The Marcher Lord (Over Guard) (5 page)

Arran
didn’t immediately answer.

“I imagine it depends on one’s tastes,”
the corporal said, considering his food. “But the city undeniably has far more to offer.”

“All right, then.”

“Carciti has many aspects of itself to be shown, if you’d like,” Corporal Wesshire said.

“I would,” Ian grinned.

“The sleeping quarters are through that door,” Corporal Wesshire said, “as well as your second.”

“Really?”
Ian asked, surprised no one had mentioned that his reloading partner was just in the next room.

“You can
even meet him,” Corporal Wesshire said, “to some extent.”

“I’ll be
right back,” Ian said, hurrying toward the door.

Looking back,
Ian only caught a glance of Arran slowly throwing his food away.

It was completely dark in the next room, forcing Ian to switch on a low entrance light after he shut the door.
The sleeping quarters were relatively rough, originally built, no doubt, for the building’s servants. The center of the room held a small table, but the rest consisted of double bunks around the walls.

Peering around for a second,
Ian checked them over twice to make sure all of them had gear except for an upper bunk at the far right corner. Upon first inspection, it appeared the room was otherwise empty, but then he noticed a still form in the bed just below his. Ian quietly moved closer. The man was softly snoring, and as Ian carefully put his pack up on his bed, he noted how ragged the fairly large man looked.

“Nice to meet you, too,” Ian muttered, realizing he’d taken it for granted that he’d be assigned a highly estimable second
man—seconds being responsible for covering their partners while they were reloading in action. As contrary as Private Anglas had been, and obviously cut from the same sort of coarse stock as this man, he at the very least had been conscious.

Even the loftiest of Ian’s expectations for his first meeting with his second aside, Ian couldn’t imagine what sort of night this man might have had to still be asleep at this hour. Or maybe it wasn’t so much that Ian couldn’t, but that he wouldn’t.

He didn’t waste any more time there. Corporal Wesshire was waiting at the front of the parlor, and they silently made their way back outside. The shadows were beginning to swallow the streets, and the worst of the day’s heat was grudgingly dissipating.

Ian
walked at the corporal’s side and stayed slightly behind him; his objective was to make an especially impressive kind of impression on the corporal. The other ranger didn’t strike him as a routinely friendly person, but Ian was hoping this little excursion would give him enough opportunity to demonstrate his competency to the corporal.

Corporal Wesshire
moved with a detachment that wasn’t exactly distracted, and his cool scrutiny didn’t seem liable to miss much as it roved over the thinning streets.

“
Keep your regulator close,” Corporal Wesshire commented at one point when a small band of street urchins passed, who looked much harder than the ones Ian had encountered. “They’re attractive to thieves, which Carciti has no shortage of.”

Ian nodded and made the motions of adjusting his regulator in tighter, though he
’d already made those corrections.

“It seems like there are actually more
Ellosians out now than there were earlier,” Ian commented, as another assorted group of noisy Dervish men passed them. “I wouldn’t have thought that there would be that many people out after dark.”

“Many of the
Dervish prefer the evening temperatures,” Wesshire said, not bothering to look at them. “Several of the markets that cater to them also do not open until after dusk.”

Ian didn’t say anything, looking up at the second story balconies that ran along the
ir street. A growing amount of conversation was coming through the doors that were opening to let in the evening’s coolness. And different kinds of people than before were being let out into the last bits of daylight—women, one young Dervish woman in particular who smiled down at him. She made small gestures with her hands like the Chax did that may have been unconscious. Not knowing how he was supposed to respond to that, Ian smiled back politely and then purposely brought his eyes back down to the street.

Ian
checked his yeoman and saw that the corporal was skirting them along the edges of one place in particular that Sawlti had pointed out as being best to avoid. Corporal Wesshire didn’t seem all that worried though, so Ian didn’t see much reason to be either.

As
the corporal had hinted, an entirely different market was coming alive the further on they walked, being directed far less toward material needs as toward material wants. More and more groups that talked with the lilting tones of disposable incomes appeared, including those Bevish regulars that were of the off-duty persuasion.

I
ncreasingly more sources of interest were also appearing and doing their best to hail them. Ian was indifferent to most of these, though the amount of briefly entertaining vendors increased substantially. For a shilling or two, a person could be treated to a complex display of light juggling. The entertainer used either electric gloves to manipulate patterns of light or the more difficult job of using energy balls to cast changing colors that interacted with the lights that the other balls were projecting as they passed. For a ranging variety of pence, someone could buy demonstrations of the impossible from a street magician, optical illusions, and slights of hand. The music was also more prominent than it had been during the day, its conflicting movements running in harmony with the activity rather than trying to interrupt it as it had earlier. There was something of a riskier selection as the musicians pulled from different styles from various planets and sensibilities in their ongoing jockeying for attention and street space.

