Rise of a Hero (The Farsala Trilogy) (34 page)

Odd that Hrum law would allow a rebellious slave to be beaten, but not the torture of captured enemies—though in a way it made sense. If you tortured captured enemies they might do the same when they captured you, but everyone knew that slaves had to be disciplined.

Soraya, wielding a shovel in callused hands, smiled grimly. Garren was in for a long wait. About half her current tasks were ones she’d done before—and if she’d traded the lighter duty of serving tables for all the dirty jobs other servants wanted to shed, it also got her out of the kitchen and into the forge, the cobbler’s shop, the carpenter’s shed. She was accustomed to sweeping floors by now; carrying buckets of charcoal wasn’t any
harder than carrying sacks of flour; and the fact that her friend Calfaer had once slept there made even the narrow cleft behind the goat pen comfortable—to her heart, if not her body.

Soraya was surprised how much being separated from the other servants hurt. They’d been ordered not to speak to her, though shortly after her capture, Casia, carrying a load of dirty pots out to the wash yard, had paused to whisper, “Are you all right, San—um, girl? We were told—”

“I’m fine,” Soraya whispered back. Two soldiers lounged against the fence. Not quite near enough to hear, but near enough to see and report if Casia lingered. There were always two soldiers near her these days—seldom the same men, and most of them very good at not seeming to watch her. But Hrum soldiers were hardly ever idle, and in the midst of the busy camp they were painfully conspicuous. “Don’t try to talk to me. You’ll only get yourself in trouble, and I’m all right. Truly,” Soraya reassured her friend.

Casia, never one for taking orders, had hugged Soraya before going back into the kitchen. Soraya spent the next half mark scrubbing pots, with tears dropping into the dirty suds.
It was good to know that someone cared. But she also noticed that the next day she was set to other tasks, and that Casia scrubbed all the pots—a duty that was usually shared among the kitchen workers.

She didn’t know if the order for Casia’s punishment had come from Garren or if it was Hennic’s own idea, for Hennic was genuinely angry with Soraya. Doing other work, even harder work, was almost a relief since it took her out of range of his slaps and kicks. Most of the other servants were angry with her too—or afraid, as if being revealed as a Farsalan spy had somehow made her dangerous.

Soraya tried to use the strange people sense her shilshadu magic had given her to ease both the anger and the fear, but she failed. She could usually read people’s emotions, some more clearly than others, but she couldn’t persuade them to change. Maok had said that animals were easier to handle than people—perhaps it was that. Or perhaps, Soraya reflected grimly, it was just that she was a despicable excuse for a Speaker, on whom Maok should never have wasted her teaching.

In her current loneliness, thinking of Maok
and her friends among the Suud brought Soraya to tears. So she stopped thinking about them and avoided the other servants, for she disliked both the emotions that had replaced their friendship—except in Casia, who she was avoiding for Casia’s own sake, and Ludo, who she couldn’t avoid because he wouldn’t let her.

Ludo didn’t understand that being a Farsalan spy was a bad thing, though Soraya tried to explain it. She was Farsalan, he said. It was brave of her to fight, though in the end the empire always won. All he really understood was that his friend was sad and lonely, and working too hard. He worked with her when he could, and sought her out whenever he had a free moment, and neither Hennic’s furious scolding, nor Soraya’s own arguments and pleas could stop him.

Soraya knew she could have stopped him, and perhaps she should. She had only to tell Ludo that she didn’t like him, that he was stupid and boring and she didn’t want him around. As a child, Ludo had been driven off by cruel children using just those words, and he still cried when he remembered it. Soraya thought that might be why he so stubbornly refused to abandon her to her own hurt.

Even if it might be better for him in the long run, Soraya couldn’t bring herself to hurt him. But she didn’t encourage him either. At times she longed to praise him for his loyalty and strength, and tell him what a good friend he was. But binding him closer would be unfair at best, and might harm him if Garren took it into his head that Ludo was on her side. Still, she couldn’t help welcoming the chance to talk to someone person to person, instead of receiving orders as a slave, to feel friendship instead of anger or fear—both others’ and her own. These days, Ludo was the only one who smiled at her.

So when she saw the crowd gathering around him, saw the rare scowl on his face and heard the angry voices, Soraya put down the roll of leather she was carrying to the cobbler’s shop and joined them.

