That was again reassuring to hear, because within the building they found what could only be called, in Erik’s judgment, a demon. Jadow had his sword half out of his scabbard when the creature turned and struck him across the knuckles with a long wooden spoon. ‘Put that away,’ it said with a deep rumbling growl.
Jadow let out a yelp and released the sword hilt, letting the sword slide back into its scabbard. ‘That hurt!’ he exclaimed while sucking on his bruised knuckles.
‘Don’t talk with your mouth full,’ admonished the creature, motioning for the four guards to sit at a table.
Erik paused and realized he was in a kitchen. The ‘demon’ was a red creature, about as big as Jerome, looking as if its skin was two or three sizes too large. It seemed to droop around the creature’s body in folds and creases, and to be thick, like hide. A large head without hair was dominated by two horns, which rose in front of fanlike ears, to arch back to points just behind the head.
It appeared to be nude, save for the large white apron it wore. Pulling a big bowl of fruit from a shelf, it placed it upon the table and said, ‘I’ll have soup in a minute.’
Gathis said, ‘Alika will care for your needs and send someone with you to show you where you’ll sleep.’ As the cook crossed to the other side of the room, Gathis lowered his voice. ‘She’s very sensitive, so say something nice about her cooking.’ Then he hurried off.
Biggo said, ‘She?’ in low tones. Jadow grinned and shrugged, taking a large pear from the platter and biting deep into it. He closed his eyes as juice dripped down his chin, and made a satisfied sound.
Now Erik noticed the smells. Suddenly he was ravenous as hot spices filled the air, and he remembered what food not cooked aboard ship tasted like. He took an apple and bit into it, finding it crisp and sweet, and savoring the taste.
Then Alika was back with a large platter of bread and cheese. Placing them on the table, she turned away. Erik hesitated briefly before he said, ‘Thank you.’
The creature paused and rumbled, ‘You’re welcome.’
Soon the four men were eating as well as they had back in camp, with far more leisure, as the cook produced a thick soup of creamed vegetables with spices, a full roast chicken for each man, and steaming greens piled high, buttered, and spiced. Ale, cold and foaming in pewter mugs, was placed at each man’s elbow, and Erik hadn’t recalled drinking anything quite so thirst-quenching.
Between mouthfuls, Biggo said, ‘I don’t think I would have believed any man who told me of this place and these creatures.’
Jadow said, ‘Man, it’s far easier to imagine evil spirits and black sorcery than this.
‘“And you say the creature could cook?”’ he mimicked someone questioning him.
‘“Ya, man, she cooked better than me own mother!”’
The others laughed. Jerome said, ‘I wonder why we came here?’
‘Wondering’s not good for the health,’ said Jadow.
Jerome said, ‘One thing we learned in camp. You follow orders, you stay alive. Don’t volunteer, don’t cause trouble. Each day after the gallows is a gift.’
Erik nodded. He still had trouble not wincing when he remembered that fall with the rope around his neck. The sour taste of fear in his stomach was one he wished never to repeat.
The cook came back with more bread and Biggo said, ‘Alika?’
The cook paused. ‘Yes?’
‘Ah, what are you?’
The creature fixed Biggo with a narrow gaze, as if weighing the nature of the question, then she replied, ‘A student. I work for my instruction.’
‘No, I mean, where are you from?’
‘Targary.’
‘I’ve never heard of Targary,’ said Jadow.
‘It is far away,’ she said, turning back to her work.
They ate in silence after that.
When they finished, a young girl, no more than ten or eleven by her appearance, but with grey hair and maroon eyes, escorted them to a room. In a voice tinged with alien nuances, she said, ‘Sleep here. Water there.’ She pointed at a basin and pitcher. ‘Relieve yourself outside,’ she said, making a general down-the-hall and out-the-door gesture. ‘You need. You call. I come.’
She bowed and departed. Biggo said, ‘I swear that child’s feet weren’t touching the ground.’
