The Folding Knife (62 page)

What happened after that was pretty straightforward. After all, the men are Cazars. They had a pretty good idea of what needed to be done. All I had to do was say, Right, I want them completely surrounded and sealed in tight before anybody so much as thinks about moving in, and they did all the rest. Very well, too. I stayed right back. My burning thirst for martial glory well and truly quenched some time earlier.

They came and found me when it was over, though I'd more or less guessed by the noise level. No idea of our casualties in the encirclement/butchering phase; the impression I got was single figures (including the poor bastard Hus who made it all possible, of course). Their side: well, nobody would admit to having let through a single man, but we reckon a couple of dozen oozed through the cracks. Nothing is ever perfect, not even wholesale slaughter.

We all felt pretty good about it; even though, as always in these circumstances, it was an incredible amount of hard, gruelling physical slog. Some Cazar told me: you don't actually feel tired when you're smashing heads; it's the next day when everything aches like hell and you wish you were dead. Took his word for it. But anyway: dog-tired, but quietly, ferociously pleased.

We counted the bodies, then just left them to lie; too much work putting our own dead back together and dumping them in a pit. Our losses: four thousand, six hundred and fifty-seven. Theirs: twenty-seven thousand and some.

Since intelligence assured Aelius before we left that the absolute maximum number of insurgents there could possibly be in the whole forest, including support and non-combatants, was twenty-four thousand, I think it's probably safe to assume we got most of them.

Well, we had a good night's rest after that (apart from the poor devils who drew sentry duty, of course); and in the morning we faced up to the fact that we'd permitted ourselves to overlook the previous evening: namely, that the Mavortines had (in pursuit of their religious and cultural agenda) destroyed all the food we'd brought with us.

No exaggeration. They must've worked like men possessed to do so much damage in such a short space of time. I'm guessing: either it's the old ritual-killing-of-objects thing, where you don't just kill your enemy but everything he ever owned or associated with, to wipe him off the face of the earth totally and for ever; or maybe it was to deny a hated enemy food in the afterlife; or maybe even to provide food for the slaughtered enemy in the afterlife as a way of apologising for killing him in the first place. Who knows? Who gives a shit? The point was, there wasn't an unsmashed bacon jar or an unburnt wheat grain or a dried cod fillet not trodden into the mud and jumped on in the whole wreck of our provisions train. Oh, and they'd killed the packhorses too, and gutted them and filled up the body cavities with mud, so we couldn't eat them either.

Your sylvan poets, Tarchannius and the Elemental school, would have you believe that living in forests is the natural, unpolluted state of Man; that all you've got to do is trudge your merry way through the greenwood, plucking this, killing that, washing it down with crystal-clear water from unsullied streams, and you're back with our ancestors in a state of pure and natural virtue, before greed and ambition were our racial downfall. Well, yes. Maybe you, or you and your own true love at a pinch, in berry season. There were twenty thousand of us, and we were starving hungry. Forget food--there wasn't enough water. I used to think the stuff in the old histories about armies drinking rivers dry was dramatic hyperbole, like arrows blotting out the sun. ("In which case," replied our indomitable ancestors, "we'll just have to fight in the shade." All cheer, and sing the School Song.) Actually, it's frighteningly easy. You don't drink it right down to the gravel and the clay, of course. What happens is, you drink off the clean water and kick up the silt at the bottom, which means the river--which in the forest means the big stream--fouls up into a thick silty muck and stays foul for hours. You can't afford to wait till it clears, because all that means is another five thousand out of your twenty thousand get to swallow a few brackish mouthfuls; in ten hours, ten thousand of your twenty thousand have each drunk a pint of water. It simply doesn't add up. No big deal while we still had barrels and water-skins and bottles: fill 'em at night, in rotation, making sure you get all your capacity full whenever you get the opportunity, like a big enough river or a freshwater lake. But most of us had nothing to carry water in, on account of having left our kit behind when I ordered the retreat during the ambush.

