The Marcher Lord (Over Guard) Page 5

  While Ian was able to comprehend the concept of food being purchased here, he could make very little sense of the actual process through all of the confusion. So he was glad that the corporal didn’t hesitate, but strode straight for a particular knot of vendors off to the right.

  “The shanpaii stews are excellent,” Corporal Wesshire said, and Ian assumed that was his way of announcing what they were going to have.

  “Sounds good,” Ian answered, looking at some of the other selections as they moved through the people. Some of it did look interesting, but he was too hungry to offer up much resistance.

  The corporal raised his hand and made a slight gesture as they neared the vendors. This immediately caught the attention of four vendors who were in the ongoing midst of preparing what evidently were the shanpaii stews. A couple of other nearby vendors of different commodities also tried to hail Corporal Wesshire, but he ignored them.

  “Seven,” the corporal called out toward the men. “Two at seven each.”

  This shook the interest of two of the vendors, who began to call out to other customers, though one kept half an eye on Corporal Wesshire. Both Ian and Wesshire had been drawing attention in general, though most of it was guarded and often quickly pulled away, and they had been given a relatively easy way through even more crowded areas like this. So it was difficult for Ian to discern just what sort of prospects they looked like to these vendors. It grew increasingly difficult as well for him to try to decipher what exactly the corporal was doing.

  “No,” their most avid salesman shook his head stiffly, gesturing with his thick accent and hands at his steaming wares, “best ingredients, no fills. Six is best price, fery fery generous.”

  “I give sefen,” the nearest vendor spoke up. He also struggling with his v’s, which seemed to be a Carciti trait. “Far more filling—better taste—superb stay! Mofes in your mouth!”

  “Eight,” the first salesman immediately countered, “eight, and I efen throw in a whistle.”

  “A whistle?” Ian asked, trying to keep up with the exchange but feeling like he was keeping up in the wrong direction.

  “Keep the whistle,” Corporal Wesshire said flatly as he reached the nearest vendor and looked back at the first vendor, “I will take nine.”

  “Nine,” the vendor next to them slapped the top of his small counter enthusiastically, “you haf it for best stew in Carciti! And I gife you both real necklace made in Hawati.” He beamed at Ian.

  “Ha,” the first vendor scoffed, “made in Hawati is why you gif them away so easily. Real whistle, real purpose. Best ingredients—his all fill, but at least you haf something to wear at funeral.”

  “Pah!” the nearest vendor offering the necklace threw an odd hand gesture toward the other vendor. “Cooks are always jealous when their stew tastes of mud, be lucky to use whistle at all after doctor has to fix what his’s stew—”

  “Ten,” the first vendor who was offering the whistle, the one who seemed more willing to fight for them, “best price in town, can’t beat. Best price for best stew. See?”

  “Nine and three necklaces from Hawati,” the vendor next to them tried, but it must have sounded weak even to him. “Nine best price if you want best taste.”

  Ian was about ready to start with Corporal Wesshire toward the higher buyer, as that made the most sense at least on some levels, but he stopped when he saw the corporal looking back at the nearest vendor. Wesshire’s expression was detached boredom, but he gestured to take a closer look at the necklace the nearest vendor was holding up for them.

  “Ten and a whistle,” the first vendor exclaimed, sounding earnest.

  By this point, there seemed to be a mounting urgency in both vendors, as if an invisible clock had gone off. A continually loose press of prospective buyers was of course all around them, but a ruddy, young Dervish man walked by them, holding up his hand the way Corporal Wesshire had and shouting eight in a way that wasn’t especially clever.

  “There is Chazzi meat on the other side for eleven,” the corporal said loud enough for the whistle vendor to hear, having the appearance of coming to a decision as he waved the vendor and his necklaces away.

  The whistle vendor, who was leaning around the other vendor, took a surprised look a moment before bursting into a large smile.

