Chapter 193: Brotherhood and Spoils
The fire had real wood in it, the flames flickering against the cold of a steppe night. Around them, from the camp and beyond it, voices went across the shadows at various distances, laughter and discussion at other fires, other arbans talking through their own versions of the battle, the camp marking this night in its own way.
Gal’s fire had four, as others moved nearby in celebration.
Nasan had been looking at the fire for a while before he said it. "Some coins, three horses, two bolts of linen, a piece of amber and a servant. That’s my total take from the whole campaign."
"Is the amber worth anything?" Chaqu said.
"Less than what I wanted."
He turned the stick he’d been using in the coals. "You know what I heard? Düriget’s arban came out of the merchant district with horse loads. Full loads. Silver, bronze work, strongboxes. Where’s the plunder? Why nothing came to daddy here."
"The distribution is based on rank and merit," Gal said.
"I know, I’m just saying."
Nasan looked at the stick in his hands. "Shit, I know exactly why the distribution is what it is. It doesn’t make the amber worth more."
He glanced toward Chaqu.
"What’d you get?"
"Five horses, a set of armor and swords and three servants." Chaqu said. "Less than I expected."
"Fuck me, and that’s less?"
"Compared to the others. The arbans that assaulted the citadel became rich with their merits."
"That’s still way better than me."
"Less than expected," Chaqu said again, in the same flat way.
Orkhon had not spoken yet. He sat with both hands around his cup and his eyes on the fire.
Nasan looked at him. "Next campaign I’m going to tell our jaghun commander that I want the merchant district instead of the sorting civilians. See what they make of it."
Orkhon lifted his eyes slightly.
"You’ll end up at the rearguard."
"Yeah," Nasan said. "I figured."
From three or four fires over, someone said something and a cluster of men laughed.
"Did you watch the fire thrower thing?" Nasan said. "Before they sent us through?"
"I watched the gate burn," Chaqu said.
Nasan started to gesture wildly, "The whole gate. And the compound as it spread across the timber before the main burn caught is crazy work! I’m telling you, I’ve seen how pitch burns, it moves the way fire moves, upward and outward. The compound spread flat first, into the joints, before the heat came up under it. It’s different from anything I’ve seen."
"It brought down the gate," Chaqu said.
"Shit, I know it brought down the gate. I went through it."
He paused. "Just saying it’s crazy strong."
Gal shifted slightly where he sat. "I heard the foreigner responsible for it had to ratio the fuel the whole siege. There was three days of compound left when we went through, they’d cut the firing rate down the last week because of it."
Nasan turned to look at him.
"Only three days?"
"I guess. He told someone before the push."
"Hell." Nasan looked at the fire. "This whole time I assumed they had as much as they needed."
"Apparently not," Gal said.
"Is there more for the next spring?"
"Sure hope so."
Chaqu frowned slightly.
"Can they make more of it?"
"That’s not ours to know," Gal said.
Orkhon looked up for the first time.
"It doesn’t matter, the Rus cities won’t all be timber."
Nobody answered that. The coals flickered once and calmed down.
"Right," Nasan said eventually. "Someone else’s problem."
He continued a beat later, "You hear what happened at Bilyar’s gate?"
He hadn’t been there. None of them had. He said it the way it had come through camp, part tale and part discussion, and neither part was easy.
"I heard," Chaqu said.
Nasan recalled it regardless, "They drove the captive population at the ditch, farming families from the villages around the city. Heard the garrison didn’t want to fire when they recognized their people."
"It brought down the gate," Chaqu retorted.
"I know it did."
Nasan turned his cup over in both hands. "I’m just saying it’s been in my head since I heard."
Gal poked once at the coals with a stick.
"Here it didn’t have to come to that."
"Cost us more men at the wall before we breached though, and we had those corps guys help."
Gal shrugged, "From what I heard, Toqa-Timur lost as many men in the siege before he changed tactics. Either way, people die. It’s part of the job."
"It’s part of the job, mm." Nasan said. "Couldn’t be more right."
Nobody spoke for a while after that. The larger camp kept its noise, other arbans finishing their own conversations in their own spaces.
Orkhon spoke without looking up.
"Every gate we’ve been through, someone made the decision for us."
He left it there.
Nasan looked at him for a moment. Gal stayed where he was, watching the fire. Chaqu had nothing to say to that.
"Yeah," Nasan said. "That’s about where it lands."
The conversation moved after that. Nasan had been sitting on a specific complaint about the civilian preservation and he finally set it loose. The collection work in the residential district, the people at the market square, and at the end of it the spoils and plunder and nothing that belonged to him personally.
"Those guys, the tanner and ironworker will be moved to Sarai."
He snickered. "The city grows. Very good. Meanwhile I’ve got my little spoils and a servant."
Gal leaned back slightly.
"The city needs it. You can’t build a capital on soldiers."
"I’m aware of what he’s doing."
Nasan retorted. "I have no idea why he wants a city and not live in the steppes though. Regardless of the reason, the problem is that it doesn’t benefit me specifically."
"You’re alive."
Gal rolled his eyes, "And you’ve been paid, and you knew exactly what you were going into before you joined the campaign. That’s all that matters."
Nasan looked at him.
"Kind of have a feeling you have been repeating that since Suvar."
"Because it keeps being true."
Nasan looked at the fire for a moment.
"Yeah," he said. "It keeps being true."
Chaqu said, "What about Rus?"
"Next spring," Nasan said. "After we winter around here. That’s what’s going around."
"After the other princes arrive," Orkhon said.
"What comes after that, we find out when we get there." Gal said.
Chaqu reached for a strip of dried meat from his pack, ate it, and lay back on his saddle. He looked at the sky for a while.
"Next campaign," he said, "I’m going to find the merchant district before the gate."
Nasan snorted once.
"We’ll be assaulting the gate."
Chaqu didn’t answer because it was true.
The fire went to coals. Around them the camp kept its noise for a while longer.
