Cadmians Choice (41 page)

Mykel waited and
watched until Senglat raised his hand and waved. “Wait here with the company,”
he told Fabrytal. “I’ll ask about watering the mounts after I talk with him.”
If need be, Mykel could insist, but he preferred to ask. He eased the roan
forward, down the narrow lane toward the two Cadmians and Gerolt.

As Troral had said,
four blackened patches had seared the ground and structures, especially just
beside the front door to the dwelling and at one corner of an outbuilding.

The patches on the
ground were long and thin, more like black streaks or lines. Mykel looked more
closely at the outbuilding. In places, the surface of the mud bricks had turned
shiny, almost glassy, and above that area the roof beams had burned through. A
third of me roof had collapsed into the small building.

Mykel reined up short
of the man in brown. “I’m Majer Mykel. Troral asked us to come out.”

“Gerolt.” The man’s
face was weathered and lined, and streaks of gray ran mrough his long hair and
short, but ragged beard. His heavily scuffed boots bore learner patches of a
lighter shade.

“Have you seen any
sign of your sister or her husband?” asked Mykel.

“No. Except he was
running from something. His boot tracks were far apart. They ended just short
of the goat barn there.”

“Mind if I look?”

“Help yourself.”

Mykel rode slowly
toward the building with me blackened corner and partly collapsed roof. As
Gerolt had said, there were boot prints—and the prints ended in a larger black
spot. Mykel had been afraid of that. He turned to Gerolt. “Troral said that not
much was missing.”

“Depends on what you
mean. Maybe three, four goats and a lamb and ewe don’t sound like much to him.
They were a lot to Sis.”

“Have you seen anyone
else?”

“Haven’t seen anyone,
except you. Did see something glowing over the hills to the southwest afore it
got full dark last night,” Gerolt said slowly. “Thought it might have been
fire. Went away too quick for that. Didn’t smell smoke. Wasn’t about to go
looking.”

“You haven’t seen any
strange tracks?”

“Told you. Haven’t
seen noming....”

Mykel asked several
more questions, but Gerolt could provide no other information, and Mykel had
the strong feeling that the man was telling the truth.

In the end, Mykel
secured permission to water the mounts. After all the mounts were watered,
Mykel and Fifteenth Company headed back southwest, in the general direction
where Gerolt had said he’d seen the glow over the hills.

“What do you think,
sir?” asked Fabrytal, riding on Mykel’s right. “Could it be those flying
things?”

“It’s possible.”
Mykel doubted it. The blackened spots left by the pteridon-like creatures had
all been more oval or circular, and the fires hadn’t been hot enough to turn
particles of sand into glass.

“What could it be?”

Mykel shrugged. He
had an idea, and he didn’t like it at all. “We’ll have to see.”

Just past midday,
Mykel called for a halt on a flat area to the north of the second line of hills
to the southwest of the stead where he had talked to Gerolt. Beyond the first
line of hills had only been a swale a vingt or so across filled with the sparse
grass that was turning from the green of late spring to the gold of
summer—before it dried completely in the arid heat of late summer and harvest.
The second line of hills held scattered junipers and bushes and rose higher than
the first. Beyond the junipers was another set of hills, rocky and more rugged,
and those were close to where the regional alector’s compound was located, from
what Mykel’s memory and maps indicated.

Mykel had halted
because men and mounts could use the rest. He would have liked water for the
horses, but water wasn’t all that plentiful around Hyalt. He had also ordered a
stop because he could sense a faint reddish purpleness beyond the
juniper-scattered hilltop. That feeling was similar to what he associated with
alectors— or at least what he had sensed aboard ship. Whether it was emanating
from just over the hilltop or from the more distant regional alector’s compound
he could not tell, but there was no reason not to look into it.

“Undercaptain.”

“Sir?”

“Hold the company
here. I’m going up the hill to check something. If you’d detail two men to
accompany me.”

“Yes, sir.” Fabrytal’s
crisp response disguised his puzzlement. “Jasakyt, Olfyn ... forward!”

