They sat a spell with the old man and fed him lunch out of their own supplies, even brewing up a pot of Goblin Tea, which Ilbei brought out from one of the panniers—Ilbei felt doing so was not exactly theft, given he’d had to take on responsibility for the animal and all. They chatted for a while about the man’s luck digging up precious metals, of which he said he’d had little to none in the six months since he’d come here to try. They asked him about the major, whom he’d never seen, and about Ergo the Skewer, whom he’d never seen either. Meggins asked him if he’d had any encounters with harpies, at which he’d laughed, as if Meggins were a child asking after pink mammoths. Jasper responded to that, of course, with a lecture on the migration patterns of harpies and the close family unit cohesion that could easily explain why some locals saw harpies and others did not. The old man, in turn, told Jasper he’d once served on a merchant ship with a man who had similar “squeezy bowels of the mouth,” as he’d put it. He explained how one day the crew had had enough and “threw the blabbering lubber overboard to run with the sharks, as sharks was the only creatures in nature as ready to work their jaws as that windy sailor was.” That, of course, precipitated a round of riotous mockery from Kaige and Meggins, which ultimately ended up in Ilbei yelling at them and getting them moving up the river again.
In places, they might have saved time by climbing the boulders and slick, root-entangled lower steppes, which were often little more than vertical shifts of two to ten spans and down which the river poured in a sequence of waterfalls like a rug over stairs. However, quicker as that direct assault on the climb might have been for men on foot, having the horse with them required that they go out and around the steppes, sticking mainly to the supply road. As it had been with Deer Trail Road, this one was little more than a path rubbed into the ground, and even that lost itself entirely from time to time, sending them back toward the river lest they lose their way. If they’d all had mounts, working their way back and forth up what the miners called the Lower Switchbacks would have been easy enough, but doing so was slow on foot, and it turned a half-day’s journey into a full one.
The shadow of the mountain was once again upon them as the sun hid behind the peaks. By the time they could smell the smoke from the fires at Fall Pools, the bats were already dipping their toes into the pools near the river’s edge, and the occasional hoot of an owl could be heard from the treetops.
The crash of a waterfall ahead filled the air with a low thunder, the weight of the river falling from a great height thrumming beneath their feet. The wind stirred up by the falling water was misty and wet, and it made its own sound, as if an audience cheered the magnificence of the falls in the distance somewhere. The air grew cooler with every step up the trail.
Lights shone through the trees a short time after they’d rounded a projection of stone and angled up a natural ramp made by the last of the short lower steppes. The whole mountain was a great stairwell of sorts, the stone broken and forced into tiers during some ancient continental shift. Fall Pools sat atop the last of the easily assailable ones, at the base of the first of the mighty ones, walls of stone that thrust in places over a hundred spans high, like a great stairwell climbing to the sky.
When the ground finally leveled out, or at least the slope gentled some, they picked their way through the trees, heading toward the lights. Soon enough, Fall Pools was in sight. Ilbei noted Major Cavendis’ glistening black warhorse tethered along with three lesser animals to a goat pen near the center of the assembled buildings.
He raised his hand that they should stop. “Well, maybe he ain’t dead after all,” he said, upon seeing the animal.
“Or someone got themselves a nice new horse,” Meggins put in.
Ilbei turned on them and looked very grave. “Now listen here, the lot of ya. I don’t much care for the sense I got of all of this what’s goin on up here. If’n I’m right, the major ain’t goin to be as pleased to see us as he ought to be, despite us comin up here to look after him. So, if’n it turns out true, well, ya need to keep yer heads.”
Kaige looked nervous. “So what do we say, Sarge? What if he asks why we came up here, or why we went to Camp Chaparral at all?”
Ilbei knew the soldier wouldn’t do well trying to lie to an officer and nobleman. “You just tell him the truth, son. We come back because of Ergo the Skewer and worryin on the major bein dead and all. It ain’t no lie. And Jasper tried to speak to him through that paper spell of his, and he didn’t get no reply, neither. We was worried, and here we are. Ain’t that how ya remember it?”
