Considering the Hostigi resistance, the three thousand casualties taken in entering Tarr-Hostigos surprised no one. From the stories brought in during the day with the wounded, Sirna concluded that another ten to twelve thousand must have been casualties of the keep's explosion. That made roughly fifteen thousand casualties. More than half were dead, and half the wounded wouldn't fight again this year if at all. Sirna would have liked more accurate figures, but she was relieved to know that she could go on doing a University outtime observer's work even in the middle of a battle.
It would be embarrassing if she ever returned home and had to confess that she hadn't taken advantage of her 'unique' opportunity to observe historically significant Fourth Level events. It would probably cost her that doctorate!
Sirna told herself this over and over again, to keep some grip on her sanity, as the wounded poured into the Gull's Nest. It was the first time she'd allowed herself to think of Home Time Line since the day she woke up in Menandra's back bedroom. Somewhat to her surprise it helped.
Having some extra hands helped even more. More of the lightly wounded men turned to changing bandages or helping comrades to the privies. Menandra rolled up her sleeves and went to work setting bones, a skill she'd acquired in her younger days from cleaning up after tavern brawls in Agrys City. She also turned out all of her girls who could be trusted to know a clean bandage from a dirty one, which was a larger number than Sirna had expected.
Another of Scholar Dras' bits of wisdom kept running through Sirna's mind: "The danger of paratemporal contamination doesn't come from the stupidity of lower-level people. It comes from the fact that they're inherently just about as smart as we are. Once they've been shown that something is possible, you would be surprised how fast they can pick it up and even start filling in gaps on their own."
Sirna knew that the problem-solving abilities of outtimers would never surprise her again.
By the time the western sky turned an appropriately bloody color, the flow of fresh wounded had stopped. A little later the sky darkened and rain began to fall. The crash of thunder resounded inside the Gull's Nest, reminding Sirna of Soton's guns. She trudged through the house on feet that felt shod in lead boots, checking splints and dressings she hadn't put on herself.
In the pouring rain outside she heard shouts and screams. Men, drunk or avenging dead comrades or simply celebrating being alive when they'd expected to be dead, were sacking Hostigos Town. The hard-eyed mercenary guards from the Iron Band kept the noise and the noisemakers safely outside.
At least she didn't hear the sinister crackling of flames she'd heard the night the Royal Foundry was sacked. The Styphoni weren't going to burn the town as long as they needed its roofs over their heads.
Sirna felt like a deer that'd somehow managed to be adopted by a pack of wolves. The Captain-General's men would protect her against all the other packs as long as she did what they expected. But that didn't make her a wolf. Somehow it was no longer hard to take for granted a situation she would have found unbelievably degrading two years ago. Not hard at all, when she listened to the screams outside.
She was changing the bandages on the stump of a man's arm when someone banged on the door to the street, loud enough to be heard over the din outside and the cries of the wounded inside. One of the house women looked through the peephole. Then she unbarred the door and jumped aside, with a look on her face that brought every fit man in the room to his feet.
Two of Styphon's Own Guardsmen strode in, their red cloaks flapping dramatically. Behind them came a tall man in a white robe. Two more of Styphon's Red Hand followed their white-robed charge inside, and then stood flanking the door. Sirna saw hostile glances flicking over the Guardsmen's clean clothing and silvered armor.
At least Holy Investigator Roxthar looked as if he'd worked today, and worked hard. His long hollow-cheeked face was coated with dust and soot and his robes were bloodstained and frayed. He reminded Sirna of a Fourth Level Christian representation of the Devil.
For a moment she wondered if Kalvan was the only cross-time hitchhiker on Styphon's House Subsector. Then she remembered the file on the Kalvan Control Time-Line equivalents to the major Archpriests. On one group of time-lines, possibly the beginning of a new paratime belt, Arch-priest Roxthar was purging Styphon's House almost as spectacularly as he was here. On several others he'd died mysteriously, doubtless courtesy of one of Archpriest Anaxthenes' handy little vials. On the rest Roxthar was ignored, or shunned by the rest of the Inner Circle.
Phidestros struggled to a sitting position and raised a hand in greeting. "Welcome, Your Holiness. Today Galzar's Hall is filled to bursting, but the first and vilest of the Daemon's nests has at last been burned out."
Roxthar nodded, as though acknowledging a remark about the weather, and then looked around the room. His nostrils flared.
"So this den of flesh-selling has served as the Captain-General's nest. I wondered why we had so often lacked your esteemed company at the Palace."
From the Grand Captain-General's face, Sirna knew his patience was strained nearly to the breaking point.
"I must admit, Your Holiness, that I much prefer the cries of honest passion in this house to the constant uproar in former Prince Ptosphes' Palace basement. No offense meant, of course. Let Styphon's Will Be Done!"
