The Crown of blood

II

Wandering along the clean, paved streets of Talladmun, Gelthius was again convinced that he had made the right choice siding with the Askhans. Magilnada aside, there was nowhere in all of Salphoria that could match the size and achievement of an Askhan town. Gelthius had never seen one before, and it was amazing to him that only twenty years earlier, Talladmun had been little more than a fishing village on the Ladmun River. He guessed there must be thousands living here now, in stone and wood buildings, brought from quarries and forests at least a dozen days' travel away. In contrast, even Carantathi, capital of Aegenuis, Salphoria's current king, looked like a dishevelled collection of rough barns and mud-brick hovels.

It'd be easy, thought Gelthius, to slip away into the town and hide until this all blew over. He could be a shoemaker again. Even Askhans needed shoes. He was not young, but Gelthius was sure he could find another wife; he still had it in him to raise another son or two. He could start all over; put the cattle thievery, the debts behind him. Nobody would care, nobody would know.

But Gelthius couldn't bring himself to slip away. He wasn't much for thinking, he was the first to admit, but he hadn't survived in an uncaring world by being slow-witted. The general was a man with an idea, and that sort of person, once started, was hard to stop. And Gelthius had no doubt that if he abandoned his current mission he would end up getting caught out in the end. Somehow, Ullsaard would find him and make him pay for any disobedience. If there was one thing above everything that he had learnt in his time in the Thirteenth, it was the price of failure.

There was something else that nagged at him as he walked along the main road that led to the town's central district. He already had a wife, two sons and a daughter. It would not be right for him to forget them while he enjoyed the comforts of this Askhan life. If he wanted this, it was only right that he shared it with them.

Family was important to Askhans: legionnaires got pensions, farmers got money from the king when their crop failed; even a middle-aged shoemaker could expect the odd bit of trade thrown his way by the legions or governors if he really needed it.

He crossed the street, nimbly stepping between two lumbering abada, as he caught sight of the distinctive black robe of a Brother amongst the growing crowd of townsfolk. He was in two minds about that lot. The other men in his company had told him how the Brotherhood was the glue that kept the Askhan Empire stuck together. A word from a Brother could make or break a man, but they couldn't be bribed, couldn't be flattered, couldn't be tricked. They were, as third captain Leagois had put it, "straight as the Royal Way," whatever that meant.

The Brotherhood upheld the law — even governors and kings had to obey it. They collected the taxes, but did so without favour, and sometimes they even paid people money if they could prove they had suffered a bad year. They wrote lots of things down, Gelthius had heard. Who was born and who was dead, who was married and who had what jobs. They arbitrated disputes between merchants and families, judged those who broke the law and kept everything working.

It was a huge difference from the chieftains and their cronies who ruled the Salphorian tribes, from the king on down. Gelthius had long ago accepted that his betters would be self-serving bullies, until he had met the Askhans. If Gelthius had a complaint about Naraghlin, chieftain of his people, there was nothing he could do but shut up and bear it. If he had something to say about Captain Leagois, he could speak to the second captain, Aladaan. Not that any legionnaire ever did make a complaint, but they could if they really wanted to.

But the Brotherhood made Gelthius uneasy. He glanced over his shoulder as the black-robed man disappeared down the road. For everything they did, the Askhans never liked talking to them, and for Gelthius there was something deeply wrong with a whole bunch of men who claimed to know the will of a man dead for two hundred years and who denied the existence of the spirits. That denial scared him more than anything. He had realised in Magilnada that he owed the spirits nothing for the woes he had suffered under their gaze, but that was a long throw from going out of his way to insult them by pretending they didn't exist.

Caught up in his thoughts, Gelthius wandered into the path of a patrol of legionnaires. There were twenty of them with heads of ailurs painted on their shields, from the Second Legion commanded by Nemtun. Seeing the soldiers reminded Gelthius of his mission — and of several dozen other men sent by the general — prompting him into action.

Unslinging a small bag from his shoulder, Gelthius tripped in front of the soldiers, spilling its contents. Bunches of spring berries scattered across the paving slabs in a shower of red and purple. He fell to his knees and hurriedly gathered them up, with a glance of apology at the patrol's officer.

