She snorts. "That won't be a problem."

Witred returns with her two outriders the next day. Both are rangy, with weather-beaten skin that masks their youth. One has a nose with three gold rings in it and more yet-to-heal empty piercing holes dotting his ears and lips, while the other has her right arm tattooed with a night sky split by lightning and the left with a winding strand of black barbed wire impaling five people and three horses. They wear the fatigues of the Last War (the North's brown for the man, the South's gray for the woman) with insignias removed, slit sleeves, and unfastened at the chest to show quilted silk vests underneath. Both have shown up with a couple of horses each, sprightlier creatures than Witred's brute. Where Witred carries just a stubby pepperbox pistol, they have a sawn-off musket or shotgun on each belt and the distinctive shape of a revolver-rifle extends from their saddle-holsters. 

"This is Kagge and Attmet," Witred says by way of introduction, nodding to each for Lemrae's benefit as the names are the opposite way round from what Baelo custom would assume. "Of the High Forest and Spotted Bear, respectively, not that those will mean much to you. Telegraph-master, if you want them to ride and shoot for you, pay their shot and feed and they'll be glad to keep their skills sharp until the next war breaks out."

"My horses do have big appetites," Attmet adds, his face crinkling in amused anticipation of a haggling session. Kagge sighs, rolls her eyes, and crosses her arms.

Lemrae looks the outriders and their horses up and down, paying extra attention to their weapons. The guns seem clean and well taken care of. Their fashions are unusual by his lights, but that bothers him little: with Witred's recommendation, he can be reasonably confident in their reliability.

"Well met. The job here is rather unusual, but keep your skills sharp it will." Lemrae names a daily wage -- it's on the low end of his budget, but not insultingly so.

He can also grant them the authority to requisition water and feed for the horses from the telegraph relay stations. He doesn't mention this yet, though: he'll bring it up after they haggle for a bit, so it seems like a concession.

That does provide a strong edge in the negotiations, and with that perk included they settle on a wage not much higher than his initial offer. 

"What is the job, then?" Kagge asks, once the deal is settled and recorded. 

"Magneto-kinetic telegraph resistivity desaturation", Lemrae says, smiling at a private joke. "We need you to shoot telegraph lines with guns."

He goes on to explain the procedure: climb the pole, fire down the line, check for damage to the wire and record it, ride five miles, repeat. It takes a little under two hours to explain everything -- mostly the geographic codes that the Telegram Partnership uses to identify different lines and rest stops.

They'll prove quick studies, and notably better than Lemrae at the climbing and shooting parts. (And the riding parts too, but that goes without saying for Ctarrian nomads.)