Roxthar's face paled. "Do not presume, Captain-General, or you may yet find yourself enjoying the hospitality of my Investigators."
"I also suspect they might find a soldier too much work, after so many women and children."
Roxthar's gray eyes turned into steel ball bearings. "Enough of this babble. We have the God of Gods to serve today. The Daemon Kalvan has fled, with the remnants of his host. The land he left behind is tainted with the evil he wrought; the servants of his devils lurk everywhere. Let the Investigation of Styphon finish its work, then we can attend to lesser duties."
It was just as well Roxthar didn't smile. If he had, Sirna knew she would have laughed out loud, hoping to wake up on the other side of the abyss between her and the sane reality of Home Time Line, where people didn't blow up castles in wars over non-existent gods. Instead she bit her lip and unwound the last strip of bandage, then stood up to take the sterilized fresh dressing from the soldier holding the basin.
The movement drew Roxthar's eyes. Sirna felt their hard, unclean gaze on her all the time she was binding on the dressing, emptying the water into the slop bucket and putting the old bandages into the empty basin to be returned to the cauldrons boiling in the kitchen. She was proud that her hands didn't tremble once.
At last there was nothing more to do except stand up and face the Investigator. He was now smiling, an expression to which his gaunt features hardly lent themselves. Sirna decided that she much preferred him expressionless.
"Those bandages have been boiled to drive out the fester-devils, have they not?"
"That is so, Your Holiness." Sirna was relieved that she'd kept all traces of a tremor out of her voice.
"That is knowledge given by the servant of demons, Kalvan, you know."
You're not afraid of death anymore, Sirna reminded herself. Besides, Roxthar won't spare a heretic even if she goes down on the floor and kisses his feet. Do as you please and at least you can hope to go out with dignity, like Ptosphes.
"That is so, Your Holiness. Yet the new compounding of fireseed was also brought by Kalvan. With the blessing of Styphon's holy priests, the new fireseed has been used in the guns of Styphon's Grand Host to smite Styphon's enemies. Is it not possible that the knowledge of smiting the fester-devils may also be used to aid Styphon's cause?"
Roxthar's vices did not include being at a loss for words. "This may be so. Yet I see no priests of Styphon's House here, to bless your work so that it may drive out devils and demons instead of letting them in. Also, it is too soon to tell what may come of this day's work. Not all demons leap forth at the wave of their servants' hands. Some bide their time."
If it weren't that her life was at stake, Sirna would have believed this conversation about demons and their servants totally absurd. "In your own words, Your Holiness-that may be so. Yet I have been healing the men of the Iron Band since the siege began. In all of them, the wounds are cleaner than they would have been without my work. Ask the Captain-General or the men themselves!
"As for there being no priest here-today there were many wounded and few hands to heal them. Should I have let men who shed their blood for Styphon die, their wounds stinking and festering, because there is no priest to bless work that I know is wholesome and good? If I did that, then you would have good cause to bring me before the Investigation. I think what I have done is good service to the God of Gods, and I will pray for his blessing and also for his mercy on you if you falsely accuse me."
She knew that the last sentences must have been audible on the street outside, from the way the door guards were looking behind them. Roxthar's smile froze, and then he shrugged.
"As Styphon Wills It. I only know what I must do in his service and also pray for his mercy if I misjudge what that is. You must come with us before the Investigation and hope that witnesses may be found in your behalf."
Sirna knew that her last moment was close at hand, and also that she was going to spend it as a woman of this time-line rather than as a scholar of First Level. Her right hand was at waist level, closing around the hilt of a non-existent dagger and she'd shifted her footing to open the distance between her and Roxthar. One of the Temple Guards stepped forward- and stopped a yard from Sirna, as a dozen mercenaries drew entirely real swords and daggers. Two more armed with halberds appeared on the stairway and a third in the door to the hall, with a pistol.
"Archpriest Roxthar," Phidestros said, in a tone that reminded Sirna of a baron she'd once heard sentencing a poacher. "There is nothing but truth in what this woman says. This I swear, by Styphon God of Gods and Galzar Wolfhead, by Yirtta Allmother and by Tranth who blesses the hands of the craftsman. My men will swear the same."
"How many of them?"
"As many as needed to make it unlawful for this woman to go before the Investigation, and ten more besides. The Iron Band knows good healing when it sees it."
One of the Temple Guardsmen started to draw his pistol at Phidestros' tone. An imperative and slightly frantic gesture from Roxthar stopped him. The Archpriest's good sense clearly extended to recognizing when he saw a situation where one false move would leave him and his guards dead on the floor and the Investigation of Styphon's enemies in chaos.