  “Ah, you fery fery clefer,” the vendor said, and then slapped his counter with a note of finality. “Elefen and a whistle. It’s done.”

  Corporal Wesshire nodded and made his way over quickly enough to keep the vendor from waiting any longer than politeness dictated, but also not nearly fast enough to belie any sense of victory. The corporal calmly transacted the money for both stews, forty pence to the man who then proceeded to give twenty-two pence back. Corporal Wesshire also took the whistle from the man and then the two bowls which were quickly meted out for them.

  “Fery fery clefer,” the man was still going on. “Best stews for best empire, yes? Calm winds, calm winds to all you both.”

  And that was all, as the vendor and general ebb of the street guided them onwards.

  “It’s hardly worth the effort,” Corporal Wesshire commented, leading them toward a slightly more relaxed part of the street behind some vendors who were selling a sort of thick, green liquid to pour over other kinds of foods.

  “Eleven pence is eleven pence,” Ian said, moderating the majority of his admiration, though he still needed to clarify exactly what all had just happened. “And for both? That’s more than enough saved to buy another two bowls. You paid them twenty each, right?”

  “Yes,” the corporal said, handing Ian the whistle. “Keep it if you care. In most circumstances it would be a waste of time, but that is how affairs are conducted on this planet.”

  “Uh, thank you,” Ian said, taking the whistle and examining it. It was maybe the length of his hand and really quite beautiful, done in a light, handcrafted brown wood. It wasn’t really disdain that Wesshire had handled it with, but Ian decided he would keep the whistle for now only if it sounded good, and he wouldn’t try it out until he was alone. “I really appreciate it—I mean not just this—” he held up the whistle before putting it back in his pocket, before remembering the bowl he was holding in embarrassment, “—and not just the food either. I’ll pay you back, in fact I can do it right now—”

  Corporal Wesshire shook his head as he waited for a spoonful of his stew to cool.

  “But most of all for that,” Ian said, discerning it best not to push paying for the meal, “that was right amazing. Going by the look on that man’s face you must have got the best price on the street.”

  “Dervish businessmen usually aren’t all that subtle,” Corporal Wesshire said. He looked over at where Ian was standing. “Keep your back up against the wall. Thieves watch for that.”

  Ian nodded, backing up closer to the building. He tried to make it look like a casual slip as he took a quick sip of stew, which was of course too hot.

  “Delicious,” Ian said as he opened his mouth and did his best to stealthily suck in air as he talked. “So—sellers try to—give things to—”

  “There’s a law in Carciti about the maximum price various commodities can be sold for after certain hours,” Corporal Wesshire said, eyeing the passing people in front of them as he slowly sipped at his stew. “The psychology of their culture, Dervish though the top layer may be, is always to take full advantage of what’s available first, and then to offer concessions to carry through. In an instance like this, it compensates them the most to always charge the highest price—”

  “—Because not everyone will bother to try for the best price,” Ian put in.

  “Yes,” Corporal Wesshire said. “This only works because almost all participate; they compete to be most attractive to buyers by immediately offering money back. Often with useless gifts as well.”

  “It seems to work well here,” Ian said, trying to match the other’s tone.

  Corporal Wesshire’s eyes coldly regarded the unru
ly patrons’ shouting and laughing that moved up and down the street. “Indeed. There are always variables, but all vendors have a notion of the limit of what they’re willing to pay. They are, however, easy to prod a little farther, to their true absolute limit given the proper application of involvement. And conflict.”

  Ian nodded in what he hoped was a sage manner.

  “So what would you do?” Ian asked, mostly pushing his hesitancy aside. “What do you think the Bevish Empire should do about Orinoco?”

  Corporal Wesshire slowly looked at him.

  “That depends if one’s interests were perfectly aligned with the interests of the Bevish government,” the corporal said, “which no one can ever truly be aware of. However, assuming that theirs was to bring long term stability and prosperity to the region, loyalty of the dominant majority of the most powerful Dervish individuals would have to be secured—”

  “How is that?” Ian put in, not wanting to have such a trifling detail glossed over.

