Fortune and Fate (Twelve Houses) (8 page)
Read Fortune and Fate (Twelve Houses) Online
Authors: Sharon Shinn
She nodded and bent over to pick up the legs of the first dead man. Orson grabbed the man’s arms and they half dragged, half carried the lifeless figure off the road.
“You have a lot of trouble with bandits in these parts?” she asked him when they’d dropped the body.
He shrugged and smacked his hands together as if to rid them of the dead man’s taint. “Things have been unsettled ever since the war,” he said. “Lot of good men died following Rayson Fortunalt to Ghosenhall. Lot of men refused to sign up for his war, and some of those folks found themselves stripped of their positions and their properties. Hard times came to Fortunalt and haven’t really let up since.”
Wen gave him a sharp look. “Are you one of those who wouldn’t turn rebel against the king?”
Orson shrugged again. “Been a soldier my whole life, one way or the other. I left Forten City five years ago, when it started to look like war might come. I ended up fighting anyway, but I was in Ariane Rappengrass’s army. Came back here a year or so ago, but the work hasn’t been too steady. I keep thinking things will turn around for Fortunalt, so I stick.” He made a small motion with his hands. “So far, not much improvement.”
She turned to collect the next body, and he followed her. “What about you?” he said.
She grunted a little as she lifted the corpse’s legs. This was the big man that she’d cut down; it would be a hell of a job to move
him
five inches, let alone five yards. “I told you. I come from Tilt country.”
him
five inches, let alone five yards. “I told you. I come from Tilt country.”
“Well, maybe originally,” he said. “But you got training somewhere else when you learned to fight like that.”
Like him, she shrugged, certain he wouldn’t press too hard. Among people of their kind, it was just expected that there would be episodes in your past you would prefer not to discuss. Justin, for instance, had lived on the streets of Ghosenhall as a common street thief until Tayse found him. “Did some guard work here and there,” she said. “I fought in the war, too, but I was on the side of the royals.”
“Any sane man would have been,” he said, and almost threw the big man’s body down when they were off the road. Then he grinned at her again. “Or sane woman.”
She crouched over the body and motioned Orson down, as if to show him something interesting on the big man’s clothes. When he squatted beside her, she murmured, “I’m not so sure these were random outlaws. I’m wondering about our driver.”
Orson’s eyes gleamed, but he was too canny to suddenly twist his head around and stare at the wagon. “Why?” was all he said.
“Just a feeling. He seemed so edgy. He didn’t like us lingering over our meal. I think he might have made plans with this particular party to meet us at a certain point on the road.”
Orson was silent a moment. “Hard to prove.”
“I know. But two raids on the same wagon in three days? Only makes sense if they followed it all the way from Storian—or if the driver was giving information about his route.”
“Well, let’s get the rest of these fellows onto the grass, and then ask our driver a few friendly questions.”
They finished clearing the road within ten minutes, then checked on the status of their hurt companions. Jack was up and walking around, cursing and flexing his sword arm, but Fibbons was still woozy.
“Is there room for him to lie down in the wagon?” Wen asked.
“Don’t want to dent the doors,” Orson said.
“Well, couldn’t he lie
next
to them?”
next
to them?”
It took a little effort, but they were able to reposition the cargo and make a narrow lane of space so the hurt man could lie on the straw. Orson stepped back and gave Wen a meaningful look before saying, “I’m starting to wonder how many more times this particular load might be attacked before we get to Forten City.”
“Better not happen again,” Carp muttered.
Orson turned deliberately to the driver. “What do you think? Hey? We likely to have to fend off thieves another time? Some more of your friends, maybe? I’m wondering just how much you know about all these attacks.”
For a moment, the driver stared back at him, white-faced and slack-jawed. Then he grabbed the reins and slapped the horses into motion. The wagon lurched forward hard enough to cause Fibbons to yelp, and within seconds it was careening down the road. Orson swore and ran for his horse, for all of them had dismounted to try to make Fibbons more comfortable. Wen was the first one back in the saddle and racing after the jouncing wagon, but Orson came pounding up after her quickly enough. Orson went flying by Wen to crowd against the team, tangling their traces and forcing them to slow. Wen kept pace alongside the wagon, gauging the distance and the rate of travel. When she judged it safe enough, she swung from the gelding’s back and dropped beside the driver on the bench.
He turned on her frantically, dropping the reins to try to pummel her head and shoulders. Just as she’d thought; he wasn’t armed. She gave him a hard shove merely to keep his fists away from her face, then brought up her knife hand and pressed a blade to his throat. Orson had the team under control, but they were still moving at an uncomfortably fast pace, and the rocking motion threatened to drive the tip of her knife through the driver’s skin.
“Don’t make me kill you,” she said calmly, and he sagged on the seat. Keeping the knife in one hand, she caught up the reins in the other, and slowly pulled the horses to a halt. Behind her, she was aware of Fibbons moaning and the sound of more hooves coming closer. She glanced over her shoulder to see Stef and Carp galloping alongside, Jack far behind them, leading Fibbons’s horse. Her own gelding had shied away from the chaos of the runaway team and nervously paced the side of the road about ten yards back.
