Monstrous Regiment

“You’re Tonker, right?” she said.

“Yeah, and, er… could I have a borrow of your shaving gear, right?”

Polly looked at a chin as free of hair as a billiard ball. The boy blushed.

“Got to start sometime, right?” he said defiantly.

“The razor’ll need sharpening,” said Polly.

“That’s all right, I know how to do that,” said Tonker.

Polly wordlessly handed over the mug and razor, and took the opportunity to duck into the privy while everyone else was occupied. It was the work of a moment to put the socks in place. Anchoring them was a problem, which she solved by unwinding part of one sock and tucking it up under her belt. They felt odd, and strangely heavy for a little package of wool. Walking a little awkwardly, Polly went in to see what horrors breakfast would bring.

It brought stale horse-bread and sausage and very weak beer. She grabbed a sausage and a slab of bread and sat down.

You had to concentrate to eat horse-bread. There was a lot more about these days, a bread made from flour ground up with dried pease and beans and vegetable scrapings. It used to be made just for horses, to put them in fine condition. Now you hardly ever saw anything else on the table, and there tended to be less and less of it, too. You needed time and good teeth to work your way through a slice of horse-bread, just as you needed a complete lack of imagination to eat a modern sausage. Polly sat and concentrated on chewing.

The only other area of calm was around Private Maladict, who was drinking coffee like a young man relaxing in a pavement cafe, with the air of someone who has life thoroughly worked out. He nodded at Polly.

Was that him in the privy? she wondered. I got back in just as Strappi started yelling and everyone started ru

“Sleep well?” he asked.

“Yeah. Did you?” said Polly.

“I couldn’t stand that shed, but Mr Eyebrow kindly allowed me to use his cellar,” said Maladict. “Old habits die hard, you know? At least,” he added, “old acceptable habits. I’ve never felt happy not hanging down.”

“And you got coffee?”

“I carry my own supply,” said Maladict, indicating an exquisite little silver and gilt coffee-making engine on the table by his cup, “and Mr Eyebrow kindly boiled some water for me.” He gri

Polly nodded. “Er… is Igor a friend of yours?” she said. At the next table Igor had obtained a sausage, presumably raw, from the kitchen, and was watching it intently. A couple of wires ran from the sausage to a mug of the horrible vinegary beer, which was bubbling.

“Never seen him before in my life,” said the vampire. “Of course, if you’ve met one you have in a sense met them all. We had an Igor at home. Wonderful workers. Very reliable. Very trustworthy. And, of course, so good at stitching things together, if you know what I mean.”

“Those stitches round his head don’t look very professional,” said Polly, who was begi

“Oh, that? It’s an Igor thing,” said Maladict. “It’s a Look. Like… tribal markings, you know? They like them to show. Ha, we had a servant once who had stitches all the way round his neck, and he was extremely proud of them.”

“Really?” said Polly weakly.

“Yes, and the droll part of it all was that it wasn’t even his head!”

Now Igor had a syringe in his hand, and was watching the sausage with an air of satisfaction. For a moment, Polly thought that the sausage moved…

“All right, all right, time’s up, you horrible lot!” barked Corporal Strappi, strutting into the room. “Fall in! That means line up, you shower! That means you too, Parts! And you, Mr Vampire, sir, will you be joining us for a morning’s light soldiering? On your feet! And where’s that bloody Igor?”

“Here, thur,” said Igor, from three inches behind Strappi’s backbone. The corporal spun round.

“How did you get there?” he bellowed.

“It’th a gift, thur,” said Igor.

“Don’t you ever get behind me again! Fall in with the rest of them! Now… Attention!” Strappi sighed theatrically. “That means ‘stand up straight’. Got it? Once more with feeling! Attention! Ah, I see the problem! You’ve got trousers that are permanently at ease! I think I shall have to write to the Duchess and tell her she should ask for her money back! What are you smiling about, Mr Vampire sir?” Strappi positioned himself in front of Maladict, who stood faultlessly to attention.

“Happy to be in the regiment, corporal!”

“Yeah, right,” mumbled Strappi. “Well, you won’t be so—”

“Everything all right, corporal?” asked Sergeant Jackrum, appearing in the doorway.

“Best we could expect, sergeant,” sighed the corporal. “We ought to throw ’em back, oh dear me, yes. Useless, useless, useless…”

“Okay, lads. Stand easy,” said Jackrum, glancing at Strappi in a less than friendly way. “Today we’re heading on down towards Plotz, where we’ll meet up with the other recruiting parties and you’ll be issued with your uniforms and weapons, you lucky lads. Any of you ever used a weapon? You have, Perks?”

Polly lowered her hand. “A bit, sarge. My brother taught me a bit when he was home on leave, and some of the old men in the bar where I worked gave me some, er, tips.” They had, too. It was fu

“Expert, are yer?” said Strappi, gri

“No, corporal,” said Polly meekly.

“All right,” said Jackrum. “Anyone else—”

“Hang on, sarge, I reckon we’d all like a bit of instruction from swordmeister Parts,” said Strappi. “Ain’t that right, lads?” There was a general murmuring and shrugging from the squad, who recognized a right little bullying bastard when they saw one but, treacherously, were glad he hadn’t picked on them.

Strappi drew his own sword. “Lend him one of yours, sarge,” he said. “Go on. Just a little bit of fun, eh?”

Jackrum hesitated, and glanced at Polly. “How about it, lad? You don’t have to,” he said.

I’ll have to sooner or later, Polly thought. The world was full of Strappies. If you backed away from them, they only kept on coming. You had to stop them at the start. She sighed. “Okay, sarge.”

Jackrum pulled one of his cutlasses out of his sash and handed it to Polly. It looked amazingly sharp.

“He won’t hurt you, Perks,” he said, while looking at the smirking Strappi.

“I’ll try not to hurt him either, sir,” said Polly, and then cursed herself for the idiot bravado. It must have been the socks talking.

“Oh, good,” said Strappi, stepping back. “We’ll just see what you’re made of, Parts.”

Flesh, thought Polly. Blood. Easily cut things. Oh, well…

Strappi waved his sabre like the old boys had done, down low, in case she was one of those people who thought the whole idea was to hit the other man’s sword. She ignored it, and watched his eyes, which was no great treat. He wouldn’t stick her, not mortally, not with Jackrum watching. He’d try for something that’d hurt and make everyone laugh at her. That was the Strappi type through and through. Every i

The corporal tested her more aggressively a couple of times, and twice, by luck, she managed to knock the blade out of the way. Luck would run out, though, and if she looked like putting up a decent show Strappi would sort her out good and proper. Then she remembered the cackled advice of old Gummy Abbens, a retired sergeant who’d lost his left arm to a broadsword and all his teeth to cider: “A good swordsman ’ates comin’ up against a newbie, gel! The reason bein’, he don’t know what the bugger’s go