Read Online The Ten Thousand by Paul Kearney - Free Book Online Page B

at the outside. What’s the
matter, Orsos; do you have trouble holding your men to the colour?”
    “Not since I
stopped shitting yellow,” the Bull said, and about the length of the table
there were grunts of humour.
    “Then have some
patience. Pity of the goddess, this is the biggest fee you’ll ever earn and you’re
havering over the matter of a few days here and there. If this thing comes off,
we will all of us be rich as kings.”
    Greed warmed the
air of the room a little. The men leaned forward or back as the mood took them,
chairs creaking under a bulk of scarred muscle. From below, the raucous
slatternly din of the wine-shop rose up through the floorboards.
    “Quite a little
army your Phiron is digging up, Pasion,” another of the men said. This fellow
was lean as whipcord, with one long brow of black across his forehead, and eyes
under it that made a blackbird’s seem dull. He had a trimmed goat’s-beard, and
a moist lip. No father would trust his daughter to that face.
    “I hear that this
is only the tip of the spear, this host of ours gathered here. There’s more
down in Idrios, and others in Hal Goshen. We’ve near two thousand men in the
colour, here in Machran, and that’s the biggest crowd of hired spears I’ve ever
heard tell of. What employer is this that can hire such myriads and keep them
kicking their heels for weeks as though money were barley-grain to him?”
    “Our employer’s
name is not to be spoken,” Pasion snapped. “Not yet. That is one of the terms
of the contract. You took the retainer, Mynon, so you will abide by it.”
    “If you do not
mean to take Machran itself I would do something to reassure the Kerusia of it,”
another man said, a dark-skinned, hazel-eyed fellow with the voice of a singer.
“They’re more jittery than a bride on her wedding night, and wonder if we have
designs on their virtue. There’s talk of a League being gathered of the
hinterland cities: Ponds, Avennos and the like. They don’t like to see so many
of our kind gathered together for so long in one place.”
    “Agreed, Jason,”
Pasion said. “I will talk to them. Brothers, you must keep your men outside the
walls, and in camp. We cannot afford friction with the Kerusia, or any others
of the city councils.”
    A rumble went down
the table. Discontent, impatience. The room crackled with pent-up irritability.
    “I’ve had my
centon here the better part of a month,” an older man said, his beard white as
pissed-upon snow and his eyes as cold as those of a dead fish. This was Castus
of Goron, perhaps the wickedest of them all. “I’ve lost eleven men: two maimed
in brawls, one who’s gotten himself hung by the magistrates, and eight who took
off out of boredom. Most of us here can say the same to some degree. It’s not
lambs we lead, Pasion. My spears are losing their temper. Where in Phobos’s
Face are you taking us anyway, if we’re not to annoy Machran itself? The
capital can muster some eight thousand aichme, given time. If we’re to strike,
it must be very soon, before these farmers get themselves together.” There was
a murmur of agreement.
    Pasion smashed his
fist down on the planks of the table.
    “Machran is not
our goal,” he said with quiet vehemence. “Nor are any of the other hinterland
cities. Hammer that into your heads and those of your men. You’ve taken money
from my hand— that makes me your employer as much as anyone else. If you cannot
hold to your half of the contract, then refund me your retainers and be off. Go
pit your wits in some skirmish up north. I hear Isca has been sacked at last,
so there’s not a decent soldier up there to stand in line. Rape some goatherder
women if you will, and boast of killing farmers’ sons. Those who stay with me
will find real flesh for their spears, a true fight such as we’ve not seen in
the Harukush in man’s memory. Brothers, stay to the colour here and I promise
you, we shall all become forgers of history.”
    The