“So I see. Is Charles with them?”
Oglethorpe chuckled. “He wanted his turn in the amphibian boat. He took a company to Apalachee territory, where we had word some Russian troops had landed. God willing, he'll be done with them quickly. How are things in New Paris?”
They outlined the situation quickly.
“So you've need of a general, then?” the margrave asked lightly.
“Sir, we do indeed,” Nairne replied.
“Good. I'm damned weary of this nautical stuff. If you'll clear me a way, I can have my men ready to fight by sundown.”
“That's not soon enough,” Nairne said, “but we'll make it do. God bless you, sir.”
“Let Him bless us all. We shall need His best wishes,” Oglethorpe replied.
* * *
Philippe threw a small celebrabratory dinner for Oglethorpe and his men that night, outside on what passed for a hill, a sandy open place overhung with live oaks grown in fantastic shapes and hung thick with Spanish moss. Two Indian fiddlers played and sang, and the wine, which Philippe had previously been necessarily stingy with, flowed freely. Toward the end of the evening, Franklin found himself facing Oglethorpe across a popping fire. Next to him sat the coal-black Unoka, and between them they were telling the story of the battle of Fort Marlborough.
“And Unoka, here, disobeyed my orders,” Oglethorpe said.
“Not so, General,” the African said. “You never order me not t’ do it.”
“Do what?” Voltaire asked. His gaze cut a little toward Franklin, but the ambassador would not meet it. Whenever Ben saw the Frenchman, he felt that odd lump of shame and betrayal.
“We were in the spur of the fort, which is, in a way, its own fort. I expected to make a siege out of it, while Azilia's Hammer went to safety, then on to find King Charles.”
“You expected to die,” Voltaire said.
“I did not,” Oglethorpe said. “I intended to fight my way back over the wall, then run fugitive back to Azilia and then here.” He smiled grimly. “But I'll concede the chances of doing so were not good. In any event, the moment came, and the rest of the fort started to attack us. But imagine my surprise when there were fewer than fifty of them, and only one airship.”
“Then the fort was not garrisoned as you thought?”
“Oh, that it was. Better, even. Near two hundred men. But our friend Unoka here had taken five of his men and slit the throats of nearly all while they slept.”
Franklin felt acid rise into his mouth, and for a moment fought to retain his dinner. Who were these men who could talk so casually of such things? Who were these walking knives he called companions? He saw a similar look cross Voltaire's face, and despite everything suddenly felt a deep kinship with the Frenchman. Voltaire, after all, was an author, a philosopher. Of all those assembled here, he and Franklin were closest.
“We had the one airship to deal with, but a lucky shot remedied that.”
“T’ general, he jumped from te wall, and shoot t’ pilot from one yard!” Unoka guffawed.
“The stuff of epics!” Philippe shouted a little drunkenly. “I shall need a court poet to compose an opera based on this, or some such.”
Privately, Franklin could not imagine epic heroes cutting throats in the dark of night. He tried to imagine himself as a young soldier in the Pretender's army. He would not— could not—know who his ultimate masters were. He would think he was fighting for a just cause. Perhaps he was prepared to die, yes, but at least imagined he would meet death on his feet, like a man, not gutted like a fish in the middle of a pleasant dream.
But war wasn't for men, was it? It was for fools. And fools deserved no better than what they earned.
He shook himself away from such uncharitable thoughts. Theirs was a just war, perhaps the only just war. If he expected to win it without any tarnish on his soul, then he was the fool.
“Mr. Voltaire? Would you be my court poet?”
Voltaire put on the wry grin he wore so well. “Last time I composed something about your court, I was guested in the Bastille.”
“That was my father's court, not mine. And I am not the man— or the king—I was in Paris.”
“I will consider it,” Voltaire told him, “though at the moment I already have a commission.” This time he looked quite boldly at Franklin, before turning his gaze back toward his feet. “Nor am I the same man I was in Paris. I have little poetry in me now, I fear.”
