For a moment, Valens was silent. "That's a rather large undertaking," he said.

"Hence," Stellachus replied, "the rather large army. We know they don't do things by halves. No skin off their noses, of course; that's the charm of using mercenaries. Every casualty's a saving on the wage bill rather than a dead citizen."

It was Valens' turn to look away. "Have you ever been to Civitas Eremiae? Me neither. But by all accounts it's the perfect defensive position, massively fortified -"

"War engines," Stellachus said. "Why send a man where you can send a large rock, or a big steel spike? Probably just the sort of technical challenge your red-blooded Mezentine engineer relishes."

The Mezentines aren't savages, Valens reminded himself, but it didn't sound so reassuring this time. "Storming Civitas Eremiae," he said slowly, "would be an impressive achievement."

"The Cure Hardy."

"Quite." Valens frowned. "Assuming it's possible to impress them, or that they care. But I can see how the Mezentines would view it as a pleasant fringe benefit, to scare the wits out of the Cure Hardy."

"And it'd make a first-class frontier post," Stellachus added, "assuming they don't level it to the ground in the process. Anyway," he said briskly, "that's three possibilities. There could well be others; those were just the first things that came to mind."

Valens grinned. It'd be wise to keep an eye on Stellachus' drinking, and he was as lazy as a fat dog, but he was still most likely the best man for his job. "Think about it some more," he said. "Meanwhile, I'll let you get back to your paperwork."

Stellachus inclined his head, like a fencer admitting a touch. "I'll have the stuff you need about the Mezentine army as soon as possible," he said.

"Good. See you later, at the meeting."

As he retraced his steps back to his reading room, Valens wondered how on earth he was going to reply to her letter now, with his mind full of what Stellachus had suggested. Perhaps she didn't know there was going to be a war; perhaps Orsea didn't know... He lifted his head and stared blankly out of the window, at the billowing curtain of thin, slanted rain. If the defector was dead, surely the problem had solved itself; no Vaatzes, no risk to the Republic, no war. Somehow, he knew it wouldn't work like that.

I'm not in control of this situation, he told himself suddenly. I wonder who is.

He sat down, laid his sheet of parchment flat on the tabletop, looked at it. At that moment it put him in mind of the very best tempered steel armor; warranted impossible to make a mark on it, no matter how hard you tried.

Valens Valentinianus to Veatriz Sirupati, greetings.

He put the pen down, lined it up carefully with the edge of the desk. Precision in all things, like a Mezentine.

(I'll have to tell her, he thought. Maybe, if I can make her understand, I can get her to promise; as soon as the Mezentines get too close, she'll come here - she can bring him too, if she likes, just so long as she's safe, here, with me...) He closed his eyes. I might as well soak the palace in lamp-oil and set light to it, he told himself. I've just been thinking how stupid Orsea is, and I've proved I'm worse than him. To bring the war here; unforgivable. I shouldn't even think it, in case they can read minds; they seem to be able to do pretty much everything else.

He sighed. No point hating the Mezentines; you might as well hate the winter, or lightning, or disease, or death. As far as he knew - he actually paused and thought about it for a moment - he didn't hate anybody; not even Orsea, though at times he came quite close. Hate, like love, was an indulgence he didn't need and refused to waste lifespan on - (Correction, he admitted; I hated Father sometimes. But that was inevitable, and besides, I should be proud of myself for the elegant economy of effort. Hatred and love only once, and both for the same person.) In any event; hate and anger wouldn't make anything better. His fencing instructor had taught him that; they make the hand shake, they spoil your concentration. The most you can ever feel for your opponent, if you want to defeat and kill him, is a certain mild dislike.

He picked the pen up.

You never got my last letter [he wrote]. So that settles that, and we needn't discuss it.

I don't know where the wet oak leaves business comes from; can't have been anything I said. As a matter of fact, I despise getting wet, particularly in the morning. The smell of damp cloth drying out depresses me and gives me a headache. I like bright sunlight, cool breezes, tidy blue skies without piles of cloud left scattered about, moonlit nights - I like to be able to see for miles in every direction. Not quite sure where I stand on the issue of forests; I like them because that's where the quarry tends to be, and every bush could be hiding the record buck or the boar the farmers have been telling me about for weeks. But I don't like the tangle, or the obstruction. You can't go fast in a forest, and you can't see. I like to flush my quarry out into the open. Unfortunately, it doesn't always work like that.