Erik removed his baldric and sat on the nearest bed, a thickly padded feather mattress with two pillows and a heavy comforter against the chill. ‘I am through with being amazed.’ He lay down with an exaggerated stretch. ‘This is the first bed I’ve been in …’ He stopped and grinned at his friends. ‘This is the first bed I’ve been in!’
Biggo laughed. ‘You’ve never slept in a bed?’
‘With my mother, when I was a baby, I guess, but I’ve been sleeping in the hayloft as long as I can recall, then prison, the camp, and the ship.’
‘Well, enjoy, Erik von Darkmoor,’ said Jerome as he lay down on his bunk. ‘I plan on sleeping until someone makes me get up to work.’ With that he closed his eyes and raised his arm to cover his face.
‘Man, that is a fine notion,’ said Jadow.
Erik and Biggo followed suit, and soon the room was silent, save for the sounds of heavy breathing and snoring.
Erik awoke to the sound of voices. Sitting up, he was disoriented for a moment, then remembered where he was. The voices were coming through a window, one that looked out upon the garden.
The familiar voice of Robert de Loungville carried through the night as he and someone else approached. ‘… never seen him like this before.’
‘He has a great deal on his mind,’ said another; Erik recognized the speaker as being their host, Nakor.
‘He took that last mission hard. We’ve had setbacks before, but nothing like that. If he hadn’t carried me half the way, I’d have died on the banks of the Vedra River. Of the two thousand of us who went, only sixty returned.’
‘Ah, I had heard it was difficult.’
‘Whatever you heard, it was worse.’
Erik felt awkward. He didn’t think it was proper to eavesdrop, but this was the room he had been assigned and Nakor and Robert weren’t taking pains not to be overheard.
‘I hear this and I hear that,’ said Nakor, and Erik could tell they had stopped moving.
‘It was the biggest battle so far. Calis put us in with Haji’s Red Hawks and a half-dozen other companies that usually work out of the Eastlands. We joined up with the other defenders at Kisma-hal, a town between Hamsa and Kilbar. Ran into the Westland army skirmishes as we beat them back. Then their leading elements rolled through us and drove to the gates of the city. We fortified the garrison and beat back three assaults on the walls, and we sallied a few times, burning their baggage train and causing them a great deal of pain. Then the second wave of Westland infantry showed up and we were surrounded.
‘Two hundred and sixty-five days of siege, Nakor. And those damn magicians. Nothing like those Tsurani during the Riftwar were supposed to have done, but enough to make a man hate all magic. The King of Hamsa’s magicians barely kept us free of most of the worst, the lightning, fires, the freezing spells. But they couldn’t protect us from the rest, and it was almost as bad: flies and mosquitoes in clouds appearing out of nowhere. Every barrel of wine in the city turned sour. After the first hundred and fifty days, we ate hard bread and drank foul water and we survived. After two hundred, we ate maggots in green meat, and we ate insects when we could find them and were thankful. We were close to eating our dead.
‘Then, when the city surrendered, Calis took the head start rather than sell out the contract and join the invaders.’ Erik heard bitterness in Robert’s tone. ‘Half our men were injured or sick. Half of those still living, I should say. We got our one day’s grace; then they turned their cavalry after us. If we had headed south along the river, they’d have run us down for certain. We turned east and hid.’ Robert was silent for a time, then when he spoke again, Erik could hear the barely held-back emotions in his voice, as if he had never told the story to anyone before. ‘We killed our own wounded rather than leave them behind. As it was, the rest of us barely made it to the steppes. The Jeshandi covered our retreat from there, and the snakes were smart enough not to get into a running fight with them in their own territory. The Jeshandi fed us and nursed us, and we eventually got back to the City of the Serpent River.’
Nakor said, ‘I remember the first visit, twenty-four years ago.’ There was a moment of silence. ‘Calis was very young then. He still is, by the measure of his race. Now he has much responsibility, and lacks Arutha or Nicholas at his side to instruct him.
‘And now you plan this very dangerous thing.’
‘Desperate thing,’ said Robert de Loungville. ‘It was a long time in the planning, and getting the right men for the job was harder than we thought.’
