34
They looked like beggars. Their clothes were little more than rags, their belongings pushed on rickety handcarts and makeshift sleds that rattled along Corcillum’s cobbled streets. Fletcher barely recognised the men and women who slumped in exhaustion beside the tavern.
Then he saw him. Berdon. The man stood head and shoulders above the rest, his long red hair and beard tangled and unkempt. He was carrying two children on his back and dragged the largest cart behind him, but still he walked tall and proud.
He barely had enough time to let the children down before Fletcher’s arms were around him, face buried in Berdon’s shoulder. Beneath the shirt, Fletcher could feel his father’s ribs. The journey had not been easy on his adoptive parent.
‘Easy there, son,’ Berdon said, cupping Fletcher’s face in his big hands and smiling down at him. ‘It’s good to see you.’
‘I thought I’d been through the wars,’ Fletcher said, smiling through tears. ‘But you look like you’ve had it worse.’
‘Oh I don’t know about that,’ Berdon said, wiping at his own eyes. ‘We watched every minute of that mission of yours. Those orcs and goblins made the highway robbers look like milksops.’
‘Robbers?’ Fletcher asked, looking at the band and suddenly noticing their numbers were far lower than he remembered. ‘Was anyone hurt?’
‘Not with Sir Caulder around.’ Berdon winked, motioning over his shoulder with his bushy eyebrows.
Fletcher looked up to see the cantankerous old man striding towards them, still skinny as a rake but no worse for wear. The children were imitating his lopsided gait, and he feigned a swipe at them with his hook, sending them squealing to their parents. He grinned and patted Fletcher on the back with his good hand.
‘All right, lad – nice to see you made it out in one piece. More than you could say I did when I fought them last, eh, boy?’ He knocked his peg leg with his hook.
‘I’m sure there are a couple of orcs out there who are missing a limb or two thanks to you,’ Fletcher replied with a grin.
The people of Pelt were already being welcomed into the tavern, where the Thorsager family were waiting with warm food and fresh clothing. Fletcher caught a glimpse of Janet, the leatherworker who had been the spokesperson for Pelt, back when they had been evicted by Didric’s men. She ignored a greeting from Thaissa and stomped into the tavern without giving her a second glance. He grimaced at her behaviour and put it down to tiredness from their long journey.
‘Right, so where are these recruits Harold informed me of?’ Sir Caulder growled, squinting around. ‘His message said there would be plenty of them for me to whip into shape. They should be out here, helping us get this baggage sorted!’
‘We haven’t gone to collect them yet,’ Fletcher replied. ‘They’re in the barracks, a few streets from here. Although, in all honesty, I’m not sure if any will show up.’
‘No time like the present,’ Sir Caulder barked. ‘We could use some likely lads to help sort this mess out. Well, come on, don’t dawdle.’
Berdon chuckled at Fletcher’s expression of incredulity and gave him a gentle nudge.
‘You go on, son. I’ve been to this tavern before – I’ll make sure everyone gets squared away.’
Fletcher stared at Berdon.
‘What, you didn’t know?’ Berdon laughed. ‘When you were in prison, the Thorsagers and I were busy petitioning the King for your trial, remember? Uhtred and I spent many a night in there, sharing our sorrows over a beer. Of course, that was before the Anvil attacks started and it closed down.’
Fletcher felt a twinge of shame. He knew so little of Berdon’s life now.
‘All right,’ Fletcher said, shaking his head in mild disbelief. ‘But you tell Uhtred I will need the transports and our dwarven volunteers ready to set out, first thing tomorrow morning.’
‘Volunteers?’ Berdon asked.
‘Uhtred will explain,’ Fletcher mumbled, unwilling to go further. No matter how he cut it, the people of Pelt would be unlikely to relish sharing their new home with strangers, especially ones who until recently had been reviled as anarchists and assassins. He would put off telling them as long as he could.
‘All right,’ Berdon said, his brows furrowed. ‘You’d better get on, before Janet accosts you. She’s been doubting their decision since we left the damned mountains.’
Fletcher gave Berdon another quick hug and then hurried off, Sir Caulder in tow.
The barracks were a five-minute walk from the Anvil Tavern. On the way, Sir Caulder regaled Fletcher with tales from their journey down from Pelt; of hungry mountain wolves prowling in their wake and marauding brigands who had underestimated the preparedness of the intrepid band.
Their numbers had dwindled from roughly eighty to sixty, mostly families with young children peeling off to seek work in the towns they had passed by. But Berdon’s confidence in his son had kept most of their group together. On hearing each story, Fletcher’s heart sank deeper and deeper. He could only hope that their trust wasn’t misplaced.
