‘You will be most welcome, captain.’
Ranaud returned to the keep and Kaelin stood for a moment, eyes locked on the Varlish trader. ‘See you in a month,’ he said, then strolled back to the wagon.
Captain Ranaud ascended the stairs and entered the colonel’s office. The older man had been imbibing the narcotic mixture again, and his lips had a blue tinge. Why don’t you just die, wondered Ranaud? Your body is racked with disease, your lungs are like wet paper. Why do you hang on? Masking his contempt for the dying man, he fetched him a goblet of water.
‘Do you think he will prove helpful?’ asked Colonel Linax.
‘One way or the other, sir.’
‘I don’t follow you.’
‘He will either give us valuable information, or I shall arrest him for discharging a pistol. It is a long time since we hanged a highlander publicly. It will send a message to Jace and his cut-throats.’
‘Jace is not to be underestimated, Ranaud. You are new here. His power is formidable.’
It has been allowed to become formidable by weaklings like you, thought Ranaud. ‘I bow to your superior understanding, sir. However, we did have troublesome clansmen in the Isles, and we dealt with them.’
‘I know, I know,’ said Linax. ‘Two hundred hanged, villages burned. The fishing fleet was sunk, I understand, and there is now widespread starvation. There are those who think that a small price to pay for stability. I am not one of them. The Isles now produce no tax revenue whatever.’
‘The Isles themselves were never important, but the message of the Isles, and the two hundred and twelve hanged, has reached the mainland. It will keep the clans in their place. We should have wiped them out a century ago, and peopled the highlands with Varlish.’
‘We must agree to differ, captain. Has your prisoner offered any useful information?’
‘Call Jace has two cannon and around five hundred muskets.’
‘I am surprised you got him to talk. These Black Rigante are hardy fellows.’
‘He resisted all pressure until we sawed off his foot. I swear these clansmen have little feeling. They do not experience pain as we do.’
‘How will you use this information? With two hundred men we cannot storm Call Jace’s stronghold.’
‘No, not yet. But I think the Moidart will begin to make plans when he learns of the cannon. Then we can burn out these rebels once and for all.’
Linax began coughing again, but the spasm passed swiftly. ‘I knew a man once,’ he said, ‘whose house was infested with cockroaches. They drove him crazy. In the end he torched his home. It burned very brightly. And he was highly successful. As he stood among the charred ruins the following day he did not see a single cockroach.’
‘Your meaning is lost on me, sir, I am afraid.’
‘It is one thing to light a fire, captain, quite another to control it. And I think you may be wrong about the Moidart. Have you heard from the capital lately?’
‘Not in the last month, sir.’
‘There is more talk of unrest. The king’s popularity is not what it was, and he is still at loggerheads with the Tribune Chamber. Civil war is coming, Ranaud. Not this year perhaps, or even next. But it is coming. The Moidart will have to choose sides. He will not want to commit troops so far north when he has enemies of his own far closer.’
‘A campaign here would be over in days,’ said Ranaud. ‘We’d hang Jace and fifty or so of his senior men, indenture half of the clan to work in the mines, and build a garrison at the centre of Rigante territory.’
‘Do not let your success in the Isles go to your head, captain. Yes, they were troublesome, but they were badly led, badly provisioned, and carried no real weaponry. Call Jace has probably two thousand fighting men, and he is a real leader. He is clever – cunning if you like – and unafraid. I do not think it would be over in days.’
That’s because you are old and dying, thought Ranaud savagely. You have invested these qualities in Jace so that your own failures become more understandable. There was little point in telling this weak and indecisive man that he had already set in motion a plan to eliminate Call Jace. The Rigante leader had built his tiny empire on bands of murderous raiders operating to the east of Black Mountain. Well, two could play that game. Ranaud had been gathering intelligence about Jace for the last few months. The Rigante was known to frequent the house of a young widow half a day’s walk from the sanctuary of his own lands. Ranaud had sent eight men into the mountains; hard, ruthless men. They would wait until Jace showed himself, then kill him. Without their leader the Black Rigante would be infinitely easier to handle.