Satan's Gambit (The Barrier War Book 3) (26 page)

“Not upset.
Thoughtful, you might say,” Garnet said, humoring Kala’s charge. “Just trying
to work out a resolution to a problem.”

“Won’t work.”

“Pardon?”

“It won’t work,”
Trames said. He strolled forward and settled himself cross-legged on the ground.
Garnet stared at the older man for a moment, then sighed and knelt beside him.

“What do you
mean, it won’t work?” he asked once he was at eye-level with Trames.

“You can’t work
out a resolution,” Trames said, “the resolution works itself out. Oh, you might
have a part in that, but you’ll find you end up doing very little of the work
that matters. The bigger the problem, the less you can do to fix it.”

Garnet stared at
him in perplexity.

“Things have a
tendency to work out all by themselves,” Trames said, “usually without the rest
of the world even knowing something was wrong. Once the path of a problem is
laid down and it’s put in motion, there’s usually not much you can do that will
help, and a lot you can do that will just get you hurt for trying. Solving
problems is sort of like trying to cook a small fish: the more you poke at it,
the more it’s going to fall apart on you.

“You’d be amazed
how much you can accomplish by doing nothing at all,” Trames said with a happy
smile on his face.

“It’s an important
problem, Trames,” Garnet said patiently. Even if the old man
wasn’t
a
bit touched in the head, he obviously had no perspective and didn’t understand
the potential scope of the issue. San! He didn’t even know what the issue was
in the first place. “It’s not something I can just let alone and hope that it
works out for the best.”

“Things always
work out for the best,” Trames said, smiling brilliantly up at Garnet, “they
just may not work out the best for
you
.”

Garnet shifted
his weight and took a step backward. “I…”

“Shhh,” Trames
shushed him urgently, lifting a finger to Garnet’s lips. Slowly, he removed his
finger and pointed at Garnet’s foot. “Quickly lift your foot and put your hands
down like you’re trying to catch a grasshopper,” Trames said in a conspiratorial
whisper.

At a loss,
Garnet followed the old man’s instructions. In one swift motion, he shifted his
foot to the side and cupped his hands over the ground without ever seeing what
it was he was supposed to be trapping.

“Now carefully
scoop your hands up and keep them closed,” Trames said. Garnet started to move
his hands. “Carefully!” Trames insisted urgently. Curious in spite of himself,
Garnet obeyed and carefully cupped his hands around each other. It didn’t feel
like anything was in his hands, but he wasn’t sure if pointing that out would
make any difference to Trames.

“Now what?”
Garnet asked. “What do I… uh, do with it?” he asked.

“We need
someplace to put her,” Trames said, peering about anxiously as though a box or
something would just be lying around in the open. Then his face lit up, and he
reached into a satchel at his side and took out the small, empty jar he’d
brought with him from Garnet’s home. The jar was about the size of two men’s
fists, and Trames removed the lid and peered inside with a triumphant
expression.

“Here, here,”
Trames said, “put her in here.”

“Her?” Garnet
asked.

“Shhhh,” Trames
said and motioned urgently with his hands.

A look of
resignation on his face, Garnet obliged and opened his hands over the jar as
though placing something inside. He tried to peek in, but Trames slipped the
lid in place too quickly for Garnet to see anything more than an empty jar.
Which, to be honest, was all he really expected to see.

“What is it?”
Garnet asked.

Trames peered
down at the closed jar with a look of ecstatic pleasure and said, “See, an
empty jar no longer.”

“Trames,” Garnet
said insistently. The old man looked up at him in surprise. “What did we just
catch?”

“A fire faerie,”
Trames said, his eyes gleaming. “I’ve always wanted to see one up close to see
if I could talk to her.”

Garnet frowned.
“I’ve never heard of them.”

“Most people
haven’t,” Trames said. “You almost never see them at night, and you
can’t
see them during the day.”

Garnet looked up
at the sun shining in the sky overhead.

“How did you see
it, then?” he asked.

“You have to pay
attention to everything, young man,” Trames said. “If you focus on just one
thing at a time, you’re as good as blind. Don’t focus on anything if you want
to see everything.”

