Warlord (42 page)

"What do you think he'll do?" Menyez asked. Of all of them he looked the least worn. "His own force wasn't committed for long; they're still fresh."

"So's our right, and they saw Jamal's men run today," Raj said. He looked up; another nine hours of light, but then it would be dark-black for most of the night.

"Dinnalsyn," he continued. "How many enemy guns did we bring back?"

"Twenty, pompoms," the artilleryman said. "Destroyed about the same, but our gun line's going to be weaker tomorrow, too."

"That doesn't matter, if it's strong where it counts," Raj said. "Menyez, pull . . . six . . . no, four battalions out of the right flank, it'd be suspicious if there were more, march them over to the left and have them help with the cleaning up. Then," he continued, "after dark, trickle them back, and every second battalion from the left, too; the least-hurt ones. Dinnalsyn, leave those guns on the left and make like you're digging them in. Then bring them all back to the right, and all the mobile guns originally on the left as well."

They all looked at him; Raj let his hands fall between his knees, watching the smoke of his cigarette trickle up. "We can't be strong everywhere," he said. "They've still got more men, and more weight of metal; and the left was our stronger flank. We'll just have to bet that they won't lead off with the same formations again."

Even for an army as large as the one the Settler had brought up the Drangosh, the losses had been gruesome. Still, those were brave men, well-disciplined; they had proven it today.

"What if Tewfik shifts front, too?" da Cruz asked. Even the veteran noncom was looking a little shaken; nobody in the Civil Government's forces had seen carnage like today's, not in twenty years. The Colonists' had, of course, in the Zanj wars
. . .

"
He
might, I don't think Jamal will," Raj said. "And this is two armies we're facing; I'm betting with the confusion back there, it'll be too much trouble to redirect everything. Jamal will do the straightforward thing, hit us with the other hammer on the other side of the head."

"And if you're wrong?" Menyez said, looking at him curiously.

"We all die," Raj said. The only consolation being I won't see it, he thought.

" . . . will fall and wind will blow— 

Lost men die in the mountain snow 
 

Souls break their wings on Heaven's wall 
 

Dark night must come, come to us all—"

Spirit-damned cheerful folksongs the Stalwarts have
,
Raj thought, leaning his head back against Suzette's knees. The plangent silver strings of her
gittar
tinkled as she played, singing the ancient songs a nurse from the western tribes had taught her as a child. The troopers seemed to like it; a hundred or so had come from their own fires to listen, here behind the redoubt. Nobody wanted to sleep in the redoubt, if it could be avoided. For that matter, nobody seemed to want to sleep, much. . . . He had been able to get them a hot meal, sent out from Sandoral on wagons, at least. More than the enemy had, from what the prisoners said; evidently they had come north with nothing but hardtack and jerky, enough to see them through into the fertile lands north of the city, but no more. And it would be a cold camp over there, not enough firewood left around here to roast an avocat.

One more time, he had told the men, doing the rounds of the fires. One more time, and they'll break. Nobody could take what we dished out today more than once more. The question was, could his men take it once more?

A burst of firing out of the night brought men rolling to their feet.

"Stand easy," Raj called, hearing it being echoed through the long jewel-chain string of campfires behind the trench line. Not enough firing to be an attack, and he had Skinner and Descotter scouts in plenty on the slope. Suzette followed him as he climbed to the roof of the redoubt and watched the spiteful fire-tongues flickering through the dark, frowning.

"Fucking Tewfik!" Raj said with sudden anger. "
Fucking
Tewfik!" Shaking his head in admiration.

"What?" Suzette said.

"The fougasses, he's not leaving anything he can to chance either," Raj said. "They're really not as dangerous as a round of cannister, but they've got lots of mental impact. On our men as well as his, seeing them go off would be a big plus. At a guess . . . yes, from where they are . . . he's going for the fougasse detonator lines. Messenger!" A trooper ran up. "Off to the scouts, and tell them to concentrate on the fougasses, don't let the enemy damage them."

"Can you replace the lines?" Suzette asked, standing closer and hugging his arm.

