it.’ He shook his head. ‘Never thought I’d see grown men so excited about getting wet.’
The sun rose, and plants began to unfold in the desert. The thorn bushes unravelled, releasing tiny green leaves soft as kittens’ ears; coarse patches of sickly yellow delft grass put forth brilliant pink flowers with crimped edges like torn silk. A flock of jewel-green birds descended to bathe and drink in the puddles. Insects burst out from the cracked earth, iridescent beetles the size of a man’s thumb, yellowish grasshoppers with huge brown eyes. Even a couple of small dark-coloured frogs that splashed frantically in the shallows of the pool.
Marith stared at it all in wonder. So much life. So much life in this dead place. The air smelled of life. The stream sang of life. The sky was luminous with life, colourless, liquid. He felt a wild peaceful happiness inside him, like when he was a child, standing on a high rock looking down into the sea, arms raised aloft in triumph.
‘Emmna therelen, mesereth meterelethem
Isthereuneth lei
Isthereuneth hethelenmei lei.
Interethne memestheone memkabest
Sesesmen hethelenmei lei.
In the midst of the desert,
You came to me like water,
Your face gazing, like water.
So quickly my love came, like flowers,’ he said quietly.
‘You what?’ said Alxine with a start and a stare at him. ‘What was that you just said?’
‘Maran Gyste. The opening lines of The Silver Tree. The original Literan, then Daljian’s translation. It just seemed … appropriate.’
‘Oh.’ Alxine shook his head. He thought for a moment. ‘It’s meant to sound dirty, I assume?’
Marith laughed. ‘You should read the later bits.’
The light shimmered around him, the sand like new silver, the air clean as glass. One day, he thought. One day it will all burn, and there’ll be no more living.
When they made camp that evening, Skie ordered proper watches set and kept to. They’d not bothered, previously, so deep in the desert, letting two or three men guard the entire troop. Now there were to be three shifts of five, and a proper guard kept while they marched. No fires lit, not even a small one for a kettle of tea. From this alone, it was clear that they were approaching their destination. The great disadvantage of campaigning in the desert: smoke or fire, even the flash of reflected light on polished metal, would show for miles. Caught out here, such a small body of men would be annihilated. Nowhere to run even if you ran: without water, a man would survive two days, perhaps three; without cover, he would be spotted and hunted down. Sound, too, carried astonishingly – anyone within twenty miles must have heard the dragon attack like a thunderstorm – so they were ordered to march and camp in near silence, communicating by gestures, voices whispering in each other’s ears. It would be a long, dark couple of nights from now on.
It surprised Marith more than he had realized how cheerfully the men accepted the new regime. Where the previous night they had been an unruly huddle, grousing about the size of their portions of beer, singing and joking, then shouting and whooping in the fresh cold water that morning, cheerfully ignoring Skie’s angry shouts that it was potential suicide to swim in a storm channel, now they were silent, disciplined, uncomplaining. He understood for the first time that they truly were hardened soldiers, men who would follow Skie’s command to the letter unthinkingly, men who would kill at Skie’s word.
Strange, it felt, to see that in them. To understand that. The power something held over them, that Skie could lead them to that and they would obey.
They ate a dinner of raw oats soaked in cold water, augmented with scraps of meat and cheese. Neither exactly improved by having got soaking wet and then dried out again. Drank cold water with a few tea leaves floating in it ‘for flavour’. Amazing how quickly you could miss rancid goat and vile beer. There was only a sliver of moon, thin clouds obscuring the stars: they crawled into their tents in silence by feel and memory, blind like birds in the dark. Marith simply lay down to sleep fully dressed rather than struggle out of his clothing. It wasn’t like he hadn’t had plenty of practice sleeping in his clothes.
It took him a long time to fall asleep, staring into the night through the rent in the canvas. He could hear Alxine breathing hoarsely, the sound hypnotic and loud as a heartbeat. Other than that there was silence, an awful empty silence broken by the occasional cry of some night creature, sad and angry and wild. Marith shivered. His skin and eyes itched. When we get there, he thought suddenly, when we get there, I have six iron pennies to spend. There would be things there that would interest him. The thought comforted him, some of the fear drained out of him. He lay awake trying to force himself to sleep before he had to wake up. He would probably be dead in a few days. It would be nice to get some sleep in first.
He must have slept, because suddenly Tobias was in the tent, waking him for the dawn watch. It was utter, pitch black. The stars had disappeared completely, hidden by thicker clouds. Marith flailed around trying to collect himself and scramble out of the tent, tripped over Alxine who cursed him. They crawled out into the cold air, trying to see in the dark. It reminded Marith of playing blind man’s catch as a child, a thick velvet scarf bound over his face. The claustrophobia of seeing nothing, like being dead – he had screamed once, playing it, and his brother had laughed at him. The stars frightened him but he wished they would come back, so that he could see something. Pretend something was there. He put his hand to his pocket, trying to cling to the feeling of security he had felt. Six iron pennies to spend. But it was so dark now. The darkness pressed on his shoulders, smothering him. Calling him. Knowing him. His eyes itched so much that his hands shook and he clawed at the skin of his face.
And then finally he saw the light coming up in the east, the sun rising, the sky changing from black to soft deep blue. In the west the clouds blew over so that stars appeared, the last stars of the early morning, the Maiden, the Dog, the Tree; the Fire Star that burned even in the full light of day. A soft pink sun blossomed in the sky like the delft grass flowers unfolding. He turned his face to it, tears running down his face, because it was beautiful and alive.
After breakfast, they lined up for orders, Skie standing to address them. ‘We’re approaching the city now.’ He had the trick of keeping his voice low but clearly audible, a good voice for battle commands. It was deep, rather pleasant, a nice low bass. Marith thought: I wonder if he can sing. ‘Another two days or so now. As I said last night, from now on it gets serious. The desert’s safe: it’s virtually uninhabited—’
‘Except for a bloody dragon,’ Rate muttered.
‘—not well travelled; anyone coming, we can see them. The desert stops, now. We get to good-sized villages, towns, farmlands. Soldiers on manoeuvres, local watches. People. Thirty armed men aren’t exactly inconspicuous. You know all this.’ Skie nodded at them. ‘You’ve done this kind of thing before. We’ve done this kind of thing before.
‘We’ll be splitting into the different squadrons, taking different routes in. We leave the tents here.’ There was a chorus of half-ironic cheers. ‘If we can come back for them, we will. I’d like to come out the way we came in to pick them up. But the payment includes money for new.
‘If anyone is caught, you’re on your own. You’re a small band of labourers looking for work