Garnet almost
laughed, but something in what the old man said brought him up short.

Attack with a
form, but keep your overall attitude formless.

Don’t fix
your eyes on my sword, damn it. If you watch my sword, I’m going to put my boot
in your bloody jewels. No, don’t watch my feet! I’ll split open that ass
sitting on your shoulders! Don’t focus on
anything
, you fool. Watch the
whole attitude of your opponent, and you’ll see everything at once. Focus on
any one thing, and you will die.

Garnet heard the
words of Gerard Morningham echoing in his head like they had just been shouted
at him moments before. Strange to think he should now hear something so similar
from a crazy old man.

Is there
something more to Trames?
Garnet wondered.

Garnet stared
speculatively at the old man, who was frowning at the jar in his hands.

“What’s wrong?”
Garnet asked.

“Now I don’t
have an empty jar.”

Well, maybe
not.

- 4 -

During the next
two days, their expedition made its way slowly through the mountains, climbing
ever higher toward their destination. They followed Mikal’s directions
unquestioningly, and the angel seemed to have no doubts about their route.

Garnet developed
a throbbing headache that he initially blamed on overuse of using Brican to
look through people’s eyes. Shadow Company continued to run training drills,
and platoons often broke away to practice maneuvers and group tactics away from
the main body of the column. Most of the time they completed their practice
sessions without observation or interruption, but sometimes a handful of elves
or human paladins would accompany the denarae – Siran especially watched them
with great interest, and he and Garnet often spoke about tactics, training, and
most of all what it meant to be a “warrior,” a term that had special
significance for the elf. Garnet was coming to appreciate the elven captain’s
philosophy, and he added the man’s ideas to his own growing repertoire of
combat philosophy.

Because of his
overall command duties, during many of the training sessions, Garnet stayed
with the column and just had visual images of the training routed to him by
Brican, and it was on this that Garnet blamed the pounding in his skull.
Gradually, though, Garnet realized the headache wasn’t unique to him. He had
Blue Platoon disperse and wander through the camps, and they reported that
nearly a third of the expedition was experiencing headaches of some degree.
There also seemed to be an unusual incidence of insomnia and general fatigue.
Elves and humans suffered equally, but the denarae seemed especially hard-hit
by the sudden onset. Garnet began to worry about some sort of disease to which
the denarae were especially susceptible.

It was Kala and
Perklet who discovered the cause.

“We’re pushing
to make good time, and the men aren’t used to the altitude,” Perklet explained
to Garnet and his officers.

“We call it
altitude sickness,” Kala said. “The air is thinner up here, and it will only
get worse the higher we go. We’re only marching, so most of your men are only
experiencing headaches. The more you work your body, the more it will affect
you, though.”

 “We’ve
been running practice drills,” Garnet mused, absent-mindedly straightening his
tunic and brushing his hair out of his eyes, “so we’ve been exercising more
than any of the other units. No wonder the denarae are being affected so
sorely.”

“I told you it
wasn’t my fault I missed the target so often yesterday,” Marc said. “It was the
headaches.”

Guilian laid a
consoling hand on Marc’s shoulder and said somberly, “Marc, your aim is even
worse than mine, which is an accomplishment.”

Flasch snorted.
“Marc, your aim is worse than Garnet’s flirting, and
that
’s an
accomplishment.”

“My what?”
Garnet asked, too preoccupied to pay attention.

“Nothing.”

Garnet muttered
a curse, oblivious to the half-hidden grins around him. “Alright, so what do we
do about it? How do we prevent this? I can’t have half my men suffering from
this sickness, but I’d rather not lose the training unless I have to.”

“You have to,”
Kala said firmly, “at least until they become more acclimated to the altitude.
Ease up the marching pace a bit and let them recover and get used to it. Extra
rations of water for everyone, and lots of grain foods and potatoes for meals.”

Danner nodded.

“I remember
Maran told me about something like this once, Garnet,” the Blue said softly.
“Trust her experience.”

“I do,” Garnet
said, combing a hand through his hair, “I just hate having to curtail training
for something like this.”