"No," he said, returning the embrace. "But I've got a trick or two like that myself." He looked down into her face, and thought of trying to persuade her to leave again.
No
,
he thought.
Useless
.
Besides, there were limits to a man's unselfishness.

"Meanwhile, I don't much feel like sleeping," he said.

"And we have a whole bunker, all to ourselves. . . ."

"We're not going to stop them," Menyez said flatly.

Raj looked out the slit of the observation pillbox. It was like one of those horrible recurring dreams, where you die over and over again, never able to vary your actions. The same hammering cannonade back and forth, the same stinking clouds of smoke . . . 

Of course, there
were
differences. The gun lines on both sides had thickened up from yesterday; dawn had shown him most of the remaining tubes on the ridge above shifted over to positions facing the Civil Government's right.
Fucking Tewfik
,
Raj thought with weary irony.
That's becoming my motto. Although I'm the one who's getting screwed
.
The attack had been different, too, faster and a little looser. These were Tewfik's own men, the Colonial Army of the South, and they had been with the prince-general during the Zanj wars in the lands beyond the Colonial Gulf. They had come with the same leapfrog tactics, but sprinting rather than trotting, and their rifle-fire was damnably accurate.

"We wouldn't have held them this long if we hadn't stripped the left flank," Raj said.

"Which won't hold either, not if
they
come down," Menyez said. The ridge to the left was quiet, but the reformed battalions of the Settler's Army of the North had marched a little past it, and their ranks had held under the light shelling of the muzzle loaders in the Civil Government gun line opposite. The lanky Kelden County man sighed; the battle on the right wing was turning into a short-range firefight, the front lines of Tewfik's riflemen only two hundred and fifty yards from the trenches.

"You can probably get most of the cavalry back to Sandoral," Menyez said, turning to go. He stopped when Raj touched his shoulder.

"Suzette," Raj said, "what was that toast the Brigade ambassador gave, last year?"

She stood beside him. "He fears his fate too much, and his reward is small—"

He finished the words: "—who will not put it to the touch, to win or lose it all," he continued. "Battles are won or lost in the minds of men . . . signaller, the rocket."

A single trail of smoke rose from the redoubt, above the wreathing smoke of ten thousand rifles and two hundred guns. Behind the trenchline cavalrymen jumped up and ran to the captured pompoms, jerked the lanyards. They did not attempt to aim, nor could they have even if the front was not blanketed with heavy smoke. The Colonist weapons had a single clip each . . . and only one target; each had been boresighted on a fougasse that morning, before Dinnalsyn's gunners were called to serve their own weapons. The pompoms hammered . . .

 . . . and the flame-arcs erupted, not in a smooth progression but all within fifteen seconds of one another. Men jumped and ran, screaming, struck by a weapon their leader had told them was disarmed. The snapping of carbines faltered for a moment.

"Signaller," Raj called: "All left-flank units, general advance. All cavalry, prepare for pursuit."

"Tewfik's men won't break, we haven't hurt them enough," Menyez protested. Below them came the pig-snarl of armored car engines, and all along the left flank of the Civil Government line men were clambering out of their trenches, forming line for a sweep into the Colonist flanks. "You can't do that, Jamal's men still outnumber us and they'll take us in the rear!"

"No, they won't," Raj said softly. His binoculars were trained on the motionless units on the heights, battalions cut to the strength of companies. A banner wavered and then dropped; he could see the officer behind it pistol the soldier who had thrown it aside, then fly back as a dozen rifles fired with their muzzles pressed almost to his flesh. "They'll run . . . from their own memories. Why do you think I allowed them a truce, yesterday? They spent four hours in hell, then ten picking up the results and burying them."

He drew his pistol; Horace had been led up to the edge of the redoubt, whining with eagerness after a day spent bridle-chained to the floor of a bunker.

"Fucking Tewfik," Raj said.
I've got to stop that
.
"Damned if I don't like the man," he continued.

