A gate-watcher stepped out to squint up at the barbed, bestial guard as he drew rein beneath the arch.
‘Gruntle, ain’t it? You been in a fight, man. Is this Sirik’s caravan-gods below!’ This last cry announced the watcher’s discovery of the first wagon driver.
‘Best just let us past,’ Gruntle said in a low, rasping voice. ‘I’m in no mood for more than one conversation, and that one belongs to Sirik. I take it he’s done his move into his new estate?’
The man nodded, his face pale and his eyes a little wild. Stepping back, he waved Gruntle on.
The journey to Sirik’s estate was blessedly brief. Past Despot’s Barbican, then left, skirting High Gallows Hill before reaching the freshly plastered wall and broad, high-arched gate leading into the merchant’s compound.
Word must have gone in advance for Sirik himself stood waiting, shaded from the morning sun by a servant with a parasol. A half-dozen armoured men from his private bodyguard were clustered round him. The merchant’s expression descended in swift collapse upon seeing a mere four wagons roll into the compound. Curses rode the dusty air from the guards when they spied the first driver, whose centre crow at that moment decided to half spread its wings to regain balance as the withered hands twitched the traces, halting the wagon.
Gruntle reined in and slowly dismounted.
Sirik waved his hands in a helpless gesture. ‘But-but-’
Drawing off his cloak revealed the damage on Gruntle’s chain hauberk, the slashes through the black iron links, the gouges and punctures, the crusted blood. ‘Dwell raiders,’ he said in a rumble, grinning once more.
‘But-’
‘We gave good account,’ Gruntle resumed, squinting at the guards behind the merchant. ‘And if you’d let loose a few more of your precious preeners there, we might ha’done better still. The raiding party was a big one, a hundred shrieking savages. The fools torched the other wagons even as they looted ’em.’
One of the bodyguard, Sirik’s sear-faced captain, stepped forward, scowling at the wagons. ‘A hundred, was it? Against what, eight guards under your command, Gruntle? Do you take us for idiots? A hundred Dwell and you’d not be here.’
‘No, Kest, you’re not an idiot,’ Gruntle allowed. ‘Thick-skulled and a bully, but not an idiot.’
As the captain and his men bridled, Sirik held up a trembling hand. ‘Gruntle, Gisp sits that wagon but he’s dead.’
‘He is. So are the other three.’
‘But-but how?’
Gruntle’s shrug was an ominous roll of his massive shoulders. ‘Not sure,’ he admitted, ‘but they took my orders anyway-granted, I was desperate and yelling things I normally wouldn’t, but by then I was the last one left, and with four surviving wagons and as many horses…’ He shrugged again, then said, ‘I’ll take my pay now, Sirik. You’ve got half the Bastion kelyk you wanted and that’s better than none.’
‘And what am I to do with four undead drivers?’ Sirik shrieked.
Gruntle turned, glared up at Gisp. ‘Go to Hood, you four. Now.’
The drivers promptly slumped, sliding or tottering from their perches. The three crows picking at Gisp’s shredded face set up an indignant squall, then flapped down to resume their meal once the body settled on the dust of the compound.
Sirik had recovered enough to show irritation. ‘As for payment-’
‘In full,’ Gruntle cut in. ‘I warned you we didn’t have enough. Kest may not be an idiot, but you are, Sirik. And sixteen people died for it, not to mention a hundred Dwell. I’m about to visit the Guild, as required. I get my pay in full and I’ll keep my opinions to myself. Otherwise…’ Gruntle shook his head, ‘you won’t be hiring any more caravan guards. Ever again.’
Sirik’s sweat-sheathed face worked for a time, until his eyes found a look of resignation. ‘Captain Kist, pay the man.’
A short time later, Gruntle stepped out on to the street. Pausing, he glanced up at the morning sky, then set out for home. Despite the heat, he donned his cloak and drew up the hood once more. The damned markings on his skin rose flush with battle, and took weeks to fade back into a ghostly tint. In the meantime, the less conspicuous he could make himself the better. He suspected that the hovel he called home was already barricaded by a murder of acolytes awaiting his return. The tiger-skinned woman who proclaimed herself High Priestess of the local temple would have heard the fierce battle cry of Trake’s Mortal Sword, even at a distance of thirty or so leagues out on the Dwelling Plain. And she would be in a frenzy… again, desperate as ever for his attention.