The Reformer g-4 Page 5

  "Ah, young Adrian," a voice said.

  He felt the cold clutch of fear, the sort that makes the stomach clench and the scrotum try to draw itself up into the abdomen. This is exactly what I had planned, he told himself.

  "My lord," he said, turning and bowing. Wilder Redvers in the life, his ample form looking impressive in the wrapped mantle of a Councillor, with the broad purple stripe along the edge.

  "I heard the summation of your speech. Most impressive, most impressive-a Confederate advocate couldn't have done it any better. I can see that giving you the run of my library was a sound decision, yes, sound."

  "My gratitude is eternal, my lord," Adrian said. He glanced around. "If I might beg a minute of your time?"

  "Well. . I suppose."

  "Alone, my lord. It's a very sensitive matter."

  The plump beak-nosed features changed. He suspects you know something, Raj cautioned. He's remembering that you're Esmond's brother.

  In the privacy of his mind Adrian nodded. And I'd be dead inside the hour if he confirms his suspicion, he thought. Or even if he doesn't. Now to show myself useful.

  "As you may know, my lord, I've been putting together some notes for a history," he said. Redvers' face relaxed slightly; that was a traditional hobby for lawyers. "And I've come across some information in the most ancient chronicles that may be of importance to the State. Naturally, I didn't presume to judge such matters myself, but thought first of you-my patron, a citizen of standing and influence, one competent to judge such matters."

  "My boy, I'm glad you show such wisdom and maturity," Redvers said softly. "To others may be given the art of speaking, of shaping marble so that it seems to live-but to the Confederacy alone is given the mandate of the Gods to rule, to spare the humble and subdue the proud," he said.

  That would be more impressive if I didn't know you were quoting, Adrian thought, the words dry under the hammer of his pulse. They reached one of the inset niches along the walls, this one holding a small chryselephantine statue of the God of War, flourishing an archaic spear, heroically nude, with his foot on a dead Southron barbarian.

  "I have found a series of formulae known to a select few among the ancients," Adrian began. "Knowledge long since lost."

  Redvers nodded; it was well-known to educated men that before the Age of Iron had been an Age of Gold, whose glories were forgotten.

  "With devices based on these formulae, an army would be invincible-it could sweep aside forces many times its size. And the formulae are quite simple; within three months-" Six months, but let's not get too realistic "-given the resources and artificers needed, a force could be so equipped as to sweep the Western Isles, or the Southron barbarians. . a great boon to the State, and of course undying fame and glory to the commander."

  Redvers stood stock-still, his eyes hooded. "And you've come to your patron with this knowledge. Very proper, my boy; very proper."

  He's going to buy it, Raj said, his mental voice almost as dispassionate as Center's.

  probability of agreement 92 % ±5, Center added.

  * * *

  "What on earth is the Emerald babbling about?" one of the nobles said pettishly. "Invincible weapons. . what does he mean? A better catapult, something of that nature?"

  The Redvers family was wealthy enough that their townhouse gardens had a secluded nook like this out of sight and most hearing from the main house. Adrian would much rather have conducted the trial somewhere outside the city. . but Center had decided that Redvers was becoming quite dangerously impatient.

  The stretch of lawn ahead of them held an oak tree and a circle of scarecrowlike dummies, each hung with the mail tunic and helmet of a Confed soldier. In front of them rested a simple jar, stoppered with a clay disk that was pierced for a wick of cotton that Adrian had soaked in the solution that Center showed him. .

  He shuddered at the vision, one from Raj's memories. A vision of what the explosion of a shell or bomb could do to men's bodies.

  "The jar contains my mixture, my lords," Adrian said. "Surrounding it-"

  "Get on with it, Emerald! We're not apothecaries, you know."

  "Yes, my lord. If my lords will step behind this barricade. ."

  Adrian walked towards the jar, blinking at the bright sunlight, a lighted oil lamp in his hand. He held it by the loop at one end and touched the flame to the wick with the other. It started to sputter and fume with evil-smelling blue smoke, and he turned and walked-it was an effort not to run, but the nobles must be impressed-towards the thick pine logs of the barricade.

