“Pardon me, gentlemen,” said Caliban, lengthening his stride.He stopped beside Slate, knelt, and offered her a hand up into the saddle. She gave him one of her crooked smiles as she mounted.
He was pretty sure she hadn’t heard the conversation behind her.
Probably that was just as well.
Another day passed, then two. They passed through miles of carefully tended fields, where some crops were just starting to pull their way up from the soil. It was humble but prosperous land, full of humble but honest people. Slate felt like a fish not just out of water but twenty miles from the nearest puddle.
No one’s evacuating. No one’s leaving. I suppose you still have to plant seeds even if there’s a war going on, but this seems utterly mad…
One night there were no inns, and they stayed at a farmhouse, or more accurately, in the barn.
“I am surprised you did not take the offer of their bed,” said Caliban, as they walked back to the barn, carrying provisions.
Slate shrugged. “Safer not to. If we have to run in the middle of the night, less chance of being split up.”
“That hardly seems likely out here, with these people.”
“I have gotten out of the habit of trusting people,” said Slate. “No matter how harmless they appear.”
The sun was setting and dyeing the fields crimson. Caliban raised his eyebrows. “That seems a difficult way to live.”
“You note that I’m still alive, though. At least for another few days.”
“An unassailable argument. At least until we get to the war zone.”
She slept that night at one end of the barn, far enough away that Learned Edmund need not fear her feminine exhalations. Caliban took the stall beside her. She woke in the night to hear the demon muttering, and rolled over and went back to sleep.
“I cannot get used to this,” said Brenner, looking up the road. They had dismounted and were leading the horses. “That’s an army outpost.”
“A minor one, yes,” said Learned Edmund.
“And we’re just walking right up to it.”
Caliban laughed softly to himself.
“Something funny, god-boy?”
“Yes.”
The assassin’s eyes narrowed. “Be a shame if someone slipped up and dropped your name,LordCaliban.”
Caliban controlled his expression as tightly as he could, but he knew that Brenner saw his eyes flicker. “They are expecting criminals. As you enjoy reminding me, I, too, am a criminal.”
“Damn straight. Try acting like one.”
Slate turned her head and looked back at them. There was no mistaking her expression. Annoyance crossed her face like clouds casting shadows on a hillside. “I swear to god, if you two don’t stop, I’ll tell the army to give you forty lashes for insubordination.”
“Can they do that?” asked Brenner.
“They can,” said Caliban. “Though time in the stockade is more usual.”
“I’ve never had forty lashes. Actually, I’ve never had even one lash.”
“I have,” said Caliban.
Slate had turned back around, but missed a step at that. “What?”
He shrugged. “The demon had a whip.”
