The Black Prince: Part II by P. J. Fox Read Free Book Online Page B

Twilight was upon them, and would soon bring a night filled with hostile eyes. Some of which, Hart was certain, must report to Maeve. That no one had come across the slightest sign of their presence, as tempting as it was to believe otherwise, didn’t mean they weren’t there.
    They couldn’t have come this far with no one noticing.
    “We’re there.”
    “What? What do you mean?” Hart was exasperated at this reticence. “Out with it, man.”
    “We must have crossed the border into Chilperic some time this morning. Because House Salm is right over that rise. North along the gorge, and perhaps another league.”
    “Perhaps?”
    The scout swallowed again. “Another league.”
    It had better be.
    He turned on his heel and stalked toward his tent. Arvid, behind him, motioned the scout to follow. Hart’s mood, bad before, was now black.
    He pushed open flap. Inside was just as wet as outside. He began examining his maps, which were strewn over his desk, without bothering to sit down. Arvid and the scout joined him. He looked up, his finger on where they were supposed to be. “Show me.”
    The scout took a hesitant step forward.
    The map in question was already covered with Hart’s annotations. Gods be damned useless piece of sheep hide. The only use in having them along was ever taking these kinds of notes, so the mapmakers could fix them later on. Or, rather, point fingers and argue and ultimately do nothing.
    But the maps weren’t usually quite
this
wrong. “That, uh….” The scout pointed. He was just as hesitant to touch the map as he’d been, at first, to address Hart. “That piece of land, um, it isn’t there.”
    “What do you mean?”
    “It doesn’t exist. We’re not days out from House Salm. We’re there.” As he spoke, he seemed to gain confidence. “We just can’t see it now, because we’re below the rise. But once we crest it, House Salm is in the valley. On the other side of this river well, in the river. There’s a moat.”
    Fuck. Positions like that were easy enough to defend, but hard to take. The river meant that House Salm, like Caer Addanc, had a ready source of water. He looked up, his eyes meeting the scout’s. “How wide is the moat?”
    “Uh…not wide. About six paces. Maybe ten.”
    Six or ten. Fantastic. “More than ten?”
    The scout shook his head. “No.”
    A moat meant no scaling, and no sapping. If he’d all the men in the world to spare then he might consider mounting some full scale assault, knowing he’d lose half of them—or more—just in reaching the top of the wall. Prone as he swam, a man was an easy target. Clinging to a wall, he was an easier one. A single cauldron of boiling oil could dispatch a dozen men or more, as those who hadn’t been hit directly fell on their fellows and knocked them into the drink.
    But Hart didn’t have unlimited men. Even so, the kernel of an idea was forming. Finally.
    The scout sneezed. He really did look well and truly miserable. And might, Hart thought, weigh even less than Isla.
    “How,” he asked, “did you become a scout?”
    “Uh.” There was silence. Had the question been too hard? And then, “at Goffstown.”
    The battle before Ullswater Ford, which had caused that catastrophe.
    Hart waited.
    “I uh…I pulled a spear from myself to defend my lord. He’d been knocked from the saddle and set upon.” He sneezed again. “My lord died anyway. And then there was nowhere else to go.”
    “Show me your scar.”
    The scout lifted his shirt and vest to show a deep gouge that resembled the canyon outside. That was a wound from which he should have died. He was telling the truth. About something, at least.
    Arvid grunted in approval.
    But a scar proved only a result; not a cause. There were a thousand different stories that a man might tell, to explain any of the events in his life. And Hart might command these Southrons, but he did not trust them. Nor their motives. They claimed to want the same as him, but they