Powder Mage: The Autumn Republic Part 5

Adamat shook away the sleep. "A few hours, I think."

"The sentries are unconscious. We have a few minutes until the guard makes their rounds. We have to go. Now."

Adamat hesitated. If Hilanska only wanted to hold them for a time, an escape attempt would only make things worse. Bo moved around to the front of the prison wagon and licked the end of his gloved finger. He twitched his fingers twice and then set it against the steel of the lock.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Adamat asked.

"They tried to kill Nila," Bo said. "They don't want us quiet-they want us dead. Nila! Get the other wagon."

Adamat turned to see Nila rush over to one of the other prison wagons. She glanced around, as if self-conscious, then held one hand out in front of her, palm up as if holding a fruit. Adamat frowned at the gesture. What was she doing?

A cold blue flame danced over the palm of her hand. She reached out and grabbed the lock. Steel melted in her hand, dripping to the ground with a sizzle. One of the soldiers swore under his breath.

This girl was a Privileged? No wonder Bo had insisted on bringing her along! But where were her gloves? Adamat didn't have time to think about it as he was pushed out the front of the prison wagon by whispering soldiers.

"How the pit are we all getting out of the camp?" Adamat hissed to Bo.

"With help," Bo said. He gave a low whistle, and two men suddenly emerged from the blackness near the hitching posts. They both stood well over six feet tall and each carried a bundle of blue-and-crimson uniforms in their arms. "Oldrich," Bo said. "Get your men dressed. They've just joined the grenadiers of the Twelfth Brigade. You too, Adamat. Over your clothes, boys. We can't leave them any sign of how we escaped."

Adamat s.n.a.t.c.hed one of the uniforms and pulled it on over his suit. It was an awkward fit, the uniform was made for someone far larger. The jacket followed, and he was handed a bearskin hat.

Nila went down the line, straightening uniforms and tugging them to fit here and there. She joined Adamat and Bo and gestured over the two grenadiers. "You're part of Colonel Etan's honor guard," she said to Adamat, "escorting him up to Adopest. He was going to leave in the morning, but word of a sickness in his family has him riding out tonight."

"And we can trust this Colonel Etan?"

Bo hesitated for a moment, and then nodded. "One of Taniel's friends."

Adamat looked between Bo and Nila. Neither was wearing a uniform. "And what about you?"

"We're making our own way out," Bo said. He didn't elaborate further.

"And this civil war?" Adamat asked.

"Not my problem."

Nila gave Adamat an apologetic look.

"Get a move on," Bo said. "The guard changes in an hour. We'll wait here to make sure your disappearance isn't noticed before the colonel can get you out, then I'll make a false trail running for the Adsea. They'll a.s.sume you've escaped by boat."

Adamat suppressed the urge to thank him. After all, he wouldn't be here if it weren't for Bo's urging. "And my boy?" He needed to get his son back, and Bo was the only one who could help him do it.

"I'm going to find Taniel, and then I'll come get you in Adopest. You have my word."

Adamat gave the Privileged a tight nod and followed Oldrich and his men after the two grenadiers. They were led through the camp at a double march and Adamat struggled to keep up. Oldrich's men were Adran soldiers. They might not have been as big as grenadiers, but they could play the part without too much of a stretch. Adamat was older than most of these men by ten years, softened by his own age and family life. He was used to riding in carriages, not marching.

He remembered a time in the academy when Tamas, then a colonel, had first begun to pave the way for the rise of commoners among the ranks. Adamat had considered joining as a career.

Three minutes into the march and Adamat said a grateful prayer that he had not done so.

They soon arrived in the section of the camp occupied by the grenadiers of the Twelfth Brigade. Adamat recognized their standard, two hawks over the Adran Mountains, and tried to recollect what he knew about Colonel Etan.

Etan was a career military man. Just over thirty, he had risen through the ranks by distinguishing himself in battle during one of the many small wars in Gurla after the Gurlish campaigns had supposedly ended. His rise might have seemed swift, but was less strange when Adamat considered how short an average grenadier's career normally was. Shock troops didn't often last long, and few enough of the big men were known for their intelligence.

Adamat also remembered reading in the papers just a couple of weeks back that Etan had been wounded in battle. Paralyzed, the article had said.

His breath sounding ragged in his ears, he caught sight of a waiting carriage near the edge of the camp, surrounded by an honor guard of some fifty grenadiers. Several grenadiers stood by with rifles and kits. Adamat, Oldrich, and the rest were hastily outfitted.

"Fall in, men!" a captain called. "d.a.m.ned dogs, arriving late! You're not worthy to carry the colonel on your backs! Not worthy to bathe his feet. It'll be latrine duty for all of you when you get back!" He ran up and down the line, slapping at their knees with his riding crop. Adamat felt the sting across his calf and bit back a curse. He was playing a character now. He dared not drop it.

