Soldiers Live (6 page)

An Abode of Ravens:

Exercise Session
As soon as I healed enough I asked Uncle Doj to let me resume the martial arts
exercises I had given up many years ago. “Why are you interested now?” he asked.

Sometimes I think he is more suspicious of me than I am of him.

“Because I have time. And the need. I’m as weak as a puppy. I want to get my
strength back.”

“You chased me away when I offered.”

“I didn’t have time then. And you were so much more abrasive.”

“Ha.” He smiled. “You’re too kind.”

“You’re right. But I’m a prince.”

“A Prince of Darkness, Stone Soldier.” He knew that would get my goat. “But a
lucky prince.” The old fart indulged in a smirk. “Several of your contemporaries
have approached me recently, also motivated by anticipation of those hardships
that can no longer be that far ahead.”

“Good.” Did he know something I did not? Probably a lot. “When and where?”

His grin became evil, revealing bad teeth. Which made me wonder if Sleepy had
found anybody to fill the dentistry vacancy left by One-Eye’s passing. The old
fool had not bothered taking on apprentices.

“When” was the crack of dawn and “where” was the unpaved street outside Doj’s
small house, which he shared with Tobo’s uncle Thai Dei and several bachelor
officers of local origin. My fellow victims were Willow Swan, the brothers
Loftus and Cletus, who remain the Company’s principal architects and engineers,

and the exiled ruling prince and princess of Taglios, the Prahbrindrah Drah and
his sister the Radisha Drah. Those are not names, they are titles. Even after
decades I do not know their personal designations. And they show no inclination
to share.

“Where’s your pal Blade?” I asked Swan. For a while Blade had been Sleepy’s
military envoy to the File of Nine, but I had heard that he had been recalled
after One-Eye’s death. I had not seen him around, though.

“Old Blade’s got too much on his plate for anything like this.”

Loftus and Cletus both grumbled under their breaths but did not clarify. I had
not seen much of them lately, either. I supposed they were working themselves to
death building a city from scratch. Suvrin, who arrived just in time to hear
what they mumbled, nodded vigorously. “She’s going to work us all till there’s
nothing but grease spots left.” I am not sure about Suvrin. I have no trouble
imagining him going around endlessly repeating the silent mantra, “Every day in
every way I am going to become a better soldier.”

“Well, old Blade never was real ambitious,” Swan replied. “Except when it came
to carving up priests.” He seemed to know what he was talking about even if it
was not obvious to me.

Clete said, “If we’re getting the straight shit from Shivetya there’ll be a
whole new crop in need of culling when we get home.”

The Prahbrindrah Drah and his sister edged closer, eager for hard news from
home. Sleepy took no trouble to keep them posted. She did not have much of a
diplomatic streak. I had best remind her that she will need their amity once we
are back across the plain.

They were not handsome, those two. And the Radisha looked more like the Prince’s
mother than his sister. But he had been under the ground with me while she rode
the Taglian tiger and tried not to lose its reins to Soulcatcher. They strove to
remain unobtrusive here, the Prince because he had been our active enemy in the
field, the Princess because she had turned on us at the very last moment of our
victory over the last Shadowmasters.

Sleepy fixed her for that.

Technically, the Radisha was our prisoner. Sleepy had abducted her. She and her
brother will become tools of the Company once Sleepy stages our return. Everyone
agrees. But I suspect that the royals have reservations.

“Rajadharma.” I said, bowing slightly. I could not resist the taunt, reminding
them both that by attempting to betray us they had ended up failing to fulfill
their duty to their subjects.

“Liberator.” The Radisha returned a tiny bow. I swear, the woman gets homelier
by the month. “You appear to be healing well.”

“I’ve got a knack for coming back. But my bounce sure ain’t as fast or as high
as it used to be. Guess it’s old age creeping up.” I lied and told her, “You’re
looking well yourself. You both are. What have you been doing? I haven’t seen
you for a while.”

The Prahbrindrah Drah said nothing. He remained inscrutable. He had been quiet
and unexpressive since our resurrection. We had gotten along well, once. But
times change. Neither of us were the men we had been during the Shadowmaster
wars.

“You’re lying like a snake’s belly,” the Radisha told me. “I’m old and I’m ugly
and I’m still ashamed of myself . . . But you’re telling the lie my soul wants
to hear. Forget rajadharma, though. That accusation has no power to hurt me
anymore. From outside. I still crucify myself. I know what I did. At the time I
thought it was the right thing. The Protector manipulated me using my sense of
rajadharma. Once we get back there you’ll see us in a different light.”