Veatriz, I need to ask you something. Do you think there's going to be a war? I don't know how much Orsea's told you, or even how much he knows himself; but the Mezentines have raised a large army, and it looks horribly like they mean to use it against Eremia. I'd like to say don't be scared, but I can't. If you haven't talked to Orsea about it, maybe you should. And - I'm going to have to be obnoxious for a bit, so bite your tongue and don't yell at me - the truth is, I have my doubts about how Orsea's likely to handle this. I think Orsea is a good man, from what I've heard about him. He's brave, and conscientious, he cares very much about doing his job and not letting his people down. That's why I'm worried. You see, I believe that if the Mezentines invade, Orsea would rather die than run away and desert his people; which is all very well, and I'd like to think I'd do the same in his shoes, though I wouldn't bet money on it. I'm not a good, noble man, like he is. If I'd been good and noble, I'd be dead by now.

I'm still writing this letter; you haven't read it yet; so the waves of furious anger and resentment I can feel coming back at me off the paper must just be my imagination. Yes, I know. How dare I criticize Orsea, or suggest... We both know what you're thinking. But listen to me, please. Your place is at your husband's side, yes, right. But Valens stopped writing. He knew that if he finished the sentence, he could be condemning the Vadani to war and death. Why would he want to do something like that?

I want you to know that, if things go badly - you don't know the Mezentines like I do, once they start something, they don't give up - if things go badly, I can protect you, both of you, if you come here. I don't know how, exactly, but you can leave that to me. I can do it, and I will. Piece of cake.

There; now you see what I mean about getting the quarry out in the open. You do it by bursting in, making a noise, waving your arms, yelling, making a complete exhibition of yourself, being as loud and as scary as you possibly can.

This is going very badly. I'm not thinking. For a start, even if you're prepared to do as I say, how are you going to persuade Orsea? He doesn't know you and I are (Valens hesitated for a very long time.) friends; so why on earth would he want to come here, to the lair of his traditional enemy and all that? I can see him, he's looking at you as though you've gone soft in the head. He's asking himself, why's she saying this, what on earth makes her think we'd be safer with the bloody Vadani than we are here? And besides, I couldn't ever do that, it'd be betraying my people.

Veatriz, I'm worried. I'm scared, and I can't make the fear go away. Please, at least think about it. The Mezentines aren't savages, but they're very different from us, they think in a completely different way.

I have no right to make this sort of proposition to you; it's worse than making a pass at you, in some ways. Most ways, actually. But if you think I've been wicked and hateful and manipulative, you just wait and see what I"m going to say next. Namely: I know you love Orsea, and your place is with him, and you'd never do anything to hurt him. But which do you think is the better option: Orsea good and brave and keeping faith with his people and dead, or Orsea ashamed, dishonored and alive?

I'm your friend. I want to keep you safe. If, when, if the Mezentines get to Palicuro (in case you don't know it, it's a small village on the main east-west road, about seventeen miles from Civitas; inn, smithy, little village square with an old almond tree in the middle), I want to ask you to think very carefully about what I've suggested. It's the only thing I'll ever ask you to do for me. Please.

A short, round woman whose red dress didn't suit her complexion at all was half-killing her elderly gray palfrey, making it lug her not insignificant weight all the way up the long uphill road to Civitas Eremiae. She'd come to sell perfumes, flower essences and herbal remedies to the Duchess at extortionate prices. She came away smirking.

In the heel of her shoe was a little piece of folded parchment. It was sharp-edged and it chafed like hell, but she didn't mind; she was riding rather than walking, and besides, it would make it possible for her to sell perfumes, flower essences and herbal remedies to the Duke of the Vadani for an absurdly large sum of money. Her feet hurt anyway, because of the corns.

The Duchess had asked her to wait while she wrote the reply, and she'd been expecting to be kept hanging about for a long time; she'd made a little nest of cushions for herself in the handsome window-seat in the small gallery (such a good view down across the valley) and she'd brought a book - The Garden of Love in Idleness; very hard to get hold of a copy, especially one with quality pictures - but she'd hardly had time to open it when the Duchess came back again. She'd looked tense and unhappy, but that was her business.

The woman in the red dress didn't take her shoe off until she reached the inn at Palicuro (miserable little place, and some clown had cut down the almond tree). She was a thoughtful woman, careful and attentive to detail, so she packed her shoes with lavender overnight. The Vadani Duke was reckoned to be a good mark and a cash customer; he wouldn't want his letter smelling of hot feet.

An hour or so after the woman in the red dress reached the bottom of the mountain, a team of carpenters, stonemasons and guardsmen set about installing the first batch of the new war engines on the ramparts of Civitas Eremiae.

