IronStar (40 page)

Kirrah authorized the “immediate
surgery”. Under half a dozen watchful and wondering pairs of eyes, she used the
wristcomp’s screen to guide the active end of the first probe to extend itself
deeper into the man’s back wound and clip itself to the back of his rapidly
beating heart. There its tiny claws unfolded and clamped shut the spurting
three-millimeter nick in the heart muscle, and extruded a fast-setting
biopolymer adhesive that tightly and thoroughly glued the wound shut. She then
reconfigured the probe as a drainage tube, and the suitpack began pumping the
pooled blood out of his chest, up the tube and out a drain into the ready
basin.

“Blood! I need blood! I mean…”
Several eyes, already widened at the viewer’s image of the man’s interior and
the sight of the gore filling the basin, looked at her in some alarm.
Damn,
now I have to show them transfusions…
“Sorry. Issthe, with this device I
can replace some of the blood he has lost. I can borrow a little from a healthy
person, but they must be the right type and
gnnnn
, I don’t have the
words, and he doesn’t have the time to explain!”

“You can
borrow
… Tell us,
Kirrah. Whatever you ask, we do.” Calm, dark gray eyes simply accepted what was
happening.

“Yes, ok, someone take that third
probe, that’s right, the thin string on the other side of the backpack, and
pull it out… good… now touch the end and a small needle will come out - that’s
right - now stick that against the skin, just a finger prick will do, it will
take one drop of blood…” Irshe was first to give a sample.

“Good, now let the probe go back
into the suitpack, it will clean itself in a moment, now the next person… good.
In a few moments, the device will tell us the best blood for this man…
everyone’s blood is different, but between any two people, some can be safely
borrowed and some cannot.” Issthe was next, then the other two priests, then
the two students. None matched to the satisfaction of the suitpack’s analyzer.

“More people! Find me more people!
This will not harm anyone, and it will save Ana’the’s life! Hurry!” Students
scurried from the room, Irshe following. In under a minute, a lineup was
forming at the door. Three students, rejected as fast as the probe could cycle.
Slaetra and Brai’klao, rejected. Two more students, rejected, one just barely.
Two more priests, not even close. Peetha, at a run from somewhere… rejected.
Tash’ta her maid, rejec… no! A 98 percent match!

“Tash’ta! Please lie down on - on
that extra table, thank you, whoever set that up. There, wonderful, this won’t
hurt at all…” Hurriedly Kirrah’ fingers secured a probe to the vein in Tash’ta’
elbow and set the suitpack to filter and transfuse blood into the dying man. As
soon as the flow began, a deep sigh flowed out of his mouth. Simultaneously the
wristcomp’s alarm beeped, and the priests at his head and feet stepped back.
Kirrah spun to read the wristcomp’s display, and began tapping keys quickly.

“Kirrah… Kirrah, he is departed,”
Issthe said softly.

“What…
what
?”

“His
ath’la
, we felt it lift
from his body, the body is stilled. I am sorry.”

“
Oh, no it isn’t!
His heart
has stopped, that is all. Don’t look at me like that… just watch!” Kirrah
tapped a few final keys, authorizing the medcare program to deliver a dose of
chemical stimulant into the man’s heart and provide a small electrical shock
directly to the heart muscle. The body twitched, once, twice. A shiver ran down
both arms, and a ragged breath drew in and out, and again, and again.
Finally!
A reaction out of Issthe!
Kirrah thought to herself as the tall priestess
rubbed her eyes like a small child on Christmas morning. Everyone else was
watching openmouthed, the two priest healers at head and foot with tears
running down their faces. Irshe was holding Ana’the’s free hand in a deathgrip,
his eyes closed. As the transfusion and drainage continued, Kirrah explained:

“My suit’s healing device has given
his heart a powerful stimulus. His heart was only resting, now it has returned
to work. With the blood we are adding, he will be weak but probably recover.”
The screen beeped again for attention. Kirrah read:

<
E/C Cardiostim SUCCESSFUL at 6.0
joules, normal sinus rhythm restored.
>

<
WARNING: Subject still at risk due to
blood loss and possible infection:
>

<
Recommend continued blood transfusion,
additional 2.4 lt minimum.
>

<
Recommend anti-infective Salvitoxa or
Orthocillin-C
>

<
Recommend immediate care by qualified
medical personnel>

Kirrah approved the expenditure of
one of her irreplaceable doses of antibiotic, and looked up into Issthe's gaze.

