They trooped on down a wide corridor to the other end of the building and entered a cluttered room with iron-tipped spears and other weapons stacked in the corners, what appeared to be models of various war engines on a large central table, and white walls with extensive drawings on them— drawings that reached as high as the ceiling. Veltan examined the drawings. They had no color, and there didn’t seem to be any central point to draw the beholder’s eyes. “What are these pictures supposed to represent, Narasan?” he asked.
“Land,” Narasan replied. “We call them maps, and they’re supposed to look more or less like the ground of various regions.” He pointed at one of the larger drawings. “That’s the Trogite Empire.”
Veltan went closer to the drawing. “It’s not very accurate, you know.” He pointed at the upper part of the drawing. “If that’s supposed to be the north coast, it doesn’t even come close to the real thing.”
“It looks close enough to me,” the balding Gunda objected. “My family lives in that district, and I don’t see very many mistakes.”
“That might explain some of the errors,” Veltan said. “We all tend to overemphasize our ancestral home.” He pointed at a jutting peninsula on the representation of the north coast. “Your family lives here, doesn’t it, Gunda?”
“How did you know that?”
“The picture shows it to be at least twice as big as it really is.”
“That’s our Gunda,” another soldier laughed. “He seems to think that everything about him is twice as big as it really is.”
“Is this big enough to suit you, Padan?” Gunda asked, holding up his clenched fist.
“All right,” Narasan said wearily, “that’s enough of that. Just exactly where is this Land of Dhrall you were telling me about, Veltan?”
Veltan looked around the room at the various maps. “It’s not on any of these,” he replied. “It’s about five hundred leagues to the north of Gunda’s home territory.”
“There’s nothing up there but ice,” a bone-thin officer called Jalkan scoffed.
“It’s beyond the ice,” Veltan told him. “There’s a sea current that comes down from the far north, and it carries those large ice floes down from the eternal ice. The ice floes form a barrier of sorts. The fishermen of the south coast of Dhrall know all about them, and they know how to avoid them.”
“Could you draw us a map?” Narasan asked.
“Of course.”
“I think it’ll be too risky, Narasan,” Jalkan warned. “No Trogite vessel I’ve ever heard of has made it through those floating ice mountains in one piece.”
“The Maags don’t seem to have much trouble, Jalkan,” the soldier named Padan said. “They’ve been raiding our north coast for years now.”
“Their ships aren’t as big as ours, and they’re faster,” Jalkan pointed out. “They can get out of the way if an ice mountain’s bearing down on them. Our ships are bigger and slower. We’ll lose at least half of our army if we try to go through that zone of floating ice.”
“We’re going to have to work out a few details, I think,” Narasan told Veltan, “and it’s likely to take us a while. For right now, why don’t we talk about payment? How much are you prepared to give us for our help?”
“How much do you want?”
“Why don’t you make me an offer?”
“Why don’t you tell me how much you expect?”
“How does one gold crown per man strike you?” Narasan asked tentatively.
“It fills me with confusion,” Veltan replied. “We don’t have what you Trogites call money in the land of Dhrall. I picked up a few brass and copper coins when I first came here, but that’s about the extent of my familiarity with your money. Just what exactly is a gold crown?”
“It’s one ounce of pure gold,” the young soldier Keselo supplied.
“And what exactly is an ounce?”
“Somebody show him a crown,” Narasan said.
The soldiers all sorted through the leather purses each of them carried at his belt, and eventually the one called Jalkan managed to find a gold coin. “I’ll want this back,” he told Veltan as he handed the coin over.
“Of course,” Veltan replied. He bounced the coin thoughtfully on the palm of his hand. “All right,” he said, handing the coin back to Jalkan. “We have gold in Dhrall, but we usually store it in the form of bricks. As closely as I can determine, each brick would weigh as much as five hundred or so of those coins. How many men do you have in your army, Narasan?”
“I can field a hundred thousand.”
Veltan made a quick computation. “That would be two hundred bricks,” he said. “That seems to be a reasonable number.”
“You’re taking a lot of the fun out of this, Veltan,” Narasan complained. “Don’t you want to argue with me just a little?”
“What’s there to argue about?”
“Nobody ever pays the first price we ask. You’re supposed to tell me that I’m asking too much. Then we bicker back and forth until we come to the real price.”
“What a waste of time,” Veltan murmured. “I need to speak with my elder brother anyway, so I’ll bring some of the bricks with me when I come back.” Veltan squinted at the map. “Which one of those coastal towns will you sail from?”
“What do you think, Gunda?” Narasan asked.
“Castano,” Gunda replied immediately. “It’s the biggest town on the coast, and it’s got the most protected harbor.”
“Very well,” Veltan said. “I’ll meet you gentlemen in Castano in three, maybe four weeks. I think we’d better move your army to Dhrall by spring—sooner if we can manage it. We’ve all got work to do, so I’ll get out from underfoot so that you can do yours. My work might take a bit longer, but please be ready to sail from Castano when I come back. Hopefully, I’ll have a better idea of when the war’s likely to start when I return.” Then he turned and walked briskly from the war room.
2
The night sky was clear and the stars were very bright when Veltan left the city of Kaldacin. The pale moon had not yet risen, but Veltan knew her very well, so he was certain that she’d soon put in an appearance. He walked on out across the brown-stubbled, sleeping winter farmland beyond the walls of Kaldacin before he summoned his pet thunderbolt. She always seemed a little bad-tempered when he was obliged to awaken her after the sun went down, and she made more noise at night than she did in the daytime. It was highly unlikely that the Vlagh had agents here in the Trogite Empire, but Veltan didn’t really think that announcing his presence with a shattering crash of thunder just outside the walls of Kaldacin would be very prudent.