"Eh, my fren', amitu!" he called, in an atrocious mixture of Sponglish and Kanjuk. The woman squeaked as he finished in a flurry of grunts and withdrew. "You sojer-man who mal cumme nus, bad like us! You wan' cushez cet fil, eh? She pretty good." Massive, at least, which was how comeliness was measured among the northeastern nomads.
"Not right now, thank you," Raj replied politely.
"Eh, good, you drink wit' me." He gave the woman a ringing slap on her presented buttocks and stood, scratching his crotch energetically. "Fetch drink, woman."
She rose and scurried into the hut, returning with a clay jug. The Skinner drank noisily, liquid running down his chest, and handed the jug to Raj. Gritting his teeth and conscious of the beady eyes watching him, he took a healthy swig, spat a mouthful out.
"Dog piss," he said politely, and drank again; thank the Spirit he'd had the foresight to stuff himself with bread soaked in olive oil before coming out here. The liquor was basically arak, a sort of gin distilled from dates; the additions were those traders dealing with the steppe had found popular, chili peppers, sprigs of wormwood and a little turpentine.
"Want eat?" the chief said, pulling a stick of dried meat from a bag hanging from the eaves.
"No," Raj said: that was no breach of etiquette among Skinners, they could gorge and then go for days without a bite, as indifferent to hunger as they were to any other physical discomfort.
"So," the barbarian said, the formalities having been satisfied. "What you want, sojer-man? Mez gars, my men, they no kill any more farmers?"
Not since we took to shipping the liquor up here by the wagonload, Raj thought. That was a solution of limited use, though: he wanted them alive when Tewfik got here. On the whole, he wished that the Minister of Barbarians had been a little less efficient in moving the Skinners across the Civil Government and down to the frontier; it would have been more convenient had they arrived later. Most troops benefited from extra training, but if you kept Skinners in one place too long all they did was rot. On the other hand, there was no knowing exactly when the Colonists would make their move, now that the campaigning season was open.
"There are to be fireworks tonight," he said. The chief frowned, scratching himself again and tying on the breechclout. Raj amplified: "A great feast; meat, drink, music, women." Sandoral's dockside knocking-shops had agreed to furnish volunteers, heavily subsidized from Army funds. At that, Skinners rarely actually hurt cooperating females; they considered it beneath a warrior's dignity. "Lights-lights in the sky."
The barbarian's eyes lit with comprehension. "Ah, medicine dance!" He crossed himself vigorously. "Kill cattle for Juscrist an' de whetigo. Fais thibodo! We make great medicine feast before fight, take lots of heads, good fighting!"
He ran into the hut, returned with his rifle and shooting-stick. The weapon was taller than he, beautifully cared-for and gleaming with cleanliness. He opened the breech with a snick of oiled metal and slid in a cartridge from the belt across his chest; resting the barrel on the cross-stick of the rest he fired downrange without seeming to aim. A bronze cauldron leaped into the air, and the ringing metal pealed across the camp. Seconds later over a hundred warriors were on their feet, many mounted, all with their long rifles in hand.
"Feast!" the chieftain bellowed, shaking his weapon in the air. "Nus fais'z thibodo, then we fight!"
Now, how do I tell them they've got to get on a barge? Raj wondered. Ah, I'll tell them it's part of our battle-magic.
* * *
"Cursed if I'd have been able to handle this without you filling in on the paperwork, Gerrin," Raj said, throwing down the muster roll. Thirty demondark cursed battalions! he thought. All up to strength, now: fifteen thousand men, from the drummer boys to officers with twice his years and experience, every one of them convinced he could do it better. Possibly rightly. It was almost time to head down to the river for the celebrations, but. . I like it better here in Gerrin's billet.
"Well, I haven't been bloody good for much else, have I?" the other man said. "I'm going to be ready by the time that arsecutter Tewfik shows up, if it kills me."
Thunder rolled outside the window; man-made thunder, now that the thin rains of winter were giving way to the clarity of spring; volley firing from the ranges outside Sandoral. It was still pleasant to have a blaze going in the fireplace of an evening, although noon was already giving more than a hint of the savage furnace heat summer would bring to the Drangosh Valley; the thin desert air lost warmth quickly, once the sun was down. The smell of coal smoke mixed pleasantly with kave and wet boots steaming, and the underlying tang of massage oil and tobacco; there was still a smell of the day's stew from the bowls soaking in the kitchen bucket.
"You kill yourself, not be much good fighting," Fatima said sharply, in accented but passable Sponglish, as she kneaded the scented oil into the mass of scars along Gerrin's flanks. "Lie still!" She walked away toward the kitchen.
"Insolent wench," Barton said from the corner chair, without looking up from his noteboard.
"Your own fault, you manumit me," she called, coming back in with a bowl of heated towels and laying them over Gerrin's ribs.
"And you teach me read, always spoil a woman," she continued sardonically. Some of the thick muscle was coming back on his shoulders, but the bones still showed more clearly than they had nine months earlier, when the 5th Descott marched into the basin of El Djem. An infant's wail came from up the stairs. "Master calls," she said, unbuttoning her blouse as she climbed.
"You going to adopt it?" Raj said.
Gerrin nodded, reaching out from his stomach-down position to snake a sheaf of papers out of a pile. "Jellica and I aren't going to produce any, not after six years of regular attempts," he said amiably. "Doesn't matter who the father is-" he glanced over fondly at Foley, who wrinkled his nose at him "-and it'll be rather a relief to stop trying. I only did because I couldn't stand the thought of my brothers-in-law inheriting the estate; my sisters are dear girls, but lack my taste in men." Foley threw a half-eaten dried fig without looking up, bouncing it off the older man's skull. "How are the infantry shaping?"
"Better than I expected," Raj said. "That's the Kelden Brigade out there now; Jorg has a real gift for it." Getting Menyez on the strength had been a stroke of luck.
"Nice enough sort, if you avoid all mention of dogs," Foley continued. The door banged open. "Speaking of dogs," he continued, "what do you call people who track mud in the door?"
"Soldiers," Kaltin Gruder said, but he stopped to use the bone scraper. "Ground's firming up nicely, though. What's that?" he continued, looking over Gerrin's shoulder at the document in his hands. "Nice fancy seals." He turned and called up the stairs, "Can't a man get a drink, around here?"
Fatima climbed halfway down the stairs and sat on a tread, cradling the infant to her breast. "This man get drink first, Messer Gruder," she said. "Wine on hearth."
"It's yet another missive from our distinguished Chancellor, moaning and whining about the infantry drawing cash," Gerrin said, skimming it expertly into the fireplace. The heavy linen paper curled and browned on the bed of coals before bursting into flames.