“This healing device is only a
small one. When trade with the Regnum begins, we will have a whole building
full of devices more powerful than this. On my birthworld, almost no one dies
of an injury, unless the head is damaged or treatment is delayed.”

“I am deeply impressed,” said
Issthe. “We have never seen one return from a heart that has ‘only’ stopped.
His
ath’la
lifted out, then flowed back. A little ragged, but returned.
It seems that not only Wrth children will want learning at your new school.”
The wristcomp beeped again.

“Tash’ta, thank you, that is
enough. Ana’the needs more blood, but we must find another volunteer, we do not
want to weaken you.” The girl’s eyelids fluttered open. “Ana’the will need
another two measures of blood to be safe. I am sure we can find more people
whose blood type matches. Please find others to be tested.

“Tash’ta, you can get up now…
what’s
wrong
, girl?”

“Warmaster,” the young woman said
shakily, “I was told you needed someone’s blood. I thought you meant
all
of it…”

“
What!
” Kirrah’s jaw fell.
“They did not say it would not harm you?”

“No, Warmaster, Patat’th was in a
hurry, he just said…”

“And you came anyway?”

“Yes, Warmaster, of course.” Tash’ta
sat up a little unsteadily on the second table and put one hand on Kirrah’s arm
for support.

Kirrah looked accusingly around the
circle of people now crowding the small room. “
How many others thought I was
asking for their lives?
” she demanded. There was an uncomfortable shuffling
in the room, including two of the students, and Slaetra and Brai’klao.

“
Ahhh! People!
Do not throw
your lives at me so! I cannot bear it! Slaetra! You were just going to watch me
slay Tash’ta?”

“Kirrah,” Slaetra said, her eyes
somber but her lips quirking upwards. “You are our Warmaster. You command every
life in Talam. We are completely serious about this. You have used this
shee’thomm
magnificently, better than anyone who has ever led us in war. I doubt there
are a hundred persons in this entire city who would not give their life to your
request, without question or hesitation. None, certainly, in this school.

“However, it is a relief to know
that this particular request was not so dire, and I’m
sure
Master
Brai’klao will want to have a word with the young man who delivered your
message, about the virtues of
clarity
, at his next class
if not
before
.” From the look exchanged by the two senior Masters, and the arch of
Slaetra’s eyebrows, Kirrah could well imagine the lad’s fate. Irshe appeared at
the door with another half dozen volunteers, and the crowd began to disperse in
a hum of voices.

Some ninety minutes later, with two
more units of fresh, compatible blood in him, Ana’the was resting comfortably
in the priests’ care. Kirrah and Irshe walked together across the torchlit
courtyard to her apartment.

“Irshe
’jasa
, your people
still surprise me.” In the faint light of the small inner moon, she could
imagine one dark eyebrow sliding half a centimeter up his forehead. “Tash’ta just…
just threw her life to me, without a word of protest, not even a question. So
did Slaetra and the others who were misinformed by that, that unfortunate
student. Are the Talamae not afraid of death?”

“Of course we are, Kirrah’
jasa
.
Tash’ta was terrified. I did not see it, but she told me later she almost
fainted when your device selected her.”

“Being afraid, but acting anyway -
in the Regnum Navy, we call that ‘
courage
’. Here, not only soldiers,
everyone seems to have …more of it, more than I am used to. It is the reason I
am sure we will win…
when
I am sure.

“But I do not want Tash’ta, or you,
to think that I will barter lives like that, just spend one to save another. It
is not…” Irshe’s touch on her arm stopped her stride and her words. He stepped
in front of her, and looked down into her face with a puzzled expression.