Mykel concealed a
smile. Fabrytal had picked Jasakyt because the scout had worked with Mykel
before. Olfyn was far more fresh-faced, one of the latest replacements to
Fifteenth Company before Third Battalion had left Elcien.

“We’re going to ride
up the hill. Olfyn, you’ll be stationed halfway up, and Jasakyt will take
position just short of the top.”

“Yes, sir,” murmured
both rankers.

Mykel eased the roan
off the road and started across the grassland. From a distance, the ground
appeared to be unbroken tan and green, but when Mykel glanced down, he could
see patches of red-sandy soil between the clumps of grass.

After they had
covered a hundred yards and started up the gentle slope, Mykel glanced at the
older scout, whose face bore a look of fatalistic resignation. “Jasakyt, why
the long face?”

“Just thinking, sir.”

“Thinking that you
don’t want this to be like Dramur?”

“I’d hope not, sir.”

Just past the midway
point on the slope, Mykel turned to the younger Cadmian. “Olfyn, you hold here,
right over by that tree.” He gestured to a juniper that was little taller than
the head of a mounted Cadmian.

“Yes, sir.”

Jasakyt and Mykel
continued riding up the rise, avoiding the few rocks that protruded from the
grass and sandy ground, and turning as necessary to avoid the scattered low
brush and infrequent junipers. As they rode, Mykel could sense the growing
strength of the purpleness on the far side of the hill.

“Right here.” Mykel
reined up beside another larger juniper, far enough below the hillcrest that he
could not see over it—or that whoever or whatever was on the other side could
not see him. He dismounted and handed the roan’s reins to Jasakyt, then took
his rifle from its case.

“Begging your pardon,
sir, but shouldn’t I...”

“Not this time,
Jasakyt. I hope I won’t be long.”

As Mykel headed up
the last part of the hill, he could hear the scout murmur, “... worse ‘n
Dramur, maybe.”

As he neared the
crest, he realized that he could have ridden farther, because the top was flat
and extended another fifty yards before sloping down. While Mykel could see the
top of the regional alector’s building and upper part of the structure carved
out of the redstone cliff behind it, the width of the hill blocked his view of
the nearer valley south of him. The feeling of purpleness had grown ever
stronger, and he moved more deliberately, changing his approach to take
advantage of the scrub and low junipers.

When he finally
reached the south side of the ridge, he settled behind the trunk of a juniper.
For several moments, he just looked out. From what he could determine, at the
base of the ridge was a group of men in shimmering silver uniforms, trimmed in
black, with black trousers. They stood behind a cart that held a tripodal
framework. Farther to the east, mounts were tethered to a line fastened between
two junipers.

A line of light
flared from the tripod and struck the side of an embankment carved from the
lower part of the hill by a stream in wetter times. Mykel squinted. He wasn’t
certain if there happened to be a target set before the embankment. Were they
firing the device at something or just calibrating it? And who were they?

The feeling of the
purpleness was overwhelming, but he needed to know more. If he scuttled away
now, what could he say or report? That he thought he’d seen strange troopers
with a strange weapon?

He studied the
hillside below, mentally charting a path that would bring him to a section of
the lower ridge that overlooked the cart and tripod. Then, he slipped from
behind the juniper and moved downhill and behind some brush, keeping low the
entire time. From what he could tell, none of those below even looked up. From
the brush he crept to behind another juniper, and then farther downhill behind
more brush, all the time careful to keep his rifle from hitting the scattered
clumps of grass or open stretches of sandy soil.

Mykel paused to catch
his breath. From where he was, a good hundred yards below where he had started,
he had a better view of the troopers below. Both his feelings and his eyes
confirmed that the uniformed figures were alectors, and at least one was a
woman. There was not just one target, but a line of crude man-shaped figures
set up before the sandy embankment with three blackened patches on the
embankment behind where previous targets had stood. Purplish energy pulsed
around the oblong shape at the top of the tripod, from which protruded a short
crystalline barrel.

SSSSS.... A line of
blue fire seared across the brush above Mykel’s head.

He flattened himself,
trying to locate the source of the weapon that reminded him of the lightcutter
sidearm used by Submarshal Dainyl. In instants, he could see a uniformed
alector less than a hundred yards away, downhill and to his right. The alector
stood beside a juniper, scarcely bothering to conceal himself.