  “Through appropriate manners,” Corporal Wesshire said, sounding a little irritated at the interruption, “depending on what the individual best responded to. Gifts, promises—opportunities to eliminate rivals.”

  “Would that really work?” Ian asked slowly. “I mean … would that be alluring enough to buy someone’s loyalty? And even once you had it, is loyalty from someone like that really ever dependable?”

  “When handled properly,” Corporal Wesshire said. He went quiet for a while as they both sipped at their stews. “There are several instances in history where a smaller foreign element was able to control a diverse territory by carefully harnessing indigenous forces against themselves. The Barbeish crusader state is a prime example. Afellos nellex.”

  Ian nodded, excited as some of old Peter came to mind. “You know Sesish.”

  Wesshire shrugged. “To an extent.”

  “What other languages do you know?”

  The other man hesitated. “Some amount of Dervish, Kees …”

  Ian saw, felt how that was intended to forestall any further interest in the topic. Knowing this, however, only further fueled Ian’s curiosity as to how many more languages the corporal might not be mentioning. Ian also noticed he was experiencing something that felt an awful lot like intimidation when he considered how little his command of language extended beyond Bevish.

  It was good to note, though, just how little Corporal Wesshire was willing to share about himself.

  “But that’s true,” Ian said, returning to their previous topic. “When you’re outnumbered, it’s best to let others fight the battles as much as possible.”

  “Yes.”

  “Still,” Ian said, thinking, “there seems to be a lot of risk involved in that. It would have to be carefully maintained, and all the time. In the end, we still wouldn’t have real control over them.”

  “You have control over anyone who does what you want them to, regardless of what they feel or believe about it,” Corporal Wesshire said.

  “I suppose,” Ian said, shrugging a bit. “I just meant that it would be hard to keep. You can only have two conditions for diplomatic relationships. You either trust them or you don’t.”

  “No,” the corporal said, staring at the crowds. “There is only one: how far do you trust them?”

  Ian slowly nodded, though he wasn’t sure how far he agreed with all of that. He would have to think about it more, as it was difficult in this setting. Though they were out of the way from most of the jostling, the street was only growing more boisterous as the last bits of pink and yellows faded from the sky.

  But he realized he had been neglecting his stew, which was actually quite good, and he said as much to Corporal Wesshire as he tried to catch up to the corporal’s progress, who was nearly done by this point.

  To a very alluring degree, Ian could see the efficiency of the corporal’s ideas. After all, the chief problems in managing Orinoco were the deeply rooted pockets of power that weren’t Bevish and were potentially contrary to the Empire’s desires. Instead of trying to confront them directly, especially with Baldave’s hold of the planet still in its infancy, it would be advantageous to redirect them against each other. However, that just seemed to be delaying the problem, not solving it. He supposed that if done brilliantly enough, much of their opposition’s strength could be sapped or even negated entirely against each other, but the risk of losing it all would be an ongoing gamble with high odds always running of everything falling apart.

  Ian almost voiced that notion but stopped himself. It would probably be best if he took more time to think about it. He smiled, taking in a deep breath of the mingled, excited aromas, feeling the softer air touching all around him.

  This was wonderful. Though he was unfathomable distance away from Wilome where he’d spent his whole prior life, the ache he had always seemed to carry in his chest was gone. In its stead, he could find nothing but excitement, anticipation. And like a friend at his ear, it seemed like the air was confidently whispering that it wasn’t possible tomorrow could be anything but just as good.

  Corporal Wesshire began to start back toward their quarters so gradually that Ian wasn’t immediately aware that he was following the corporal in that direction. It was a lot of gratitude he felt toward the corporal, and Ian felt favored, surmising that all this wasn’t something the corporal did for very many people.

  “I suppose this hunting expedition is primarily for the margrave’s sake,” Ian said as he came alongside Corporal Wesshire.