Kaige nodded, looking relieved. “It is.”
“Good. Just stick to that.” He looked to the others. “And don’t add nothin else, especially you, Jasper.”
Jasper seemed to have no idea what that could possibly imply, but Ilbei raised a hand and quieted him before he could inquire.
“Enough on that,” he said. “What I really want is fer you three to stay outside. Me and Mags will go in and see if’n we can’t get all the talkin done anyway. You all split up and keep yer eyes open so that ballista-boltin bandit don’t sneak up behind us and bury one of them long shafts a half pace up my arse.”
Kaige and Meggins both nodded and moved off into the trees, one of them on either side of the trail. That left Jasper looking startled as he realized that he was going to be left alone. Ilbei patted him on the arm and directed him to a tree a few paces closer to the camp and only a few spans off the trail. “Go on and hide behind that crooked one, there. Crouch down so ya get some cover from the little bush beside it.” Jasper nodded, but still didn’t look pleased.
Ilbei and Mags went up the trail, Ilbei leading the horse while Mags tied her hair into a loose braid. He caught glimpses of Kaige moving forward from tree to tree, a swift, dark shadow. Meggins he couldn’t see, but a pinecone fell to the ground as they neared the clearing around the camp, revealing where the agile fellow had scrambled up a tree.
Ilbei glanced back at Mags, who smiled confidently. “You don’t have to tell me to keep my eyes open,” she said in a soft voice. He winked, and they moved together out of the trees.
The camp consisted of eleven buildings. Like the other two camps, most of them were crudely made; although the main building, which, if patterns held, would serve as tavern and general supply, was a sturdy-looking structure built from pine logs that had been slotted at the ends and tightly stacked. Several windows were cut into it, though all of them were shuttered to keep out the advancing chill of the night. Still, light shone from around their edges and between the shutter slats, and Ilbei could see shadows passing over the bands of light, indicating that there was activity within.
He would have known without seeing the movement, however, for stray notes of music wafted in the misty air, dancing in and around the roar of the waterfall. The falls were a constant presence, a rumble in the near distance, just left of the tavern from where Ilbei stood and some forty spans behind. They fell from high above, plummeting fifty spans from the top of a wide steppe, a sheer cliff that dominated the view and marked the first of the upper steppes, or as the locals called them, Anvilwrath’s Climb. At the top, at the very edge where the river rushed over and began its descent, the curve of the water shimmered pink and violet in the moonlight.
“It’s pretty up here,” Ilbei observed as he led the horse toward the goat pen. “I can see why fellers would stay content to live on copper and lead.”
“It is,” Mags agreed. “But don’t let the setting fool you. The men up here are the worst of the bunch. Mean and greedy. These are the ones that are left. The ones that spent the first year up here diverting water any way they wanted, doing anything to get at the gold everyone was so damned sure was here. They did what they felt like doing without a thought for how it affected anyone else’s operation downstream. Anyone that came up to complain came down with their mouths shut.”
“So there
was
gold up here. I thought they didn’t find any, or not much.”
“No, they didn’t find much. But they found some at first, and that’s why everyone thought it was going to be a big haul. They spent it like drunken mariners, blowing it all on whores and gambling down in Hast or over in Murdoc Bay, all of them assuming there would be a whole lot more when they finally found ‘the big lode.’ But the big lode never surfaced. When what gold was there had been dug up and gambled away that first year—the first six months, really—most of them moved on. The ones that stayed only got worse. That’s how Camp Chaparral got started, decent folks trying to get away from these.”
Ilbei thought back to some of the deep trenches they’d seen, the abandoned gear, and nodded that he understood. He tied the horse to the goat pen, noting that there were no goats inside.
“Well, ya ready?” he asked.
She drew in a deep breath, then checked her braid. She nodded. “Let’s get it over with.”
Ilbei went in just ahead of her to give the place a quick once-over before she came in: fifteen tables, a big fireplace, the best-made bar in all three camps by far, and a whole roomful of rowdy-looking miners, who all stopped laughing and talking the moment he came in. There followed in the intervening stillness the dull thud of tin pints and pewter goblets being set down on tabletops, one after the next, and after that, absolute silence but for the crackle of the fire.