It was a bitch of a job. The stupid things were heavy, but their wooden frames weren't robust enough to allow them to be hauled about on ropes and cranes (the little Mezentine had been very fussy about that) so they had to be manhandled up the stairs, and they were an awkward shape. There wasn't anywhere you could hold on to them easily, and unless you shuffled along a few inches at a time, you barked your shins on the legs of the stand. It was the general consensus of opinion that if the little Mezentine had had to install the things himself, he'd have given a bit more thought to stuff like that; also, that the engines themselves were a complete waste of public money, since nobody in their right mind would ever dream of attacking Civitas, which was universally acknowledged to be impregnable; and only a born idiot like Duke Orsea would've been gullible enough to buy such a load of old junk in the first place. Still, what could you expect from someone who spent all his time pig-hunting when he should be running the country?

Forty-seven of the things - they'd been delivered fifty, but there was simply no way of fitting fifty onto the top platform of the old gate tower, there just wasn't room, and if only people would take the time to measure up for a job before starting, it'd make life so much easier for the poor sods who had to do the actual work - eventually sat in their cradles overlooking the road, like elderly wooden vultures waiting for something to die. In theory they were adjustable for windage and elevation - you made the adjustments by knocking in a series of little wedges until you'd got the angle, but you just had to look at it to know it wouldn't actually work in practice - and the range was supposedly up to three hundred yards. Word was that the Duke had upped the order to two hundred, proving the old saying about fools and their money, not that it was actually his money, when you stopped and thought about it.

The installation crews finished their work, stood shaking their heads sadly for a while, and went away. Tomorrow they had the equally rotten job of fetching up the arrow things to shoot out of them. Stupid. It wasn't like there was going to be a war anyway, not now that this Valens character was in charge of the Vadani. Another rich bastard who spent all his time chasing pigs. What they all saw in it was a mystery.

Just as it was beginning to get dark, Ziani Vaatzes climbed up the long stair and stood on the top platform for a while. He'd come to inspect the scorpions, set his mind at rest, but instead he looked down at the road, dropping steeply away into the valley.

It was a great pity, he thought, and if there had been any other way he'd have taken it. But he'd had no choice, no more than a dropped stone has a choice about falling. He hadn't started it. It wasn't his fault.

18.

Captain Beltista Eiconodoulus of the First Republican Engineers - the title was, he felt, meaningless, since the unit had been arbitrarily formed only three days ago - was afraid of maps. Something inside him went cold when a superior officer summoned him and unrolled one. We're here, the enemy is over here, this is the road, here are the mountains, bit of rough ground between here and here; he would stand rather awkwardly and try and look eager and intelligent, but the fear would start to grow in his mind like an abscess under a tooth, until he could feel it with every heartbeat. The diagram became the focus of all the terrible possibilities that inevitably arise in a war - the mistakes, the enemy's superior knowledge or ability, the unforeseen and the negligently omitted, the things left undone and the things done to hurt and deceive. He felt as though he was looking at a sketch, such as artists make before they mix their paint and trim their brushes, a study for what was about to happen. Somewhere (that mess of brown rings representing mountains, that stipple of short lines signifying marshes, that bridge, that apparent plain) was the place where he would meet the contingency he hadn't prepared for or couldn't prepare for, and when he arrived there, as and when, there'd be confusion, terror, pain and death.

"You'll take this road to begin with," he was told. "They call it the Butter Pass, for some reason. Follow it up as far as this ridge here, then branch off along this track - it's a bit rough, apparently, but they assure me it's fit for wheeled traffic; you might want to take bridging and road-building equipment just in case - and follow it round all the way up to here. You can then double back along this pass here, which'll bring you out north of the city. By then, our main expeditionary force will be here, Palicuro, and we'll be able to establish a line of communication and put you in the picture. That's about it for now. Questions?"

He'd asked one or two, just to show he was smart and had been listening; but the map told him everything he needed to know.

He went back to his tent, summoned his lieutenants, fired off a string of orders while the key points were still fresh in his mind. He hardly knew the men he gave the orders to, but if the recruiters back home and the Mezentines had confidence in them, he supposed they must be all right. He'd find out soon enough, in any case.