“Kirrah - you have surely commanded
men in warfare before. I have. The barter of lives is the
task
of the
commander. If we did not believe you would do it, and do it well, we would not follow
you. When you sent Rash’koi and a few archers to harass the Wrth outside our
walls at night, when you let five hundred enemy ride into the city into an
untested trap, when you ran down to the river to strike with your
not-sword
against
the O’dai vessels, you were trading lives to save lives. This is not something
to be ashamed of.”

“It just seems so… so easy, Irshe -
go there - do that - die here - while I give the commands. I
do
feel
ashamed that it is not I, accepting the risks, every time.”

“Kirrah’
jasa
, the word you
used,
anshath’la
, to us it means not only willingness to do something
necessary which one is afraid of doing. It also means doing something necessary
which one is
ashamed
of doing. When you demanded Doi’tam
-fira'tachk
serve, not according to
his
honor, but
yours
, everyone at that
meeting knew that you were his commander. It is why he shifted, and why he has
worked so hard for you ever since, training and rebuilding the cavalry.”

“I did not understand what my
object-which-speaks
meant, when it translated the Regnum word ‘
courage’
into
anshath’la
.
That literally means “arm of the spirit”. Now, I think you have a most
realistic language.” They resumed walking side by side. “By the way, the name
‘Ana’the’ seems close to
anshae
, ‘arm’. Do you know if it has a
meaning?”

“It means ‘strong-of-arm’, in the
old dialect. His mother chose that name - as an infant he clung strongly to her
breast.”

“You knew his mother?”

“She was my mother’s sister.
Ana’the is my cousin-by-blood, I grew up caring for him when his parents
traveled.”

“I am so sorry, Irshe
’jasa
,
I did not know. As soon as he becomes conscious, we must hear his story.”

“I am afraid his story is all too
clear, Warmaster. He was on patrol south of the Geera. He was attacked by O’dai
light cavalry, they use that style of quarrel Issthe pulled from his back. I
believe they were an advance party for a larger force. That would be their
standard procedure in enemy territory, to hunt and stop scouts like Ana’the.
What the O’dai were unable to accomplish by Wrth and by river, they now attempt
by land. Soon.” Now it was Kirrah’s turn to stop Irshe, and look up into his
face.

“Irshe, we are as prepared as we
can be, for whatever they attempt. I am weary after this day, and I want to be
rested for whatever comes. Do you think you could
not
call me
‘Warmaster’ for the rest of the night? Without risking the realm, of course?”

“As my friend wishes.” His voice
conveyed the smile that darkness masked. “One other thing, Kirrah’
jasa
.
As we sat at dinner earlier tonight, your
device-which-speaks
made a
sound, and you smiled…”

“Oh, I had forgotten, Irshe
’jasa
.
The device was reminding me. Today is the day I calculated, if all has gone
well, that my, …my friends from the Regnum Navy, will be setting out on their
journey here.”
Why didn’t you say ‘rescuers’ like you started to,
Lieutenant? Not so anxious to be ‘rescued’ any more, are we?

Shortly thereafter they sank
gratefully onto what Kirrah had come to think of as ‘their’ bed, and fell
swiftly asleep in one another’s embrace. In what seemed like far too little
time, they were awakened shortly before dawn by fresh peals of alarm bells from
the south wall.

“A fair fight will count as
evidence of poor tactical planning on your part.” - unofficial sign over the
door to the Naval Warfare Tactical Simulator at the Regnum War Academy.

Kirrah rubbed sleep from her eyes
and sipped steaming hot brew from the mug graciously provided by Mastha’cha.
From this height atop a riverfront guard tower, she could look south through
the thin morning drizzle straight across the small lake, and see the O’dai
encampment formed up on the southwest shore. Hundreds of tents, baggage trains,
piles of equipment, horsemen, colorful banners, and four or five
ominous-looking long-beamed machines in various stages of assembly, spread out
across the plains.