Oglethorpe cleared his throat. “I've heard it rumored, sir, that you were in London when she was destroyed. That you stayed behind to try and warn the court there. You are a hero in your own right.”
“Hero?” Voltaire's haunted gaze rose up again. “What should I have done? I cannot know. But what I did was not the right thing.”
“Tell us, Monsieur,” Philippe said. “This may be our last night for such stories. Tell us your tale.”
Voltaire was silent for the space of fifty breaths, then he sighed. “We could not make them listen, of course, and were nearly arrested for trying. Mr. Heath, a student of Sir Isaac and my companion, hit upon a desperate plan. The comet, we knew, must be guided to London by some sort of attractor, a device with an affinity for that hurtling stone. If we could find it, Mr. Heath thought we might possibly reverse it.”
“Reverse it?” Franklin heard himself say. “You mean hurl the comet back into the heavens? That was only days, perhaps hours, before it struck. It was an impossible task.”
“We did not think we could hurl it back into the void,” Voltaire said, “but even a small deflection, a small alteration of course, might have landed it in the sea.” He clasped his hands as if in prayer. “We could think of no other plan.”
“But you did not find it.”
“No, we did. Mr. Heath had the resources of Newton at his disposal, and made a detector. We found the device. But it was ringed with French spies, and they took us up. They clapped irons on us and put us in a galley bound for Barbados.”
“Barbados?”
“We never reached it, of course. The comet fell, and the waves came. It was all darkness and motion for us, and at last water. The hold was filling, and a jailer with a heart tried to set as many of us free as he could. I was one, but before we could reach Mr. Heath, the ship was shattered. I had his hand; I felt him go down. I had the jailer's keys, but could not find the lock on his chains—and then fear took me, and to save my miserable life I left him. I clung to wreckage and ended on the shore of Normandy, almost dead.” He shook his head. “I am no hero. I am a coward of the worst sort.”
“You lived to fight another day,” Oglethorpe said gently.
“You would not have done it. You would have sunk to the very bottom with him, given your last breath to save him. I did not.”
Franklin pushed a stick into the flames. “I knew Heath. He would have been furious if you had died in a vain effort to save him. And no man here can say what he would have done—only what he might hope to do, which is not the same thing.”
“That was well said,” Oglethorpe replied.
Voltaire looked back at Franklin, and this time their eyes met, not in contest but in commiseration. Then the Frenchman nodded.
“And remember what your mentor Leibniz was wont to say,” Franklin added. “This world is the best of all possible worlds, and so what happened, naturally was for the best.”
That drew a bit of laughter, and even Voltaire grinned again. “I once bitterly remonstrated with that philosophy,” he said. “It is a philosophy well suited to men of wealth and privilege, yes, and ill suited to those who daily suffer in this life. And yet, at times, I understand it. If things could not have been better—if they cannot be better—then why waste the effort of remorse or of hoping for a better future day?”
“And now I see you are still a poet,” Philippe said.
Voltaire did not answer, but stared into the fire as if he saw any better day consumed in its flames.
“Well, gentlemen,” Oglethorpe to
ld them all, “I will bid you good night. A little sleep, and then I have a march to make. I've asked King Philippe and Governor Nairne to give me the northern command, and they have been kind enough to flatter me with it. By tomorrow, I shall be carrying the standard of Mars to our enemy.”
“Good night, sir,” the king said, “and godspeed. You are our truest knight.”
Oglethorpe and his men reached the northernmost redoubt before first light. He was struck by the incredible calm of the morning, in the face of what he knew must come. Since the invaders landed from the airships, there had been a few minor skirmishes—it seemed that the Indians from the West were as undisciplined and overeager for battle as his own—but for the most part there had been silence from them. That wouldn't last much longer.
Their first target would have to be the towers—until they were down, the Russians could not use their airships to best advantage. The towers would be tough prizes, with their magical aegis shields—the perimeter of devices that made the air unfit to breath—and their devil guns.
Unfortunately, according to the Karevna woman, those same alchemical devices would attract the attention of the Russian sorcerers.