"Yes sir!" he said with the others.

The captain stopped beside him and leaned forward, speaking low. "If you cause trouble for my colonel, I'll kill you myself." He moved on before Adamat could reply.

A hand reached out of the carriage and thumped the side. Adamat had barely begun to catch his breath before they were marching double-time again.

Sweat was already pouring down his face when the carriage trundled off the hard-packed dirt of the camp thoroughfare and onto the cobbles of the main highway to Adopest. They came to a slow stop beside the northernmost checkpoint. Two sentries approached the carriage.

Adamat wasn't close enough to hear the ensuing conversation. He stood with rifle shouldered, the pack on his back pressing against his spine, and hoped that they wouldn't notice how short he was for a grenadier-or that his uniform was already soaked with sweat and they hadn't even begun their march.

One of the sentries shrugged and they both stepped back, waving Etan's carriage on. Adamat wasn't even given a second glance as he trotted past them.

His legs burned as they continued on into the night, and his lungs felt on fire. Every wound from the last six months seemed to flare up-his nose ached, cuts on his stomach and shoulder itched, and bruises he'd not even known existed began to throb. He felt himself lagging behind the other grenadiers-both Oldrich's men and Etan's real soldiers-and struggled to push himself harder.

What a miserable existence. Who could stomach putting their body through this kind of abuse? Adamat used his indignation to propel himself forward. This whole trip had been a waste. Taniel was likely dead, and it could be weeks or months until Bo returned to help Adamat look for Josep. If he returned at all. Why had he ever agreed to this in the first place?

And this whole affair between Hilanska and Ket. It would prove Adro's undoing, he had no doubt. The more he thought over the map he'd seen in Hilanska's command post, the more he was convinced that the general wasn't just preparing for a fight-he was looking for one.

Would Ket really accuse Hilanska of being a traitor just to cover her own tracks? Perhaps she'd thought more of the General Staff would side with her? Or perhaps she'd thought to sway the Wings of Adom. Regardless, she would be crushed between Hilanska and the Kez.

Did she know that three brigades of Adran infantry would die because of her? Was she that selfish?

Adamat didn't realize he'd stopped marching until he noticed the carriage and its escort some forty paces ahead of him. He ran to catch up, forcing himself to ignore the pain in his knees, and arrived at the back of the line just as the captain called for a stop.

Adamat shouldered his way through the soldiers, heading toward Etan's carriage, and felt a hand on his chest.

"I didn't say to fall out," the captain said to him. "Back into line before I give you a beating."

"I have to speak with the colonel," Adamat said.

"You'll do no such thing. Back in line!"

Adamat didn't have time for this. His heart beat with a sudden urgency that had nothing to do with this quick march. "I'm not one of your d.a.m.ned soldiers and you know it," Adamat said. "I appreciate your help, but get out of my d.a.m.ned face. I'm on a.s.signment from Field Marshal Tamas himself."

"Field Marshal Tamas is-" the captain started, drawing himself up.

"Captain," a voice called from the carriage. "Settle down. Let the inspector ride with me."

Adamat suppressed a triumphant grin. No need to antagonize the man further. He pushed past the captain and opened the door to the carriage, stepping inside.

In the darkness it was difficult to see any of Etan's features. Adamat was certain he was a large man. He was propped in his seat-probably strapped in place, due to his condition-and leaned on a cane.

"You can get rid of the uniform now," Etan said. "If someone comes after us now, it won't be much of a disguise."

Adamat removed the bearskin hat and the crimson jacket and breathed a sigh of relief. He immediately regretted it as the cold night air reached his soaked suit underneath, chilling him to the bone. "Thank you for this help, Colonel," Adamat said.

"It's the least I could do." Etan thumped on the side of the carriage and they began to move again. "Taniel saved my life. He was a good friend. I know that you are trying to help him. I just wish we could all have done more."

"There may be more we can do yet," Adamat said, and quickly added, "for the army, that is."

Etan made a noncommittal grunt.

"This affair between Ket and Hilanska could be the end of Adro," Adamat said.

"I've washed my hands of the whole thing. I'm returning to the north, quietly going into retirement. No one has use for a crippled grenadier, whether or not we win the war."

"But..."

"No 'buts,' Inspector. I'm glad to help you escape Hilanska's machinations, but this is the end of it for me."

"I understand." Adamat smacked his fist into his palm in frustration.

Etan's next words were hesitant. "If there's anything I can do to speed you on your way, I'll do it."

"There is," Adamat said, feeling a surge of renewed hope. "I could use a letter of introduction."

"To whom?"

"Brigadier Abrax of the Wings of Adom. I think I know how to save General Ket's troops."

CHAPTER.

6.

Taniel watched the squad of Adran soldiers as they searched the canyon floor far beneath him.