Really, he told himself, I'm just a wagon-master, delivering goods. And there's the enemy to consider, of course, but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. He steadied his mind with a series of tried and tested departure rituals. He carefully packed up his writing-desk, checking to make sure the paper-box was full and that there was a good supply of soot and oak-gall for making ink (running out of materials to write orders with in the middle of a battle would be a singularly stupid way to die, he'd always felt). He loaded his clothes, spare boots, books of tables and tolerances, food, bandages and medicines methodically into his pack. He checked his armor, joint by joint and strap by strap. Finally, he moved everything to the middle of the floor of his tent, in a neat pile, ready for the muleteers to collect and load. Twenty-seven years of soldiering and he was still alive and he hadn't caused a defeat or a disaster yet; if there was a reason for that (it was a question he remained open-minded about) it was probably attention to detail and the methodical approach.

As soon as they were under way (he didn't like the look of the road; it was dusty, which obscured visibility, and the ruts and potholes were already beginning to gnaw away at the temper of his cart axles), he made a start on the next step in his customary procedure: to consider the purpose of his mission, and to make it as simple as possible, so he'd be able to keep sight of it. Fortunately, in this instance that was straightforward enough. All he had to do was deliver his cargo, one hundred and fifty Mezentine war machines, to the place on the map marked with an X. There was other stuff once he'd got there - unpack the machines, assemble them, tune them, assemble the carriages and the mobile platforms and install the machines on them - but he had a bunch of Mezentine civilians along to do all that, so his involvement would be limited, in effect, to nodding to them and saying, "Go." Once he'd done that, of course, there'd be new orders, but that'd be another day.

The next step was, of course, to plan a daily routine. He'd found that if you broke the day up into small pieces, it was easier to control (hardly a startlingly new discovery, but as far as he was concerned, it was one of the great truths of human existence); accordingly, he preferred his days dismantled into units of one hour. He could hold an hour comfortably in his mind without straining. Sometimes he wondered who'd invented the hour. A genius, whoever it was; the hour was a perfect tool for handling and controlling the world, ranking alongside fire, the wheel and the axe.

These exercises kept his mind engaged and unavailable for worry and panic as far as the first night's stop, at which point he was able to hand over to fatigue, which put him gently to sleep until an hour before first light, when his day began. That first hour of the day was essential, as far as he was concerned. It bore the weight of the rest of the day like an arch. In it, he woke up, drew up his duty rosters and assignment schedules, studied his map and his intelligence reports; all the components of the armor that would protect him against chaos and failure.

The final stage of his early-morning procedure, and the one that always caused the most amusement to his subordinates, involved the rolling of two densely woven rush mats around a green half-inch stick, which fitted upright into a slot in a heavy piece of board. Mats and stick together simulated perfectly, so he'd been reliably informed, the human neck, viewed as an objective for the swordsman. If he performed the cut neatly and accurately each time, he could get three days' cutting practice out of each mat, but he was a realist and always made sure he had a plentiful supply. He was, after all, a soldier; which is a euphemism for a man who kills other men by slashing at them with a sharp edge.

Because his men didn't know him well yet, he didn't attract an audience for cutting practice on the first morning. Information travels quickly through an army, however; by the third morning, he performed a distinctly botched cut in the presence of two lieutenants, two sergeants, half a dozen enlisted engineers and the captain of muleteers, all of whom had managed to find legitimate reasons for calling on him a quarter of an hour before the scheduled start of the daily briefing. He no longer minded. He didn't object to being laughed at behind his back, so long as he had control of the subject matter.

"You should try it," he chided a young lieutenant whose face he didn't like, although he was probably the most competent of the junior staff. "Warms up the muscles, helps concentration, good mental and physical discipline. In fact, I'd make it compulsory if we could source enough mats."

The lieutenant had the inherent good sense not to reply, and Eiconodoulus wished he could remember what the man was called. He was razor-sharp when it came to faces, but a martyr to names. He hoped there'd be time to learn them all.

It was a rather fraught meeting; mostly his own fault, because they'd reached the point where they had to turn off (according to the map) but there was no sign of the track they were meant to follow. Everything else was there, as duly and faithfully recorded: a slight horn in the mountain wall, and under it a gully, the perfect place for a track, except there wasn't one.

"Maybe it's an old map and the road's just got a bit worn away," suggested one of the lieutenants (big, square man with a short beard, too old to be a lieutenant, too ineffectual to be promoted, but reasonably bright nevertheless). "It's surprising how quickly a track can heal up, if you see what I mean. But -"

Eiconodoulus shook his head. "I've been and looked," he said. "While you were still asleep," he added, unnecessarily and untruthfully. "There never was a track there, which means either the map's wrong or we're in the wrong place. You," he went on - not being able to remember names meant he'd got a reputation for brusqueness in all his previous commands; mostly, he'd found it helped. "Take a dozen men on horses and go and have a look. Ride on about five miles, see if you can see any sign of this bloody track. You, take half a dozen on foot, go and see if your friend here's right and there was a track there. Don't take too long about it."