Orson was off his own horse and up onto the wagon on the other side of the driver. “You son of a bitch,” he said roughly, and began shaking the man as if hoping to snap his head off.
“Stop it,” Wen said sharply. “Either let him go, or tie him up and dump him in the back so we can take him to Forten City.”
Orson shook the man once more and then cuffed him hard across the face before allowing him to collapse, gasping, on the bench. “I’m not letting him go,” Orson said angrily. “We could have lost two men back there because of him! I’ll take him to the magistrate in Forten City, unless I decide to kill him right here.”
Wen wasn’t worried. Orson wasn’t the type to murder a man in a fit of fury. If the driver had attacked him, well, Orson would have cut him down, but the soldier wouldn’t offer any serious harm to an unarmed captive.
“Tie his hands and put him in the back of the wagon,” Wen said again. “And then let’s keep moving. Anyone here know how to handle a team?”
Wen was actually rather relieved when Stef answered in the affirmative. If they were going to lose another guard to driving duties, she’d rather it be the one who’d showed the least skill in fighting. It took a little more time to truss up the driver, reposition Fibbons, and tie the two extra horses to the back of the wagon, but they were finally on their way again. This time Orson rode alone in the lead, Carp and the injured Jack stayed close behind the wagon, and Wen dropped back about fifty yards to cover their trail.
She should have taken that rear position earlier today. It was something Justin always did on any expedition, riding some distance behind the main party so he could give advance warning of any hostile riders coming from that direction. She would have heard the outlaws heading their way, she could have sounded the warning sooner. Justin would never have been so lax.
Although, she had to admit, Fibbons and Jack probably would have been injured anyway. Neither of them was more than a passable swordsman, and Stef was almost hopeless. She hadn’t had much chance to see Carp in action, but the fact that he had emerged unscathed made her think he could handle himself pretty well. But Orson was really good—better than he’d allowed her to see when they were fencing back in the freighting guard. Not as good as Wen, but someone she would trust to battle beside her no matter how fierce the fight.
It felt good to have a comrade in arms, however briefly.
They had traveled another couple of hours before they came to a small village huddled on one side of the road. There was no inn, but the tavernkeeper’s wife agreed to let the injured Fibbons stay in their spare room for a few days in return for a little extra gold. The rest of them continued on till nightfall, when they pulled the wagon off into the underbrush and made a hasty camp. Orson even served rations to the driver, who hadn’t spoken a word since the afternoon stop. They divided the watches and tried to find the least rocky patches of ground on which to spread out their blankets.
Under the stars, outside in the brisk spring air, in the company of a thief and four near-strangers, Wen slept like a lost child who had finally found her way safely back home.
THEY
made Forten City a little before dusk the following day. Wen looked around her with interest. It was a busy and crowded town, one of the major seaports of the south, and within ten minutes she noticed the whole range of humanity striding by—sailors, soldiers, merchants, noblewomen, beggars, and a pickpocket or two. The smells of salt air, wet wood, fish, and horse were particularly strong, though overlaid now at dinnertime with the more appetizing scents of meat and onion.
“I hope our pay covers a real room for the night and enough money to buy a meal,” Wen said as she trotted along next to Orson. No need to keep a rear guard here in the city. There was hardly enough room to maneuver the wagon down the narrow roads, let alone defend it with any kind of grace.
He nodded. “Would have covered a room last night, too, but it didn’t seem worth explaining our captive,” he said, indicating the driver with a jerk of his head. “And for the same reason, I’d like to get rid of him first before we deliver our shipment.”
A few questions to passersby elicited the address of the magistrate, and their erstwhile driver was turned over to some rather rough-looking authorities. Wen found herself wondering if serramarra Karryn was involved in handling legal matters in Forten City. It seemed unlikely in the extreme. Perhaps that was one of the duties that Jasper Paladar was administering until Karryn attained her majority.
It was true night by the time they made their way to a large house on the western edge of town, far from the stink and bustle of the wharves. It was hard to be sure in the dark, but the house appeared to be built of glittering black stone, roofed with gleaming copper.
“Now you have to admit a pair of gold doors would be a pretty impressive sight at a place like this,” Orson said to Wen, grinning.
“It would—if this was the queen’s palace,” she retorted. “But for a Thirteenth House lord? So grand it’s foolish.”
It took longer than she would have expected to unload the cargo, though there was a certain entertainment value in watching the servants struggle to lift the heavy doors and carry them into the house. Stef, in fact, couldn’t restrain his laughter the second time one of the footmen stumbled and brought the whole line of bearers to their knees.
“Well, I’m glad those are off our hands and someplace they can cause trouble for someone besides me,” Orson observed. “Come on. Let’s look for food and beds.”
They found both in a well-appointed tavern situated comfortably close to both the harbor and the main road. Dinner was convivial, as the five of them ordered big meals and several pitchers of beer, and spent the whole meal swapping progressively less believable stories of brawls and battles they had single-handedly won. Stef did little of the talking but most of the drinking, so naturally he was sick before they’d even gotten up from the table. For some reason, that made Wen and Orson laugh even harder. They practically carried him up the stairs to the one big room they’d rented for all of them to share. Wen stripped off her outer garments and fell onto the narrow bed allotted to her, falling asleep within minutes, even happier than she’d been the night before.
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