Rajadharma means the ruler’s obligation to serve the ruled. When the word is
thrown into a ruler’s face, or is used as an epithet, it is a savage accusation
of failure.

The Radisha is a hard, stubborn little woman. Unfortunately, she will have to
get the better of a hard, stubborn, crazy, almost supremely powerful sorceress
if she wants to fulfill her expectations for herself.

I glanced at her brother. The Prince’s expression had not changed but I sensed
that he thought he appreciated the difficulties more fully than his sister did.

Uncle Doj whacked something with a practice sword. The loud crack ended our
chatter. “Your canes, please. On the count, commence the Crane Kada.” He did not
bother to explain what that was to the new guy.

Maybe two decades ago I had observed and briefly joined the Nyueng Bao
exercises. Murgen was Annalist then. He had had Gota, Doj and his wife Sahra’s
brother, Thai Dei, living with him. Doj expected me to remember.

About all I recalled of the Crane Kada was that it constituted the first and
simplest of a dozen slow-motion dances incorporating all the formal steps and
strokes of Doj’s school of fencing. The old priest led from up front, his back
to his pupils. Although he was the eldest of us all, he moved with a precision
and grace that verged on beauty. But when Thai Dei and Tobo joined us briefly,

later, both outshone the old man. It was hard not to stop just to appreciate
Tobo’s mastery.

The boy made me feel clumsy and inept just standing still.

Everything came so easily for him.

He had all the talents and skills he could possibly need. If any question
remained, it concerned his character. A lot of good people had worked hard to
make sure that he became a virtuous and upright man. Which he did appear to be.

But he was a blade not yet tested. True temptation had not yet whispered in his
ear.

I missed a step badly, stumbled. Uncle Doj laid his cane across the seat of my
trousers as vigorously as if I had been an adolescent. His face remained bland
but I suspected that he had wanted to do that for a long time.

I tried to concentrate.

Glittering Stone:

Steadfast Guardian
The being on the huge wooden throne in the heart of the fortress at the center
of the stone plain is a construct. Possibly he was created by the gods, who
fought their wars upon that plain. Or perhaps his creators were the builders who
constructed the plain—if they were not gods themselves. Opinions vary. Stories
abound. The demon Shivetya himself is not disposed to be unstinting with the
facts, or is, at best, inconsistent in their distribution. He has shown his
latest chronicler several conflicting versions of ancient events. Old Baladitya
has abandoned all hope of establishing an exact truth and, instead, seeks the
deeper range of meaning underpinning what the golem does reveal. Baladitya
understands that in addition to being foreign territory the past is, as history,

a hall of mirrors that reflect the needs of souls observing from the present.

Absolute fact serves the hungers of only a few disconnected people. Symbol and
faith serve the rest.

Baladitya’s Company career duplicates his prior life. He writes things down.

When he was a copyist at the Taglian Royal Library he wrote things down. Now,

nominally, he is a prisoner of war. Chances are he has forgotten that. In
reality he is freer today to pursue his own interests than ever he was at the
library.

The old scholar lives and works around the demon’s feet. Which has to be as
close to personal heaven as a Gunni historian can imagine. If the historian does
not remain too determinedly wedded to Gunni religious doctrine.

Shivetya’s motives for refusing categorical declarations may stem from
bitterness about his lot. By his own admission he has met most of the gods
face-to-face. His recollections concerning them are even less flattering than
those spicing most of Gunni mythology, where few of the gods are extolled as
role models. Almost without exception the Gunni deities are cruel and selfish
and untouched by any celestial sense of rajadharma.

A tall black man stepped into the light cast by Baladitya’s lamps. “Learned
anything exciting today, old-timer?” The copyist’s fuel expenses are prodigal.

He is indulged.

The old man did not respond. He is almost deaf. He exploits his infirmity to its
limits. Not even Blade insists that he share routine camp chores any longer.

Blade asked again but the copyist’s nose remained close to the page on which he
was writing. His penmanship is swift and precise. Blade cannot decipher the
complicated ecclesiastical alphabet, except for some of those characters it
shares with the only slightly simpler common script. Blade looked up into the
golem’s eye. That appeared to be about the size of a roc’s egg. The adjective
“baleful” fit it well. Not even naive old Baladitya has ever proposed that the
demon be delivered from the restraint guaranteed by the daggers nailing its
limbs to the throne. Neither has the demon ever encouraged anyone to release it.

It has endured for thousands of years. It has the patience of stone.

Blade tried another approach. “I’ve had a runner come from the Abode of Ravens.”

