Ordermaster (61 page)

   
There were few souls out and about, although Kharl could see the haze from chimneys and smell cooking oil and smoke.

   
"How far are we going, ser?" asked Erdyl, from where he rose behind Kharl.

   
"As far as we need to. No one wants to talk about roads or about what's happening in the south."

   
Erdyl was silent, as were the others. Kharl concentrated on riding and not bouncing in the saddle, although his riding was far better than it had been when he had first been required to ride at Dykaru two seasons earlier. He also kept checking the streets, and roads, and the area through which they rode for signs of chaos. He found none; but he was well aware that, even so early in the day, several uniformed patrollers had been watching them.

   
As they passed the last dwellings of Brysta on the southeast side of the city and began to ride through the small plots that were neither true holdings nor just gardens, the ground grew somewhat more hilly to the east of the road, low hills that were more like rocky meadows, dotted with wood-lots and irregular fields. Then the road swung due south-or mostly so in its winding path-to avoid a long ridge that rose a good fifty cubits above the road and angled to the southeast.

   
A half kay farther south, the packed-clay track turned back southeast, following the curve of a hill below the rocky ridge. At the end of the low

hill the ground to the east of the hill flattened, and Kharl saw more clearly the barracks he had seen from the carriage earlier and heard about-four new plank-sided buildings-and two long stables. On the flat between the base of the ridge and the stables, Kharl could see at least two companies of mounted patrollers drilling.

"Those are lancer drills," said Demyst quietly.

   
"I thought they might be. I saw some mounted patrollers the other day-first time I've seen them in Brysta." Kharl had half expected it, but it was still a surprise.

  
Just past the barracks, the south road was joined by another, narrower road from the east that cut through a low spot in the ridge farther east of the barracks and stables and ran due west on the south side of the patroller buildings, ending where it met the south road.

   
As they continued south on the main road that would eventually lead to Surien-if hundreds of kays farther to the southeast-the holdings and cots became far less frequent, and the road itself was often bordered by hedgerows and holder fields. Yet they encountered almost no one, except an occasional cart.

   
Then, less than two kays south of the barracks, the road abruptly changed from packed clay into a gray stone highway. The paving stones were large, two cubits by one, and the road was a good rod wide, with gravel and pebble shoulders.

   
"This looks new," Kharl said. It was new, at least since the time a year before when he had walked southward to Peachill to see Warrl.

   
"It's cut off sharp as with a knife. Right here. Doesn't run all the way into Brysta. That doesn't make sense," replied Erdyl.

"They're probably still building it," Kharl offered.

   
"There's no sign of 'em doing any more, but maybe they don't want folks to know about it yet," suggested Demyst.

   
Kharl stood in the stirrups of the chestnut gelding, looking ahead, but the pavement stretched out at least three kays ahead before disappearing over a low rise, cutting through the wide curves of the old road like a crossbow quarrel, in places running through meadows and fields. "We'll see how far it goes." He eased his mount forward.

   
On the west side of the road was a stone wall that ended abruptly near the shoulder of the new road, which cut through an irregular corner of what had been a pasture. The stone wall had not been rebuilt along the

shoulder, something Kharl certainly would have done to keep in grazing livestock.

   
He glanced at the cot immediately ahead and to his right. Despite the cool of the early morning, the shutters were closed when they should have been open. So was the door to the small barn to the south of the cot. He could sense no one in the buildings or nearby. Had they protested the loss of their land to the road?

   
Kharl shook his head, imagining what Egen would have done to anyone who protested. He was just glad that Dowsyl's orchards were well back from the old main road, and he hoped that they were also well back from the new road.

   
For the next two kays, they were the sole travelers on the gray stone high road. Perhaps half a glass passed before Kharl saw riders coming from the south, wearing the traditional blue-and-burgundy uniforms and moving in formation.

"Looks like lancers, ser," said Demyst. "What do you want us to do?"

   
"Let's stop here and wait for them. I'd like to see what they have in mind." Kharl didn't have any illusions. The only question in his mind was exactly what sort of trouble the lancers posed. He reined up, then turned in the saddle. "Close up. As close as you can get."

"Ser?" asked Erdyl.

"You heard him," hissed Demyst.

The others moved in.

   
Kharl watched carefully as the lancers rode toward them, double file, in good order. The half squad of lancers reined up less than two rods away. All the riders carried not only sabres, but rifles in saddle cases-Hamorian rifles from their order-feel, Kharl sensed. Their undercaptain reined up to one side.

Kharl eased the chestnut forward.

"Hold it right there, fellow!" snapped the undercaptain.

   
"I didn't want you to have to yell." Kharl reined up slowly, so that he was almost a rod closer to the officer.

   
"You're not supposed to be here," announced the undercaptain. "The south road is closed."

   
"There were no signs or barriers," Kharl replied politely. "Might I ask why?"

"That's ser, to you, fellow, and no, you can't ask why."

   
"No one in Brysta said that the road south was closed," Kharl said, his eyes and senses on the ten lancers, all of whom had their hands on their rifles, clearly waiting for a command. He'd wondered about riding south, but, since no one had been able to tell him anything, he'd felt that waiting would not be wise. Now he was seeing why. He almost smiled at the thought. He'd never liked waiting.