  "See here," one said as he ducked gratefully behind the thick wood. "How are we supposed to see whatever-it-is if we're huddling behind here?"

  He started to rise. Adrian clamped a hand on his shoulder and pulled him down again; sheer surprise helped him, since the Confederation nobleman couldn't imagine that an Emerald would lay hands on him.

  "You-"

  BWAAAAMMP.

  The sound was louder than thunder, louder than anything Adrian had ever heard, loud enough to stab pain into his ears. He'd been expecting it. The other men there had not. Esmond's sword flashed out in a movement too fast to see except as a blur. One or two of the Confederate nobles threw themselves down with their hands over their ears; another turned and ran for the villa, tripping on a chair leg and lying sobbing and beating his hands against the ground. Most of them simply stood and stared at each other. Audsley, the ex-general, gathered himself, shook back his shoulders to settle his mantle, and walked around the edge of the barricade.

  He stopped, staring at the forward part of the logs. Holes had been gouged into them; he ran his little finger into one, and pulled it back with a jerk.

  "That's hot," he said. "What is it?"

  "A ball of lead, like a sling-bullet, my lord," Adrian said. "Hurled by the daemonic force of the ancient formula's mixture. And that is a hundred feet from the bursting. If a man was closer. ."

  He smiled and spread his hands. Audsley and the others moved towards the place where the jar had rested. A knee-deep hole had been gouged in the soft black dirt, and bits of sod flung all over this corner of the garden. The front of the oak tree gleamed cream-white, the bark scarred and blasted away. Bits and pieces of the armor on the scarecrow stakes were scattered about; one helmet was embedded in the tree itself, three inches of the plume holder driven into the living wood. Audsley examined a mail shirt, putting a gingerly finger through a hole in the iron links.

  "Well. ." he said.

  "Consider, my lord, catapults throwing dozens of such vessels into a tight formation of infantry," Adrian urged. "Still more into cavalry."

  "Yes, I do see," Audsley said. A grin stole across his lined, weathered face. "Redvers, I thought you were wasting our time, but you weren't. Brilliant, man-brilliant!"

  The nobles gathered around Wilder Redvers, slapping him on the back and laughing like men reprieved from death. . which might well be what they were. Adrian turned, feeling the pressure of eyes on his back. Esmond was standing by the barricade, looking at the havoc the bomb had wrought and then at the sword still clenched in his hand.

  * * *

  "What exactly am I supposed to be doing out here?" Esmond asked, looking back over his shoulder. "You've got your infernal machines to tinker with, but I should be back in the city."

  "Don't worry," Adrian said. "She's a lot safer with you gone than she is with you there."

  Esmond nodded gloomily. "The question remains."

  They were two days travel out of Vanbert's outskirts, and an hour's travel down a gravelled road that turned off the military highway west of the city. They'd been travelling on Redvers land that whole hour; past slave villages, wine presses, an alum mine, past fields where the yellow grain was mostly reaped and stooked, past pastures and orchards where green fruit swelled. . and now they were turning into the paved laneway that led up to the villa of Wilder Redvers, one of many he owned. It was a handsome building, a simple rectangular block with a portico of
pillars in front and the usual formal gardens behind; to the front was a stretch of close-cropped pasture dotted with trees, and the cypress-lined driveway.

  "Two things," Adrian said. "First, most of the higher-level staff here are probably Emeralds. I need you to deal with them."

  "Why? You're just as much an Emerald as me."

  "But I'm not a victor of the Five Year Games, and I don't look like Nethan the Great returned," he said. "By the Goddess, brother, I think you're blushing."

  That brought an unwilling crooked grin. "Besides that," Adrian went on, "somebody's going to have to command the unit that actually uses this stuff. . and the guards that make sure nobody spears us while we're doing it."

  Esmond glanced over at him. "Nonsense. Redvers will never let a bunch of foreigners get their hands on something like this."

  "Redvers will," Adrian said. "When he sees what they make of it."