“. . . don’t care if he’s simple.” Soraya recognized the speaker as one of Marcellus’ underlings. “He’s got no business spying around my documents! Much less—”

“He works in my kitchen,” said Hennic. “One of the cooks probably told him they wanted him to check on some supplies, and he thought they meant the accounts. Was that it, Ludo?”

“No,” said Ludo. “I wanted—”

“Well, if he was checking on supply records, what’s he doing with correspondence between Governor Garren and the first strategus? Private correspondence, that—”

“If it’s so important and secret, then how could Ludo get hold of it in the first place?” Hennic demanded.

“I only left my case for a moment, right outside the door! Tampering with the Governor’s corres—”

“Be quiet!” Reevus’ voice wasn’t loud, but there was an edge in it that cut like a knife. Soraya wasn’t the only one who jumped. The ordnancer pushed past her, and the crowd fell back to let him approach Ludo, Hennic, and the ruffled clerk. “What’s going on here?”

“It wasn’t my fault!” said the clerk, beating Hennic by half a breath. “I’ve been copying a letter from the governor to the first strategus, and I had to visit the privy. Didn’t have time to take my writing case to the record room, so I left it outside the door. Well, you know how small those shacks are. When I got out, my case was open and he”—he gestured at Ludo—“was walking
off with a copy of the governor’s letter! That’s stealing the empire’s official correspondence! That’s treason! That’s—”

“That’s your fault, for leaving your case unattended,” said Hennic. “You’re just trying to shift the blame to Ludo so you won’t be punished for negligence. Ludo was probably told to check the supplies, and thought—”

Reevus held up his hand for silence. His expression was so stern that Hennic stopped in midsentence. Soraya shivered. As she well knew, the Hrum took the security of their records seriously. The clerk could be dismissed for such carelessness. But no one could think that Ludo—

“Tell me, Ludo, why did you take the scroll?” Reevus’ voice was gentle. As ordnancer, he knew all about Ludo and dealt well with him. Soraya began to relax. It would be all right.

“I took it for a friend,” said Ludo. “She needs scrolls from the camp. Real bad. I told her—” He stopped and shook his head. “I don’t want to get her in trouble. I’d better not say any more.”

Several people gasped, and Soraya stiffened. Ludo went into Setesafon often—he was big enough to carry a heavy load, so they sent him to
fetch things. But no Farsalan spy in their right mind would recruit Ludo—he wouldn’t know what documents to take!

Reevus held up his hand again. “I think you need to tell us a bit more, Ludo, or there will be trouble. Can you tell me who this friend is?”

Ludo was already shaking his head. Once he fixed on an idea, he was almost impossible to move. “I don’t want to get her in trouble.”

“But it is a girl,” said Reevus. “You’ve told us that much already.”

The dismay on Ludo’s face was almost comical, but no one laughed.

“You might as well tell us the rest,” Reevus went on persuasively. “What did this girl ask you to look for?”

“I’m not going to say more,” said Ludo stubbornly. “I won’t get anyone in trouble.”

“This is preposterous,” Hennic sputtered. “You can’t think Ludo was recruited by some . . . some Farsalan spy. He wouldn’t even know what to take!”

“Wouldn’t he?” asked the clerk. “When I found him, he had Governor Garren’s letter to the first strategus in his hand.”

Soraya’s fingers itched to slap the smug smile off his face. The Hrum expected the enemy to spy on them, to fight back, but for Ludo to do it was treason. He could be executed for this!

“It must have been someone, one of us, who asked for some information,” Hennic repeated. “He’s just frightened by all the fuss. Ludo, anyone in this camp, I promise they won’t get in trouble. This is just a misunderstanding, my friend. If it’s a Hrum, they won’t get in trouble at all. So you can tell us, all right? So we can straighten this out?”

Ludo set his lips together and said nothing.

“Ludo,” said Reevus slowly. “Hennic is right. If it was a Hrum who sent you to get something, no one will get in trouble. Do you understand that?”

Ludo nodded vigorously. He understood. He said nothing. Fear shook Soraya’s bones. Some cursed Farsalan she-bitch had recruited him. And Ludo—

Others had reached the same conclusion. Hennic looked around frantically, seeking any excuse, any escape . . . and his gaze fell on Soraya.