Oddly enough, both scouting parties reported back within minutes of each other. No, there wasn't a turning further up the main road. No, there hadn't ever been a track in the gully under the horn. Eiconodoulus could feel the world tightening around his head like a sawyer's clamp, but at least it wasn't totally unexpected.

"Fine," he said, as the scouts waited for the miracle they obviously expected him to be able to perform. "My guess is, whoever made the map looked at that gully and assumed there'd be a track down it. In any case, that's the direction we've got to go in, and we don't have any choice. Lucky we brought the road-building stuff."

Hardly luck; he'd been ordered to bring it. But they needn't know that. Let them assume it was his own resourcefulness and foresight. They seemed happy enough. They had confidence in him. Probably they'd asked around when they heard who they were being assigned to, and men who'd served with him in other campaigns had told them, you'll be all right, he's eccentric and a bit of a bastard, but he'll get you home again. He'd worked hard for that reputation, so that over the years the lie had gradually started to come true. Anyway, he knew how to lay a road quickly and with the minimum of materials. Just to cover himself, he sent a messenger back to headquarters: No sign of track, am building road, anticipate three-day delay, will advise. That put it rather well, he felt.

Mostly it was digging, with pickaxes, crowbars, mattocks and shovels; get the big rocks out of the way and use them to fill the big holes. The further he went, the more certain he became that there was indeed a track, probably just over the lip of the first rise up ahead, somewhere in that basin of dead ground. As he stared at the hillside beyond he was sure he could see the line of it, a very slight contrast in color, like an old scar. In which case, what had happened was that the map-makers knew there was a track around here somewhere - maybe they were coming along it from the other direction - but through sloppiness or lack of time they didn't bother to survey the link from it to the Butter Pass, just assumed that it followed the convenient gully. It annoyed him to think that they were probably dead by now (it was an old map) and so they'd never be officially found out and reprimanded.

He was right. They found the track a day and a half later. Just out of curiosity, he sent scouts back along it, and they reported back that it did indeed come out on the Butter Pass, about ten miles before the mouth of the gully. They'd probably have seen it quite easily if they hadn't been relying on the map. Eiconodoulus tucked the thought of that away in the back of his mind, in his private store of other people's notable failures, to be relished properly at leisure.

It wasn't much of a track, after all that fuss. At times, Eiconodoulus wondered if he'd have been better off cutting his own, because there was a much more suitable lie about a hundred yards further up the slope. Clearly these hills had never been grazed - sheep are much better surveyors than humans when it comes to finding the easiest path - and whoever had laid this track in the first place must've been blind, or at any rate short-sighted. Every time a cart bottomed out in a hole or a hub graunched against a half-buried rock he winced, expecting to hear the crisp crack of failing wood or the brittle note of snapping iron. There would be worse places to be laid up mending a busted cart - it was open enough to allow him to see an approaching enemy in good time - but he had food and water to consider. They were going to be several days later than anticipated, and this wasn't land you could live off. He knew better than even to consider ditching the carts and going back, leaving Mezentine war engines lying about for the enemy to find. If the worst came to the worst... Now he came to consider it, he didn't know what he should do. Nobody had told him; destroy the engines before the enemy could get hold of them, yes, but the wretched things were made of steel, so they wouldn't burn, and he didn't have the tools to cut them up. The most he could do was bend them out of shape, but that'd take a long time and a lot of effort. He should have been briefed on that point. More negligence.

Well, he'd just have to complete the mission successfully, then. So much clearer when you simplify.

On the fourth day, young Lieutenant Stesimbracus - the one he didn't like, the competent one - came back from scouting looking unusually cheerful. He'd found, he said, the other track marked on the map, the one which had been supposed to cross the one they were on at a place marked as "cairn," except there were no cairns. Not being able to find it was more than a trivial annoyance. The missing track was a link between their path and another running parallel to it, which happened to be the frontier between Eremian and Vadani territory. Obviously it was important not to cross the border inadvertently. Likewise, they could reasonably assume that they wouldn't be attacked from that direction, since the Eremians wouldn't dare trespass on Vadani land. The last thing the Eremians would want would be a war on two fronts.

"It's annoying, though," Stesimbracus said. "The path on the Vadani side's a much better road; straighter, and properly made up. We could save a day, and cut back here" - he jabbed a finger at the map - "and precious little chance of getting found out, because we're a long way away from any of their manned outposts. Also, there's a river down in a goyle on the other side."