Oh well, I thought, at least we killed a lot of them before we starved and parched ourselves to death. You know what? I actually thought that. Seriously. Like it made it better, as opposed to worse.

After a while my inner logic started telling me: fine, and you'd have had exactly the same problems if you'd read the sun right and managed to lead the army north instead of round in a circle; we'd still all have died of thirst and starvation, and then the savages would've come screaming out of the forest and slaughtering our brave lads in the forts. Some degree of truth in that, but I definitely rationalised it after the event, to excuse myself for the original purely spontaneous thought.

After that, I decided to play a game. Obviously, I told myself, I'm not going to be able to get twenty thousand of us out of this forest alive. Fact faced: can't be done. Accepted. But how'd it be if I played this game: guess the number of survivors I actually do manage to lead out into the sunlight. Five hundred? A thousand? Five thousand? For every five hundred saved, I get a prize--a sausage, or a cup of water, or a century let off my time in Hell being trampled under the hoofs of the horses of the Invincible Sun. Of course, the game would presuppose me being alive at the end, to see if I'd won, so I'd have to survive too. Just a silly game.

Sometimes, that's all it takes. We scraped up as much edible food as we could with potsherds and our fingers, and tied it up in pockets torn from dead men's shredded coats. We figured: the bottom of a smashed gallon jug will carry a pint of water; one pint between ten men may be enough to save one man's life. We were ridiculous, laden down with stupid little parcels and packets, nursing broken barrels and scraps of crockery in our hands as we walked, like put-upon husbands carrying their wives' shopping. Of course, it was far too little to make any difference, and it slowed us right down, so in that sense it was counter-productive. But it got us into the game, and it was the game that saved us.

How it saved us isn't quite so uplifting and edifying.

As I just said, nursing all that junk slowed us down. It also made us rather quieter, less obvious than the average army on the march. Which, I guess, is why we escaped the notice of the insurgents' wives, children and livestock, coming up the road to meet us.

More guessing: that as soon as the ambush struck and we ran for it and the initial pursuit was called off, they sent for the women and children and food to rejoin them as soon as possible--scared because there were lots of enemy still loose in the woods, I guess, or maybe they were hungry too, or just lonely. Don't know. Don't care. We practically bumped into them; just enough advance warning for a three-quarter envelopment manoeuvre.

Which worked fine. We charged in on three sides, making a hell of a noise. The women and kids ran like hell out the fourth side. Naturally, we didn't pursue. We had no interest whatsoever in massacring innocent, harmless civilians. I expressly ordered, not one of them to be harmed, if at all possible. All we wanted to do was steal all their food and livestock and leave them alone in the heart of the merry greenwood to fend for themselves. I regard that as the mark of a civilised man. Of this particular civilised man, at any rate.

Who knows? Some of them may make it, especially if they figure out their own version of the game. Point is, they may be women and kids, but they're still the enemy. Or at least, they're not Us. Us and Them. Sides.

Dear Uncle Basso, I know perfectly well what I've become, what I've turned into. Maybe it's an effect of the place, or the situation. Maybe, when I'm home again, I'll get better. Right now, I really don't care. No: rephrase. I really don't mind. There's a difference.

Anyway, that's enough from me; how are things at home?

I imagine I'd rather not know. But, as far as I can see, in my capacity as acting unconfirmed viceroy of Mavortis, we will start digging iron, copper, silver and lead precisely on schedule.

Love,

Bassano

"General Aelius," the lawyer said, "filed a will with the probate registry two days before he left. I have a certified copy here." He lifted the plain brass tube out of his pocket as if slowly drawing a sword at the start of an exhibition bout, and placed it on Basso's desk, gently, so as not to wake it. "He appointed you, myself and your nephew Bassianus Licinius as his executors. I have to ask you if you are prepared to accept the appointment."

"Yes," Basso said.

"Very well." The lawyer pinched the tiny collar of parchment just showing above the rim of the tube, and carefully drew out the roll. "I have, of course, read the will, which is quite short and simple. As required by standard procedure, General Aelius listed his assets in the opening declaration. You might care..."

