The Serpentwar Saga. Raymond E. Feist

he had passed their tent. Jadow was watching that group. Four others were working commissary duty. That left four unaccounted for, and if Biggo was doing as ordered, he was close to them.

      Erik found Roo in his tent, trying to get some sleep. ‘I thought you had duty?’ said Erik, sitting down to pull off his boots.

      ‘I traded with Luis. He wanted to go into the fortress and see if there were any whores.’

      The thought of women suddenly had Erik interested, so he stopped pulling off his boots. ‘Maybe I should check up.’

      Rolling over, Roo said sleepily, ‘You do that.’

      Erik quickly made his way to Calis’s command tent, where he found Calis and de Loungville talking with Greylock, who had somehow found a pipe and tabac. Erik found the habit noxious, but had put up with it all his life; smoking was common enough in the taproom at the Inn of the Pintail, though it was discouraged when serious wine tasting was under way. For a moment, Erik wondered what had become of the fancy flint and steel lighter he had possessed back home.

      ‘What?’ asked de Loungville.

      ‘I’m going into the fort,’ said Erik, ‘if that’s all right. Luis is in there, and I think Biggo is there, too.’

      De Loungville nodded. ‘Keep alert,’ he said with a dismissive wave.

      Erik walked up the damp hillock upon which the fortress had been erected, and made his way along the perimeter until he reached the gate. It was still open and the guards on duty were almost asleep. A pair of Saaur, one wearing what Erik took to be an officer’s mark on his breastplate, were talking inside a hut at the gate, but they ignored him as he walked in.

      De Loungville had called the fort a ‘classic’ motte-and-bailey, and Erik was fascinated by its construction. An earthen hill had been raised up and a tower built high upon it. Around this hill and tower, a large open area, the bailey, had been left, with the buildings nestled against the wall, sheltered by it. Suddenly it struck Erik that this is the sort of construction Calis had undertaken at Weanat, but on a much more modest scale. This tower could house a half-dozen bowmen with little discomfort, on a platform thirty feet above the ground. A fifteen-foot-high log wall had been erected around a small village, complete with wooden rampart and earthen reinforcement. An army would have little trouble with such a fortress, but most single companies would have had more than enough trouble to take such a fortification.

      Inside there were a half-dozen buildings, all made of wood and covered with daub made from dried mud and straw. Smaller wattle-and-daub huts had sprung up around the larger buildings, and a fair-sized town had evolved. Erik could see why the Saaur at the gate had ordered them to remain outside; it was quite close inside this fortress.

      He heard laughing and moved toward what he assumed would be an inn, and once inside he knew he had been correct. The room was dingy with smoke and poor light, but the stench of ale, spilled wine, and human perspiration struck Erik like a blow. Suddenly he was terribly homesick and wished to be nowhere so much as back at the Inn of the Pintail. He pushed down the sudden surge of feeling and made his way to the bar.

      The barkeep, a stout man with a florid complexion, said, ‘What’ll it be?’

      ‘Got any good wine?’ asked Erik.

      The man raised an eyebrow – everyone else seemed to be drinking ale or fortified spirits – but he nodded and produced a dark bottle from beneath the counter. The cork was intact, so Erik hoped the bottle was fresh and not resealed. Old wine tasted like vinegar mixed with raisins, but you couldn’t convince the average tavern keeper he couldn’t just stick the cork back in at the end of a day and unseal it again the next and not have his customers complain.

      The barman produced a cup and poured. Erik sipped. The wine was sweeter than he would have liked, but not as cloying as the dessert wines made to the north of Yabon. Still, it was acceptable and he paid and indicated the barkeep should leave the bottle.

      He glanced around the room and saw Biggo on the far side, trying to look inconspicuous and failing mightily. He leaned against the wall, behind a table where five men gamed with two Saaur. The lizard men were too large for their chairs, but they hunkered down as best they could and seemed intent upon the game. Erik recognized the sound of knucklebones, as they called dice here, rattling across the table and the accompanying shouts of the winners and groans of the losers.

      After a few minutes. Dawar stood up and left the game. He came over to Erik and said, ‘Got a minute?’

      Erik motioned to the barkeep for another cup and filled it. Dawar sipped and made a face. ‘Nothing like the wine from the grand vineyards of home, is it?’ he said.

      ‘Where’s home?’ asked Erik.

      Dawar said, ‘Far from here. Let’s go outside for a minute.’

      Erik picked up the bottle and let Dawar lead him outside into the fresh, cold night air. The man looked one way, then the other, and signaled for Erik to follow him around the corner, into a dark place next to the wall, sheltered above by the palisades.

      ‘Look, Corporal,’ began Dawar. ‘Let’s have an end to the mummery. You’re the company Nahoot was sent to keep from coming this way.’

      ‘What makes you think that?’ said Erik. ‘You’re the ones that jumped us.’

      ‘I wasn’t born this morning,’ said the man with a grin. ‘I know your Captain’s not your Captain, but the slender blond fellow is.’

      ‘What do you want?’

      ‘A way to get rich,’ said Dawar, a greedy glint in his eye.

      ‘How do you propose to do that?’ said Erik, moving his hand slowly down to his sword.

      ‘Look, I could maybe get myself a gold coin or two for telling Murtag you’re not who you say you are, but that’s a gold coin or two, and then I’m back looking for a company to join.’ He glanced around. ‘But I don’t like what I’m seeing lately, with this grand conquest. Too many men dying for too little gold. There’s not going to be much left of use to anyone if it keeps on, don’t you see? So I’m thinking I might be a help to you and your captain, but I’ll want more than wages and found.’

      ‘You’ll get ample chance for loot when we take Maharta,’ Erik said noncommittally.

      Dawar took a step forward, lowering his voice. ‘How long do you think you can keep this up? You lot are not like any company I’ve seen, and I’ve been around more than most. You talk funny and you have the look of … I don’t know … some sort of soldiers, without the parade ground nonsense, but tough, like mercenaries. But whatever you are, you’re not what you want people to think you are, and it ought to be worth something for me to stay quiet.’

      ‘So that’s why you covered for us at the gate?’

      ‘Sure. Most of us look alike to the Saaur and Murtag’s pretty stupid – don’t make that mistake about most Saaur – which is why he’s stuck out here running this garrison and not with the main host. I figure I can turn you in any time, but I thought I’d first give you a chance to make me a better offer.’

      ‘I don’t know,’ Erik said, holding his wine cup to his lips with his left hand, while his right moved to the hilt of his sword.

      ‘Look, von Darkmoor, I’ll stick with you until the end, if the pay’s right. Now, why don’t you talk this over with Captain Calis –’

      Suddenly a figure loomed up behind Dawar in the darkness, and large hands reached around and gripped him by the shoulders. They jerked him around, and as he spun, they grabbed the back of his head and his chin and forced it in the opposite direction, and with a loud crack, his neck was broken.

      Erik had his sword out as Biggo stepped forward. ‘We found a spy,’ he whispered.

      ‘How could you be sure?’ hissed Erik, his heart pounding as he returned his sword to the scabbard.

      ‘I’m