The Lost War by Karl Gallagher (novel24 .txt) 📗

back in a silent scream. The hair and clothes had burned away. The shoes were only burnt at the tops. Maybe that would be enough for identification.

Cinnamon laughed silently at herself. They didn’t need to identify the body, just see who didn’t show up for dinner.

“Make a stretcher,” she ordered Leaf.

“Shouldn’t somebody else do that?” he protested. “We have work to do.”

“So does everybody else. You’re here. You’ll take him to the grave yard. Someone else will dig the grave.”

Leaf sighed and waved his men to work. They began cutting saplings and branches. An argument broke out over whether to use the partially burned branches by the body.

“Hell, no. They’re dirty.”

“So? The corpse won’t care.”

“Burnt wood is weak.”

“The ones left were too green to burn. Good thing. Imagine if this had spread?”

Cinnamon shuddered at the last comment. A forest fire would ruin their chances of survival.

On the far side of the burnt corpse Ivy picked up her basket. Her collection had spilled when she panicked. Cinnamon helped her gather the plants up again, automatically inventorying them. A dozen of the fig-like fruits. Some of the leafy vine that cured scurvy. And a disappointingly small vineroot.

When the stretcher was done they had a new problem. All the woodcutters balked at picking up the body with their bare hands. Cinnamon admitted she didn’t want to touch it either. Leaf solved it by cutting more wood to lever the corpse over.

As it turned a scorched metal can fell onto the ashes.

“Hey, that proves it’s suicide,” said a woodcutter.

“Nah, could have been left in the fire to destroy evidence.”

“Who’d go to this much work to commit a murder? There’s easier ways.”

“I know what I’m sure of,” quipped another. “I’m having fish for dinner tonight.”

As the body twisted and cracked the smell of burnt meat overwhelmed the wood smoke.

Leaf cursed the wiseacre into silence.

The six men lifted the stretcher and marched toward the camp. They weren’t in step but they walked slowly enough to have the proper funeral procession feel.

Cinnamon walked behind. “Ivy, go ahead and ask Lady Burnout to meet us,” she ordered.

The woman scampered off, relieved to be away from the corpse. She was fast enough—or the woodcutters were slow enough—that Burnout met them at the camp gate.

The chiurgeon looked at the grisly remains without flinching. “Strongarm. Poor bastard.”

“You recognize him?” burst out Leaf.

“I recognize the shoes. The size is right. And . . . he was at risk.”

She and Ivy unfolded a sheet. Cinnamon noticed multiple faded bloodstains and concluded it came from the examining table. She helped them drape the sheet over Strongarm’s remains.

Sighs of relief came from some of the woodcutters.

Burnout turned to Cinnamon. “Do we have Court tonight?”

“Nothing’s scheduled, no.”

“Then schedule it. I need to make an announcement.”

***

Sharpedge wiped orange blood off his sword with some leaves. “If these things ever figure out how blades work we’re going to be in trouble.”

“That’s why we don’t let any escape,” said Borzoi. He kicked a body to make sure it was dead.

The four orcs had gone down quickly. They’d thought Newman was alone and chased him into the solid formation of squires. The one that tried to get away had three arrows in its back.

The “cuk—cuk—cuk” of the local waterfowl interrupted them as a flock took off from the river. Newman had an arrow nocked as they came overhead. He hit one in the breast. It landed fifteen feet from the expedition. A second arrow also hit its mark. That bird landed the same distance away on the other side.

“I guess we’re having lunch early,” said Sharpedge.

***

The bluff veered east away from the river as they approached the mountains. A lake formed where the river met the ridge. The land had been gradually descending the whole trip. It looked to keep descending until it reached the mountains, much to Falchion’s disgust.

Orcs were scarce. They hadn’t seen any since the handful they’d killed on the second day. The Autocrat’s hope that they’d find the spawn point of the orcs was looking slim.

When they reached the base of the ridgeline Sharpedge directed them back toward the river. The going was rough, though they weren’t forced to break out the ropes. Falchion pointed out sharp corners and rough surfaces on the peaks as signs of recent uplift. Erosion hadn’t smoothed anything yet.

As they drew closer to the river a roar became audible. The sound of a waterfall. They couldn’t see the drop but from the noise it must be spectacular.

“Oh!” said Falchion. “I’m an idiot. These mountains aren’t uplifted at all. They’re a crater rim.”

Joyeuse looked back and forth along the ridgeline. “Craters are round.”

“Anything round looks straight when you just have a small piece of it.”

The six men contemplated this a moment.

“That’s a hell of a big crater,” said Newman.

“Let’s keep going,” said Sharpedge.

Climbing to the top of a foothill let them see the river as it passed through a gap in the ridge.

Falchion had to shout to be heard over the waterfall. “That’s not erosion. There must have been a gap in the crater wall when it formed.”

“No, something knocked a hole in it,” Newman shouted back. “See those horizontal marks on the far side of the gap? That looks like a wall I saw after a shaped charge blew it open.”

“Okay, that would do it. But the blast would need enough energy to throw the debris downrange where it wouldn’t dam the river. You’d need a nuclear weapon for that much energy.”

“Or magic,” said Joyeuse.

They watched the river roar through the gap for a moment.

Sharpedge broke the spell. “Let’s go back and find a pass we can get through. There’s no game on bare rock. We’re eating