Basso nodded, and the lawyer unrolled the paper and held it down on the tabletop to stop it curling--a curiously brutal movement, like soldiers with a prisoner.

"That's all he had, was it?" Basso said.

The lawyer's eyebrow nearly lifted. "Quite a substantial estate for a man of his background and antecedents. Valuing the house at seven hundred nomismata, we arrive at a total of just over six thousand."

Basso looked down at his hands. "I spent more than that on a book once," he said.

"No doubt it was very rare and precious," the lawyer said briskly. "Since the general died on active service, his estate is exempt from death duties and foreign-born citizens' capital transfer tax. Likewise, his funeral and testamentary expenses will be borne by the government."

"They couldn't find his body," Basso said. "So we're getting a bargain there."

The lawyer couldn't have heard, because he went on: "The general kept very precise and well-ordered household accounts, and his wants and pleasures were few. Unless there are debts we don't know about, the liabilities to be deducted from the estate amount to something in the order of fifteen nomismata."

"Fifteen nomismata." Basso scowled, as though the concept of fifteen nomismata was utterly alien to him. "The hell with that," he said, and dug his hand in his pocket. "Here's fifteen nomismata. Pay the bills with that." He almost ground the coins into the table, then took his hand away. "Right," he went on, "who gets the money?"

The lawyer nodded, as though Basso had just passed a test. "There are five specific legacies, of twenty-five nomismata each, to named military welfare funds: the Army Benevolent, the Salt Fund, the Boots Fund, the Widows and Orphans and the United Disabled. A further legacy of one hundred nomismata is made to the Cazar Salt Brotherhood, as trustees, to hold and use for the relief of poverty and want among his clan resulting from the deaths and injuries of clansmen serving in the Mavortine war. I should point out that this legacy is unenforceable, since it conveys the property of a Vesani citizen to foreigners resident abroad. The government can, however, authorise payment..."

"It just has," Basso said grimly. "Go on."

The lawyer was jotting down a note in the margin, using Basso's own gold and silver pen and inkstand. Churlish to object, but he might have asked. "The balance," he said, "amounting to something in the order of five thousand, seven hundred and seventy-five nomismata, he leaves to you."

Basso didn't move. He couldn't; it even crossed his mind, for a fraction of a second, that he'd just had a stroke. Then something gave way, painfully, in his mind, and he said: "No, scrub that. Divide it up between the army funds and the clansmen."

The lawyer looked at him. He'd clearly done something very bad. "It's not as simple as that, I'm afraid," he said.

"It had better be."

"Sadly," the lawyer said (a man who knew no fear; reminded Basso of Tragazes), "it isn't. As residuary legatee you are, of course, entitled to refuse to accept the legacy. Should you do so, however, the residue--the five thousand, seven-seven-five--devolves by intestacy to his nearest of kin; since he had no relations who are citizens, we are left with the default position, which is that the entire estate, including all the legacies, passes to the Treasury."

Basso blinked, as though he'd had a bright light shone in his eyes. "That's the law?"

"Yes."

"Fine, I'll change it."

"An admirable idea," the lawyer said, "of which I'm sure my profession will approve. We've been lobbying for such a change for thirty years. However, such a change could not be made retrospective, for obvious reasons."

Basso sighed. "All right," he said. "If that's the law, it's the bloody law. I'll just have to take the money and give it to the boot people and the rest of them myself."

The lawyer nodded slowly, which meant awkwardness. "You certainly can do that," he said. "However, I should point out that if you make such gifts within two years of the death of the deceased, the Treasury can, and most certainly will, apply its anti-avoidance powers and confiscate the money from you. This includes any gift made on your behalf by intermediaries, or any gift by a third party that can be shown to have been funded by you, directly or indirectly; or any loan you make to the funds in question with the intention of cancelling the debt at a later date; or any such loan where the Treasury has reason to suspect that you intend to cancel at a later date."