The barracks was a compound that took up an entire street, with a palisade surrounding it. Blockhouses with firing slots could be seen above the wooden stakes, and sentries kept a lookout from towers on each corner. It was a fortress inside a city, and Fletcher felt out of place as they walked past marching squads of soldiers and through the open gates.
They found themselves at the edge of a courtyard, with more blockhouses hemming in on each side. There was a single occupant in the centre – an aged man with a long, bent nose, upon which rested a pair of golden spectacles. He sat at a wide desk that was covered in ledgers, and he was busily scribbling away with a quill.
‘Come!’ he barked, without looking up from his books.
Startled, Fletcher obeyed, standing before the man’s desk like a naughty schoolboy. Sir Caulder stomped in his wake, a bemused look upon his face.
‘Lord Raleigh, I presume,’ the man said in a reedy voice, his quill still scratching.
‘Yes, that’s right,’ Fletcher answered. Was he expected? Perhaps Harold had sent word ahead.
The man sighed.
‘Squeems!’ he yelled, making Fletcher jump.
A door opened in the building behind them and a young lad wearing a red uniform and a peaked cap hurried out.
‘Get the volunteers for our young lord here, sharpish now,’ the bespectacled man ordered.
‘Right away, Staff Clerk Murray,’ Squeems said, doffing his cap to Fletcher before scurrying back the way he had come.
‘Clerks,’ Sir Caulder muttered derisively.
Murray paused and looked up from his writing.
‘The administration of the military is often disdained by the feeble-minded,’ he snapped at Sir Caulder. ‘Any fool can load and fire a musket.’
‘And any coward can hide behind the walls with his books, while the real soldiers do the fighting,’ Sir Caulder replied.
Murray did not respond, only smiled as Squeems emerged from the door behind him. A troop of boys no older than Fletcher followed in a ragged line. No sooner had the boys entered the courtyard, Squeems disappeared back into the blockhouse.
‘One of the best parts of being a clerk is deciding which volunteers to send off for training, and which to keep back for skivvy work and outside hires,’ Murray said, his smile widening. ‘I’ve saved you some of the best. Fresh delinquents from jail these ones, volunteering to escape a trip up to Pelt prison.’
Fletcher tried not to let his disappointment show as he took a closer look at his new soldiers. There were fifteen in all, wearing homespun canvas shirts and trousers – most likely the clothing they were given in jail. They were a rough-looking bunch, with greasy, unkempt hair and unshaved faces. Those who weren’t staring at their feet gave him surly glances, resentful of their predicament.
‘You’ll want to watch them,’ Murray said in a loud, exaggerated whisper. ‘There’s already been a few escape attempts.’
‘Is this all?’ Sir Caulder asked, his tone apparently unconcerned at the pedigree of their new recruits. ‘Fifteen lads to defend an entire county?’
‘These are just the jailbirds,’ Murray said nastily. ‘There’s a few freemen mad enough to volunteer for you. They say they know our young lord here.’
‘Know me?’ Fletcher asked aloud. Who could they possibly be?
Already Squeems was leading out some more young men, all of them strangers in Fletcher’s eyes. They were on the skinny side, and there were only six of them, fewer than Fletcher had hoped for, but otherwise they did not look unusual.
‘Still not nearly enough,’ Sir Caulder said.
‘Squeems, get the guests who arrived last week,’ Murray ordered. ‘I think I’ve found the ideal place for them.’
‘You mean …’ Squeems began.
‘Now, boy,’ Murray ordered.
Squeems shot off, a look of apprehension on his face.
‘Lord Raleigh,’ a dark-skinned boy from the new arrivals stepped forward. ‘We came as soon as we heard you were hiring.’
‘I’m sorry, I …’ Fletcher began. Then he knew. It seemed so long ago, but he had seen this young lad only two weeks before, chained to a wall and surrounded by a horde of sleeping goblins. These boys were some of the slaves he had freed back in the pyramid.
‘… almost didn’t recognise you,’ Fletcher said, shaking the young man’s hand. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Kobe, my lord,’ the boy replied.
‘I’d have thought, after your ordeal, you’d want to get as far from the orcs as possible,’ Fletcher said to the escaped slaves.
Kobe smiled, his teeth shining bright against his dark skin.
‘We’ve a few scores to settle first.’
But Fletcher barely heard the young man’s response, because Squeems had appeared with the next group of arrivals.
Elves.