“
Damn!
” she said in the
Regnum language. “Sorry, Opeth, I don’t have words to curse satisfyingly in
Talamae. But when I developed the mortar tubes with Wai’thago, I expected they
would fill our needs until the Regnum Navy arrived. Now I wish I had made
larger tubes, able to throw farther.”

“One wishes to apologize to our
guest from the ‘other shore of the sky’,” said the weathered Armsmaster, his thin
gray hair and bushy eyebrows beading in the fine drizzle. “It is not our custom
to be invaded every tenday. We have had years of peace, until the Wrth began
their raids last winter. I fear our guest will form a poor opinion of the
people of this world.”

“Your ‘guest’ lays all this at the
feet of the Kruss, Armsmaster. I am sure there were disagreements and
unfriendly ambition here before they came, but they have thrown oil on every
small flame they could find, seeking to inflame human civilization. I wish I
knew how many they are, and how long they’ve been here. Our captive told me
sixteen plus guards, but I trust him not at all.”

Kirrah turned and looked back
across the small lake which formed the south termination of the city. Three
tributaries of the river Geera met at its east end. The Upper Geera flowed in
from the northeast, along which she and Irshe’s party had first approached the
city over eighty days ago. The Geeratha - ‘mother of Geera’ - flowed from due
east across the plains. A third, the South Geera, arrived from due south to
disgorge its waters into the complex weave of currents. Between the South Geera
and the lake’s outflow at its west end, the south shore was a four-hundred
meter wide, nearly circular projection of low-lying land bulging out into the
eight hundred meter long lake. O’dai soldiers were spread over this entire
peninsula, setting up tents and erecting equipment as though they owned the
place.

“Those machines look even larger
than the siege weapons we saw on the O’dai ships. I believe they can throw a
large stone farther than our arrows. I expect they will attack our towers and
our new riverside wall, and then hope to cross the river on rafts with their
infantry. How many do you think they are?”

“I see five large siege weapons,”
the grizzled Armsmaster replied. “I would say eight thousand infantry and
archers, and about two thousand light cavalry. There may be another thousand
men handling baggage and supplies. And unless I’m mistaken, those ten large
carts carry smaller siege weapons, siegebows and catapults intended for use
against massed archers and infantry. It seems the O’dai also know your teaching
about ‘rock, scissors, paper’ - every weapon has a weakness, and they have
brought an answer for each of ours. A fast charge would put those light cavalry
among our archers before we could loose four arrows.”

“I hope that’s what they think,
Opeth. No offence,” she amended, seeing his eyebrows raise, “but if they expect
to get horses among a company of pike and archers, they will be painfully
re-educated. I think we may finally have a job for the cavalry that Doi’tam
-fira'tachk
has been training so hard. We are going to have to destroy those siege weapons,
hopefully
before
they are ready. How long do you think they will take to
set up?”

“Three
takka
, if they hurry. They seem to be in no rush.”

“So it seems. They are acting more
like farmers at a festival,” said Irshe from behind her.

“Perhaps we can show them a
festival,” said Kirrah. “Will they parley, do you think, or do we go straight
to fighting?”

“We can try parley, Warmaster,”
said Opeth, “…but no one sends an army like this,” his callused right hand
swept the far shore, “this far, to seek parley. Their Wrth allies failed them,
now they are here to take our city themselves.”

“I want to talk with them first,
Armsmaster. Whether they negotiate or just make demands, whatever they say will
tell us something. How do we arrange a parley that is safe for both sides? I
remember the treachery of their Captain Durkalo.”

“We shall arrange it, Warmaster.”

“Let us also begin preparations,
Armsmaster. Here’s what I want ready by noon, if we see signs that they are
about to operate their throwing-machines.
Trebuchets
, in my native
language. First, inform Doi’tam
-fira'tachk
, then…”.

Within minutes, couriers were
carrying orders across the city. Soon, thin trickles of smoke began to rise
from the four new steamboats at the docks, upriver. A Talamae rowboat crossed
halfway across the small lake and a courier fired an arrow with a blunt end and
a message scroll attached, onto the south shore. Half an hour later, several
brightly-dressed O’dai carried the arrow to the river’s edge, and made a small
show of breaking and burning it.
So much for negotiations,
Kirrah
muttered darkly.
On to Plan B
.