Eiconodoulus scowled. Neither of the streams marked on the map had been there, and although they'd found one that wasn't marked, that had been two days ago, when they weren't so worried about the water running out. They'd been relying on the imaginary streams believed in by the map-makers.

"You know better than that," he said. "If we go blundering about down there and run into a Vadani unit, you don't need me to tell you what could happen. In fact, you'd better pass the word around: nobody is to cross into Vadani territory for any reason whatsoever. Got that?"

"Sir." Stesimbracus was wearing that kicked-puppy look he found so intensely annoying. "May I ask, what are we going to do about water?"

"Use it sensibly," Eiconodoulus answered briskly. "We've got enough, so long as we don't waste it. You'd better talk to the quartermaster about that."

It got worse. Just after noon on the fifth day they reached the top of a low ridge, only to find a completely unexpected combe dropping away at their feet. Eiconodoulus' first reaction was fury; competent scouts should've found it and told him, it should've been on the bloody map. He got off his horse, walked up to the lip and looked at it as though it was a personal affront.

You couldn't get a cart down there. The other side perhaps, going up again; but going down would be suicide. He turned his head left and right. The bloody thing seemed to go on forever, it'd take days to go round it, assuming there actually was a way round. Combe; canyon, more like. The downward slope was studded with boulders, and he was prepared to bet that the dust and gravel wouldn't give a firm footing. Final mockery: there was a substantial stream, practically a river, gurgling cheerfully away at the bottom of it. All the water in the world, but he couldn't get at it.

He sulked for an hour, pretending to study the map, while scouts went out to see if there was a way round. Of course not. On one side the canyon went away straight until it faded out of sight, a very long way away. The other side wasn't even worth exploring. He was fairly sure there would be a crossing-point quite close, a trail zigzagging down, or a hole in the wall. It had to be possible to get through on the other side, because that was where the Vadani road ran, and of course he couldn't go there.

Nothing for it. They'd have to cut a road of their own, just enough to let them take the carts down, unloaded, without the horses; then back up to the top, collect the dismantled war engines and carry them down on their backs. Three days? Be realistic, four. Plenty of water, of course, but food was going to be a serious problem. Half-rations; the men were going to love that. Finally, just in case that wasn't enough to be going on with, he'd lost his precious visibility. Standing on the lip and looking round, he could see at least a dozen places where an enemy unit could sneak up on him and attack with little more than a quarter of an hour's notice.

He thought about manpower. Building a road, then unloading, then carrying the machines; he needed sentries on those vulnerable approaches, and a fighting reserve in case he was attacked. He didn't have nearly enough men (which was just as well, given the food situation) and he was already horribly late. It didn't take much imagination to visualize the main expeditionary force pushing on to its assigned position, confident of artillery cover that wouldn't be there. The map had done for him, just as he knew it would one day.

He sent Stesimbracus away with the sentries, mostly because he was getting to the point where he couldn't stand the sight of him anymore. That meant he had to put stolid, stupid Lieutenant Ariophrantzes in charge of the road party, while he perched on the edge of the combe doing nothing with the fighting reserve. That looked bad, he knew. The men would think he was skiving, when he ought to be down on the slope, digging or lugging baskets. But Ariophrantzes couldn't be trusted to command the reserve if there was an attack; it was a tactical nightmare in any case, because any enemy with a functional brain would use the terrain to attack in front and at the side, possibly from the rear as well if there were other gullies and ravines he hadn't spotted yet. One thing he could do: he gave orders for two dozen of the war engines to be assembled, fitted to their field carriages, and set up on the highest point of the lip. If he had to carry the wretched things, he might as well use them.

As four days dragged on into six, and half-rations had to be further reduced, and the road party's progress gradually slowed, he became convinced that there'd be an attack. It was obvious, the logical thing. It went without saying that the Eremians must have scouts out, watching every single thing he did. They'd know that he'd be at his most vulnerable when the road party were almost at the bottom of the canyon. First they'd attack the reserve, kill them or drive them off. The road party, practically defenseless, could then be slaughtered at leisure, the engines brought down the road Eiconodoulus had so obligingly built and carried off in triumph to Eremia. Anybody, some nobleman's idiot nephew, could devise an effective strategy for that. Defending against it, on the other hand... At the back of his mind, Eiconodoulus knew it was possible, but he also knew that he wasn't a good enough tactician to do it. Probably they'd write up the disaster in the military textbooks - his place in history - and cadets would be taught what he should have done (blindingly obvious, no doubt, with hindsight) as an awful warning against overconfidence. It amused him that he didn't even know the name of this place, though he'd be remembered in the same breath as it forever. Meanwhile, the Eremians would be inspired by their miraculous victory, the Mezentines would be stunned by the worst defeat in their history, and all because some fool couldn't draw a decent map, though nobody would remember that in two hundred years' time.