One of the 75's beside him on the ridge crashed, and a spout of water flashed up white and black beside the giant bridge. It had been an impressive structure under construction; from the hills above its terminus on the western shore it was even more majestic. A blossom of flame came from the entrenchments on the eastern bank, a slow earthquake rumble that ended in a massive gout of dirt on the plain below. The surface of the road across the Drangosh was red with fleeing Colonist soldiers, most in disorder; the shrinking semicircle around the head of the bridge traded slamming volleys with Civil Government cavalry who had pursued them all day.

"Why—" Menyez began, then withdrew a little distance to cough his lungs free. For
this
he had been willing to ride a dog, counting a week's illness a small price to pay. "—do you say so?" he continued, face red and flushed.

"Because he wasn't concerned with anything but getting as many of his men out as he could, once there wasn't a chance of turning things around. Not even his baggage train." The 5th guarded that now, with a picked band of Companions about certain heavy chests. Not M'lewis, who was here; there was no point in pushing a man too far. "Too bad for him he has to work for that butcher Jamal," Raj continued, sighing.

I thought victory was supposed to bring triumph, he thought. Maybe I'm just too tired; all I want is Suzette and a bath and bed for a week . . . sleeping the first two days.

"
Eh, mun ami
!"
Juluk Peypan was in high good humor. "
Jey ahz un caddaw per tuh
!"

A gift
?
Raj thought. The sun was almost down, the banks of the river in enough shade to make the muzzle-flashes brighter than reflected sunlight; the thousand and one details of administration marched through his mind like weary troops.
Oh, well, it's certainly better than defeat
,
he mused.

"Yes, I gots this for you!" the Skinner continued, grinning from ear to ear as he reached into a bag tied to his saddle.

Jamal's teeth were showing as well, but Raj would have judged the expression one of surprise. It was difficult to tell, since much of one side of the face was missing.

"Well, it's a little different from the last time, isn't it?" Foley said, pausing before one of the wall mirrors in the steamboat's lounge. His Captain's uniform was immaculate, the chain mail of the epaulets matching the mirror polish of the hook where his left hand had been. The stump was actually still a little tender for it, it had only been a month or so, but appearances had to be kept up on a visit to court.

"All relative," Raj replied abstractedly, watching out the window as the multicolored lights of East Residence swam by; the Palace was lit like day, new arc-lights throughout the grounds. The humid air felt soft on his skin, after the dryness of the southern border, but his gut tensed again; fear, different from the scrotum-raising tension of combat, but fear nevertheless. "We got a little more time, but then again, we won."

"This time," Menyez said, laying down his book. "Is he really planning to send us to retake the Southern Territories?" A pause. "You know, my family originally came from there? We had estates around Port Murchison, back when: got out just before the Squadron took the city." Another pause. "They can keep it, frankly, as far as I'm concerned."

"Well, that will be the Governor's decision, won't it?" Suzette said neutrally. She was frowning as she adjusted the court dress; not formal, the official reception would not be until tomorrow, but it was unaccustomed after so many weeks in riding clothes or uniforms.

"Maybe it's Tzetzas who wanted us back," Foley continued. "He's going to have Raj sent to the frying pole for not turning over all Jamal's pay chests. Remember that message he sent when he found out you'd ordered half invested for life pensions to the disabled?"

"'Fiscally irregular,' I believe the phrase was," Muzzaf said; the Komarite was sitting at one of the lounge desks, carefully blotting his pen on a scrap of paper. His new northern-style civilian trousers and jacket were Azanian silk themselves, and a ruby stud glowed in his cravat. "Shall I tell Messer Gruder our journey was uneventful?" he continued, finishing the letter.

"Tell Kaltin to stay flat on his back, for another four months or so," Gerrin Staenbridge said, stretching cat-content. A bullet through the inner thigh and a fractured legbone were no joke, especially after a bad infection. Of course, another inch to the right and Captain Gruder would have been the
last
of the Graders, whether he survived or not. "He's used up about all his luck as it is. . . ." He glanced east, toward Sandoral. "You know, I hate to have loose ends, and I'm a little anxious leaving someone bedridden in charge back there; did they ever find that wog who murdered Reed, for example, what was his name, Abdullah?"

"No," Suzette said, in a tone even more detached; they all looked over at her. The shuttered, unreadable manner seemed to be inversely proportional to the distance from Court.