  “Primarily, yes,” the other said, “though it would be best if that subject is avoided in public.”

  And though Wesshire didn’t look over at Ian, there was a distinctly discernible bit of ice to the comment.

  “Oh, yes—of course,” Ian said, trying not grimace as he looked down. “I’m sorry.”

  It was of course a good idea not to mention that a Bevish margrave was on the planet, even though it was hopefully doubtful that anyone would wish to do him any harm—and, Ian thought somewhat defensively, it seemed exceedingly doubtful that any of the rather distracted-looking people around them would care about such things.

  They were just making it out of the worst of the street traffic. Here, at the edges of the largely Dervish excitement of transaction, a greater mix of Chax were either perpetrating pleasant airs and selling something, or nursing far more sober expressions. Their dark eyes seemed to disappear into their faces now that the sun was gone, and they didn’t stand out in general nearly as much as the Dervish humans did.

  Corporal Wesshire paused at one pair of younger Chax boys in particular who were calling out something in Dervish and holding up cups. At first, Ian thought they were selling them, but again his understanding of Carciti business turned out to be backwards. The corporal handed them his stew bowl and spoon, and Ian quickly did the same. One of the boys thanked them in Dervish and gave the corporal back two pence.

  “Do you know much about what this expedition will consist of?” Ian asked cautiously.

  “Several Chax have been contracted, and Captain Marsden has some knowledge of such things.” Corporal Wesshire paused, looking as though he was carefully picking the least rude way of phrasing an unpleasant story. “There was some difficulty with hiring an expert for the local details. The Bevish haven’t been allowed the right to hunt on Orinoco—our charge is among the privileged first. Many Dervish guides were available—the Bevish have suspended many of the superfluous Dervish trades for now. As such, there are many eager to offer their services, but our charge was not interested in being led by a Dervish guide. The captain had to settle for a party of Chax and will navigate to the best of his ability with what material is available.”

  “The Chax should work out well,” Ian tried, thinking that he would like to know how the rest of his company interacted with the Chax. “It’s their planet after all.”

  “Yes.”

  “I imagine the planet must have quite a lot of large game,” Ian went on. “I have alw
ays heard about the red lions, but for all the renown of this place, I don’t remember hearing of any other specific animals.”

  “The Dervish haven’t been nearly as interested about such things as the Bevish,” the corporal said. “Their approach to hunting is also quite different, but the Bevish attention seems to be most arrested by the grazing herds on the plains. There are long buffalo and four horns. All of them are very large and fast, difficult to drop with a single shot.”

  “Great,” Ian grinned, “I suppose we’ll be using our Allen rifles.”

  “The company has special magnum chokes that will be used on the game.”

  “Really?” Ian asked. “That would make a difference. I have a hard time imagining a normal Allen rifle bringing down anything that large. Though I guess we’ll have to make sure to give our charge the first shot at everything.”

  “Yes. Though there will likely be more than enough opportunities throughout the expedition.” Corporal Wesshire stopped for a moment in the street, looking ahead of them quietly. “There always are.”

  Ian was about to ask why the corporal stopped, but Ian caught sight of a familiar set of red patterns up ahead. As he watched, two men from his company and a Bevish regular became increasingly visible—and audible—around the other people. Private Kieran Anglas was at the center and a bit ahead of the two others, talking fast and gesturing empathically about something.

  Chapter 3

  “Carciti, founded at least by the time of the ancient Kees colonization, has since then always remained the seat of foreign rule on Orinoco. Being situated directly beneath the Great Eye, the largest and safest approach to the planet, has allowed it to flourish as the planet’s chief port, regardless of who has held it.”

  —Yeoman encyclopedia entry

  The other ranger beside Kieran Anglas made some comment and laughed along with the regular, Anglas giving a smug smile in answer. But the other ranger caught sight of Ian and Corporal Wesshire.