IronStar (39 page)

“Is Kirrah
’jasa
sorry for
our body-sharing?” Steady gray eyes searched her face.
No guilt, no regrets,
just asking
…

“No, Irshe
’jasa
, never
sorry. Just …I’m sort of surprised at myself, it’s not like me at all…” One
black eyebrow raised. “Yes, it must be like me, I did it. And I’m not even a
little sorry! And I want to do it again! I
am
concerned that we do not
misunderstand one another. You know my Navy may be coming, perhaps in one
hundred twenty days or less. You know I am oathbound to them.”

“As I am to Talam. And I know there
may be fighting before then, and that my life serves your orders. This is a
time between those times.” Kirrah goggled inwardly a moment at the man’s simple
acceptance of things-as-they-are, and even more when Irshe added:

“Again? How soon?”

Somewhat later that morning, they
got back to the job of saving their nation, of bringing the planet’s technology
into the equivalent of nineteenth century old Terra, of preparing the Talamae
to greet the Regnum, and preparing the planet’s inhabitants to rejoin humanity
and the greater Civilium society.
One thing at a time…

“Courage is not the absence of
fear, but rather the judgement that something else is more important than
fear.” Ambrose Redmoon, ancient Terran author

Akaray whooped and laughed as he
raced excitedly up and down the twenty-meter deck of the newest ship in the
Talamae Navy, the
Flowerpot II.
Captain Og’drai at the helm was
positively beaming, and Maka’ra the shipwright and Wai’thago the blacksmith,
standing together by the port rail, seemed lost in an orgy of mutual
congratulations.

Not that they didn’t deserve congratulations,
Kirrah admitted. The small steam-turbine vessel was finally performing to her
expectations. The latest modifications to the propeller design had done the
trick… coarser pitch, that made all the difference. They were steaming across
the small lake beside the city of Talameths’cha, making an honest eleven knots
- twenty kph according to the wristcomp’s inertial nav readout, and this, to
everyone else’s awe and wonder, was straight into the evening breeze.

Smoke and a few sparks trailed out
astern, and the early evening air was filled with sounds not heard on this
planet before - the whirr and hiss of the turbine, the rumble of the
driveshaft, the grinding rattle of the gearpump recirculating the condensed
steam.
To say nothing of Akaray’s laughter
, she added mentally -
I
don’t think I’ve heard that since I met him
.

At this rate, modification on the
other three steam ships should be done in four or five more days, and meanwhile
the swivel-mount mortars could be tested: two firing forward, one midships on
each side, and two at the stern. A pair of fore-and-aft rigged masts completed
the vessel’s eclectic design. Sail power was needed to stretch the fuel supply
at opportunity. Kirrah’s concerns about efficiency had been borne out fully,
and with all the firewood they could carry, the turbine could be operated only
about a day and a half before exhausting its onboard fuel.

But according to the best estimates
of the Talamae sailors and Fleet-Captain Schmado’s educated opinion, under sail
alone they could outpace the O’dai excise ships as long as they were sailing
across or into the wind. Downwind, the disadvantages of shorter waterline
length and the drag of the unused propeller was too much to overcome. However
when under steam power, the new ships would be unbeatable. It appeared this
world was about to be introduced to a whole new set of naval tactics.

As the western sky began to color
orange and yellow with dusk, they turned toward the shipwright’s docks. This
took them past a half kilometer of Talameths’cha waterfront, where the many
newly-energized activities were drawing to a close with the day’s end. A
section of docks was untenanted, where the fleet of barges sent to carry the
stranded O’dai sailors home had left a few days ago. Another section of
waterfront was crowded with the hundred or more fire-rafts they still kept in
reserve against enemy ships. They soon approached their home docks. Captain
Og’drai ordered the steam valve turned to “bypass” a conservative sixty meters
out, and they coasted and rowed to their moorings by the light of torches just
set out.