“Sir? May I ask a question?”
Oglethorpe turned to Parmenter. “What's that?”
“Why haven't we invested the redoubt, if our mission is to hold it?”
Oglethorpe smiled wryly. “I'm not much for being cornered like a badger, no matter how snug the hole. The tower is a fat bull's-eye for the arrows of our enemy, and I don't intend—”
At that instant, coincidentally, a shell made his point for him. They heard its shrill whine and then an explosion that shook the air, even here, a quarter mile from its detonation. The tree—a five-hundred-year-old pine, if it was a day— teetered, charring black but not catching fire, due to its presence in the zone of bad air.
Another shell struck next to it, this one spattering a viscous burning fluid that immediately went out.
After that, so many shells fell that there was no space in the sound, only a noise like God humming. An avenue opened in the thick forest as the explosions worked their way directly toward the invisible redoubt.
“See? They've taught their shells to seek the aegis, just as Franklin feared. If we were in there, we wouldn't dare come out.” He grinned. “As it is, we're free to go find the bastards working those cannon and lay them down to sleep.”
“Amen, General,” Parmenter said.
“Get ‘em on their horses. ‘Tis time to meet the devil.”
It was eerie to hear the shelling fade in the distance, and as it did, the sound of cannon fire come over like one symphony replacing another. It reminded him vividly of his first battle with Prince Eugène, of his younger self ‘s sheer unbelief at the range and accuracy of the new alchemical guns—that they could be placed so far away you not only couldn't see them but also couldn't even hear them. His first command had been to take a company and find the cannon chewing up their lines. He had done it then, and he would do it again.
Of course, it hadn't been easy that first time, either.
As Oglethorpe and his men approached the slope of the hill the guns were sounding from, bullets began swarming from the trees like a hundred acres of bees. Something like a sledgehammer struck Oglethorpe in the chest, nearly unhorsing him, and he gave quick thanks for his adamantium breastplate as he raised his pistol and fired at the Indian springing from behind the nearest tree. The fellow howled like a catamount as the kraftpistole cut him in half.
The fighting got dirty. This time they didn't face regulars, trying to keep neat columns—this enemy fought from amongst the trees, like his own people. The rangers unslung their carbines and dismounted, forming a rough line, firing and advancing, one tree to the next. The air was thick with the smell of powder and pine sap.
Oglethorpe stayed mounted, barking orders and shooting at shadows. A trio of Indians broke from cover and ran at him, firing their muskets; then, when they saw they had missed, pulling tomahawks. He calmly shot one with his last charge, then drew his saber as his horse screamed and collapsed, rolling on its side, blood blowing from its neck like spume from a whale surfacing. He was on his feet but still untangling himself from the saddle when they reached him.
One pitched back from him at a distance of a yard, and he heard a ranger behind him shout in triumph. The other leapt, whirling an ax. Oglethorpe struck savagely with his saber, and the bright edge bit into the Indian's arm. It didn't slow him. They crashed together, Oglethorpe reaching with his free hand to catch the descending ax. He missed, and the weapon skinned down his arm, surprisingly painful, before spanging into his breastplate. With an involuntary roar, he struck his knuckle guard into the man's face, and for an instant he was twenty-three again, in a low tavern in London, fury and alcohol mixed in his veins, experiencing the dirty exhilaration of feeling a nose collapse under his fist, the sheer animal pleasure of killing a man with his bare hands. He cursed the Indian for bringing that memory back, knotted his hand in the thick black hair, and pulped the face into a red nightmare. He kept hitting the corpse long after it was dead.
By the time he returned to his senses, four of his rangers were around him, firing at more attackers.
“No more bush fighting, by God!” he snarled. “Fetch me a mount and sound the charge!”
If they questioned his decision, no one said so. He did not care what was wisest—he was a general, by God, not the brawling fool he had been more than two decades ago. He should not have to fight like that!
A moment later, shrieking like Indians themselves, they swarmed up the hill.