“Her! I bet she asked him to do it. She must have! She is a Farsalan spy, but Ludo doesn’t
understand that—he thinks she’s a friend. He’d think she counts as someone in the camp, so you can’t blame him,” Hennic finished triumphantly.

Everyone stared at Soraya. Her heart was pounding. Even if she denied it, they wouldn’t believe her. Garren was looking for an excuse to have her flogged, and this would provide it! They would beat her as a disobedient slave, and then question her as a spy, for answers she didn’t possess. Soraya wrapped her arms around herself, trying to still her trembling. If she denied it, they might be sufficiently uncertain to beat Ludo, too. And since she was going to be hurt anyway . . .

“I did ask him to get papers for me.” To her own amazement, Soraya sounded calm, almost arrogant. Strange, since her stomach was quivering like jelly. “I was trying to find out where my mother and brother have been sent—”

“You see?” Hennic interrupted. “And you can hardly blame her for that, much less Ludo! He probably got confused about what she wanted.”

Was Hennic trying to get her off too, now that she’d supported his lie? If she could sense his shilshadu she might have known, but Soraya’s fear pulled her sensing inward. She felt no more
from the crowd around her than she would from a pile of stones—and that made her feel strangely isolated, but she lifted her head defiantly and stared back at them.

“Wait a moment.” Ludo had finally tracked the conversation. “That’s not true. She wasn’t the one.”

“I told him not to name me if he was caught,” said Soraya. A strange serenity stole over her. Her mother would be horrified, that she would sacrifice herself to defend a servant, but her father would have understood. “I told him I’d get in trouble if he did. That’s why he’s denying it. He did it for friendship, because he likes me. He didn’t realize that it mattered.” Most of which was probably true—and if she ever got her hands on the girl who’d abused his friendship so despicably . . . There were some things even fighting against the Hrum didn’t excuse.

“This must be taken to the governor,” said Reevus. He looked even more worried than he had before, and Soraya’s fear deepened.

Reevus detailed two soldiers to take her to her “room” and lock her in. She worked frantically at the boards she’d been trying to rot, shifting them
against the nails that held them, but the wood was still too strong. She tried to weaken them with magic, but she was too agitated to touch the shilshadu of something as alien to her own temperament as the spirit of wood. And if she set it alight, which she couldn’t do without a source of fire, the guards would notice. Why hadn’t she taken a tool from the carpenter’s shed? She’d feared that the tools would be counted after she left, but still . . .

Evidently Garren, or some other Hrum officer, was also thinking of ways she might escape. Just before sunset her guards unlocked the door and took her to the slave pen.

The torches inside had already been lit. “So the night watch can keep an eye on you,” one of the soldiers told her as he tied her wrists together. “We’re not taking any chances on you getting away.” For all the world as if she made a habit of escape, but Soraya didn’t say it aloud. If she irritated them, they might tie her hands behind her back instead, and that would be even more uncomfortable. She hadn’t even been able to think of a way out of the small slot behind the goat pens, much less this open yard with its open-walled shed and tall, wood-and-iron fence.

At first she could see the men who passed by in the fading light, but after sunset the world outside the fence was a black mystery. In the beginning it made her uncomfortable to be watched by men she couldn’t see. But as the night wore on and the camp quieted, she found she could always hear their clanking approach, and hear them leave again. So unless someone was watching her very quietly, and Soraya couldn’t think why anyone would, it appeared that she had simply been added to the list of things the night watch was required to check on. They came about every third mark, which might even have given her enough time to escape, if she could only figure out how.

She could probably free her wrists from the rope, tight as it was, but then what? She was agile and desperate, and after a summer of hard work she was strong enough that she might have been able to climb the bars to the point where they curved inward—but not beyond. The Hrum were experts at keeping slaves from escaping; they’d had centuries of practice, after all.

Soraya paced like the leopard cub her father used to call her, but in her heart was none of the leopard’s ferocity, only the growing chill of fear. If
she had been a spy, with real information, she thought she could have controlled her fear better—she would be steeling her will to resist, to keep her silence at all costs, to protect Sorahb’s cause. But to be beaten for information she didn’t have . . . She had nothing to protect from the Hrum’s harsh justice except Ludo, and while that might help him, it wasn’t enough to steady her madly beating heart. She had seen Calfaer flogged. She was afraid of the whip, afraid of the morning.