None of this impacted their pace much, but Ian was able to enjoy
brief tastes of what other people were paying for as they passed. The sound of it all was indescribable, and Ian closed his eyes for a moment, trying to take it all in and categorize it, break it down into definable pieces. He of course couldn’t, and this was all just Carciti, an incomprehensible convulsion of incredible happenings and opportunities, all performing a delicate dance of what could be and what actually happened. And even visibly tinged as it was by things that Ian didn’t want to think about, it was wonderful.

“It’ll take a lot,” Ian suddenly said, “quite a lot to make this place work, but it’ll be worth it.”

Corporal Wesshire glanced at him. “You mean aside from the silks and fines.”

Ian swallowed. T
alk about the fines also accompanied conversations about Orinoco, fines being the rare resources the planet offered that were desirable in many markets. They were greatly sought after as one of the purest substances that could be used to make calosos natrium, the principal firing element in modern firearms, along with a host of other minor products.

“I mean all of it,” Ian said.
“The people, the government, all of it. It’s good that it won’t have to be mismanaged under Dervish rule any longer.”

“What do you believe has to be done?”
Corporal Wesshire asked, his eyes sweeping the crowds around and occasionally behind them as well.

“T
he administrative bodies all need to be nearly redone,” Ian said. “It seems like the Dervish had set them up with differing aims. Most of the officials should be immediately removed, most of them are Dervish anyway, and new ones should be put in. If the current ones are good enough, then that’s fine, but incentives should be used to encourage qualified Bevish people from other places to come, to encourage moving out of the various local corruptions and toward better impartiality. A total redrawing of local standards as well, based after a real version of the Dervish code civil.”

“Indeed?”
the corporal said. He looked the closest to being surprised that Ian had managed yet. “There aren’t many Bevish who are fond of the Haspian Code.”

“I
do think that Haspial was right,” Ian shrugged. “While it is Dervish, it is very practical, and it’s only to Bevish advantage if we can accomplish it. The rangers are a perfect example of the logic in rewarding genuine ability instead of social position.”

Corporal Arran Wesshire’s
mouth moved in a way that wasn’t quite a smile. “That’s all very ambitious. It would seem to be difficult, however, to implement it even in stable times, which are certainly not what Orinoco is currently experiencing. Do you believe it wise to attempt it immediately?”

Ian hesitated, feeling a distinctive urgency for carefulness.

“Perhaps not,” he said, “I’d have to have more information, but I would move for it as soon as possible. It might be good to move in additional troops to ensure stability, but I think a change in administration needs to happen. After all, you can’t polish mold.”

All this
reminded him very much about old Peter’s long discourses on the tasks of holding Narcapoli. It had been a favorite topic of his family’s old friend, and a difficult one that Ian was suddenly very glad to have discussed so many times, eager as he had often been to talk about battles and wars or anything else more kinetic.

“No,”
Corporal Wesshire said. “However, much more change than what has already occurred seems unlikely as those that the Bevish government sent to assess the situation have quickly fallen into Carciti’s cares. Those in power here are deeply rooted, and to disturb them too greatly could risk an uprising. So for the present, at least, it seems the Bevish are approaching change slowly.”

“It’s too bad that it’s so difficult to get here, that even communication is so hard to
maintain,” Ian said, feeling rebutted. “Hopefully in the future that will improve so that things can be managed more efficiently. That would speed up change.”

“Perhaps,”
Corporal Wesshire allowed.

It was probably a kind allowance on
the other’s part, but it felt like Ian had been talking too much. He realized that it was because his ideas felt childish in light of Corporal Wesshire’s appraisal. Ian did indeed have a sizeable gap in his ignorance of the politics surrounding Orinoco. But even if it would be exceedingly difficult to dramatically change things without causing the wrong sort of accompanying drama, that didn’t mean it was impossible.

“Our destination
,” Corporal Wesshire said as they turned onto a street dominated by meal vendors.

It was much louder here
, even more than some of the other streets that had multiple music entertainers. Lined along both sides of the street, and some even in the middle, were dozens of small vendors interspersed by a handful of much larger ones. They were mostly Dervish, and shouted out to the thick inflow of people, argued with them, laughed and cursed at them in Dervish.

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 se
fen,” 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 s
alesman 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.”