The soil in those parts is very poor. The crops are not of a delicate nature. They eat much cabbage and roots, and rye is the common grain.

When we were in garrison at Thruthelwar for a month I befriended the landlord’s son, a boy of about eleven, and found him intelligent but ignorant of both religion and of reading and writing. His father reported that the Shadowmasters have banned all religious practice and all education throughout their empire and there were rewards out for books, especially older books, which were burned as soon as they were turned in, and likewise there were rewards for priests who tried to serve their faith, who were also burned as soon as they were turned in. This rule must have pleased Blade very much.

After a month in garrison orders came for the regiment to return to Jaicur, where Lady was gathering an army for a summer campaign in the east. At Jaicur I left the regiment and travelled north to Taglios, where I was received with great joy by my old companions of the Black Company.

The record of that campaign appears to be One-Eye’s most careful and detailed. The remaining fragments suggest stories much less coherent.

33

The captive red-hand Deceiver awaited us in a room guaranteed proof against sorcerous espionage. One-Eye swore he had woven the spells so well even Lady in her heyday could not have picked through them to eavesdrop.

Croaker grumbled, “What Lady could do back when doesn’t concern me. I’m worried about the Shadowmaster now. I’m worried about Soulcatcher now. She’s lying low but she is out there and she does want to know everything about everything. I’m worried about the Howler now. He wants a big bite of the Company.”

“It’s all right,” One-Eye insisted. “The Dominator himself couldn’t bust in here.”

“What do you want to bet that’s exactly what Smoke thought about his spyproof room?”

I shuddered. So did One-Eye. I had not witnessed Smoke’s destruction by the monster that got into his hidden place through a pinhole in his protection, but I had heard. “Whatever became of Smoke?” I asked. The monster had not killed him.

Croaker lifted a finger to his lips. “Right around the corner.” I thought we were going back to the room where Goblin, One-Eye and the Old Man wakened me from my last seizure. I just assumed they had the red-hand Strangler there, behind that curtain. Not so. We arrived at what seemed to be a different place entirely.

And the Deceiver was not alone.

The Radisha Drah, sister of the ruling Prince, the Prahbrindrah Drah, leaned against a wall and stared at the prisoner in a way that suggested she enjoyed a conviction that the Liberator was soft on villains. Small and dark and wrinkled, like most Taglian women who make it past thirty, she was one hard woman, and too bright besides. They say the only time she ever lost her composure was the night Lady killed all the senior members of Taglios’s various priesthoods, ending religious resistance to her participation in the war effort as a key player.