He had been trailing them since they left the Veridi Valley, breaking off from the main company two days before. There were twelve of them in all, dressed in Adran blues and carrying a full kit on their backs and rifles under their arms. They proceeded warily up the valley, covering less than a mile a day and searching every deer trail and crevice along the way.

At this rate it would take them two more days to find Ka-poel's hiding place.

Taniel fought the urge to stand up and shout. He wanted to rush down the side of the mountain, sliding on the scree, waving his arms to be seen. It had been weeks since he'd had a good meal and a soft bed. His skin was cracked and dirty, his body still aching from the beating at the hands of Kresimir's soldiers.

He'd long since stopped noticing his own smell-a sure sign that he was too used to the foulness.

The only thing that kept him silent was the nagging doubt of suspicion. It was more than likely these men were looking for him; the mountains of southwest Adro were nigh impa.s.sable and their immense network of valleys led to nowhere important. Why else would Adran soldiers be up here? The real question was: Why were they looking for him?

No one in command had reason to send two companies to find him. General Hilanska had betrayed Taniel, betrayed Tamas, and betrayed Adro. These could be his picked men. Or perhaps Tamas had returned and they were friendly.

Surely they would be shouting for him if they were friendly. He was wracked by indecision. At a mile away, it was impossible to recognize any of them. Taniel cursed quietly under his breath. If he'd had any black powder left, he could have seen them clearly from five miles away.

It took him several hours to move down the mountain with enough stealth to avoid notice. His boots were full of grit and his calves burned from the descent, and it was nearly dusk when Taniel finally crouched in the shadow of a boulder some hundred and fifty feet above the squad, his body hidden. Sweat poured from his brow. He swore again.

Each of the soldiers carried a rifle with the bayonet fixed. From a distance the rifles' basic shape could be mistaken for any flintlock, but from here Taniel could very clearly make out the sleek, streamlined barrel and the rounded stock. These weren't flintlocks. They were air rifles-they fired bullets not with the combustion of black powder but with compressed air.

They were delicate, unreliable weapons. Soldiers only carried air rifles when they needed to kill a powder mage.

Taniel waited in his hiding spot until after dark, watching the soldiers set up camp, and then headed back up the steep side of the mountain.

Taking goat paths, he crossed over the ridge and then followed it to the east for almost a mile, back into a narrow crevice wedged under two great, flat boulders.

Ka-poel sat cross-legged with her back against the wall of their cave. Her ashen freckles were obscured by mud, her long black duster ripped and worn. There were large, dark circles under her eyes. She looked up at Taniel and her head bobbed slightly from exhaustion.

"A squad of Adran soldiers," Taniel said. "Armed to the teeth with air rifles." He lowered himself down beside her, unwilling to look at the wax figure lying on the dirt before her. "No doubt Hilanska's men." He felt the fatigue deep in his bones. Every muscle ached and his hands shook from the lack of gunpowder. It was progress. A few days ago he had barely been able to stand from the withdrawal symptoms. "They're working their way up the valley. They'll reach the curve soon, then come up this direction. It won't take them longer than two days. I can't sense an ounce of powder on them."

He forced a smile onto his face. Ka-poel leaned her head on his shoulder, and Taniel tried to sit up straight. He couldn't show his own weariness. It wouldn't be fair to her.

Not after she had rescued him. Her very sorcery gave him strength.

She who kept a G.o.d in check by the power of her will alone.

Taniel finally looked down at the wax figure lying in the dust. He recognized that face, from the delicate chin and the golden hair to the ugly black pit where one eye used to be. A rock the size of Taniel's fist sat in the center of the wax figure's chest and one long needle stuck out from its head.

Gently, Taniel pushed Ka-poel's head off his shoulder. "It's time," he said.

She looked up at him, a question in her eyes. He wondered briefly how her voice would sound if she were able to speak. He kissed her on the forehead and climbed to his feet.

"I have to go kill my countrymen."

Taniel crept down the mountainside just after midnight. The night was deep, thin clouds obscuring a quarter moon. His whole body shook from the effort of the descent, holding himself back so that he wouldn't disturb the scree or startle small animals out of hiding, and his eyes ached from squinting hard into the darkness.

He had the musket that he'd taken in their mad dash from the Kez camp as his only weapon. Bayonet fixed, it would be little use to him except as a spear, as he lacked both powder and ammunition. He'd left his jacket behind with Ka-poel, as the silver b.u.t.tons might have caught errant moonlight and betrayed him to the enemy-his belt buckle he had wrapped in leather to hide it.

He felt the lack of powder keenly. A single hit of black powder would have sharpened his senses and allowed him to see clearly in the darkness. It would have dulled the ache in his bones, the soreness of his back and feet, and would have given him strength and speed, so that dealing with a dozen men would have been...

Well, certainly not easy. But not outside the realm of possibility, either.

Crouched on the mountainside, he examined his quarry.