Free Slaves of the Mastery by William Nicholson

eat while travelling, your stomach gets upset.’
    ‘No, no, we must stop for meals. The dancing lesson, then. We must not stop for the dancing lesson.’
    ‘The Johdila is to dance in a moving carriage, greatness?’
    ‘Ah.’
    ‘The dancing lessons must continue, sire. This marriage is all that stands between us and war. And if there is war –’
    ‘Yes, yes,’ said the Johanna, getting flustered. ‘So what are we to do?’
    The Grand Vizier sighed.
    ‘The escort, mightiness –’
    ‘I won’t have you send my guard away, Barzan. You’re only saying it to spite Zohon, you know. I won’t arrive in a foreign city with a few house-servants. I won’t
shame my ancestors.’
    ‘But mightiness, three thousand men, all heavily armed, most of them marching on foot – no wonder we travel too slowly.’
    ‘The Johanna of Gang is always escorted by his Johjan Guards. It’s traditional. No, Barzan, that’s not the answer. We are travelling too slowly. Seek out who is responsible.
Punish them. That is the answer.’
    ‘As you wish, sire.’
    The Grand Vizier bowed gloomily, and withdrew.
    ‘I do wish Barzan and Zohon would stop this squabbling,’ complained the Johanna. ‘They’re as jealous of each other as a pair of schoolgirls.’
    ‘Papa,’ said Sisi, lifting her veil, ‘why will my marriage stop there being war?’
    ‘I’ve told you, precious one. Once you marry, your husband becomes our son and heir. His father can’t make war on us if his own son and heir is our son and heir.’
    ‘But doesn’t that mean he gets everything he wants without the trouble of a war?’
    The Johanna gazed at his daughter for a long thoughtful moment.
    ‘These are matters of state, Sisi. You wouldn’t understand.’
    Kestrel, listening to these exchanges unnoticed at her little table, gained more information to add to her growing store. Out of such overheard fragments, out of observations and guesses, she
was beginning to make a plan. At the heart of her plan was the Commander of the Johjan Guards.

 
6
The Hammer of Gang
    S isi and her parents always rested after lunch. Kestrel took this opportunity to walk down the entire length of the caravan. For a while she
counted the carriages and wagons she passed, but there were too many, and after the fortieth vehicle she gave up counting. Apart from the grand gilded carriages of the royal court, there were plain
carriages for officials, and plainer ones still for upper servants. There were carriages with chimneys for the cooks, and carriages with arrow slits for the soldiers. There were the
quartermaster’s wagons, and feed wagons for the horses, and tent wagons, and bedroll wagons, and more and more, to carry the necessaries of this great moving town. Near the rear of the line
she came upon the tethered horses of the Johjan Guards, and beyond the horses, in the shade of a line of trees, the mess tables where the men were to eat. On the far side of the trees the entire
force, almost three thousand men, were formed up in long regular lines, doing their daily exercises.
    Kestrel came to a stop, concealed from their view by the quietly-grazing horses, and watched. It was an impressive sight. The men were naked but for their tight black under-britches. They were
all tall, powerfully-built, and bronzed by the sun. They all wore their hair drawn back tight over the head, and knotted in a small roll on the back of the neck. They moved together, in perfect
time, the long ranks of men dropping to the ground and springing into the air, dropping and springing up, seemingly without effort, but for the glisten of sweat on their shapely torsos.
    At their head, facing them, as naked as his men, but even taller and more magnificently-muscled, stood Zohon, their youthful leader. He issued no commands. He moved, and like a reflection in a
thousand mirrors, his men moved with him. He was still, and they were still. Kestrel, watching, knew that so perfectly-disciplined a force of