Stands a Shadow

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Free Enterprise

Mistress Cheer was clearly a woman who knew how to land on her feet. In the space of a single day, amidst the confusion and high emotions of the beachhead, she obtained for herself a wagon and a mule, a cartload of supplies, and enough home comforts to create a small camp for her and her women on the seaward edge of the dunes.

By evening, awnings had been erected over two sides of the wagon and the sand underneath covered in mats of woven grasses. There were stools to sit on, and a fire smoked beneath a hanging kettle and pot, with water and stew warming in them. Mistress Cheer had even procured three tents for them all, which she instructed Ash to pitch not far from the wagon, though far enough for some privacy.

The women relaxed at last, preening themselves in clear view of the men surrounding the camp, squabbling amongst themselves whenever their mistress was beyond earshot. A few casually flirted with Ash, sporting with him over the colour of his skin, the firmness of his old body. He chuckled in pleasure, giving as good as he got.

Ash had overheard that the place itself was called Whittle Bay, a broad cove within the larger sweep of Pearl Bay, which was located on the eastern coastline of Khos. It was a pretty enough location, with its hills to the west and the high peaks of mountains both north and south, and the rocky, gull-covered island out in the greater bay. In many ways the scene reminded Ash of northern Honshu, though it was spoiled somewhat by the stink of the army deployed across the beachhead, and by the closer press of thousands of camp followers, who had accompanied the invasion force all this way to Khos, like Mistress Cheer, in hope of making a profit.

The fleet lay at anchor out in the clear deep waters just beyond the coastal shelf of the cove. Its ships bobbed in tight formation, looking weather-beaten even from here, with spars and masts missing or hanging broken amongst wrappings of sails, some of the hulls listing too far to one side. The work was hardly slackening with the falling twilight. It seemed that a great deal still required unloading before the army could set forth in the morning.

Ash rested as best he could. His cough was worse today. Every now and again his limbs would shake as if from some inner chill, though his clothes were blessedly dry for once, and he kept the oiled cloak wrapped tight about him, and refused to stray long from the warmth of the fire.

Occasionally Mistress Cheer would cast him one of her pointed stares. He would groan to himself and climb to his feet, before wandering around the camp with his sheathed sword in his hand for show, scowling at the soldiers and non-enlisted men camped all around their small oasis of perfume and stockings and girlish laughter.

As the sun finally set, Mistress Cheer put the women to work with sharp claps of her hands and practised words of encouragement. They were hardly the only prostitutes on the beach – far from it – but still, soon enough, a long line of soldiers stretched from their little camp as they waited their turn, drunk and boisterous on this foreign beach far from home. Ash maintained order within the camp itself as the girls took turns leading the clientele into the tents, their business brief.

His mind was barely on the job. To the south, where the ground rose up towards the ruins of the burned village, he could see the palisade and tents of the Matriarch’s camp, with her standard flying high. It seemed to call to him each time he turned his attention elsewhere.

There was little trouble with the men that evening. It was late when the women’s calls for respite grew loud enough for Mistress Cheer to acknowledge them, and to declare an end to business for the night. A number of drunken soldiers still awaited their turn, but their complaints died quickly at Mistress Cheer’s glare and the hard, silent farlander by her side.

Rather than preparing for sleep, the girls set about having a small party instead.

Ash was weary after the long day. He excused himself, and with reluctance left the warmth of the fire, and found a spot on top of a nearby dune and huddled down in his cloak where he could keep an eye on them, but remain alone. With his sword lying by his side, he studied the lights of the distant camp of the Matriarch, the lie of the moonlit land around it. He looked for movement amongst the many fires that were merely glimmers from here. He wished he had his eyeglass with him; even a pair of eyes younger than his own.

Ash coughed once more, spat phlegm, wiped his mouth dry. Clouds were drifting in from the north, ponderous and heavy. More rain on its way, maybe. They would obscure the waxing moons and make a darkness of the land beneath them.

A good night for it, he thought to himself.

‘See something of interest up there?’

He smelled her musky perfume even before she sat down on the sand, and fixed her dress over her legs as the coarse seagrass flattened beneath them. Ash looked at Mistress Cheer as she settled a flask of rhulika in his hands.

He nodded a grateful thanks to her, taking a long drink to warm himself.

‘Easy. It’s the last of it.’

He returned the flask with a brief smile. ‘Thank you. It has been some time since I last had a proper drink.’

Behind them, the squeals and laughter of the women rang out from their small, firelit hollow in the dunes. A breeze played through the fringes of Mistress Cheer’s hair. She fixed her shawl tighter about her head.

‘Tell me again what it was your previous employer did?’

Ash tapped the flask in her hand with a fingernail.

‘Alcohol?’

‘He shipped a small fortune of it here. Would hardly let me touch the stuff, though.’

It was a poor lie, Ash thought. He couldn’t tell if she believed him. Cheer looked away, her eyes dancing with the lights of the campfires. Singing and laughter drifted with the breeze; people elsewhere in the dunes celebrating in high spirits.

Over it all they could hear the rhythmic wash of the sea.

‘We’re a long way from home,’ she said to him sombrely.

Ash gave a slow nod of his head.

She turned to look at him again. ‘Some more than others, I suppose. Do you ever miss it – Honshu, I mean?’

‘Yes. Sometimes.’

‘Of course you do,’ she said in what sounded like self-admonishment. ‘Of course you do.’

He saw that the cloud mass was nearing the moons now. It would be getting dark soon, dark enough to prowl.

‘You know, you have the saddest eyes I think I’ve ever seen. And I’ve seen my fair share of them, in my time.’

Ash’s forehead wrinkled in a frown. He felt an urge to rise and walk away from the woman and her prying talk. But then she shifted over to press against his side for warmth. He found that he liked the feel of it enough to stay where he was.

She studied his expression, waiting for him to say something. He had no words for her, though.

‘Well, I feel my bed calling. Time the girls got some rest too.’ She rose and brushed the sand from her dress. ‘Aren’t you tired?’ she asked, and he heard the heat in her words, the unspoken offer.

His eyes lingered on the curves of her body beneath her dress. He wished very much that he could accept it.

‘I think I will stay up a while, and watch over the camp.’

She covered her disappointment by looking down at the sand.

‘It’s the scar, isn’t it?’

‘Not at all,’ he replied. ‘Really. I am just tired.’

She nodded, not believing him.

‘Goodnight, then,’ she said as she turned away, and trudged down the slope of the dune.

He waited a full hour to be certain the girls and Mistress Cheer were soundly asleep. Some fires continued to burn amongst the dunes, small groups of people talking as sparks rose upwards with the smoke. On the beach, the work parties laboured on through the night with the supplies still being brought to shore.

It was a risk, to leave the women without protection. But a risk he would have to take.

Removing his heavy cloak and picking up his sword, Ash stole out into the night.