The digging party reached the bottom of the combe, and no sign of any enemy. Eiconodoulus merely found that insulting; as well as building the road for them, he had to lug the stupid machines down it just to save them the effort. He thought about that for a while; and yes, it was blindingly obvious. They wanted the two dozen engines dismantled and out of action before they committed themselves. Very sensible. He obliged, and gave the order.

They didn't attack while the unloaded carts were led down, but of course they had more sense. Then it was time to carry the dismantled engines; the men were very unhappy about doing that, but they'd be even unhappier when the Eremian arrows started dropping down on them. Apparently, however, Eiconodoulus hadn't quite judged their plan right, because no arrows flew and the engines reached the river, eventually, after the hardest day's work Eiconodoulus could remember. By now he was very worried indeed. If the Eremians were content to pass up such a glorious opportunity as the one he'd just given them, it could only be because they had something even more deadly in mind, which he was too stupid to perceive. The engines went back on the carts, the water-barrels were filled, the horses spanned in; gradually it dawned on Eiconodoulus that there wasn't going to be an attack after all. They'd blundered; they'd passed up the most wonderful opportunity to give the Republic a bloody nose, through laziness, negligence, cowardice or stupidity. For the first time since they left the Butter Pass, Eiconodoulus laughed out loud. He'd beaten the map, after all.

On the other side of the canyon, there was no sign of any path; but there was gloriously even ground, better than the pitted and rutted surface of a track. Heather had probably grown there once, but the wind had scoured off the thin layer of topsoil and ground away the bumps and tussocks, leaving a layer of shingle and small stones that would've compared favorably with a nobleman's carefully tended gravel drive. The ground fell slowly away to the blurred gray seam of land and sky, where mists rose from the Lasenia river valley. Two days, or a day and a half if they could force the pace, and they'd be bypassing the foot of the mountain on which the city perched, on their way to where they were supposed to be. Eiconodoulus was a cautious man when it came to interpreting the actions of Providence, but he reckoned it wouldn't be presumptuous to assume that he was getting his reward for the tribulations he'd recently endured.

The final confirmation for this view came in the shape of a flock of wild sheep sheltering from the wind in a small dish-shaped combe; the scouts who found them managed to creep away without startling them, and Eiconodoulus quickly convened a tactical meeting. He listened to various suggestions (the oaf Ariophrantzes had been a hunter in his youth, and prattled on about nets and drives and beaters until ordered to shut up) and gave his orders.

His strategy was basic and simple. On three sides of the combe he drew up his spearmen, creating a hedge of sharp points about a hundred yards shy of the skyline. On the fourth side he sent in his strike force in two ranks; in front, the archers, and behind them the rest of the men, shouting, banging rocks and pans and helmets, waving their arms, generally making themselves as obnoxious as possible. As soon as they advanced over the rim of the combe the sheep bolted in the opposite direction. Running into the spearmen they veered off to the sides, round the inside of the encircling hedge, back to where the advancing line had closed the ring. Forced back into the hollow of the combe, they could then be shot down by the archers without risk to the spearmen.

It went perfectly, smooth as a carefully designed machine. At the precise moment he'd specified, the panic-stricken sheep galloped straight into his enfilade. About forty-seven went down in the first volley, whereupon the survivors bolted down into the belly of the combe, giving the archers the backstop they needed. There wasn't any need for skill. The archers simply loosed volleys until there was nothing left moving; then they strolled down into the combe to pick up their arrows and collect the carcasses for dressing. None of the sheep escaped. It was, Eiconodoulus couldn't help thinking, a rather encouraging omen for the war at large.

After days on half-rations, the men were happy again, and the excitement of it (Eiconodoulus wasn't sure if it had been a hunt or a battle) had done wonders for their morale; there were even volunteers for the chores of skinning, paunching and butchering. The only man who seemed unhappy was the fool Ariophrantzes; he scowled when he thought nobody was looking, and tried to stay out of the proceedings as much as possible. Eiconodoulus was inclined to put that down to pique (Ariophrantzes had put himself forward at the tactical meeting as a mighty hunter, his learned advice had been ignored, and still they'd got the lot) and he decided that such an attitude needed to be nipped in the bud. "What's the matter with you?" he asked him.

Eventually he got a straight answer. "It's nothing really, sir," the oaf replied. "Honestly. We had to get some food from somewhere, and it all worked out pretty well."

