Lion himself,” Pavek said mildly. “He mentions bitumen, naphtha, and balsam oil—” The sergeant blanched, as any knowledgeable person would hearing those three names strung together. “The watch at the elven market gate holds them. We’ll take them underground with us.”
He’d spoken loudly enough for the maniple to overhear, and Pavek, in turn, heard their collective gasp. They were only twenty templars, twenty-two if they counted Pavek and the sergeant. There were hundreds of traders, mercenaries, and renegades of all stripes holed up in the elven market, every one of whom would risk his life for the incendiaries they were supposed to carry underground.
“Great Lord,” the sergeant began after clearing her throat. “Respectfully—most respectfully—I urge you to leave your kinfolk behind. Wherever we go, whatever we do today, it will be no place for the unseasoned. Respectfully, Great Lord. Respectfully.”
Pavek should have been insulted—beyond a doubt she included him among the unseasoned, respectfully or not—but mostly he was startled by her assumption that his motley companions were his family. Denials formed on his tongue; he swallowed them. Let her believe what she wanted: a man could do far worse.
“Respectfully heard, but they know more than you, and they’ve earned the right to see this through.”
“Great Lord, if there’s fighting—”
“Don’t worry about me or mine. Your only concern is keeping those bowls secure on their platforms until you’ve eliminated the opposition. Now—let’s move out! We’ve got our work cut out for us if we’re to catch that other maniple at midday in Codesh. I hope you’re paid up with your fortune-seller. We’re going to need a load of luck before the day’s out.”
The sergeant shot another glance behind her. This time Pavek saw it land on a young man in the last row of the maniple, another redhead. He called the man forward. The sergeant stiffened, and so did the rest of the maniple. Whatever was going on, they shared the secret. Pavek asked for the redhead’s medallion. More grim and apprehensive glances were exchanged, especially between the two red-haired templars, but the young man removed the medallion and gave it to the high templar.
Lord Hamanu’s leonine portrait was precisely carved, delicately painted, but that vague aura of ominous power that surrounded every legitimate medallion was missing. Without saying anything, Pavek flipped the ceramic over. As he expected, the reverse side of the medallion was smooth—the penalty for impersonating a templar was death; the penalty for wearing a fake medallion was ten gold pieces. The medallion Pavek held was fraudulent, but the mottled clay beads he could just about see beneath the “templar’s” yellow tunic were genuine enough.
Underground, an earth cleric would be more useful than all the luck a fortune-seller could offer.
“When the fighting starts,” Pavek advised, returning the medallion, “stay close to Zvain and Mahtra,” he pointed them out, “because they’ll be staying out of harm’s way—as you should.”
“Great Lord, you are indeed a smart man. We might all live to see the sun rise again.”
Pavek grimaced and cocked his head toward the eastern horizon, which had begun to lighten. “Not unless we get moving.”
Corruption, laziness, and internecine rivalries notwithstanding, the men and women who served the Lion-King of Urik mostly followed their orders and followed them competently. The sergeant brought her augmented maniple through the predawn streets to me gates of the elven market without incident or delay. Three sewn-shut leather sacks were waiting for them. Their seams had been secured with pitch; each had been neatly labelled and branded with Lord Hamanu’s personal seal. The sacks had been brought from the city warehouse by eight civil bureau templars, messengers and regulators in equal numbers, who remained at the market gates with orders to join the war bureau maniple when it was time to move the sacks again.
The elven market was quiet when a wedge-shaped formation of nearly thirty templars passed through the gate. It was much too quiet, and what sounds they could hear were almost certainly signals as they passed from one enforcer’s territory to the next. There were silhouettes on every rooftop, eyes in every alley and doorway. But thirty templars were more trouble than the most ambitious enforcer wanted to buy, and there’d been no time for alliances. Observed, but not disturbed, they reached the squat, old building in its empty plaza as the lurid colors of sunrise stained the eastern sky.
The civil bureau templars would go no farther. Pavek took the sack of balsam oil onto his own shoulder while a pair of