“Practice more
on archery than melee exercises,” Kala suggested. “It’s less exertion, and you
can still put time to good use.”

Garnet smiled at
her gratefully.

“Thanks,” he
said. “I should have seen that myself. Don’t know why I didn’t.”

“I can guess,” Brican
said, raising a hand. Danner quickly reached out and lowered Brican’s arm while
maintaining a straight face. Garnet frowned slightly at them, his eyebrows
drawn together in irritated puzzlement.

“Must be the
headaches,” Flasch said blandly.

“Must be,” Marc
agreed. Behind him, Guilian nodded with a deeply serious expression on his
face.

“What is with
you all?” Garnet asked irritably.

“Us?” Marc asked
innocently.

“Not a damn
thing, sir,” Brican answered with a grin.

“Just ignore us.
Must be the headaches,” Flasch said again. Garnet’s hand twitched, but he
resisted the urge to smack his friend upside the head. He chose the better part
of valor and deliberately ignored them.

“For now, I’ll
extend the late afternoon break by a half hour. Now get out of here, all of
you,” Garnet ordered, waving a hand. “My headache right now has nothing to do
with the altitude.”

With a few
chuckles, Garnet’s friends wandered off to rejoin their units. Garnet slumped
down on a convenient rock and rubbed his temples.

“You really do
care about them all, don’t you?” Kala asked, and Garnet jerked in surprise.
He’d forgotten she was there. He straightened up and automatically brushed his
hair out of his eyes again. The stray thought crossed his mind that he needed a
haircut.

“Those idiots?”
Garnet asked. “Yeah, I guess I do.”

“Not just them,”
Kala said, shaking her head. She bent gracefully and knelt on both knees next
to him. The tough leather of her trousers did little to disguise the athletic
curves of her body, and Garnet had to force himself to look away before he
embarrassed himself.

“You really care
for all the men in your command,” she said. “Denarae and humans both. Equally.”

“A man is a
man,” Garnet said with a shrug. “My father told me if a man’s good enough to
pick up a sword and fight with you, he should fight
by
you, no matter
his race or beliefs.”

“I was taught
that humans hated denarae,” Kala said. She had already told Garnet about her
mixed heritage, and he knew all about the impression her people had of the
outside world and its prejudices. For the most part, he was forced to concede
they were fairly accurate.

“That makes men
who can see past that rare and a cut above their close-minded fellows,” she
continued, “and the fact that you shrug it off as natural means a lot. Your men
love you as much as you love them.”

Garnet smiled
wryly. “I don’t always feel like I’ve earned it yet. The original Shadow
Company was formed and trained by Gerard, and I just inherited the embodiment
of his dream and vision. All our success in the Barrier War I attribute to him.

“This Shadow
Company is practically a different entity entirely,” he said, waving a hand
toward the denarae resting in the distance. “Over half our number fell during
the war, and we had to rebuild that and retrain almost from scratch. We’ve done
well in the few skirmishes we’ve had, but,” Garnet paused, shaking his head.
“We haven’t been tested and proven where it counts. In war.”

Kala nodded.
Garnet reached up one hand to his temple again as the throbbing in his head continued.

“Here,” Kala
said, flowing to her feet. She moved behind Garnet and put her hands on either
side of his head. Slowly but firmly, she massaged his scalp in a way that made
his entire head tingle. He grew slightly lightheaded after only a few seconds
of her ministrations, but the pain faded away entirely.

“Brican said you
not only command, but you fight well,” Kala said hesitantly.

“I started as
just another warrior,” Garnet replied. “Gerard taught me most of what I know
about true sword mastery as well.”

“May I spar
against you some time?” she asked. Before Garnet could reply, she rushed on. “I
have barely lifted my blade since joining your expedition, and I … I need to
test my skills against others.”

“I don’t have a
problem with it,” Garnet said. The tingling in his head had spread down to his
shoulders, and Garnet’s body felt very relaxed. “If I’m not available, I
recommend you check with Danner or Michael.”

Her hands
stopped.

“Perhaps I
shall,” she said, then was silent a long moment. “How’s your headache?”