The Magic of Recluce - L. E. Modesitt [196]
Krystal presented a wry smile that held little amusement. “We do what we can.” She looked at me again, and I felt embarrassed. “Much as I like the view, you need to get dressed. We eat together with the guard in the morning.”
I put on my traveling clothes, including the knife that Ferrel had returned at dinner, as quickly as I could. Krystal was doing something at her desk when I peered in, staff and pack in hand, ready to go.
“Records, papers, and accounts,” she explained as she pushed back the chair.
“Surely you don’t have to do the accounts for the guard?”
“Chaos, no! But what tactics you can use depend on your equipment and your supplies. Not even the Finest can fight without horses or food.” She kept talking as she belted on the sword and pulled on the short jacket with the braid that served as her emblem of office. “Certain tactics cause a higher death rate for horses, and mounted troops need reserve mounts. While we have a grain levy, there’s a tradeoff between increasing the levy and taxing something else to buy the grain…” She shook her head. “I’m just beginning to understand a few of the complexities. Sometimes, fighting is the easiest part.”
I nodded, thinking as we walked out the door and past the near-permanent sentry guarding her quarters. I ignored his hostile look, reflecting on what she had said. Certainly, money was important to something like woodworking, but I really hadn’t thought about it as the basis for fighting and warfare.
In that light, what Antonin was doing made even more sense—unfortunately.
“You’re quiet,” observed Krystal, not slowing her steps one whit as she took the wide stairs down toward the ground level of the building.
“Thinking…Almost every day I learn something new, and it seldom answers the old questions. Just adds to the unanswered questions.” My guts twisted slightly at my overstatement, and I added another few words. “That’s the way it seems, but I guess that’s because the answers you find seem simple compared to the new questions.”
In turn, Krystal was silent.
The low-ceilinged guard mess hall contained space for more than a dozen-score guards at the long tables. Not quite half the seats were filled as we entered. Only a handful of heads turned, mostly of younger men, as Krystal marched up to the serving table.
She took a single slice of thick bread, a scoop of some sort of preserves, a slice of hard white cheese, a boiled egg, and a steaming cup of a tea so bitter that I could smell it without even nearing the huge teapot.
The cheese and egg were beyond me. I had two slices of the warm bread with the dark preserves, a battered apple, and tea.
Krystal sat at a table in the middle of the room, alone except for me. As I sat down on the worn red-oak bench next to her, I caught sight of Ferrel leaving the mess, also wearing battered leathers.
“You’ll pardon me,” Krystal said, with her mouth full. “I’d like to eat before business begins.”
I frowned. Business?
“Any guard can approach me now, ask questions, or make suggestions. They may not be quite as forward with you here, but there will be some.” She continued to munch slowly on the bread she had spread thinly with the preserves.
Me, I had slathered my bread with the sweet preserves, enjoying each bite after my days of travel. Belatedly, I realized I did not remember much of what I had eaten the night before. I had eaten, that I recalled; but besides the salad and the lamb, I didn’t recall what had been on the plates.
“Commander?” ventured a hard-faced woman wearing a single thin gold stripe on the shoulder of her vest. “You sent for me?”
I almost choked, wondering when Krystal had sent for the woman, wondering if she ever slept.
“Yes, leader Yelena. Would you be interested in an escort mission?”
The sub-officer’s eyes flicked from Krystal to me. “I’d like to know more.”
“Where are you going, Lerris?”
I had to swallow several bites of apple and swig the too-hot tea. I didn’t know exactly. What I wanted was to find the wizards’ road that ran down the Little Easthorns