  He nodded to the left of the manor house. The pasture there had probably been for the master's riding velipads; right now it was covered with leather tents in neat rows, each just the right size for a squad of eight men.

  "Marcomann's veterans, joining Audsley," Esmond said. "Must be about three battalions there. . say, fifteen hundred men."

  "And there isn't one single one of them who's going to admit that he has anything to learn about fighting from a foreigner," Adrian said. "Trust me."

  And my unseen advisors, he added. Never forget them.

  * * *

  "This little thing is supposed to kill somebody?" the soldier guffawed.

  The hilt of his assegai jerked as his thick shoulders moved; he was in full fig: mailcoat, dagger, stabbing-spear, shield across his back, helmet with transverse plume. There was a fair bit of gray in the stubble on his square chin and in the thick hair on his scarred forearms, but he moved easily under all that weight of iron and wood and leather. This was one of Audsley's elite, a hundred-commander in Marcomann's wars; there wasn't enough equipment to kit out all the volunteers gathering on the Redvers estate.

  "Yes, sir," Adrian nodded. "You light this"-he pointed at the fuse where it came out of the little wine jar-"throw it, and drop flat. Believe me, it's dangerous."

  The hamlike hand tossed the bomb up and down. "If words were blades, you Emeralds would rule the world," he laughed. "I've defeated plenty of Emeralds in my time, from the North Range to the sea-talking less, and hitting harder." He shrugged. "Oh, well, the general says we've got to try this stuff, so by the cleft of Gellerix we will. Hand me that striker."

  A little way off a baker's dozen of soldiers stood, leaning casually on their shields; Adrian saw one of them reach down into the calf-high grass and pull a stem to chew.

  Adrian smiled and handed over the flint-and-steel, taking a few steps backward. The soldier grinned at that, and worked the scissorslike action. Sparks shot out, and on the third try the fuse caught in a sputter of blue smoke.

  "Funny smelling," the soldier said with mild interest, holding it up.

  "Please throw it now, sir," Adrian said calmly, backing off another few steps. "Right out there in the pasture, towards the crabapple tree, if it please you."

  "Maybe it doesn't," the veteran said. "Don't get your loincloth in a twist, Emerald."

  The thick-muscled arm arched back and whipped forward and the jar soared out, trailing smoke. Adrian's movements had put him behind a low swelling in the ground; he went down on his belly with prudent speed. Dew soaked into the front of his tunic, chill on his skin. As he'd expected, the veteran remained upright. He did bring his shield around, peering curiously over the rim.

  Crack. The sound of the grenade exploding was a malignant snap; he knew what it would look like, too-a red snapping spark and puff of grayish-black smoke. This time he was far too close for that, and his face was pressed firmly into the grass and clover. Something hit the ground with a heavy thump; he looked up to see the soldier on his back, hands clapped to his face and blood leaking out between them. Then he went limp, with a final drum of heels on the turf. Over by the spectators, another was shrieking endlessly, louder than a wounded velipad.

  Adrian moved over to the dead man. He'd felt like smiling, until he saw what was left of his face.

  * * *

  "Idiot! I ought to have you poled right now. Do you have any idea of how valuable four trained soldiers are?"

  Adrian and Esmond bowed low, their heads level with General Audsley's foot where it rested in the steel loop of the stirrup. The big hairy saucer feet of his velipad moved on the grass before them, each with its seven blunt claws. The cinnamon-and-musk scent of the animal was strong in their nostrils, and the naked tail with its tuft of fur swung angrily as the beast sensed its rider's mood.

  "Most excellent lord," Adrian said softly. "I fully realize it, and my apologies are most abject. Using these devices is more a matter of the mechanic arts than real soldiering. Could I-once more-humbly beg that men more suitable for such lowly occupations be assigned to them? Freedmen, even slaves, would be more suitable."

  "Arm slaves?" Audsley said, quick anger in his voice. It had been only two generations since the Great Revolt; Audsley's father had been a young officer when Justiciar Carlos poled six thousand of the rebel survivors of the last battle along the road from Vanbert to Capeson.

