The slowly moving caravan was now passing the mouth of the alley, and Valentinian was finally able to get a good look.
” ‘Dogs’ is an insult to dogs. But—” He paused, until the alley was behind them. “They’re hungry-looking, I give you that.”
Anastasius and Valentinian now both looked to Kujulo. The “leadership structure” of their peculiar expedition was a fluid thing. Sometimes one, then another, of the three men in command had taken the lead over the weeks since they landed in the delta and made their slow way into Rajputana. Usually either Valentinian or Anastasius. But now that they had arrived at Ajmer, both of the Roman cataphracts were clearly willing to let Kujulo guide them.
This unfamiliar and exotic city was terra incognita to them. So too, of course, had been the Thar desert and the Aravalli mountains. But rough terrain, whatever its specific features, is much the same in many places—and both Anastasius and Valentinian were veterans of marches across such. Usually as part of an army, true, rather than a merchant caravan. But the experience had not been especially foreign. Neither, certainly, had been the two brief skirmishes with bandits.
Ajmer, however, was a different matter. Here, the “terrain” was not so much geographic as human. And neither of them knew anything about the customs and habits which characterized the city.
Kujulo immediately made clear that he was something of a novice, also. Or, it might be better to say, a man who returns to a place he had known years earlier, and finds it has been completely transformed.
“In the old days,” he growled, “no gang like that would have dared lounge openly in the streets of Ajmer. Rajput women would have driven them off, sent them scampering back into their hovels.”
“I’m pretty sure there’s another pack in that alley up ahead,” murmured Valentinian. “A more lively bunch, seems like. At least judging from the way their lookout ducked back into the alley when I spotted him.”
The only sign of Kujulo’s tension was a slight shift in the way he rode his saddle. The Kushan seemed slightly discomfited by the fact that he had no stirrups.
They all were, in truth. By now, of course, stirrups had become adopted by almost all Malwa cavalry units. But the devices were still rare in civilian use, and they had decided from the beginning that they couldn’t afford to risk drawing attention to themselves. To all outward appearances, the two Roman cataphracts and the seventeen Kushans who accompanied them were nothing more than the guards and drivers of a merchant caravan. A relatively small one, at that.
“There’s no order in this city any more,” continued Kujulo. “All the Rajput soldiers, by now, must have been drawn into the Malwa army. Probably have a small unit of common soldiers policing the city, with maybe a handful of Ye-tai to stiffen them up. But their idea of ‘policing’ will be either lounging in the barracks or—more likely—doing their own extortions.”
There was a little stir in the alley still some distance away, coming up on their right. Three men were leaning out of it, studying the oncoming caravan like so many predators in ambush. Small and mangy predators, to be sure, but . . .
As Valentinian had rightly said, hungry-looking.
“Hell and damn,” rumbled Anastasius. Moving slowly, casually, he loosened the mace belted to his thick waist. As he did so, moving his head with the same casual ease, he glanced back over his shoulder. “Hell and damn,” he repeated. “That first bunch is peeking at us from behind.”
Facing forward again, his basso rumble deepened. “It’s an ambush, sure. In broad daylight on a busy street.”
“Let’s take it to ’em, then,” said Valentinian. His narrow weasel face showed not a trace of emotion. His hand loosened his own weapon, the spatha he favored, and his left leg began to rise.
Kujulo eyed him sharply. Valentinian could dismount from a horse faster than any man he had ever seen. Just as he could do anything faster than any man he had ever seen. Within seconds, he knew, the lightly armored cataphract would be plunging his whipcord body into that alley up ahead.