Erik sat back in his saddle and stared open-mouthed for a moment, then shook his head. “I’m an idiot.”
“No,” said Calis, “but you’ve a lot to learn about the less obvious side of warcraft. The twenty men we kept all had answers that came a bit too fast and easy for mercenaries. I think this Emerald Queen has agents sprinkled throughout her army. All twenty aren’t agents, I’m sure, but I’m almost certain one or two are, maybe more. So we keep the most likely close by.”
“Trusting bunch,” offered de Loungville. “Now, look. You and a couple of men you trust, say Biggo and Jadow, keep close to those men, don’t let too many of them off duty at any one time, and keep an eye on where they wander. If any of them head into that fortress, I want one of you along.” He reached inside his tunic and pulled out a heavy purse. “We lost some gold on the baggage train, but I kept most of it.” He opened the pouch and handed a dozen small coins to Erik. “Pass some of this around so that if any one of those twenty lads wants to step into the fort for a drink, you’ll be the fellow to buy it for them. Understand?”
Erik nodded. “I’ll make sure no more than four of them are free to cause trouble at a time.” He turned his horse, put heels to its flanks, and rode back down toward the end of the line.
Calis said, “He’s rounding out nicely.”
De Loungville said, “Aw, he’s still not nearly half mean enough, but I’ll fix that.”
Calis smiled slightly and turned back to oversee the making of the camp.
Erik walked the perimeter of the camp, keeping an eye out for anything out of the ordinary. With the fortress at their back, Calis had ordered no rampart and trench dug. The men set up their tents quickly and saw to their stores, and began to settle in for the night.
As he moved along, Erik noticed that the eight men from Nahoot’s company that he had put to guarding the remounts were at their posts, talking in pairs, but otherwise where they should be. Four others were bedded down, or at least had been ten minutes before when 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 be found Calis and de Loungville talking with Greylock, who bad 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 bad been erected, and made his way along the perimeter until be 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 bill 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.