  "Freed slaves," Adrian said. "And perhaps. . there are foreigners among the slingers recruited by the great Confed Army as light troops, are there not? Some of those would be most suitable. If I might consult with my lord Redvers. ."

  Audsley scowled; Redvers was providing far too much of the money to be offended lightly. "See to it, then. And keep them out of the way of real soldiers!"

  He wrenched the velipad's mouth around, bringing a blubber of protest and a waving of the big round ears. Esmond stood silently until he was out of earshot.

  "For every insult, for every slight, I'll see a Confed liver," he said at last.

  Adrian nodded. "We've actually got some prospect of that, now," he said. "As long as we can get what I need."

  "I don't know whether it was the Gods or the daemons who told you where to find the formula for this stuff," Esmond said roughly. "But by the Gods, you'll get what you need."

  * * *

  "It's quite simple," Esmond said to his audience of four. "This is our chance."

  "Our chance for what?" the assistant steward of the estate said.

  He was an Emerald freedman; his nominal superior was a one-legged Confed veteran who hadn't been sober past breakfast for ten years. They were meeting in his office, a pleasant room with plastered walls carrying scrolls and dozens of the wax-covered tablets of folding wood used for taking temporary notes; a latticework window opened onto the kitchen gardens. His fingers played with an abacus on the desk as he leaned forward and spoke, twitching nervously. A slave girl came in with a tray of cups and jugs of wine and water. The steward motioned her away impatiently and poured himself.

  Esmond rose and stood facing them. He was wearing Emerald light-infantry armor, a tunic of three-ply greatbeast hide boiled in wax and vinegar and fastened with bronze studs, armguards of the same and high-strapped sandals.

  "There's going to be another civil war among the Confeds," he said.

  The steward blanched. So did the head stockman, the superintendent of field workers, and the woman who directed the household staff proper.

  "We can't stop it; we can't stay out of it," Esmond went on. "You all know what my brother has brought here."

  "Death," the stockman muttered.

  "We're all initiates of the mysteries of death," Esmond said. "But in this case, an awful lot of Confeds are going to die."

  "So? There have been civil wars before-Penburg rose during one of them. The wars end, and then the Confeds stamp on anyone who rebelled like a boot on ants."

  Esmond nodded. "That might have happened without my brother," he said easily. "Why do you think we're helping with this idiot coup?"

  "Because your patron told you to," the steward
said.

  "Velipad shit. We could have lifted a few thousand arnkets and headed for the Isles-our father traded there, and we have contacts in Chalice. This madness of Redvers would have been over in a few months, and all his properties would have been forfeit to the State."

  He watched them shudder at that. Sale at auction, families split up. . and freedmen were always suspect when a man was put on trial for treason. Their testimony was taken from the rack, or with burning splinters put under their nails.

  "With my brother to even things out, the war will go on for a long time," Esmond continued. "Many things could happen. For example, one side or the other could get so desperate that they offer concessions to the Emerald cities. . they might even withdraw, leaving at least nominal independence like the Roper League has. Or they might weaken each other so much that the provinces can revolt and win. Or at least if Redvers and Audsley win, we personally stand to be rewarded."

  The steward looked at his subordinates. "Well, it's worth a hearing, at least. ." he muttered. "Tell us more. What exactly does your brother need? We've all heard the explosions and heard the rumors."

  * * *

  Adrian held the handkerchief to his nose. It was soaked in vinegar, but even so the stink from the bottom of the manure pile was overwhelming; there was a row of piles in back of the barns for the master's racing velipeds. He didn't envy the field slaves who were set to the task, even if they were shambling dull-eyed brutes.

  A few years in that underground prison they keep them in would do that to most men, Raj pointed out.

  Sorry, Adrian thought.

  "Don't you ever put the manure out on the fields?" he asked the chief stockman.

  The stockman was from the Isles, a short brown-skinned man, wrinkled but still agile. There was a strong gutteral accent to his Confed. "Not very much of it," he said. "Place is too big to make it worthwhile, too much trouble to haul it out to the distant fields. Sometimes if it gets in the way we dump it in the river."