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.When I reflect on my companions’ inner natures I usually wish I controlled one small talent.I wish I could look inside them and unmask the darks and brights that move them.Then I take a quick look into the jungle of my own soul and thank heaven that I cannot.Any man who barely sustains an armistice with himself has no business poking around in an alien soul.I decided to keep closer watch on our newest brother.We did not need Doughbelly coming in from the point to tell us we were close.All the forward horizon sprouted tall, leaning trees of smoke.This part of Forsberg was flat and open and marvelously green, and against the turquoise sky those oily pillars were an abomination.There was not much breeze.The afternoon promised to be scorching.Doughbelly swung in beside the Lieutenant.Elmo and I stopped swapping tired old lies and listened.Doughbelly indicated a smoke spire.“Still some of the Limper’s men in that village, sir.”“Talk to them?”“No sir.Longhead didn’t think you’d want us to.He’s waiting outside town.”“How many of them?”“Twenty, twenty-five.Drunk and mean.The officer was worse than the men.”The Lieutenant glanced over his shoulder.“Ah.Elmo.It’s your lucky day.Take ten men and go with Doughbelly.Scout around.”“Shit,” Elmo muttered.He is a good man, but muggy spring days make him lazy.“Okay.Otto.Silent.Peewee.Whitey.Billygoat.Raven.”I coughed discreetly.“You’re out of your head, Croaker.All right.” He did a quick count on his fingers, called three more names.We formed outside the column.Elmo gave us the once-over to make sure we hadn’t forgotten our heads.“Let’s go.”We hurried forward.Doughbelly directed us into a wood-lot overlooking the stricken town.Longhead and a man called Jolly waited there.Elmo asked, “Any developments?”Jolly, who is professionally sarcastic, replied, “The fires are burning down.”We looked at the village.I saw nothing that did not turn my stomach.Slaughtered livestock.Slaughtered cats and dogs.The small, broken forms of dead children.“Not the kids too,” I said, without realizing I was speaking.“Not the babies again.”Elmo looked at me oddly, not because he was unmoved himself but because I was uncharacteristically sympathetic.I have seen a lot of dead men.I did not enlighten him.For me there is a big difference between adults and’ kids.“Elmo, I have to go in there.”“Don’t be stupid.Croaker.What can you do?”“If I can save one kid.”Raven said, “I’ll go with him.” A knife appeared in his hand.He must have learned that trick from a conjurer.He does it when he is nervous or angry.“Think you can bluff twenty-five men?”Raven shrugged.“Croaker is right, Elmo, It’s got to be done.Some things you don’t tolerate.”Elmo surrendered.“We’ll all go.Pray they aren’t so drunk they can’t tell friend from foe.”Raven started riding.The village was good-sized.There had been more than two hundred homes before the Limper’s advent.Half were burned or burning.Bodies littered the streets.Flies clustered round their sightless eyes.“Nobody of military age,” I noted.I dismounted and knelt beside a boy of four or five.His skull had been smashed, but he was breathing.Raven dropped beside me.“Nothing I can do,” I said.“You can end his ordeal.” There were tears in Raven’s eyes.Tears and anger.“There’s no excuse for this.” He moved to a corpse lying in shadow.This one was about seventeen.He wore the jacket of a Rebel Mainforcer.He had died fighting.Raven said, “He must have been on leave.One boy to protect them.” He pried a bow from lifeless fingers, bent it.“Good wood.A few thousand of these could rout the Limper.” He slung the bow and appropriated the boy’s arrows.I examined another two children.They were beyond help.Inside a burned hut I found a grandmother who had died trying to shield an infant.In vain.Raven exuded disgust.“Creatures like the Limper create two enemies for every one they destroy.”I became aware of muted weeping, and of cursing and laughter somewhere ahead.“Let’s see what that is.”Beside the hut we found four dead soldiers.The lad had left his mark.“Good shooting,” Raven observed.“Poor fool.”“Fool?”“He should’ve had the sense to run.Might’ve gone easier on everyone.” His intensity startled me.What did he care about a boy from the other side? “Dead heroes don’t get a second chance.”Aha! He was drawing a parallel with an event in his own mysterious past.The cursing and weeping resolved into a scene fit to disgust anyone tainted with humanity.There were a dozen soldiers in the circle, laughing at their own crude jokes.I remembered a bitch dog surrounded by males who, contrary to custom, were not fighting for mounting rights but were taking turns.They might have killed her had I not intervened.Raven and I mounted up, the better to see.The victim was a child of nine.Welts covered her.She was terrified, yet making no sound.In a moment I understood.She was a mute.War is a cruel business prosecuted by cruel men.The gods know the Black Company are no cherubim.But there are limits.They were making an old man watch.He was the source of both curses and weeping.Raven put an arrow into a man about to assault the girl.“Dammit!” Elmo yelled.“Raven!.”The soldiers turned on us.Weapons appeared.Raven loosed another arrow.It dropped the trooper holding the old man.The Limper’s men lost any inclination to fight.Elmo whispered, “Whitey, go tell the old man to haul ass over here.”One of the Limper’s men took a like notion.He scampered off.Raven let him run.The Captain would have his behind on a platter.He did not seem concerned [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]