An hour later, Kirrah, Akaray,
Irshe and the senior teaching staff were at dinner in the courtyard of the
‘Stone in a River’ school. As the dishes from their appetizer course were being
removed, Kirrah’s wristcomp alarm sounded. She glanced at it, smiled, opened
her mouth to speak. The alarm bells began to ring on the north wall. Sour,
worried looks were exchanged at the sound - two high notes and one low,
‘enemy
approaching’
. Quickly setting aside their half-eaten meal, Kirrah, Irshe
and corporal Mastha’cha mounted their horses and trotted briskly the few blocks
to the nearest gate. Inside the gate a cluster of worried-looking farmers and
merchants from outside the walls were gathered. Irshe was first up the tower’s
inside ladder. As Kirrah arrived at the top, the light of a glowing maroon
sunset picked out the approaching column of Wrth horsemen three kilometers to
the northeast across the plains. As they watched, a straggling family of farmers
came galloping down the north road on three over-driven draft horses, two
riders each. Another pair of horses was visible hurriedly being mounted at the
nearest farmhouse. Down Falling Ash Road behind them, the quick tramp of feet
announced the arrival of two platoons of longbowmen.

“Irshe! What is this? They agreed
to stop fighting! They have already begun grazing outside Malame’thsha!”

“We will know in another five
bhrakka
,
Warmaster”, Irshe replied.
Yeah,
they’re not in a big hurry, they’ll be at the gates in another twenty minutes
,
Kirrah translated the time units almost without noticing. The archers were
already deploying along the top of the wall. Shortly the ladder clattered again
as Peetha swarmed up to join them, her slim shadowed figure breathing deeply,
but not noticeably winded by the kilometer jog and twelve-meter climb.

“Warmaster, at your command!” the
younger woman saluted, then followed Kirrah’s gesture toward the northeast. “Is
that the alarm, Warmaster? That is no war party… see, they are not travelling
in
fires
of thirty, it is a peaceful caravan.” Kirrah sighed with
relief.

When the Wrth arrived under the
gates shortly thereafter, it became obvious their intentions were not hostile.
The elder leading the caravan introduced himself as Paltok’a. In the torchlight
at the gate, he looked very old, white-haired, the outside two fingers and half
of his left hand missing from an old injury. Peetha whispered to Kirrah that he
was the eldest of the Wrth elders, respected for his past deeds but with few
remaining close friends, and little political influence in council. After
introductions, Paltok’a announced that he had brought the Wrth children for
training, according to the terms of the treaty between Wrth and Kirrah. Which
was a little different from the treaty between Wrth and
Talam
which
Kirrah had understood to be the case, but this seemed a poor time to quibble
over details. As the fifty or so riders dismounted, their true statures quickly
revealed them as a collection of children, ranging in apparent age from eight
or nine to fifteen Standard years.

“Gods, Peetha! Where will we put
fifty children for the night?”

“Warmaster, they should sleep in
their own tents outside the walls. Let me assign warriors to assist your new
students setting up camp.”

“Please do. New students! We don’t
even have a school for them! I was not expecting them so
soon
!”

“We have Stone-in-a-River school…”
began a calm voice so close behind them that Kirrah whirled and Peetha’s Kruss
bushknife came half out of its new sheath.

“Issthe! How do you
do
that!?”
Kirrah near-gasped.

“I regret startling you both,
Warmaster, Peetha. I only wish to tell you that Stone-in-a-River school could
send teachers to the children’s camp, until space can be found in the city. If
you would describe what you want them to learn.”

“That would be very helpful,
Issthe. Did you come all the way up on this wall to tell me this?”

“No, Kirrah Warmaster. I came to
tell you we have a new patient you need to hear. I regret carrying new burdens
to you, but time may be short.”

So this is what a Talamae
hospital looks like
, Kirrah thought as she stepped through the door from
the school’s inner courtyard behind Issthe. A light fragrance filled the air
from a small brassier, and dim but adequate light from a few candles showed
clean plaster walls and a spotless stone floor. Along the walls, ranked shelves
held dozens of bottles and jars, a few bunches of leaves and some whole plants.
In the center of the room was a padded table bearing a man’s pale form. There
was a priest at the head and another at the foot of the table, standing
quietly, palms raised facing one another across the length of the recumbent
man, almost as though praying.