“One of the trebuchets is already
erect! Hurry the loading!” Kirrah winced inwardly as the young sailor flinched
under her totally redundant nagging.

“Yes, Warmaster!” Seeing a familiar
face among the soldiers streaming onto the steamship, Kirrah called:

 
“Hu'dakai-
dakka'tachk
!”

“Yes, Warmaster!”

“Find Doi’tam-
fira'tachk
and
Prax’soua-
ro'tachk
and tell them I want to see them there, on the dock,
immediately.” The man saluted and ran up the gangplank to where men and horses
were being packed onto the deck of the
Flowerpot II
.

“Irshe! Have you seen… there he
is!” Kirrah collared Lieutenant Rash’koi as he arrived from the city street,
and they waited together. In moments the other two soldiers joined them,
Prax’soua still looking a little uncomfortable with his new sergeant’s ribbons
and full-length chain mail. Kirrah addressed them all:

“Soldiers of Talam, heed your
Warmaster! We have practiced each step of this dance many times. Today we bring
it all together in the face of the enemy, for the first time. Everyone’s life
will depend on everyone doing exactly as we practiced, no less and no more. I
remind you this is not your traditional way of fighting, but if you trust what
we have learned, we will prevail. We must destroy those trebuchets, or our
walls will not stand. Is everyone ready?” A chorus of assents did but little to
reassure the butterflies swarming in her belly.

“The other
steamships
signal
ready, Warmaster,” said Captain Og’drai, who had materialized at her side.

“Board, everyone. Captain, you know
a place to land us?”

“Yes, Warmaster. Between the South
Geera branch and the sandbar, there is a small deep hole where we fished as
children. It will let us land the men.” The four steamboats pulled away from
the docks and turned under oar power until they were facing south. The drizzle
had stopped as they’d begun loading, and now a shaft of wan sunlight pierced
the thinning overcast. A huge grin on his weathered face, Captain Og’drai
struck twice on the ship’s bell, and each of the four vessels shipped their oars
and began to gather speed as their propellers bit the water. Behind them,
another dozen smaller oar-powered cargo boats set out. Three hundred meters
across the lake, men were visible scrambling back from the shore to report to
their masters.

“
Speed
, Captain! Don’t give
them time to prepare for our landing! They will not expect us to cross so fast!
Don’t slow down! If we break your ship I will make you a new one!”

“Yes Warmaster. It will be the most
glorious half-
bhrakka
in the history of the Talamae navy!”
You’re
right about that,
thought Kirrah.
All that work building these ships,
for a strategically critical two-minute run across a lake the size of a
medium-sized city park.

“Ready forward mortars! Continuous
fire!” the Captain bellowed. Puffs of smoke blossomed from all four vessels as
they began lofting mortar rounds into the O’dai encampment. Shouts and the
sounds of explosions drifted from the south shore where the first volley of
eight exploded in the enemy encampment. Seconds later, the second volley
followed. By the time they approached the south shore, the seventh volley was
firing. O’dai infantry were gathering at the shoreline in ragged clumps,
crossbowmen and swordsmen.
No horse yet, good…
A dozen crossbow quarrels
from the O’dai thunked into the wood of the ship, a few spanging harmlessly off
armor or raising a grunt or curse as they punched a mailed soldier.

