Hardgraa went first, his armored menace clearing a trail wide enough for the others to follow. Reaching a comer under a lamp, he thumped a heavy hand on a man’s shoulder and rumbled some cheerful platitudes about patriotism and support for our gallant fighting men. The table was quickly vacated.
Shandie sank gingerly onto a rough stool, wondering why he so enjoyed doing that when he had been sitting all day. His head still throbbed with the rhythm of hooves, but he kept his helmet on because there was nowhere else to put it. He leaned elbows on the table and watched the rain dribble down his arms. Military uniform was designed to deflect steel, not water.
Acopulo settled beside him, with a wince of relief, silver hair shining in the gloom. His civilian clothes would have given him better protection from the weather. For the moment there were only the two of them—Hardgraa had disappeared on his usual wary tour of inspection, and Ylo would have gone to arrange accommodation. Most likely Umpily was already deep in conversation with someone, extracting information like a bee sipping nectar.
“I fear we older ones are holding you back,” Acopulo sighed. He liked to exploit his frail appearance, but despite his prematurely white hair and his sparrow build, he could be tough as rawhide when he wanted. Now he was weary and fishing for a compliment. Shandie assured him that he was at the end of his own tether and quite amazed how well everyone was holding up, especially Acopulo, but he should have remembered how Acopulo had ridden them all into the ground on the dash to Highscarp . . . and so on.
Mollified, the political advisor assumed his most censorious priestly voice and went straight to business. “Why have we had no report of dwarf trouble?”
Shandie gathered up his road-deadened wits. At times the little man behaved as if Shandie were still his peach-faced student, who must be instructed in the powers of logic as well as the political structure of the Impire. He had now had a whole day to grind his mental millstones undisturbed. Fortunately, he rarely put on this professorial performance in front of witnesses. “Is there dwarf trouble?”
“Certainly. The price of flax has plummeted. Olive oil is cheap as water.”
“So the Dwanishian border is closed again?”
“Excellent!” The sly old scholar sounded disappointed. “But why were you not informed, mm?”
The deduction had not been difficult. When relations with Dwanish were strained, the dwarves cut off the supply of swords. The Impire then blocked sales of strategic materials and a glut forced down prices. The disaster on Nefer Moor had been followed by half a year of peace, but that situation was too good to last.
Shandie was not going to discuss his grandfather’s actions, even with Acopulo. ”I have one for you,” he said. “Umpily has been picking up more stories of troll trouble down in the Mosweeps—bands of outlaws emerging from the jungle and attacking the villages, killing the defenders, and driving off the inhabitants.”
“Bah! What you call villages are actually labor camps, the defenders are legionaries, and the inhabitants are serfs, who are delighted to be freed. ”
“They’re slaves, but I’m not supposed to admit that,” Shandie said angrily. “It will be one of the first matters I attend to when . . . But why this, now?”
His political advisor drummed scholarly fingers on the table. “It’s very unusual behavior for trolls, I grant you. They’re usually much more placid.”
“You’ve missed the point, my lord. . .” Shandie smiled up at the mud-splattered face of his signifer. “Yes, Ylo?”
“One room with four beds, sir?”
“Guess who gets a bed to himself? Yes, that’ll do.” Shandie watched the wolf hood vanishing into the mob. A woman smiled hopefully at him, but he shook his head. Two more nights until he was back with Eshiala!
Umpily’s bean-bag bulk emerged from the throng and squeezed onto another of the stools, sighing deeply.
“Not a word of complaint!” Shandie warned. “You’ve got more padding than all of us put together.”
“It’s the padding that hurts!” The chief of protocol twisted his flabby face in dramatic agony.
This is the last time, Shandie thought. He might never again travel a highway like this, riding the wind with a few friends and a token escort. As imperor, he would take the entire Praetorian Guard with him when he sallied forth from Hub and possibly a regular legion or two, as well. For ten years he had roamed the impire like a bird of prey, but soon he would be chained to his perch. Fatigued and cold and hungry as he was, he felt a perverse nostalgia for a life about to end. And next month he would be twenty-eight years old! Youth had slipped away, squandered on a dozen battlefields and a hundred highways.
He despised brooding. He turned back to his political advisor. ”Trolls?”
“The operative word in your query,” Acopulo said testily, “was `more.’ You said, `more stories,’ but I think you meant `stories of more incidents.’ Am I correct?”
“Probably I meant both.”
“Ah. Terminological exactitude is a prerequisite for apperception, as dear old Doctor Sagorn used to say. So you are asking why trolls should be turning to violence now, at this point in time?” The old man was cross that Shandie might have seen something he had not. He was also tired by a hard day, of course, and he was twice Shandie’s age.
“I am asking why the culprits have not been apprehended.”
“Yes, that is worrisome, isn’t it?” Even in the deep shadows, the little man was visibly intrigued at so meaty a problem. Umpily had been listening but was not much interested. “The Mosweeps are all rain forest, that’s why! I need beer!”
“If I know Ylo, beer’s on its way,” Shandie said. “They use dogs to hunt down escaped serfs. Abducted agricultural workers, I mean. The army uses dogs.”
“It fits with the dragons, doesn’t it?” Acopulo said. “If the dogs were finding the serfs, then the perpetrators would have been found also and stopped. But the attacks continue, so the dogs are being blocked. The army’s being blocked and there’s another hole in the Protocol.”
A white wolf head loomed over the crowd, which parted to emit Ylo and a buxom waitress almost as tall as he and much thicker. Her fists clutched four foaming tankards like small buckets, displaying arm muscles that would not have shamed a troll. She thumped the drinks down on the table, having to stoop to do so without tipping them. Ylo clapped her on the rump like a horse.
“Four stews and four more steins to follow, Ootha, my love!” He flashed his smile at her. She simpered and pushed off into the crowd, working her elbows vigorously.
“Ah, what a challenge that would be!” he said longingly, settling down beside the others. “A wild mare!”
“How can you even think of such things?” Umpily moaned. His jowls quivered emotionally. “After sixteen hours in the saddle?”
Ylo wiped froth from his lips, smearing the dried mud around them. He glanced briefly at Shandie to make sure the meeting was informal, then told Umpily, ”I’ve thought of nothing else all day, my Lord.”
“Do you ever?”
“Only right after.”
Acopulo seemed to have retreated into thought. Hardgraa and his two henchmen had arrived and commandeered an adjacent table. Ylo was certainly the freshest of them all.
Shandie sat in limp silence for a while, and his companions took their cue from him. They all knew one another well enough that they did not need to fill every awkward second with conversation. Then . . .
“Er, sir?”
“Yes, Ylo?”
“I keep wondering . . . Why you don’t just clear the civilians out and take what you need?”
“I assume you did that.”
“I demanded the minimum I thought you might accept. Most legates would have sent me back for seven beds, or even seven rooms.”
“You underestimate yourself. If you were serving such a man; you would have gotten what he wanted, as you did for me. You judged my wants exactly. One room will do us, because we’re leaving at moonrise. Four hours at the most. We’re also outnumbered twenty to one—why risk a riot?”
Ylo nodded, but he did not look convinced. Undoubtedly most officers would do as he suggested. Shandie did not want to draw attention to himself, just in case he was recognized.
Perhaps Ylo was right and he was making himself more noticeable by being abnormally considerate of the civilians.
Then the robust Ootha reappeared with four bowls of thick stew, contriving to jostle Ylo as she did so and win another pat. The men fumbled in their pouches for their spoons. The messy stuff was mostly water and vegetables, of course, but better than many such repasts Shandie had known. He made a mental note to congratulate the innkeeper personally.