It happened in a blur, oddly slowly. Ambushers rose from every pile of brush and fell, and some rose again, missing parts of themselves. Some waited until the Colonials were past, then leapt up behind them. He turned once, just in time to see a red hole the size of a fist appear in Cory MacWilliams, just under the silver coin he wore around his neck for good luck and see— God, yes, see—the bloody bullet that had done the work speed within an inch of his own nose.
By the time they reached the hilltop and the guns there, he had lost more than half his men. Predictably, the Yamacraw made it to the top first, Parmenter's rangers on their heels. The gunners dropped the muzzles of their weapons and fired, cutting swaths that left bits of men everywhere. Through the haze of smoke-coughing weapons, he made out that the top of the hill had been cleared and a cavalry of sorts awaited them—fierce dark men who did not look like Indians, wearing splinted armor and carrying cutlasslike weapons.
Oglethorpe barely felt the impact of the charge. His pistols were long since spent, and his saber was already more a club than a sword.
In a moment of clarity, he knew they would never make it. The ambushers they had left behind them in their hurry were catching up, and they were now in a crossfire. He had killed all his men for nothing.
And then, miraculously, the guns went silent, and the Mongols—that's what he guessed them to be, from what the tsar had said—began dropping from the rear. His men gave a great shout, almost as if in one voice, and their enemies, confused and disheartened, went down like wheat before a scythe.
And from the smoke on the hill, another company emerged. Indians, but this time of a sort he recognized by their tattoos and paint.
Choctaws.
The miracle was they didn't fire at each other. For a long moment, what remained of Oglethorpe's men stood, panting and bleeding, wondering if this was a new force they would have to fight. But the Choctaw had killed the gunners and the Mongols, and so after a moment Oglethorpe made his decision and turned his remaining men to deal with enemy coming up the hill behind them.
Within half an hour the battle was over, the high ground theirs.
“Sir,” a soldier said, limping up beside him. “Let the surgeon bind your wound.”
“Eh?” He glanced at his arm. The ax had peeled his skin back, but there wasn't much bleeding—a sticky sort of crust had already formed over the lesion. �
��It can wait,” he said. “Where is Tomochichi?”
“He went chasing back down the hill.”
“Ah. What do you think of those fellows with the guns?”
“They seem like friends, sir.”
“I'm going to see.” Over the protests of the young man, he spurred his new mount up the hill, sheathing his saber as he did so.
A small party stepped from cover to greet him—a Choctaw man, perhaps thirty years old, and a body of soldiers in dirty blue uniforms. One of these was a tall, slim fellow with hair the color of copper.
“Halito,” Oglethorpe said, one of the few words he knew in Choctaw.
“Good day,” the Indian answered in English.
“You seemed to have saved us a good bit of trouble. I'm much grateful to you. I am James Edward Oglethorpe, margrave of Azilia, commander of the English forces in New Paris.”
“We are happy to be of help. Your foe is our foe—we have been fighting these men since they crossed the Mississippi River.”
“We had heard the Choctaw were resisting.”
“I'm glad you recognized us.”
Oglethorpe smiled wearily. “It's been my business for many years to know the Indians in these territories. Well, as I said, you've helped us out. What can I do for you?”
“Most of my men will stay here and continue to fight. But we have a wounded Frenchwoman with us, and it is quite urgent that she—and I—reach New Paris as soon as possible.”
Oglethorpe chewed his lip. It could be a trick, couldn't it? A sort of Trojan horse?
“How many of you?” he asked.
“Me, the lady, twelve of her company, and one Indian woman.”
Oglethorpe coughed—his lungs were still thick with the smoke of the guns—and nodded. “I will have you there by nightfall,” he said. “But tell me—how much respite do we have? Is there more of this advance force?”
“This was most of them, I think,” the Choctaw replied. “But there will be more very soon.”
“Can your men help us carry these guns down to our redoubt?”
“Of course, General.”
“Wonderful. I hate to ask more favors, but again it is much appreciated. I will make certain your men get a share of what gifts we have.”
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