Free She Is the Darkness: Book Two of Glittering Stone: A Novel of the Black Company by Glen Cook Page A

on foot. Uncle
     Doj formed a one-man rearguard.
    Two Shadowlander militiamen broke cover suddenly. They stumbled toward the
     water’s edge. Arrows swarmed.
    Standing orders were to take no prisoners. The Shadowlanders had been warned.
    They had been given four years’ grace. They had made their choices.
    Afterward the soldiers began to settle in groups, finding what shelter they
     could, starting their cooking fires. More and more came up to the line. Our
     staff group gathered in the lee of a shattered boulder, everybody grumbling and
     shivering. Pessimists started talking about the chances of snow.
    I planted the standard. Uncle Doj and I got ready to make supper. There were no
     servants in this army. Servants ate up food soldiers could fix for themselves.
    Supper would be rice and dried fruit. Croaker and I would add a few strips of
     jerked beef. Uncle Doj would add some fish meal to his rice. Many of the
     soldiers would eat no flesh because of religious proscriptions.
    I said, “Maybe we can find out if there are any fish in this lake.”
    The Old Man looked out there. “Looks like there could be trout.” But he did not
     say anything about maybe catching them.
    The battery wagons came up. Each had a bed four feet wide by ten feet long
     packed with bamboo tubes. They were the ultimate product of Lady’s arsenals. The
     Captain supervised their positioning. He wanted them set just right.
    Under this overcast it would not be long before it was dark enough for shadows
     to prowl.
    East of the lake, where Lady’s left wing division was advancing through very
     rugged country, a single point of light shot into the air, sped southward, lost
     velocity and began to lose altitude slowly. Balls in several colors followed
     quickly.
    The soldiers stirred nervously.
    A whiff sound came from a nearby wagon. A green fireball streaked out over the
     lake, its light reflecting off the water. The breeze had died. The lake’s
     surface was growing calm.
    I was more nervous than any of the soldiers. I had seen what those stinking
     little shadowweavers could do. I had seen men scream out their lives while
     something invisible gnawed at them.
    The soldiers had heard the stories. The sentries would stay awake tonight.
    The green ball did not dip toward that island. I sighed. Maybe there was no
     danger after all.
    The wagon crews loosed another ball at regular intervals. Not a one dipped
     toward that island. I regained my confidence. The men began to relax. Eventually
     I rolled up in my blankets and lay there watching fireballs streak across the
     sky.
    It was a comfort knowing no shadow attack would go undetected.
    I listened to the wagon crews lay bets on what color fireball would pop out
     next. There was no known pattern. They were getting bored. Soon they would be
     bitching about getting stuck with the duty while everybody else got to sleep.

Black Company GS 7 - She is Darkness
    15
    I was having a bizarre dream about Cordy Mather and the Radisha when somebody
     poked me. I groaned, cracked an eyelid. I knew I did not have to stand a watch.
    I had helped with the cooking. I cursed, pulled my blankets over my head and
     tried to get back to the Palace, where Mather was arguing with the Radisha about
     her plans to shaft the Black Company after the Shadowmaster fell. It almost felt
     like I was actually there rather than dreaming.
    “Wake up.” Uncle Doj prodded me again.
    I tried to cling to the dream. There was more to it. Something nebulous but
     dangerous about the Radisha. Something that had Mather upset in a major way.
    I thought I might be working out something important ins my sleep.
    “Wake up, Bone Warrior.”
    That did it. I hated it when Nyueng Bao called me that, never explaining what
     they meant. I grunted, “What?”
    “Trouble is coming.”
    Thai Dei stepped out of the darkness. He spoke! “One-Eye told me to warn you.”
    “What’re you doing up here?” His arm had not yet healed completely.
    I