“Grenade arrows, fly!” Rash’koi
shouted from the starboard rail. Smaller but devastating explosions tore into
the nearest O’dai formations. Suddenly the ship swung left and ground to a halt
a few meters from the bank, next to a small ancient wharf. Sailors swiftly
lowered a ramp over the side and Major Doi’tam and the other fifteen heavy
cavalry that could fit on the steamship’s deck, thundered down into the shallow
water and up the meter-high bank. Behind them poured the twenty-five pikemen
and twenty archers who had crammed into every available space on or below deck.
The other three steamships landed seconds behind them, already debarking men
and horses to left and right. The two mortar tubes on the bow and the midship
and stern tubes on the ship’s starboard side facing the shore, kept up a steady
barrage of fire into the center of the O’dai encampment. As the heavy cavalry
made short work of the enemy archers and swordsmen in the immediate vicinity,
Kirrah raced down the ramp and up the bank. She was gratified to see her
company already forming up with a double row of pike facing the enemy, archers
behind them and cavalry returning to their assigned position at the flanks.
Nice
Major Doi’tam, good boy! No glorious charges, not here!

Two hundred meters away across the
milling confusion that had been an orderly war camp, soldiers and cavalry were
visible forming up. As she watched, half a dozen mortar rounds landed in an
irregular pattern among them, throwing screaming horses and less identifiable
bits in all directions. The enemy formation surged, then scattered again under
the pounding.
Now’s the time!

“Sappers, ready!” The three men and
a woman, each carrying three demolition charges, stepped forward. “Start with
that one, let’s go!” Her arm pointed to the nearest trebuchet, a half-assembled
affair of ten and twenty meter wood beams, rollers and ropes sixty meters
downstream. As a mass, the Talamae formation moved down upon the siege weapon.
Its workers quickly abandoned their position and raced west to help their
fellows at the next emplacement. Explosions continued to pound the O’dai
wherever they grouped. In a few moments, the Talamae formation engulfed the
enemy device. Cavalry swords chopped at ropes while the sappers set their
iron-bound gunpowder charges under the device’s main hinge.

“Fire in the hole!” called the
woman in charge of the sappers, using a time-honored Terran phrase Kirrah had
introduced to the Talamae language. Their entire formation moved off at a brisk
trot toward the next trebuchet, another fifty meters downstream. More Talamae
longbowmen were approaching in the smaller oar-driven boats.
Sixty-four
heavy cavalry, a hundred pike, eighty archers onside, another hundred twenty
archers on the way - not bad for their first amphibious landing,
Kirrah
congratulated herself.
Still, this is a raid, not a conquest. Keep focused,
Lieutenant…

Behind her, a huge
boom!
almost lifted them off their feet as the charge detonated. Pieces of wood
flailed through the air, one meter-long chunk knocking down two archers.
Shattered beams splashed into the lake and thudded to the sandy beach and onto
the patchy
not-grass
. An audible groan came from the O’dai camp. Some of
the workers at the second trebuchet were already running toward the third
machine another forty meters downstream. It was already assembled, its beam arm
horizontal, swung to be facing away from them and drawing lower at the end as
men frantically winched it down.

“Doi’tam
-fira'tachk
! Take
forty horse and attack the third machine, before it can throw! Then return
immediately! You have less than one bhrakka!
Move
!” The big horseman wheeled his white mount and galloped to the
attack, followed by most of the cavalry. To the south, more explosions sounded
as Captain Og’drai’s ships -
her navy
, she suddenly realized, continued
their bombardment of the O’dai positions. Smoke was rising into the cool damp
air from a dozen fires among the enemy’s scattered gear.

“Archers, drive those men away from
the second device! Move, lads! We have three more after this one! And let’s be
a bit farther away this time, shall we?” At the second siege engine, one of the
sappers had to climb up the beams to set the charge at the hinge. Leaving him
to finish the job, they moved toward the third trebuchet, where her cavalry was
engaged in a lively but lopsided skirmish with the unarmored construction crew
trying to defend their work. As the heavy cavalry swords chopped up and down,
suddenly the large horizontal beam swung up trailing severed ropes, pulled by
the massive weight hanging from its near end. At the beam’s far end, a cradle
holding a stone half as large as a bathtub, swept into the air. As the beam reached
its zenith, the few remaining guy ropes parted and the entire structure began
to topple forward. The stone left its cradle well past the vertical, and lunged
down from the top of the beam’s arc. It whistled overhead and came down in a
mighty splash in the shallows just a few meters short of the nearest steamship.