Thessalonica

Rufus came striding over. He was an old man, yes, but a tough old man, a frightening old man. When he transfixed Dactylius with a glare, it was as if he’d shoved a spear into him. “Here’s something for you to think about,” he rumbled. “Suppose you’re a scout in the woods. You make a noise or some fool thing, and about twenty different Slavs all start running right toward where you’re at. What do you do then?”

“Run!” Dactylius exclaimed, turning pale at the prospect.

George snorted, then tried to pretend he hadn’t. The little jeweler had given an utterly honest answer. If it wasn’t the one Rufus was looking for, though, Dactylius was going to be in trouble. George wasn’t the only one laughing, either, and some of the others didn’t try to hide it.

Rufus turned that fearsome gaze on them. “ ‘Run’ is the right answer,” he said. “You’re outnumbered like that, what else can you do? But what should you do while you’re running?”

“Pray to God for a miracle like the one He gave Menas,” Dactylius said.

“Pray to God you don’t shit yourself while you’re running,” John said.

“One case of long odds, one case of a big mouth,” Rufus remarked. He turned to George, as he often did when he wanted a question answered in a particular way. “What should you do while you’re running?”

“If you can, you should probably lead the Slavs back toward the main body of your force, so you won’t be so outnumbered when they catch up to you.”

“That’s the right idea,” Rufus said approvingly. “Don’t just run. Think while you’re doing it. Your wits are as good a weapon as your sword.” He glowered at John. “That’s true for most people, anyhow.” The tavern funny man blew him a kiss, as if he’d paid him a compliment. The look Rufus sent up toward God was as grim as the ones he gave the militiamen.

Dactylius said, “But what if you don’t want the enemy to know where your main mass of troops is? What do you do then?”

For once, Rufus’ sour features uncurdled. “That’s a good question,” he said, in tones implying a good question was the last thing he’d expected. He turned to George again. “What are some of the things you might do?”

George thought before he spoke. The answer here was less obvious than the other for which Rufus had asked him. At last, he said, “One thing you might do is try to make the enemy think you have a lot of soldiers close by, even if you don’t.”

“That’s right.” Rufus’ big, gray head went up and down, up and down. “A friend of mine saved himself from the Goths--or was it the Franks?--back in Italy, doing that very thing. You got to think fast when you’re fighting, on account of you don’t usually get the chance to think slow. Now let’s get back to work, so you don’t have to think about fighting at all. The more you think in hand-to-hand, the worse off you’re going to be.”

John looked around at his fellow militiamen. His gaze finally fell oil Sabbatius. “We’re in good shape there, by the Mother of God. Some of us have trouble thinking even when we’re not in hand-to-hand.”

Sabbatius’ pudgy face reddened. “Are you practicing your jokes on me? You’re not as funny as you think you are, I’ll tell you that.” He would have sounded more impressively angry, though, had he seemed more certain John was really insulting him. In truth, Sabbatius wasn’t so bright as he might have been.

Despite that, George said, “Enough.” He was looking at John as he went on, “The idea is, we’re all supposed to be on the same side. If you make people hate you, they won’t help you when we really have to fight.”

John’s eyes widened. In spite of everything, he didn’t look to have realized that the militia might have to fight. He lobbed insults as automatically as he breathed. To underscore the point, George threw back his head and did his best to imitate the fearsome howl of a Slavic wolf-demon.

Before John could say anything, insulting or otherwise, Rufus nodded again. “George has it right,” he declared. “I remember in Italy, when one part of the army didn’t get along with the rest. You couldn’t trust them at your back, so you were more afraid of them than of the Goths. Works the same way here. If you get in trouble, you have to know your chums are going to come and pull you out of it. If you can’t be sure of that, you might as well give up and go home before you ever start.”

George nodded. That made sense. Rufus commonly made sense, though he had such a rough tongue that you sometimes wished he’d keep quiet more often. If you could stand to listen to him, though, it usually repaid the effort.

Sabbatius did his best to look sly. It put George in mind of a public woman trying to look chaste, but that he kept to himself. Turning to Paul, Sabbatius said, “You see? You’d better keep us in wine if you expect us to take care of you.”

“No, that’s not what Rufus meant,” Dactylius said earnestly. “We don’t help each other from hope of reward. We help each other because that’s what we need to do when we go fight.”