He prefers the native name for the Company’s base. It is so much more dramatic
than Outpost or Bridgehead and Blade is a dramatic man fond of dramatic
gestures. “The Captain says she expects to acquire the needed shadowgate
knowledge shortly. Something is about to break loose in Khang Phi. She wants me
to get cracking getting more treasure brought up. She wants you to finish
finding everything out. She’ll be moving soon.”

The copyist grunted. “He’s easily bored, you know.”

“What?” Blade was startled, then angry. The old man had not heard a word.

“Our host.” The old man did not lift his eyes from the page. It would take them
too long to readjust. “He’s easily bored.” Baladitya cared nothing about the
Company’s plans. Baladitya was in paradise.

“You’d think we’d be a change that would distract him.”

“He’s been distracted by mortals a thousand times before. He’s still here. None
of those people are, except those remembered in stone.” The plain itself, though
older and vastly slower than Shivetya, might have a mind of its own. Stone
remembers. And stone weeps. “Their very empires have been forgotten. How much
chance is there that this time will be different?”

Baladitya sounded a little empty. Not unreasonable, Blade thought, considering
the fact that he looked into the time abyss represented by the demon all the
time. Talk about vanity and chasing after wind!

“Yet he’s helping us. More or less.”

“Only because he believes we’re the last mayflies he’ll see. Excepting the
Children of Night when they raise up their Dark Mother. He’s convinced that
we’re his last chance to escape.”

“And all we got to do to get his help is skrag the nasty Goddess, then put his
ass away for the long night.” The demon’s gaze seemed to drill right through
him. “Nothing to it. Piece of cake, as Goblin used to say. Though the saying
doesn’t make any literal sense.” Blade lifted his fingers to his eyebrow in a
salute to the demon. Whose eyes seemed to be smouldering now.

“God killing. That should be perfect work for you.”

Blade was unsure if Baladitya had spoken or Shivetya had entered his mind. He
did not like what the observation implied. It echoed too closely Sleepy’s
thinking, which is why his posh job in Khang Phi is gone and he has charge of
operations on the plain, having abandoned banquets and down mattresses for iron
rations and a bed of cold and silent stone shared only with unhappy, withered
dreams, a crazy scholar, miscellaneous thieves and a house-sized lunatic demon
half as old as time.

All his adult life Blade has been driven by a hatred for religion. He has an
especial abhorrence for its retailers. Considering his current whereabouts and
present occupation it seems likely that he should have restrained his impulse to
share his opinions.

Blade could have sworn that, for an instant, a smile played across the demon’s
features.

Blade chose not to comment.

He is a man of few words. He believes there is little point to speech. He
believes the golem eavesdrops on his thoughts. Unless it has become so bored
with ephemerals that it no longer pays attention.

That hint of amusement again. Blade’s speculation is not valid. He should know
better. Shivetya is interested in every breath every brother of the Black
Company takes. Shivetya has anointed these men as the death-givers.

“You need anything?” Blade asked the old man, resting a hand on his shoulder
briefly. “Before I head down below?” The contact is entirely contrived. But
Baladitya cares nothing about the touch, genuine or not.

Baladitya lifted his pen from his right hand with his left, flexed his fingers.

“I suppose I should eat something. I can’t recall when last I put fuel on the
fire.”

“I’ll see that you get something.” The something was sure to be rice and spice
and golem manna. If there was anything Blade regretted about his life, it was
having lived most of it in a part of the world where a majority of the
population include a vegetarian diet within their religion and those who do not
mainly eat fish or chicken. Blade is ready to start at whichever end of a
spit-roast pig and not stop until he reaches the other.

Blade’s command, the thieves, the Company pathfinders, includes twenty-six of
the outfit’s brightest and most trusted youngsters, all Children of the Dead.

They need to be both smart and trustworthy because Sleepy wants to exploit the
treasures in the caverns beneath the plain and because they really have to
understand that the plain itself will not forgive them if they do the wrong
thing. Shivetya has extended his favor. Shivetya sees everything and knows
everything inside the gates of his universe. Shivetya is the soul of the plain.

No one comes or goes without Shivetya’s countenance, or at least his
indifference. And in the unlikely event that Shivetya remained indifferent to an
unauthorized theft, there was nowhere for a thief to run but back to the
shadowgate opening on the Land of Unknown Shadows. That was the only shadowgate
under control and functioning properly. That was the only shadowgate not certain
to kill the thief.

It was a long stroll across the great circle surrounding the crude throne. That
floor is anything but crude. It is an exact one-eightieth scale representation
of the plain outside, less the memorial pillars that were added in a later age
by men who failed to possess even mythologized recollections of the builders.

Hundreds of manhours have gone into clearing the accumulated dirt and dust off
its surface so Shivetya can more clearly discern every detail of his kingdom.

