Caine Black Knife

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The dirt-colored cloud spreads wide, hugging the horizon, draining into hollows of the distant hills. “That’s them,” I say to no one in particular.

The bloody sun behind my left shoulder stains cloud and hills together, and the shadow of the escarpment overhead spreads like oil across the badlands.

Tizarre stares. Her face goes pinched, and her knuckles whiten on the scabbard of her broadsword. “You’re sure? How can you be sure?”

I could quote Sun Tzu at her: Dust high and sharp will be chariots. Dust low and wide is infantry, but instead I shrug and hand her the monocular. If Sun Tzu had ever seen infantry like this, he would’ve crapped his silk fucking pajamas.

Tizarre puts the monocular to her eye, and what’s left of her color drains out of her cheeks. “Shapes in the cloud. .” A whisper. “A lot of them.”

I nod at Rababal. “Maybe you want to have a look, huh?”

Platinum flashes in the flick-flick-flick of the coin-size disk that appears, disappears, and appears again between Rababal’s stubby fingers: this is what he does instead of thinking. His jowls, gone slack and sweat-streaked through the grey-coating dust, belie his carelessly nimble hands. “We have only a tendays’ supplies. We cannot afford any delay; our backers-”

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