   
"Well, it is, and the question is whether you fellows will hand over your golds and head back peaceably, or whether you end up in the quarries."

   
"I thought the justicers or Lord West decided that," Kharl said, even as he extended an order-probe to the rifle the undercaptain was pulling from its case. He began to untwist the order-locks in the iron.

"The lancers decide here, and I've decided-"

   
Kharl untwisted the last of the order-ties, then flung up a shield around his group.

   
Crrummmpttt! The blinding white glare and heat of chaos flared over the undercaptain and the ten suddenly hapless lancers.

   
Despite the shield, Kharl felt as though he had been thrust inside a furnace, then shaken. He just grabbed the rim of the saddle with his free hand and braced himself, trying to stay in the saddle as the chestnut jerked sideways. He managed to hold both his mount and the order shield until the tumult and chaos had dispersed.

   
Even so, a good tenth of a glass passed before Kharl's eyes stopped watering, and he could see clearly. Except for an irregular patch of darkened gray stone in the center of the new road, and a number of fine cracks in the paving stones, there was no sign of the eleven lancers, except ashes as fine as mist drifting in the light breeze.

"Light-demons ... burned 'em to less 'n ash ..."

"Mean bastards ... woulda shot us dead on the spot..."

   
Kharl had no doubts of that, or that the undercaptain had been ordered to act just that way.

"Now what?" asked Demyst.

   
"We keep riding. We still don't know why they don't want anyone here." And Kharl wanted to get to Warrl before things got worse-if they hadn't already.

   
"... no sign of 'em .. . nothing but a blackened patch on the road ..." murmured Erdyl.

Neither guard answered his comments.

Kharl eased the chestnut forward at an easy walk. He had to keep blot-

ting his forehead. They covered another two kays before he began to cool off. When he began to feel light-headed, he took out some cheese and bread from the provisions in his saddlebag, an awkward task for him because he still wasn't that good a rider. He ate slowly and drank almost half the water in his bottle.

   
The light-headedness departed, and as they continued southward, Kharl used his order-senses to study the road and the holdings. Occasionally, there were traces of chaos-wizardry, seemingly in places where stony outcrops or rises had been removed or lowered, but most of the road had been built without wizardry. Along the way, there was only a scattering of empty dwellings, and those were where the road had been built across the land belonging to that cottage or hut-at least from what Kharl could tell.

   
Still, no one anywhere close to the highway ventured out as they passed. Twice, a more distant peasant holder scurried into his hut when he saw the five riders.

   
The second time, Demyst cleared his throat. "Doesn't look like they like riders, ser."

"After the way those lancers tried to kill us, I'm sure that they don't."

"Don't see why they were acting like brigands ..."

   
"So that anyone who escaped would add to the stories about brigands dressed as lancers." Kharl wondered exactly what Egen was hiding.

   
Another glass passed. They saw no one else on the new highway, and the gray stone pavement still stretched before them, arrowing southward. They continued riding, and Kharl kept looking, trying to sense the lancers he knew had to be somewhere ahead. Yet he sensed nothing but the remnants of older chaos.

   
Just before midmorning, on the east side of the road, Kharl saw the burned remnants of a cot that looked familiar. He thought it might have been the one where he had persuaded the elderly woman who lived there to feed him.

   
"The well here should be good," he said to the others, riding though the open side gate.

Demyst glanced at Kharl.

"There's no one here." The mage reined up short of the well.

   
"Eerie," murmured Erdyl. "There's no one in these cots real close to the road, none of them. This is the first one that's burned, though. What happened, do you think?"

"They didn't want to give up their land, or part of it, to Lord West's

road." Kharl dismounted and tied the gelding to the dead limb of a tree that had been charred by the fire and stood leafless between the burned cot and the well. He walked to the well. A bucket and rope still remained.

   
After drawing the water, he let his order-senses check it, but he could detect no chaos-natural or wizardly-in the water. "It's good."

"Mounts could use water. So could I," said Demyst.

   
After watering their horses and letting them rest for a half glass or so, Kharl and the others remounted. As he rode on, Kharl's stomach grew tighter and tighter. While there were no more burned cots, and only a handful of empty cots and pastures, with untended fields that lay fallow, they saw no more holders outside. At times, Kharl could see others in the distance, and carts and wagons on back lanes, but none on the gray stone highway.

   
A good glass before noon, Kharl could see, off to the west of the new gray stone road, a curving section of the old road-and the kaystone that announced Peachill.

   
"We'll cross to the older track now." He turned the chestnut and let his mount pick his way over the uneven ground until they reached the original road. Even the ruts were old and worn down by rain and weather. Merayni and Dowsyl's orchards were off a lane on the west side of the road, short of the hamlet itself. The small hutlike cottage where he had asked directions was also a heap of charcoal, burned at least a season before.

   
As he guided the chestnut westward along the narrower lane, his eyes looked for the other cots and dwellings. He could see none, only another heap of burned ruins. His stomach clenched even more tightly.

"Ser. .. ?"

   
"I need to see someone-if they're here. If they're not. .." He forced a shrug.

   
"Doesn't look like they left anyone here," ventured Demyst. "Must have done something."