David Gemmell – Rigante 4 – Stormrider

‘I am sorry that it took the death of a kind man to bring me that gift,’ said Chara.

‘Time for you to rest,’ said the Wyrd. ‘Tomorrow we will take Feargol to safety.’

CHAPTER SEVEN

FOLLOWING THE DUEL GAISE MACON’S REPUTATION HAD GROWN among the soldiers of all units. Men talked of the Grey Ghost, and the soldiers of the Eldacre Company found themselves suddenly more popular. The name of the cowardly Lord Person was spoken with contempt. Person himself had left the camp the same day, and had not been seen since.

The body of the elderly Lord Buckman was taken to the Royalist city of Sandacum, for a state funeral, where the king spoke movingly of the general’s courage and loyalty. Buckman’s regiment was given over to Lord Cumberlane. Winter Kay became the Lord Marshal of all the king’s armies.

A winter truce, negotiated between Lord Cumberlane and Luden Macks, was agreed and many of the twelve thousand militia serving the king were allowed to go home, with orders to reassemble in the spring. The standing army of eight thousand men remained, some wintering in Sandacum, others in the regional capital of Baracum a hundred miles north.

Gaise Macon petitioned to be allowed to take his Eldacre Company home, with other militia regiments, but the request was denied. His cavalrymen and scouts were to patrol the truce lines west of Shelding, watching for incursions from Covenant skirmishers. A supply depot was also set up within the town, and in a time of famine and desperation this needed to be guarded. Billeting the men proved of little difficulty. As with most towns in the centre of Varlain there were many empty houses. Privation, sickness, starvation and the relentless drive for recruits from both factions had seen populations shrinking year by year. The arrival of six hundred soldiers for the winter was a boon for Shelding, though not necessarily a welcome one for all. New industries blossomed to service the troops. Plays were put on in the village hall, and older women took to sewing and mending for the soldiers. Younger women offered other services, and the men paid for their pleasures in food and clothing as well as coin.

Gaise Macon met with the town elders and churchmen to establish rules of behaviour for both townsfolk and soldiers during the winter, and to set down lines of communication between civil and military authorities. He also appointed Mulgrave as Watch Captain, with orders to select thirty men to act as a policing force to patrol the town and keep order. This was not an easy role. On the second night a group of rowdy young soldiers got into a fight with some of the townsfolk, following an assault on a young woman. Mulgrave and five of his men broke up the disturbance. A hasty hearing was called for the following morning. The woman gave evidence that two men had burst into her home and attempted to rape her. Her screams had been heard by neighbours who ran to her aid. A fight had taken place, and a townsman had been knifed in the leg.

Gaise Macon ordered the two men flogged, a punishment carried out in the market square, and administered by the veteran sergeant Lanfer Gosten. Each man suffered forty lashes. Both were unconscious by the conclusion, and needed to be carried from the square. One of them was Kammel Bard.

On the fourth day in Shelding a convoy of seventy wagons arrived from Sandacum, bringing supplies for the new depot. With them came Quartermaster General Cordley Lowen, a company of dragoons, and two Redeemer Knights. Mulgrave was there to greet the new arrivals. Cordley Lowen, his daughter and three servants were assigned a pleasant house overlooking a mill stream. The dragoons rode back to Sandacum. The two Redeemer Knights approached Mulgrave. He recognized them as the loaders from Gaise Macon’s duel with Person. Neither man wore battle armour, and both were dressed instead in dark tunics and leggings, and long, black coats bearing the White Tree of the priesthood upon collar and cuff. Many of the Redeemer Knights, Mulgrave knew, took holy orders in the first three years of their service.

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