Empire Rising by Sam Barone Read Free Book Online Page B

arouse anyone’s suspicions. After what Dilgarth had been through, it would be natural enough for them to keep their eyes out for bandits and robbers. “Make sure your men are fed and ready, Hamati. If I were the bandits, I’d be here an hour or two before sunset. That will give them enough time before dark to gather what they need and be gone.”
    Or they might not come at all. Eskkar worried they could already be far away, or be planning to come back in a few days or a week’s time. He had tried to put himself in their place and hoped they would do what he would have done. If he were wrong, if they had moved on . . . three days out of Akkad, and he’d look like a fool in front of his men, outsmarted by a few lazy bandits. He resolutely put the thought away. The afternoon Empire Rising
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    sun promised several more hours of daylight. If they didn’t come today, his horsemen would be back tonight, and he could ride out and search for them tomorrow.
    If Hamati had any doubts of his own, he didn’t voice them. Instead, he moved off to see to the other soldiers.
    Eskkar turned to find Nisaba standing before him. She, like Hamati, was covered with dirt from the fields. The women had rebuilt an irrigation ditch a few hundred paces from the village. Even in the best of times, ditches needed constant repair as they channeled the life-giving water to the growing crops. “What do you need, elder?”
    “Nothing, noble. I have already offered prayers for your success in battle. Kill all of them, noble. Avenge my sons.”
    Eskkar smiled at her. “Take the bravest women and keep them at work just beyond the village entrance, elder. The bandits might think it strange if they see no one outside the village. At the first sign of trouble, return to this house and bar the door.”
    As soon as the meaningless words left his lips, he wanted to recall them. If he and his men failed, a wooden stick across a door wouldn’t stop any bandit.
    She bowed and left him. He strode quickly through the tiny square, making sure the men stood ready and that everyone understood the plan.
    That earned him a disapproving look from Hamati, who had just performed the same rite. Nevertheless Eskkar wanted to take no chances, and his concern showed each man how important their orders were.
    In his successes against the Alur Meriki, Eskkar had learned no detail was too small to leave to chance, just as no order was too simple, but that some fool would forget it in the excitement of battle. Only when he felt sure everyone was ready and in place did he go to his own station near the main entrance. He’d assigned the best archers to Hamati. While Eskkar could shoot a fair shaft, he’d never managed to match the rapid-fire pace of his best trained men. Better to help hold the entryway, where his sword might prove useful.
    Once a crude gate had stood there, more to keep tame animals in and wild creatures out at night, but the bandits wanted nothing to impede a quick entrance or exit from the village. So they knocked it down and used it as firewood.
    After a few moments standing about, Eskkar realized he didn’t have the patience to just wait there, where he couldn’t see much of anything.
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    SAM BARONE
    Swearing under his breath, he returned to the elder’s house, entered, and climbed the wooden ladder to the roof.
    Mitrac, the youngest of Eskkar’s archers, glanced up at his captain’s arrival. The youth reclined on his elbow, studying the approaches to the village, a blanket under him and his bow and two quivers of arrows close at hand. A long dagger, almost as long as the short swords the soldiers carried, rested on the blanket. His powerful bow stretched a foot taller than any that the soldiers carried, and Mitrac’s arrows were not only three inches longer, but slightly thicker—all marked with a red streak near the feathered end.
    The boy’s face looked even younger than his seasons, and Eskkar had to remind himself that no one who killed an