Another line of blue
fire flared, this time almost singeing Mykel’s shoulder, so close that he could
feel the heat.

“Wild Talent! Or an
ancient!”

Mykel wasn’t about to
have a bunch of strange alector troops after him or his company—not with those
weapons. He lifted his rifle, turning and aiming for a head shot. He’d seen
what happened when crossbow bolts and bullets struck the uniforms and
shimmering clothes of alectors. He squeezed the trigger evenly, firmly,
concentrating and willing the shot home.

The alector dropped,
his weapon tumbling from his hand.

Several of the other
uniformed alectors turned. Mykel moved sideways, still on his stomach, and
brought his rifle to bear on the tripod, and once more aimed and fired,
concentrating and willing the shot home, directing it at the source of the
energy.

Soundlessly,
brilliant white light flared across the hillside, light so intense that Mykel
was blind for several moments, and his eyes burned and watered. As his sight
returned, first in sections, with gaps in his vision, he made out an area
twenty yards across that had been seared black. The two remaining alector
troopers were a pair who had been standing beside the horses, and they clutched
at their faces. Of the others there was no sign at all.

Keeping low, Mykel
scrambled and scuttled back over the hillcrest. Once he was on the flat top of
the ridge, he didn’t bother to crouch, but moved at a slow run toward the north
side. Just before he reached the point where Jasakyt could see him, he slowed
to a swift walk.

“Sir! You all right?”
called Jasakyt.

“I’m fine.” Mykel’s
eyes burned, and his vision was blurry, but he counted himself lucky at that.
His fingers trembled slightly as he stopped to reload the rifle before he
sheathed it, and he had to make an effort to mount.

“Are you sure you’re
all right, sir? What was that light?”

“One of those strange
creatures exploded,” Mykel replied. “Then some more did. It was bright enough
that it was hard to see for a bit. For the time, though, we won’t have to worry
about them.” What he said wasn’t a total lie. There had been strange creatures
and an explosion, and they wouldn’t have to worry for now. What would happen
later was another question, but he wasn’t about to explain exactly what
happened, not until he had a chance to think things through. He settled himself
in the saddle and turned the roan downslope.

“If you don’t mind my
saying so, sir,” said Jasakyt once he had pulled his mount alongside Mykel’s, “I’m
thinking this could be worse than Dramur.”

“It could be, or it
might not. We’ll still have to see.”

“Yes, sir.” Jasakyt’s
polite response carried a tone of great doubt.

Mykel laughed. What
else could he do? “You may be right, Jasakyt, but do they ever deploy us for
something easy?”

“No, sir. But
sometimes you hope.”

When they reached
Olfyn, the younger scout looked to Jasakyt and then Mykel.

“More of those
creatures,” Mykel said. “We don’t have to worry for now.”

The two scouts
trailed Mykel, letting him get farther ahead, until Olfyn murmured to Jasakyt, “What...
did he do?”

“You don’t ask, and
you don’t tell anyone ... majer’s saved more asses by putting his on the line.
Good commanders ... hard to come by ...”

Mykel smiled
ironically. Just how long could he keep that reputation? Especially with
alectors in strange uniforms and strange weapons appearing? What was he
supposed to do? Should he just ignore it? If he did, and the strange alector
engineers or troopers were part of what had been reported as an insurgency,
then not warning someone could mean a disastrous attack for which no one would
be prepared, with huge losses. If that happened, not only would far too many
Cadmians and others be killed, but his own future would be problematical, and
that was if he even survived. Yet he couldn’t report too much to Colonel
Herolt, and by the time the colonel relayed the report to the Marshal of
Myrmidons ...

He snorted, then
looked toward the company, still waiting. Fabrytal rode toward him, meeting him
a good score of yards away from the head of the column.

“Sir?” The
undercaptain’s voice was polite, but solicitous. “Were there more creatures
over the hill?”

“For a time,” Mykel
lied, adding more truthfully, “I wish I knew where they came from and how we
could handle them better.”