Big of you, Eiconodoulus thought. "So what's bugging you?"

"I don't know." The oaf made a vague, helpless gesture. "It's just that - well, like I told you earlier, my people hunted a lot when I was a kid, and I suppose I've still got their way of looking at things. Killing the whole lot like that -"

He couldn't be bothered to argue. "If that's all," he said, "you can get on with your work. This is a military expedition, Lieutenant, not a day out with the hounds."

"Very good, sir. One thing, though, if I might ask. What were you proposing to cook the meat with?"

The world is full of annoyances; none more infuriating than a fool with a valid point. In the end they had to unload a cart and trash it for firewood, having distributed its load between the others. Being best-quality Mezentine treated timber, it burned with a foul smell and a thick cloud of dark gray smoke, which made the meat taste of pitch. It was still a distinct improvement on nothing at all, but it wasn't the glorious feast of roast mutton that Eiconodoulus had been anticipating as a due reward for his achievement. Then it rained in the night, putting out the fires and drenching the remaining firewood with half the carcasses still raw. There was no point burdening themselves with uncooked meat that'd spoil by the time they reached anywhere they might expect to find more fuel, so the remaining carcasses had to be abandoned. It was just an unfortunate mishap, but somehow Eiconodoulus couldn't help feeling that the oaf Ariophrantzes had somehow been vindicated.

They made up time the next day, and by nightfall they reached the river. For once, the map was accurate; the river was shallow enough to wade across, although they had to unload the carts yet again (the second time in two days; they'd had to unload to redistribute the load from the firewood wagon). By now, Eiconodoulus was having to think and calculate in order to work out how many days they were behind schedule. Obviously he had no idea what had become of the main army, or how his tardiness was affecting the war. It wouldn't be good, he knew, but the scope of his contribution was still mercifully vague, although that didn't keep him from speculating about it endlessly. They wouldn't court-martial him or cut off his head, but they wouldn't listen to his excuses either. Somewhat perversely, he responded to that inevitability by refusing to hurry unduly; he was late already but he was making steady progress, and undue haste would probably lead to negligence and disaster. The next morning, as the sutlers filled the water-barrels from the river, he used up the last of his cutting-practice mats. No way of knowing when or where he'd be able to get hold of any more; another of the girders holding his life in shape had quietly failed. His victory over the sheep was beginning to fade from his mind, and the empty space it left quickly silted up with anxiety. More than anything, he wanted to be rid of this assignment and back with the rest of the army. He wasn't at his best in isolation, as he well knew.

From the top of the ridge overlooking the river, he was able to see the city for the first time. It was mid-afternoon by then, and the morning mist had burned away; there was nothing to soften the steepness of the mountain, and the sight horrified him. He'd been in assaults and sieges, he knew about such things; and if ever a city was impregnable, this one was. For a while he could do nothing but stand and gawp, like a rabbit faced with a stoat. It seemed bitterly unfair that he should have been sent here, set such a difficult task which he'd somehow managed to achieve, simply in order to participate in an impossible venture, an inevitable disaster. There aren't many heroic ballads about men who strive against insuperable odds, surmount unthinkable obstacles and then die in the final act of abject failure. It wasn't his fault, but nobody would remember that, or ever get to hear about the criminally negligent map, the crossing of the great canyon or the flawlessly conceived and executed campaign against the sheep. He'd remain as anonymous as the waves smashing themselves into foam against a rock.

With an effort he pulled himself together. It was an extraordinary city, yes, but it remained no more than a problem in engineering, and the Mezentines were the finest engineers in the world. No doubt they'd already worked out how to deal with it; all he needed to do was deliver his cargo to the appointed place with as little further delay as possible; at which point he could hand the problem over to somebody else who was properly qualified to deal with it. They were welcome to the glory, provided he could unload the blame along with the dismantled war engines, mountings and carriages.

"So that's it, sir," said a voice at his side - Stesimbracus, the good young officer he couldn't stand. "Where we're headed."

He nodded without looking round. "Impressive, isn't it?"

Stesimbracus laughed. "As a monument to short-sightedness, maybe," he said. "Personally, sir, I'm just grateful to be on our side. I'd hate to have the job of defending that."

Which was probably, Eiconodoulus told himself, why he detested Stesimbracus so much. "You don't see any problems, then?"

"Well, no, not really. It's a nice piece of construction work, but there's that obvious flaw. You'd have thought someone would've pointed it out while they were actually building the thing, but I suppose everybody thought somebody else would do it."