Dreams of Steel

Chapter Fifteen

We didn’t reach Ghoja in ten hours but I hadn’t expected to make four miles an hour in the dark. We did get in before dawn and, with Blade’s connivance, we chose a campsite which both shouldered the road and almost nudged Jahamaraj Jah’s encampment. We were there an hour before anyone noticed. Sloppy. Deadly sloppy. If we’d been the Shadowmasters’ cavalry we could have cleaned the area.

We used the skulls and poles to mark the bounds of the camp. I had the interior laid out in a checkerboard cross with the center square for the headquarters group, the four squares on its points for four battalions with the squares between as drill grounds. The men grumbled about having to set up for twice their number-especially since certain favored individuals, who had been performing well, only had to stand around holding poles with skulls atop them.

Croaker had been fond of showmanship. He’d said you should adjust the minds of observers to think what you wanted them to think. That was never my style, but in the past I’d had brute force to waste. Here, let everyone think I believed I’d soon have men enough for four battalions and the battalions would expand.

Tired as they were, the men were content to work and grumble. I saw no shirking. No one deserted.

People came out of the fortress and other camps to watch. The men Narayan sent to gather firewood and timber and stone ignored their undisciplined cousins. Skulls looking down moved the curious to keep their distance. Sindhu babysat Swan, Mather, and Smoke. Blade took his appointment seriously. The men in his battalion accepted him. He was one of the heroes of the desperate hours before the coming of the Company. It was almost too sweet.

But nothing crept up. I watched the watchers. The camp was three-quarters complete, including a ditch and embankment and the rudiments of a palisade faced with locust thorns and wild rose canes. Jahamaraj Jah rode out of his camp, watched for fifteen minutes. He didn’t look pleased by our industry.

I summoned Narayan. “You see Jah?” He was hard to miss. He was as gaudy as a prince. He’d carried all that with him on campaign? “Yes, Mistress.”

“I’ll be on the other side of camp for a while. If some of your men-especially Shadar-suffered a lapse of discipline and called him coward and deserter I doubt their punishments would be onerous.” He grinned, started to dart away. “Hold it.” “Mistress?”

“You seen to have friends everywhere. I wouldn’t be averse to knowing what’s going on around here if you found contacts. Maybe Ghopal and Hakim and a few others could desert when you weren’t looking. Or otherwise get out and poke around.”

“Consider it done.”

“I do. I trust you that far. I know you’ll do what needs to be done.”

His grin faded. He caught the warning edge.

From Narayan I went to Swan. “How are you doing?”

“Dying of boredom. Are we prisoners?”

“No. Guests with limited mobility. Now free to go. Or stay. I could use your cachet.”

Smoke shook his head vigorously, as though he feared Swan would desert the Radisha. I told him, “You’re awfully anxious to hang onto a Black Company spy.”

He looked at me and went through some internal change, as though he’d decided to abandon ineffectual tactics. It wasn’t a dramatic shift, though. The role he’d been in couldn’t have been that far from the real Smoke.

He never said a word.

Swan grinned and winked. “I’m gone. But I got a feeling I’ll be back.”

The racket started up in Narayan’s sector as I watched Swan go. I wondered how Jah was taking it.

Swan was back within the hour. “She wants to see you.”

“Why am I not surprised? Ram, get Narayan and Blade. Sindhu, too.”

I took Narayan and Blade with me. Sindhu I left in charge, hinting that I’d be pleased if the camp was finished when I got back.

I paused at the gate of the Ghoja fortress, glanced back. It was an hour short of noon. We had been here six hours. Already my camp was the most complete, best protected, most military.

Professionalism and preparedness are relative, I suppose.