The soldier gave him a look and said, “I didn’t ask you, merchant. Follow me.”
Fidelias stared at the soldier and then swallowed, an almost audible gulp. “Aye, aye, master. We’ll be only a pace or three behind you. Come on old boy.” He picked up the gargant’s lead straps in shaking fingers and stirred the great beast into motion again.
The soldier grunted and turned to start walking back down the road. He let out a sharp whistle, and a dozen men armed with bows appeared from the shadows and brush on the sides of the trail, just as he had a moment before.
“Keep the men here until I return,” the man said. “Stop anyone from coming past.”
“Yes, sir,” one of the men said. Amara focused on that one. The men all wore the same outfits: black tunics and breeches with surcoats of dark green and dark brown. The speaker, in addition, wore a black sash around his waist—as the first soldier had. Amara checked around, but none of the other men wore a sash — only those two. She made a mental note of it. Knights? Possibly. One of them had to have been a strong woodcrafter, to have hidden so many men so thoroughly.
Crows, she thought. What if this rebel Legion turns out to have a full contingent of Knights to go with it? With that many men, that many powerful furycrafters, they could be a threat to any city in Alera.
And, as a corollary, it would mean that the Legion had powerful backing. Any furycrafter strong enough to be a Knight could command virtually what price he wished for his services. They could not be casually bought by any disgruntled merchant set to convince his Lord or High Lord to lower taxes. Only the nobility could afford the cost of hiring a few Knights, let alone a contingent of them.
Amara shivered. If one of the High Lords was preparing to turn against the First Lord, then there were dark days ahead indeed.
She looked down at Fidelias, and he glanced up at her, his face troubled. She thought she could see the reflection of her own thoughts and fears there in his eyes. She wanted to talk to Fidelias, to ask him for his thoughts on the matter, but she couldn’t break her role now. Amara ground her teeth and dug her fingers into the pad of the gargant’s riding saddle and tried to calm herself again, while the soldier led them to the camp.
Amara kept her eyes open as the gargant’s plodding steps brought them around a bend in the trail and over a small hill, into the valley beyond and behind it. There, the camp spread out before them.
Great furies, she thought. It looks like a city.
Her mind took down details as she stared. The camp had been constructed along standard Legion lines: a stake-wall and ditch fortification built in a huge square, surrounding the soldier’s encampment and stores. Tents of white fabric had been erected within, row after row of them, too many for easy counting, laid out in neat, precise rows. Two gates, opposite one another, led into the camp. The tents and leantos of the camp’s followers spread out around it in ragged disarray, like flies buzzing around a sleeping beast.
People were everywhere.
On a practice field beside the camp, entire cohorts of men were drilling in formation combat and maneuvers, ordered about by bawling centurions or men in black sashes mounted on horseback. Elsewhere, archers riddled distant targets with their arrows, while furymasters drilled other recruits in the application of their basic warcraftings. Women moved among the camp, as well—washing clothes at a stream that passed by, mending uniforms, tending fires, or simply enjoying the morning sunlight. Amara saw a couple of women wearing sashes of black, on horseback, riding toward the practice field. Dogs wandered about the camp and set up a tinny racket of barking upon scenting the gargant as it came over the hill. To one side of the camp, not far from the stream, men and women had established what looked like a small market, vendors hawking wares from makeshift stalls and spreading them upon blankets on the ground.
“You’re here between breakfast and lunch,” said the soldier. “Or I’d offer you some food.”
“Perhaps we’ll take lunch with you, master,” Fidelias said.
“Perhaps.” The soldier stopped and looked up at Amara, studying her with quiet, hard eyes. “Get her down. I’ll send out a groom or two to care for your beast.”
“No,” insisted Fidelias. “I’ll be keeping my goods with me.”
The soldier grunted. “There’s horses at the camp, and they’ll go mad if they smell this thing. It stays here.”
“Then I stay here,” insisted Fidelias.
“No.”
“The slave then,” he said. “She can stay here with the beast and keep him quiet. He’d spook if strange hands cared for him.”
The soldier squinted at him, hard and suspicious. “What are you up to, old man?”
“Up to? I’m protecting my interests, master, as any merchant would.”
“You are in our camp. Your interests are no longer an issue, are they?” The soldier put no particular emphasis on his words, but he laid one hand on the hilt of his sword.
Fidelias drew himself up, voice shocked and outraged. “You wouldn’t dare.”
The soldier smiled. His smile was hard.
Fidelias licked his lips. Then shot a glance up at Amara. She thought she saw something in it, some kind of warning, but he only said, “Girl. Get down.”
Amara slid down off of the back of the beast, using the leather straps to help lower herself down its flanks. Fidelias clucked to it and jerked down on its straps, and the gargant settled lazily to earth with a contented rumble that shook the ground nearby. It leaned its great head over, tore up a mouthful of grass, and began chewing on it, huge eyes half-closed.
“Follow me,” the soldier said. “You too, slave. If either of you gets more than three strides away from me, I’ll kill you both. Do you understand?”
“I understand,” said Fidelias.
“I understand, master,” echoed Amara, keeping her eyes lowered. They followed the soldier then and crossed the stream at a shallow ford. The water was cold and flowed quickly over Amara’s ankles. She shivered, gooseflesh racing up and down her legs and arms, but kept pace with Fidelias and the soldier.
Her mentor dropped back beside her and murmured, very low, “Did you see how many tents?”
She jerked her head in a nod. “Close.”
“Well kept and neat, too. This isn’t a gang of malcontent Steadholders. Professional military.”
Amara nodded and whispered, “Serious money behind them. Is it enough for the First Lord to bring it to the Council?”
“An accusation without anyone to accuse?” Fidelias grimaced and shook his head. “No. We have to have something that incriminates someone behind it. Doesn’t have to be ironclad, but we need something tangible.”
“Do you recognize our escort?”
Fidelias shot her a look. “Why? Do you?”
Amara shook her head. “I’m not sure. Something about him seems familiar.”
The other nodded. “They call him the Sword.”
Amara felt her eyes widen. “Aldrick ex Gladius? Are you sure?”