The Marcher Lord (Over Guard) by Glenn Wilson Read Free Book Online

be right back,” Ian said, hurrying toward the door.
    Looking back, Ian only caught a glance of Arran slowly throwing his food away.
    It was completely dark in the next room, forcing Ian to switch on a low entrance light after he shut the door. The sleeping quarters were relatively rough, originally built, no doubt, for the building’s servants. The center of the room held a small table, but the rest consisted of double bunks around the walls.
    Peering around for a second, Ian checked them over twice to make sure all of them had gear except for an upper bunk at the far right corner. Upon first inspection, it appeared the room was otherwise empty, but then he noticed a still form in the bed just below his. Ian quietly moved closer. The man was softly snoring, and as Ian carefully put his pack up on his bed, he noted how ragged the fairly large man looked.
    “Nice to meet you, too,” Ian muttered, realizing he’d taken it for granted that he’d be assigned a highly estimable second man—seconds being responsible for covering their partners while they were reloading in action. As contrary as Private Anglas had been, and obviously cut from the same sort of coarse stock as this man, he at the very least had been conscious.
    Even the loftiest of Ian’s expectations for his first meeting with his second aside, Ian couldn’t imagine what sort of night this man might have had to still be asleep at this hour. Or maybe it wasn’t so much that Ian couldn’t, but that he wouldn’t.
    He didn’t waste any more time there. Corporal Wesshire was waiting at the front of the parlor, and they silently made their way back outside. The shadows were beginning to swallow the streets, and the worst of the day’s heat was grudgingly dissipating.
    Ian walked at the corporal’s side and stayed slightly behind him; his objective was to make an especially impressive kind of impression on the corporal. The other ranger didn’t strike him as a routinely friendly person, but Ian was hoping this little excursion would give him enough opportunity to demonstrate his competency to the corporal.
    Corporal Wesshire moved with a detachment that wasn’t exactly distracted, and his cool scrutiny didn’t seem liable to miss much as it roved over the thinning streets.
    “ Keep your regulator close,” Corporal Wesshire commented at one point when a small band of street urchins passed, who looked much harder than the ones Ian had encountered. “They’re attractive to thieves, which Carciti has no shortage of.”
    Ian nodded and made the motions of adjusting his regulator in tighter, though he ’d already made those corrections.
    “It seems like there are actually more Ellosians out now than there were earlier,” Ian commented, as another assorted group of noisy Dervish men passed them. “I wouldn’t have thought that there would be that many people out after dark.”
    “Many of the Dervish prefer the evening temperatures,” Wesshire said, not bothering to look at them. “Several of the markets that cater to them also do not open until after dusk.”
    Ian didn’t say anything, looking up at the second story balconies that ran along the ir street. A growing amount of conversation was coming through the doors that were opening to let in the evening’s coolness. And different kinds of people than before were being let out into the last bits of daylight—women, one young Dervish woman in particular who smiled down at him. She made small gestures with her hands like the Chax did that may have been unconscious. Not knowing how he was supposed to respond to that, Ian smiled back politely and then purposely brought his eyes back down to the street.
    Ian checked his yeoman and saw that the corporal was skirting them along the edges of one place in particular that Sawlti had pointed out as being best to avoid. Corporal Wesshire didn’t seem all that worried though, so Ian didn’t see much reason to be either.
    As the corporal had hinted, an