One group of walking wounded was escorting eight Soldese prisoners. Their hands had been tied behind them so tightly that the skin looked like a dead man's flesh. I ordered them cut free and found a little boiled barley for them, and some wine, although we are nearly at the point of eating Atteno's boars. They told me how they had looted Olmo, and burned it afterward. The burning was on their Duko's orders, they say. They are confident of a victory that will free them within a day or two; I do not believe it will be the victory they expect, but wish I were as sure of it as they are.
The last of the big guns has arrived. We hid it in a haystack just now, and are roasting the oxen that brought it. Everyone says how good they are and urges me to eat; but I know that it is only hunger that lends those roast oxen their savor, and I am too tightly strung for that. How long has it been since I have slept more than an hour at a stretch? Three days, I believe? I am all right as long as I keep moving, but sitting like this and trying to write, I can do nothing but yawn.
* * *
Wonderful news! It has begun to snow!
I lay down-for only a minute or two, I told myself-and slept until late this morning. No one woke me. When I got up there was two fingers of snow on the ground. Now there must be four or five.
Sfido and Rimando have performed wonders while I slept. The walls are all complete, and our troopers are building themselves huts from the remaining sacks of soil and whatever else they can lay hands on.
But the snow is the best, except that it has slacked off our trip ropes. I have set a few reliable men to retightening them. The fireworks are stacked in the solaria of this farmhouse to keep them dry; the chief danger now is that we may not get them out and into position in time.
The old woman who lives here brought me an apple and a mug of sweet cider. Apples and cider are about all she has left, she says; our troopers have taken her chickens, ducks, and geese. Her husband is dead, her sons in the hills with Inclito. She said she felt sorry for me, but I feel sorrier for her. I've told Uscita I want as good a supper as she can find me tonight, and I intend to share it with my hostess.
We are seeing unwounded troopers now. So many have thrown their slug guns away that I sent a party up the road to salvage what they can. I got a group of about twenty of these beaten men together this afternoon and talked with them for nearly an hour, then asked them to stay with us voluntarily and defend their town. Not a hand went up. Inclito would have had half of them swearing they would fight to the death, I'm sure; but I am a poor speaker.
It is interesting to walk up the rutted, snow-covered road a few chains and approach our defenses as the enemy will. Our walls do not appear very formidable, and the ditches in front of them (which are filling with snow) can easily be overlooked. I have been telling our troopers that the enemy will be here tomorrow afternoon, speaking as though I knew it. "In a day," I tell them, "it will be over." It is always a matter of hanging on for one more day, after all.
The old woman refused to share my dinner, swearing that she had just eaten. There is something familiar about that thin, wrinkled face. For a time I told myself that I must have seen her at Cugino's, but I spotted him among the new men Colbacco brought up from the south; and although I described her carefully, Cugino could not identify her. He had only his axe to fight with, but I have gotten him a slug gun. He was happy to see my staff, and surprised that I still have it.
* * *
A regular formation of unwounded men has passed through our line a little after dawn, still under discipline and making an orderly retreat. I had no opportunity to count them, but I would guess there were between fifty and a hundred. They would have been a valuable addition to our strength, but the officer in charge had been ordered to march to Blanko, and rejected my authority. (Which is scant enough, I must admit.) He said that Inclito is with the rear guard. I asked how many, and he told me three hundred; but he was lying-I knew it, and he knew that I did.
Inclito is here! He has been making a fighting retreat with his horsemen. I've seen his coachman and Perito, one of the other men who worked for him. I asked about Kupus's men; they should join us here within an hour.
* * *
It is over. Over!
Midnight, I suppose, but I cannot sleep. The woman in the boat arrived just after I wrote about Perito. I knew it could not be long then, and supposed that it would be under an hour.
That hour passed, and I sent Oreb, who returned so quickly that I knew the enemy was almost in sight.
Before continuing I should tell you who will read this, whoever you may be, that we had posted small parties along the road, in most cases three boys commanded by a man. Their orders were to fire as soon as the first Soldese troops came in sight, and retire to our lines. Most seem to have remained at their posts longer than we intended; there had been scattered shooting for some time before I sent Oreb to scout.
I should tell you, too, about something else-although it probably means nothing at all. The fireworks party came, and there was a young man there who reminded me poignantly of Hoof and Hide. I called their corporal to me and asked who he was.
"I don't know, Master Incanto sir. I saw him wandering around and asked whose squad he belonged to. He couldn't tell me, so I put him to work."
"You did the right thing, I'm sure. What is his name?"
The corporal, too young even to be a trooper in Inclito's horde, picked absently at a pimple on his chin. "I don't know, sir. He told me, but it's... I don't remember."
"Find out for me, please, and bring him to me whenever you have the time and can spare him. I'd like to talk to him."
The corporal said he would, saluted, and left, turning back after he had taken a step or two. "Cuoio, sir. I knew it'd come to me."
But Cuoio and his corporal have not come to me as I asked; and it may be that one or both are dead, although I dare to hope it is not so. Tomorrow, perhaps. No doubt they are exhausted, just as I am.
Tomorrow-tomorrow night, I suppose-I will write all about the battle, giving it an entire evening. By that time I will be rested and will have received the reports of others. I should be able to offer a rational account.
Attacked again, but we have beaten them back.
Seawrack is singing. I can hear her through the windows and the shutters and the crackling of the fire. I feel I must go to her, but I cannot.
Chapter 17
The Battle of Blanko
I was so tired last night that I actually believed I would be back in my snug bedroom in the old farmhouse tonight, writing at the little deal table by lamplight while Sfido snored on his pallet. In reality I am (as I should have foreseen) in these barren, snow- covered hills again, hunting down stragglers from the Duko's horde, a defeated and broken horde that crashed like a wave upon the small, hard rock of Novella Citta after the battle, and appears to have shattered into spray. But more about that at the proper time.
We still have not found Mora and Eco, but I have high hopes for tomorrow. It is possible, of course, that they are already with Inclito. I pray that is the case.
And now I would like to launch into my account of the battle, which had interest, excitement, and heroism enough for every quill in both Oreb's wings; but first I must mention (and truthfully, although it is difficult to be truthful here) what happened just before I went to bed last night.
I had promised you a rational account of the battle and risen, and was corking the ink bottle and wiping my pen when the old woman knocked as she did every night that I stayed in that house to ask whether we wanted anything and announce that she was about to retire.
I told her we were fine, much better off than those who had fought so gallantly and lacked the comfort of her roof. She thanked me and began moving about the room, straightening small items as women will, snuffling to herself and coughing much as I do, but moving (although it did not strike me at the time) gracefully nonetheless, so that I was reminded vaguely of you, Nettle; and then more vaguely still of Evensong, Tansy, Seawrack, Hyacinth, and various others-or perhaps simply of all the women-or of all the young women, at least-that I have known at various times in diverse places, and fell to thinking (as I pulled off my boots and removed my robe) that it was a pity, a great pity, that we had no daughter-although it was so often all that we could do to feed the children we had, boys but good boys all of them, at least until Sinew was older.