"Morning there, Captain," said Gelthius. He noticed the men looking at the fruit he scooped back into the sack. "I'll be out of your way in a moment."

"Where'd you get those?" the captain demanded, pointing at Gelthius's bag.

"These?" Gelthius replied innocently. "Picked them meself, I did. You boys look hungry. D'you want some?"

He proffered the bag towards the legionnaires, who stepped up with arms outstretched until their captain barked at them to stay in line.

"Where you from, stranger?" the captain asked. "You talk funny."

"I do talk funny, Captain. I'm from the Free Country, thought I'd try to see if things were better up here. Things haven't been going so well since the rebels took Magilnada."

"The renegades have taken Magilnada?" This was from a young, round-faced legionnaire. He stepped back into line as the captain rounded on him with a snarl.

"Keep your fucking mouth shut!" The officer turned his temper on Gelthius, grabbing him by the scruff of his jerkin. "What do you know about the rebels?"

"Not your rebels, captain," Gelthius said as he squirmed in the captain's grip. "Some other lot. Took the city to spite King Aegenuis, I reckon, and now they're raiding left and right without a care in the world. It's been hard, there ain't nothing coming from duskwards, I tell you. Not a piece of tin, nor a plank of wood nor drop of beer. Still, I'm sure you boys'll be all right. Got your own stores and everything, right enough."

The captain shoved Gelthius to one side.

"Mind your own business."

"I was lucky, got saved by one of your legions when I thought I was done for," Gelthius continued. "Drove them rebel bastards back into the hills quick enough when they came for us. Like the spirits of vengeance themselves they came down on them brigands."

Gelthius threw the bag of fruit to the captain, who caught it awkwardly out of instinct.

"You boys saved my life; I reckon you should have these more than me."

"We didn't save anybody's life," said the captain, his anger replaced with confusion. "What the fuck are you talking about?"

"I told you, legionnaires what chased off the rebels in the hills. I saw them meself. Black shields, red crests."

"That's the Thirteenth, Captain," muttered one of the legionnaires.

"I know that," said the captain, forgetting to admonish the soldier for speaking out of turn. The officer bore down on Gelthius once again and grabbed him by the collar. "You fucking idiot, the Thirteenth are the rebels. How did they look, how many of them were there?"

"Thousands of them, and they was hungry for a fight. Butchered them thieves good and proper, the ones what they caught."

"What about their gear?" the captain continued. "How did that look?"

"Bright and shiny as a new askharin, I'd say. Not that I've ever seen an askharin, but I can imag-"

"Where was this?" The captain let go of Gelthius, looking worried.

"Somewhere between here and Magilnada, Captain. We kept walking for quite a time before we got here."

"How long? How many days?"

"Sorry, Captain, I can't remember rightly and I'm not so good at counting. I'd say more than less."

"You're no fucking help," said the captain. He waved his men to continue, the sack of fruit still in hand.

Gelthius watched them go and chuckled. The Second's legionnaires were getting all sorts of news about their enemies, and none of it matched up. The general had given each of those sent to Talladmun a different story to tell, some putting him far to hotwards, others claimed he was just a couple of days' march away. Some of the tales had the legions as a bedraggled remnant of their former glory preying on whoever they could find, while others spoke of an army numbering fifty thousand well-equipped soldiers. Gelthius guessed all of the bad information was really Anglhan's idea; it smelt like the sort of thing he would think up.

It was a mean trick to play on men already missing their first three supply shipments, intercepted by Ullsaard's legions before they reached Talladmun. Hungry and confused, after a rough season quartered in the Anrairian cold and rain, the legionnaires would be dispirited.

No doubt the patrol Gelthius had just met would enjoy their fruit back in camp; unfortunately for them it was laced with canaris juice, which made it pretty much certain they would be throwing up their guts before the end of the watch. Gelthius had been assured that he wouldn't be poisoning anyone, just making them ill for a few days. The aim was to get the Second to refuse orders or disintegrate by desertion. Gelthius didn't really care whether they drifted away or fell down dead, as long as it meant there were less spears pointed at him when the Thirteenth had to face them.

Pleased with his first success, Gelthius turned back towards the house he shared with some of the others, to get another bag of fruit.