"We value your judgment and honor you for your good work in the Holy Investigation," Phidestros went on, as big a lie as Sirna had ever heard anyone deliver with a straight face. "Therefore we will also swear to watch this woman day and night, and bring word to the Investigation of any evil effects from her healing."
Phidestros paused, then fired his final shot. "And is not one of Styphon's own signs of his presence among us his gift of healing?"
Roxthar's head jerked, but to Sirna's relief he stopped short of smiling. "As you wish, Captain-General. Clearly Styphon's favor is with you today, but this may not always be so. I shall return tomorrow, to see those wounded who have been healed in days past and to take the oaths you have promised."
The Investigator whirled and strode out so fast that the Guardsmen had to scurry to catch up with him. A chorus of harsh laughter and obscene remarks about why the Guardsmen had unbattered armor after a battle like this hurried their departure. Sirna also heard a few bawdy remarks about who would have the job of watching her by night.
Sirna remembered nothing afterward until she found herself in a chair, her head pushed down between her knees and Menandra and General Geblon chafing her wrists so vigorously that they felt ready to catch fire. She kept her head down and let the chafing go on until the giddiness and the urge to vomit on an empty stomach passed.
"Sirna-"
"Get back down on that pallet, Grand Captain-General!"
"I need to talk-"
"When you're down on the pallet. Not a word until then!"
Sitting cross-legged by Phidestros' pallet, Sirna could hear him without anyone else being able to eavesdrop. Geblon made sure of that, with help from Menandra.
"I'm sorry if I put you in danger," she began. "But I couldn't-"
"And you didn't, and there's no need to apologize," Phidestros interrupted, with a grin. "We are the Iron Band, and we can do nicely without temple-rats chittering in our ears in our own quarters. You, on the other hand…"
Phidestros reached over and put a hand on her knee. "As I told you before, you've got a petty-captain's share of pay for this past campaign coming, and more if Styphon's House pays any of the victory gift they've promised. That's enough to be a good dowry for you, or buy you a horse and cart with traveling rations and servants to take you home-if you have any home left."
"Or you could stay here and buy into a partnership with me," Menandra said, who had quietly moved beside Phidestros' pallet. "I'm not as young as I once was. Somebody I could leave the place to would be a comfort to me now."
Phidestros gave Sirna a smile that showed what he thought of the Gull's Nest's prospects after the Grand Host departed.
"A partnership," Sirna began, and then pressed her palms into her eyes until the pain and the swimming red fire killed the desire to laugh. She owed Menandra too much to ridicule the idea of staying in Hostigos Town and becoming assistant madam of a bordello!
"I don't advise any of those," Phidestros went on. "Roxthar can't try anything with us-or at least anything the rest of the Inner Circle or Grand Master Soton won't stop, as long as I'm Grand Captain-General of the Grand Host of Styphon. Soton and Anaxthenes both know good captains are valuable, as long as Kalvan's still on the loose.
"You, on the other hand, Roxthar will snap up like a weasel grabbing a new-hatched duckling the moment you're out of our protection. You've humiliated him before men he distrusts. He'll forgive that the day Queen Rylla begs on her knees for a pardon from Styphon's House."
Phidestros was making sense-too much sense-but not telling her what to do. Or perhaps he assumed she already knew, and was waiting for her to offer it freely.
"I… I suppose I could ride with the Iron Band, that is, if you've a place for a healer. I'd like to train some of your men to help me, if that could be arranged, because I really can't do it all myself-"
Phidestros was kissing her eyelids and cheeks as well as her lips. Sirna wasn't quite ready to kiss him back, but she didn't stop him, either. She managed to be deaf to the new chorus of cheers and bawdy remarks around her.
"Some of my girls may want to come with you," Menandra added. "Hostigos Town may not be the most comfortable place for a while. I've three or four who've earned out their time and may want to travel on. If you could train them too-"
It's insane! Here she was, planning to live as the healer to a band of Fourth Level mercenaries and madam to their field brothel. Not to mention, probably, mistress to their Captain-General-an idea that now left her feeling curious rather than degraded. Although please, don't let the contraceptive implants run out before I find a way home!
It was insane-and it would keep her alive. If Roxthar's Investigators had to fight the Iron Band to reach her, they probably would give her up as not worth the trouble. If she had to sleep with Phidestros to keep his favor, she would at least be sleeping with an interesting man-and not interesting in a purely academic sense, either.
She would go with Phidestros and his men. She would do what they wanted her to do, and they would keep her alive until Great King Kalvan returned and took vengeance for this day and all the other crimes of Styphon's House.
Sirna was sure that day would come. It would be worth enduring much to be there to see it, and maybe, Dralm willing, help bring it about.