“I was getting so sick of that damned Kushan food,” he mumbled, around a mouthful of some savory item which Lady Sanga had prepared. Out of what, exactly, no one knew. The one item Lady Sanga had insisted on salvaging from her wagon, before the thing was put to the torch with the corpses from the cemetery in it, was a small chest full of her cooking supplies.
“No one will notice its absence,” she’d claimed. Ajatasutra, despite some misgivings, had not pressed the point. He’d simply insisted that she transfer the supplies—which consisted mostly of onions, packets of herbs and spices and other savories, and a small knife—into various sacks, leaving the empty chest behind to burn in the flames. He agreed with her that no one would notice the absent supplies. But the chest, though not an expensive item likely to be stolen, had solid fittings which would survive the flames. Someone—someone like Nanda Lal and his best spies, at any rate—might notice the absence of those fittings, and start to wonder.
“Got onions in’t,” Valentinian continued happily. “I love onions.”
Anastasius sighed heavily. “I don’t miss their cooking, but I do miss the Kushans. I felt better with Kujulo and his maniacs around.”
Ajatasutra began to say something, but Anastasius waved him down. “Don’t bother! I understand the logic, you damned schemer. Five men—two of them injured, and one of them elderly—a woman, and three children can make their way across the Ganges plain without being noticed much. No way a large party of armed men could. Especially not Kushans. Not when we got to Kausambi, for sure.”
Valentinian had finished devouring the savory by then, and Anastasius’ last words brought back his normal gloom.
“I still say this plan is insane. We could get Lady Sanga and the children out now.” He pointed to the southwest. “Easy enough—well, after a hard trek through the Thar—to reach the general’s forces. Then—”
Ajatasutra began to speak again, but, again, Anastasius waved him down. “I’ll deal with the little weasel.” Glowering: “Valentinian, that’d be even more insane. This whole little rescue operation was a side trip added on at the last moment. We still have the main thing to accomplish. If we brought out Lady Sanga now that would expose the whole scheme—no way it wouldn’t come out, in the middle of a whole army—and make the rest of it impossible. The only way to keep the secret is to hide it in the belly of the beast. In Kausambi, the last place Nanda Lal would think to look.”
“Narses!” hissed Valentinian. “Too clever by half!” But he left off arguing the point.
The supremacy of logic having been restored, Anastasius went back to his own worries. “I just miss having the Kushans around. I don’t begrudge it to them, mind you, getting back to their own folk. And since they’ll pass through the Sind on their way, they can probably give the general word of how we’re doing. But—” He sighed, even more heavily than before. “It’s going to be tricky, with just the three of us, if we get attacked by real bandits.”
Lady Sanga and the children had eaten earlier, and she had given the two wounded Rajputs what care she could. So now she and her children were sitting around the campfire listening to the exchange. No sooner had Anastasius finished than Rajiv sprang to his feet, drawing his sword and waving it about.
“Bandits—pah! Against the Mongoose? And there are four of us!”
The twelve-year-old boy’s enthusiasm did not seem to mollify Anastasius. Ajatasutra shared the giant cataphract’s skepticism. Having an overconfident and rambunctious lad as an “additional warrior” struck him as more trouble than help.
And, judging from the fierce scowl on his face, Valentinian felt even more strongly about it. But Valentinian’s displeasure, it became immediately apparent, had a more immediate focus.
“You hold a sword that way in a fight, boy, you’re a dead man.”
Rajiv lowered the blade, his face a study in contradiction. One the one hand, chagrin. On the other, injured—even outraged—pride.
“My father taught me to hold a sword!” he protested. “Rana Sanga himself!”
Valentinian shook his head, rose with his usual quick and fluid speed, and drew his own sword. “He didn’t teach you that grip,” he growled. “If he had, I wouldn’t have this scar on my head and he’d be buried on a mountainside in Persia.”