Ilbei took the opportunity to scan the room, looking for any faces he might recognize. There were none, though some concealed themselves in the shadows around the edges of the room, or shadows beneath the droop of dusty cowls and the downward tip of soggy hat brims. When the silence lingered beyond a few beats more, Ilbei twitched the corner of his mouth into a halfhearted smile. “Ain’t someone supposed to yell ‘surprise’ or somethin? Ya make a feller feel like he walked in all pus-covered and spotted with the droppin pox.” Nobody laughed. Mags stepped out from behind him and took his arm.
Seeing her, several of the men went back to their drinks and their card games, but the noise level did not return to where it had been, nor did all eyes turn away. A tall figure stood up from a table in the farthest corner and, upon stepping out of the shadows, revealed himself—by face if not by uniform—to be Major Cavendis. His regimentals had been exchanged for the finery of his status as a son of the House of South Mark, right down to the white ruffles at both collar and sleeves. He seemed to glide through the room as he came toward them, touching this man’s shoulder or nodding reassuringly into that man’s eyes as he passed by. He advanced on Ilbei and Mags and, with a flat smile, placed his hand on Ilbei’s arm, opposite the one Mags held, and gave a part push and part pull, clearly meant to turn Ilbei around and propel him in a seemingly friendly way outside.
Ilbei, however—built, as an officer in Crown City had once put it, “like four cords of good firewood”—was not so easily spun and shoved about as that. He glanced down at the major’s hand on his thick bicep and took a moment to consider what came next before looking up into the major’s eyes. “Sar, I expect ya don’t understand it ain’t regulation fer an officer outta uniform to lay hands on an enlisted man, so I’m goin to let off snappin that there off on account of ya bein young and highborn.”
The major removed his hand, his smile waxing saccharine. “I’m sorry. Of course you are right. Please, Sergeant, if I may have a word with you and …,” his eyes slid briefly to Mags, “… the lady, outside?”
Ilbei watched the removal of the major’s hand before turning and, intending to send a wink at Mags, noticed that her face had paled. Her hand trembled on his arm as well. He frowned and glanced back at the major, who pushed past him and went out. Ilbei followed, tugging Mags along. He wasn’t sure what the major had said that would have rattled her, but whatever else the man had to say, Ilbei would feel more comfortable hearing it outside, under the watchful eyes of Kaige, Meggins and Jasper rather than the frowning eyes still on him within. He’d gotten warmer welcomes stumbling into wolf dens and goblin camps.
No sooner had the door closed behind them, the young nobleman lit into him. “You had orders to go back to Hast. Why are you up here? I’ll have you stripped and lashed!”
“Well, ya can strip and lash all ya want, but you’ll want to make sure ya ain’t been killed first, otherwise givin that order is gonna be hard to do.”
“I let that little show back there go because this is the Queen’s Age, and she does love her army and its policies. But I won’t tolerate a death threat from the likes of a common turnip like you, Spadebreaker. We aren’t so far in the woods as that. You’re lucky I don’t cut you down now, do you understand?”
“Yes, sar, I understand just fine. But it weren’t me threatenin yer life. It’s that murderin Ergo the Skewer is what I’m gettin at. He killed a man down by Harpy Creek, coldhearted as a fistful of frostberries, and he would have done yers truly were it not fer some luck and the fine work of my men and young Mags here.” He turned and gave Mags a wink and a flickering smile. “He run off this way right after, and, if’n I’m bein honest, we more than half expected to find ya dead. So now ya been warned. If’n ya still want to lash me, ya go right on ahead, bein as that’s yer privilege and all. I’ll even take the orders fer it on back to Hast if’n ya want to spare yerself the strain of doin it.”
The young nobleman rumbled in his chest, half growl, half groan, but it passed quickly. “How many men did he have?”
“They was eight all told, but we pruned em back to three. Meggins put an arrow in the Skewer’s back, but seems he’s a tough old knot, so he’s one of em what got away.”