face.
Fern threw his hand out in dismissal. ‘We don’t need your help.’
‘I think you do. If it comes to a battle with auxiliaries, you’ll be annihilated and at no great cost to them.’ Carnelian turned to Lily. ‘Did you bring your people here to give your enemy more victims?’
‘Are you sure it will come to a battle?’
Carnelian turned and saw the speaker was Krow. He paused for a moment, noticing Poppy’s hand upon the youth’s arm. ‘I think it’s likely.’
He turned back to Lily. ‘If you are determined to fight, then I can help you.’
The Leper nodded. ‘We are determined and so’ – she turned towards Fern – ‘we need all the help we can get, Ochre.’
Fern turned away, pulling his cowl back over his face, and returned to sit gazing at the fire.
Carnelian gave a nod of resignation. ‘Tomorrow I’ll ride with you.’
The murmur from the camp rose up with the campfire smoke to the watch-tower platform where Carnelian and Osidian were eating together. ‘I’m going to take personal command of the Lepers,’ Carnelian announced, in a tone that surprised him with its vehemence.
Osidian frowned. ‘Why?’
Expecting a fight, Carnelian was for a moment put off-balance by Osidian’s calm tone. ‘They’re a mess. If we take them out against trained auxiliaries, they’ll be annihilated.’ Osidian’s expression had not changed. ‘That would hardly be of much use to us…’
Osidian regarded him for a moment, then nodded, picked up a hri wafer and put it in his mouth. He chewed it for a while. ‘That’s why I put the Marula in charge of their training.’
‘Today, I saw very little evidence that that’s working.’
‘Today was only the second day of their training.’
Carnelian felt the strength in his position deserting him. He imagined what Fern would think of him if he did not turn up the next morning as he had promised. That caused him to question whether Fern was the only reason he was doing it. His heart told him that Fern was a reason, but not the only one. ‘They need more help than the Marula can provide.’
‘Indeed?’
‘They can’t speak each other’s tongue.’
‘Morunasa’s Vulgate is as good as yours.’
Carnelian almost reached for the justification that he was a Master, but his instincts were against this. It was a cowardly way out and not the truth. ‘The Lepers will not easily take instructions from Morunasa.’
Osidian glanced up at him, but said nothing. He had no need to. Among the Lepers it was only Fern who would not easily take instructions from Morunasa. Osidian looked back to his bowl and selected another wafer. ‘Do as you will.’
Carnelian had no feeling of victory. He felt empty. A constant murmur was rising from the camp. Glancing down, he saw the twinkling campfires. He pulled his cloak about him. Up here the night was cold.
On the leftway with Osidian, Carnelian gazed past the dragons to the Leper multitude. ‘I want to take them out by myself.’
‘Without the huimur?’
Carnelian glanced at Osidian. ‘They need to be forged before they can be used as a weapon. I am sure you have much work you can do with your huimur alone.’
Osidian gave a nod and Carnelian returned to the watch-tower on his way down to the road.
Carnelian gazed at the Lepers. It had been hard enough to get them here from the camp in anything approaching good order, but the sun had had time to climb the sky before Morunasa and the other Oracles had managed to marshal them into an approximation to a battleline.
As Carnelian turned to his companions, several threw their arms up against the dazzle reflecting off his mask. Lily was there with other Lepers, all shrouded. Bareheaded were Fern and Krow and Morunasa. Carnelian regarded the Oracle, wondering if he could work with him. He recalled how, when he had told him he was taking control of the Marula for the day, Morunasa had glanced up to where Osidian was standing on the leftway as if he doubted Carnelian’s authority. Morunasa had obeyed him, had made the Marula do everything Carnelian asked of them, but with a visible reluctance.
‘Ride with me,’ Carnelian said to them all, then coaxed his aquar into a lope along the ragged Leper line. Only the detachments of Marula, each with an Oracle commander, formed a regular pattern along the front. Behind them, the Lepers were a rabble. Fewer than half of them were mounted and, though here and there he could see clumps of auxiliary lances, the air above their heads was predominantly a confusion of hoes and hooks and stone-blade scythes.
He pulled his aquar up. The half-flare of her eye-plumes closing as he turned her. ‘Lily, why are so few of your people mounted?’
‘You’ve reason to know our valleys are more suited to boats than aquar. We mustered all we could find there and in the fortress.’ She made a vague gesture in the direction of Makar.
Krow was nodding. ‘The Master’s been making us take all the aquar we can from the people on the road.’ He scrunched up his nose. ‘But they’re generally rather weedy and there’s not a lot of them and mostly they don’t have saddle-chairs, but racks for carrying stuff-’
Carnelian nodded, noticing how Krow was at Fern’s side, as he had been all day. He wondered how they had resolved their differences. ‘What proportion of your Lepers are mounted?’
‘Perhaps one in three,’ said Lily.
‘And are those good riders?’
Lily shrugged. Fern’s face might have been wood. It was Krow who answered. ‘Competent, Master.’
Carnelian glanced at the Lepers and wondered how long it would take for them to become good enough. He scanned those closest. They certainly did not look comfortable in their saddle-chairs. ‘How are they commanded, Morunasa?’
‘There are as many units as there are dragons, each commanded by one of my brethren. They answer to me.’
‘Is each of these units organized as a single body?’
Morunasa shook his head. ‘Under the Master’s instruction, each Oracle chose three Lepers to directly command. Each of those chose three more. And those, three more and so on until they reached groups of three or four or five.’
‘Does this work, Lily?’
The Leper glanced at Morunasa. ‘No. Many have ended up serving alongside those they don’t know. Many have deserted to be with their friends.’
Morunasa’s lips curled with disgust. ‘It’s been impossible to enforce the Master’s scheme. These wretches all look alike.’