Shivetya’s throne rests upon a raised wheel one-eightieth the size of this.

Decades ago, Soulcatcher’s tampering triggered an earthquake that battered the
fortress and split its floor into a vast crevasse. Outside the plain the
disaster destroyed cities and killed thousands. Today the only memorial of what
had been a gap in the floor a dozen yards wide and thousands of feet deep is a
red stripe meandering past the throne. It dwindles every day. As does Shivetya,

the mechanism ruling the plain heals itself.

The great circular model of the plain rises half a yard above the rest of the
floor, which exists at the level of the plain outside.

Blade dropped off the edge of the wheel. He strode to a hole in the floor, the
head of stairs leading down. They descend for miles, through caverns natural and
created. The sleeping Goddess Kina lies at the deepest level, patiently awaiting
the Year of the Skulls and the beginning of the Khadi Cycle, the destruction of
the world. The wounded Goddess Kina.

Shadows stirred along the nearby wall. Blade froze. Who? No way that could be
his people. Or, what?

Fear speared through Blade. Shadows in motion often presaged cruel, screaming
death. Had those things found a way into the fortress? Their merciless feasting
was not a horror he cared to witness ever again. And in particular he did not
want to be the main course.

“The Nef,” Blade told himself as three humanoid shapes emerged from the
darkness. He recognized them despite never having seen them before. Hardly
anyone did, outside of dreams. Or maybe nightmares. The Nef were incredibly
ugly. Though they might have been wearing masks. The several descriptions
available did not agree except as to ugliness. He counted them off. “The
Washane. The Washene. The Washone.” Names Shivetya had given Sleepy years ago.

What did they mean? Did they mean anything at all? “How did they get in here?”

The answer might be critical. Killer shadows might exploit the same opening.

As the Nef always did, they tried to communicate something. In the past their
efforts inevitably failed. But this time their appeal seemed obvious. They did
not want Blade to go down those stairs.

Sleepy, Master Santaraksita, and others who have been in contact with Shivetya
believe that the Nef are artificial reproductions of the beings who created the
plain. Shivetya brought them into existence because he longed for a connection
with something approximating those whose artifice had wrought the great engine
and its pathways between the worlds, because he was lonely.

Shivetya has lost his will to live. If he should perish, whatever he has created
himself will go with him. The Nef are not yet prepared to embrace oblivion,

despite the endless horror and tedium existence upon the plain imposes.

Blade spread his hands at his sides in a gesture of helplessness. “You guys need
to polish your communication skills.” Not a sound came from the Nef but their
growing frustration became palpable. Which had been a constant from the first
time anyone had dreamt of them.

Blade stared. He did try to understand. He considered the ironies of the Black
Company’s adventure across the glittering plain. He was an atheist himself. His
journey had brought him face-to-face with a complete ecology of supernatural
entities. And Tobo and Sleepy, whom he considered reliable witnesses otherwise,

claimed actually to have seen the grim Goddess Kina who, myth suggested, lay
imprisoned a mile beneath his feet.

Sleepy, of course, faced her crises of faith. A devout Vehdna monotheist, she
never, ever encountered any worldly sustenance for her beliefs. Though
supportive evidence is thin, the Gunni religion only creaks badly under the
burden of the knowledge we have unearthed. The Gunni are polytheists accustomed
to having their gods assume countless aspects and avatars, shapes and disguises.

So much so that, in some myths, those gods seem to be murdering or cuckolding
themselves. The Gunni have the flexibility to look at every discovery, as Master
Santaraksita has, and declare new information to be just another way of
proclaiming the same old divine truths.

God is god, whatever his name. Blade has seen those sentiments inlaid in the
wall tiles in several places in Khang Phi.

Whenever anyone strays far from Shivetya, a ball of earthy brown glow tags
along. It hovers above and behind one shoulder or another. The ball does not
shed much light but in what otherwise would be utter darkness they are
sufficient. They are the golem’s doing. Shivetya has powers he has forgotten how
to use. He might be a small god himself if he was not nailed to his ancient
throne.

Blade descended nearly a thousand steps before he encountered anyone headed
upward. This soldier carried a heavy pack. “Sergeant Vanh.”

The soldier grunted. Already he was winded. No one made more than one trip a
day. Blade gave Vanh the bad news because he might not run into him again for
days. “Had a message from the Captain. We have to step it up. She’s almost ready
to move.”

Vanh mumbled the sorts of things soldiers always do. He continued his climb.

Blade wondered how Sleepy planned to haul off the mountain of treasure already
accumulated up top. It was, for sure, enough to finance a pretty good war.