Snare

‘I heard that story at the time,’ Ammadin said. ‘When was it in years, you want to know?’

‘Well, if it’s not too much trouble. I’m curious about this fellow.’

‘I can’t blame you for that. Carry my saddle back to camp for me.’

He picked it up, but she took the saddlebags herself. As they strolled back to the tents, she suddenly spoke.

‘Ten of your years ago, that’s when.’

‘Ah! Thank you. It would have nagged at me, not knowing.’

‘Really?’ She stopped walking and turned to consider him.

‘Well, yes. I like to get things straight, that’s all. In my mind, I mean.’

She smiled, shrugged, and resumed walking. As he trailed after, Zayn was considering the date. Ten years ago Gemet Great Khan was purging his bloodlines to remove any disputes about his right to rule. That piece of jewellery might well have been the zalet khanej, the medallion that proved a man had been sanctified as a khan and thus as a rival for the Crescent Throne. Maybe. He knew nothing for certain, but that simple date shone like one of Ammadin’s crystals: hold it up, and it sent light sparkling in all directions.

When Warkannan and his men had turned east, they had left all of their plausible reasons for being on the road behind. They also traded the public roads for narrow dirt paths, and the constant rise of the land slowed them down as well. As long as they travelled through Kazrajistan proper, they rode at night and by day either camped well off the road or bribed some farmer to let them sleep in his barn. They avoided every town that was more than a village and kept clear of the military posts and courier stations that stood along the Darzet River.

After some days of this slow riding, they reached Andjaro, a province that had gone from being ChaMeech territory to an independent nation until, a mere hundred years ago, the khanate had decided that an independent nation on its border was a threat. The low hills angled from the north-east towards the south-west, so soft and regular that they reminded Warkannan of the folds a carpet forms when pushed and rumpled by a careless foot. Among these rolling purple downs, Warkannan had allies, and the allies, large landowners all, had private armies. Each night Warkannan and his party stayed in compounds surrounded by thousands of acres of purple grass, dotted with flocks of sheep. At each, Warkannan received coin for the journey, supplies of food and fuel, pack horses when he mentioned needing them, and the assurance that Jezro would have a place to hide when he came home.

Early on their third day in Andjaro, they crested a down and saw, stretching below them, a valley filled with green, billowing in the wind like clouds. Arkazo reined in his horse and stared, his mouth half-open.

‘What is that?’ he stammered. ‘Water?’

‘No,’ Warkannan said, grinning. ‘Trees.’

‘I’ve never seen so many in one place. All that green! And they grow so close together.’

‘How observant of you,’ Soutan drawled. ‘The word for a lot of them in one place is forest. That university of yours seems to have taught you little of value.’

‘We studied the works of the Three Prophets,’ Arkazo said. ‘Nothing’s of greater value. Not that an infidel like you would understand why.’

They had reached the tax forests, stand after stand of true-oak, planted in regular rows and watched over by foresters. As part of their most solemn duty to the Great Khan, the border landowners put as many acres into the slow-growing forests as they could afford – more, in some cases. Although in the volcanic mountains every metal imaginable lay close to the surface in rich veins, fuel for the smelting of it was another thing entirely. So far at least, no one had ever found any of the fabled blackstone or blackwater that were supposed to burn twice as hot as true-oak charcoal. As a result, while any peasant could pan the easily-melted gold from a stream and work it, it took a lot of that gold to buy a little steel.

‘It’s a pity about our prospecting venture,’ Soutan remarked. ‘If we’d actually found blackstone we could have been as rich as a khan ourselves.’

‘If,’ Warkannan said, grinning. ‘Those maps of yours show likely spots, not sure things.’

‘Ah, but they’re copies of ancient maps – spirit maps, the Tribes would call them.’

‘Well, Nehzaym will take good care of them. As far as I’m concerned, we’ll have better odds backing Jezro Khan than looking for blackstone.’

Soutan turned in the saddle and considered him for a moment.

‘I’m inclined to agree with you,’ Soutan said at last. ‘Ancient writings exist that present strangely disturbing implications concerning the black marvels.’

‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’

‘Your manners are painfully bad, Captain. I see no reason to speak further and be mocked.’

Soutan kicked his horse to walk, passed Warkannan, and headed downhill. For a moment Warkannan considered returning the insult, then shrugged the matter away. Most likely the sorcerer thought talking in riddles impressed people. Damned if he’d encourage him in it.

Entering the forest felt like plunging into the ocean, all cool air and deep green light. All along the narrow road grew ancient trees, twining their branches overhead. In a few minutes Soutan paused his horse in the dappled shade and let them catch up. They set off again, riding three abreast with the sorcerer in the middle.

‘A question for you, Captain,’ Soutan said. ‘Arkazo says that nothing’s more important than the books of the Prophets. Do you agree?’

‘Well, it seems extreme, I know, but actually I do.’

‘I suppose it’s a question of following the laws of God. But other prophets have written books of those laws for other peoples, after all.’

‘True. But our books, our way – that’s what makes us who we are. We follow the Three Prophets, and that sets us apart from people who follow other religious leaders. If I stopped following the laws, I wouldn’t know who I was any more.’

Soutan frankly stared. ‘You must love your god a great deal,’ he said at last.

‘I don’t know if I’d call it love, not like love for your family or for a woman. It’s more like – well, what?’ Warkannan thought for a moment. ‘More like a sense of mutual obligation. I have a duty to serve God but in return, that duty gives me a place in His universe.’

‘God as the supreme commander of a celestial cavalry?’ Soutan drawled. ‘It would make sense to you, I suppose.’

‘I don’t like your tone of voice.’

‘Sorry.’ Soutan shrugged. ‘Just a figure of speech.’

Two nights later they arrived at the last Kazraki villa. Kareem Alvado’s compound stretched out like a small town, with his mansion and gardens, the cottages of the craftsmen, the barracks for his private troops, and the dormitories for the workmen who tended the flocks and the tax forests. Since Warkannan had served on the border with Kareem, and Kareem’s son Tareev and Arkazo had attended university together, they stayed for two full days.

On their last evening, the men sat finishing their dinner around the true-oak table in the dining-hall, a long room with walls of purplish-red horsetail reeds, twined together with pale yellow vines. At regular intervals ChaMeech skulls, bleached white and bulbous, hung as trophies. The older men had been reminiscing about Jezro Khan when Tareev interrupted. Like many Andjaro families, Kareem’s had some comnee blood that gave father and son both pale grey eyes and dark, straight hair, and they turned to each other with the same tilt of the head, the same crook of a hand.

‘A favour to beg you, sir,’ Tareev said. ‘The captain’s going to have a hard time guarding our khan with just a couple of men. Let me go with them.’

Kareem’s heavy-set face turned unnaturally calm.

‘Why should Arkazo get all the glory?’ Tareev went on. ‘It’s unfair. Let me go and invite the khan here personally.’

‘Now listen, boy,’ Warkannan broke in. ‘This isn’t going to be some pleasant little ride.’

‘I know that, Captain,’ Tareev said, still grinning. ‘That’s why you need me along.’

‘It’s up to your father. There’ll be plenty for you to do once the war starts.’

Kareem had a sip of wine, his calloused fingers tight on the goblet.

‘What about that girl you promised to marry?’ Kareem said at last.

‘What would her father want with a coward?’

Kareem smiled, a weary twitch of his mouth. ‘Very well, then. But you’re riding under Warkannan’s orders. What he says, you do. Understand me?’

‘Yes sir, I do.’