Issthe walked to the patient’s side
and took his left hand in hers, in the same grip the Talamae used in greeting,
fingers around the wrist at the base of the thumb. Her right hand rested
lightly on the back of the man’s left hand, then moved up his arm to rest on
his shoulder.

“Is he…?” Issthe’s eyes touched the
priestess at the man’s head, a young woman about Peetha’s age.

“Ladyship, he rests, but he has
slipped below consciousness and his
ath’la
grows ragged and restless.
Much blood was lost reaching us. We may not hear his words again.” Behind her,
Kirrah heard a soft sigh escape Irshe, and as softly, the name:

“Ana’the.” And then with a shock,
she recognized the border guardsman who had been with Irshe’s squad when they
first met, the young man who had gone ahead to alert the town of their
approach, the very first Talamae archer to hit a target with her new longbow.
This pale figure breathing so shallowly had escaped her recognition, which for
some reason she found intensely embarrassing.

“Issthe, do you know his injuries?”
she asked.

“I suspect blood is leaking inside
his chest,” the priestess replied. “Here is the arrow we removed from his back.
It looked just deep enough to reach the back of his heart.”

“Can you…” Kirrah began.

“Can you help him?” Irshe breathed.

“…help him?” she finished, in
unison. “Would your
ath’lae’mara
not fix him?”

“We have done all we can. The
bleeding from his back has stopped, and from the other, minor arrow wound, but
if it continues inside… he is already very weak. I am sorry, Kirrah,
ath’lae’mara
does not ‘fix’, not like mending a torn garment.”

Irshe, who had taken the offered
bloody arrow in his hands, lifted it and said: “This is an O’dai quarrel.
Ana’the was on patrol to the southwest, south of the river Geera. How did he
come here?” The priestess at Ana’the’s head replied:

“The city guard brought him. His
horse was seen swimming across the river at dusk. A merchant’s son pulled him
from the water barely conscious and called the guards, who brought him to us
directly.”

“Issthe”, Kirrah said. “I have seen
you work wonders with other injuries, I have felt your hands myself. But if you
can do nothing further, let me try.”

“Kirrah, of course. How may we
assist?”

“Turn him over, I need to put part
of my suit on his back.” Strong hands gently lifted the sheet the man was lying
on, rolled him carefully onto his face, and lowered him back on the table. The
woman at his head carefully positioned his face to ease his shallow rapid
breathing. A low moan escaped his lips as his position shifted.

Kirrah swiftly opened her suit and
separated the shallow backpack. Issthe and the other priestess carefully
removed the poultice which had stopped the bleeding, exposing the 2-centimeter
angry red mouth of the wound under the man’s left shoulder blade. Kirrah placed
the suitpack over his lower back and withdrew two diagnostic probes on thin
cables. The blunt tip of one she inserted a centimeter into the wound, the
other, a short needle, went into a vein in the crook of the man’s elbow. The
suitpack busied itself for a moment, then diagnostics flowed across the screen
of the nearby wristcomp.

“You are correct”, she said. “He is
bleeding slowly, probably from a nick in the back of his heart. His chest is
filling with blood and crowding his… his breath.”
Damn! Can’t say ‘lungs’.
Should have read a medical vocabulary into the wristcomp.
“This device will
help. I will need a basin.” One of the younger students who had somehow joined
them hurried to comply. Kirrah watched the suitpack’s analysis scroll down the
screen:

<
Severe blood loss:

< tachycardia, coma and death imminent
>

<
Thoracic edema: significant pulmonary
dysfunction
>

<
Recommend immediate surgery to arrest
hemorrhage
>

<
Recommend immediate drainage of thoracic
cavity
>

<
Recommend immediate blood transfusion:

<
  
type O haemoset 3b or 4
>

<
Recommend anti-infective Salvitoxa or
Orthocillin-C
>

<
Recommend immediate care by qualified
medical personnel>