by Sales, Ian
Skaria had only a single battery of field-pieces from the Honourable Basilisk Company. These were too few to match the rate of fire of the enemy’s cannons, but they were causing some damage.
Six jolly boats full of Imperial Marines had hurtled overhead fifteen minutes ago. Nothing further had been heard of them.
“Are we winning?” Rinharte asked, unable to make sense of what she saw.
“Hard to say,” admitted Najib. “Our only objective is to break them, and I don’t see how we can do that unless Gwupek surrenders.”
“So we just kill each other until one of us decides we’ve had enough?”
“Something like that.”
Rinharte wished she had her telescope, but she’d broken it and left it behind aboard Tempest. The battle was a melee, a confusion of jackets in red, blue, grey, tan, yellow, green… Some she could identify. The yellow of the Imperial Provincial Foot, she knew only too well. The Imperial Grey Jackets she had seen at Skaria’s briefing. But all those blues and reds… Which were the Serpent’s, which fought for Major Skaria?
“At least we have the advantage,” Najib remarked.
“How so? There’s three times as many of them as there are us. And I understood the Serpent’s forces were veterans.”
“Ah yes, but see: Gwupek bunches his troops—he has to, he has so many. Ours are more spread out. Each of our cannon-shots kills more of ‘em. Can’t be good for their morale.”
Rinharte looked to left and right. “Couldn’t he send troops round to flank us?”
“We’d see ‘em.”
Najib was right. The vee-shaped valley stretched to either side in an unnaturally straight line. Perhaps it had not been a river, after all. It seemed too artificial a feature. A canal, thought Rinharte; or a road. Whatever it had been, it meant enemy troops would have to cross the valley to flank Skaria’s troops, and they would be clearly visible doing so.
Squads and platoons ran here and there, clashing against enemy troops. Knots of battling troopers swirled about the valley-floor. A thin pall of smoke, caused by burning earth from blasts by field-pieces, drifted across the battle-field, blurring detail.
“Time for another line,” Najib remarked. “Need to reinforce the troops in the field.” He turned to look at Rinharte. “We’re running short on officers. Want to take a platoon?”
Rinharte stared at the battle below in horror. Go amongst that? She was no coward but her courage was coloured with caution. True, survival in an engagement between two ships of the line was a matter of chance, and the end, when it came, was often quick. Rinharte had taken part in her fair share of naval battles. She had not escaped every one unscathed. Once she had almost lost a leg after falling debris had trapped her. She still had a scar on her abdomen, and a matching scar on her lower back, where a metal spur, broken free of a fitting, had impaled her.
She reached down and touched the hilt of her sword. She had no choice and she knew it. She had known something like this would happen once she found herself on the planet’s surface. As an officer, she could not stand idly by and watch troops die.
Her decision must have been written on her face. Najib said, “I’ll give you a platoon of Neuri’s Hussars. They’re good fighters.”
“And what am I to do?”
Najib scrambled back from the ridge and, once he was out of sight of the enemy, clambered to his feet, long arms and legs knocking. Rinharte crawled back to join him.
“We really need those field-pieces spiking,” the marine-captain said, slapping his thighs to remove the dirt. “Just pick yourself one and charge straight at it.”
“Does that tactic usually succeed?” asked Rinharte, thinking it great foolishness.
“No other way to do it,” Najib replied. He jerked into motion and began striding back to the encampment· “If they’re on their toes, they might take out a few of you. But those things can’t build up energy quickly between shots, so you should do fine.”
“Remind me,” Rinharte said, hurrying to catch up. She was as tall as Najib but he moved quickly. “Remind me how much experience you’ve had at this sort of fighting.”
“None,” he cheerfully admitted. “But it’s all very simple. Tactics is not an arcane science, you know.” He gestured vaguely. “You just need to know what you have to do and how you plan to do it.”
“If you’re that interested in tactics and stratagems, why in heavens did you join the marines?”
The marine-captain halted abruptly. He gazed up at the sky, brow furrowed. “I like ships too,” he said at length. He nodded, as if convincing himself of his answer.
Rinharte stood and watched him march away, and hoped Major Skaria knew exactly what he was doing.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
Rinharte scrambled up the reverse slope of the hill to the ridge. Her platoon, six squads of troopers in dark blue jackets, came behind. She reached the crest and stopped a moment. Enemy troops were advancing up the slope from the valley bottom. She pulled out her sword, ready to order a charge.
“Ma’am,” said her corporal major. He pointed across the valley.
An enemy field-piece was pointed their way. As Rinharte watched, its muzzle flashed with an eye-searing brightness. The beam hit the slope some ten feet below them. Dirt and sods of grass were vaporised in an instant. A glassy crater, steaming, was all that remained. At this distance, the field-piece’s six-inch beam had dispersed until it was a foot across. It was not wide enough to hit more than a single trooper, although it could drive through several before being stopped by the ground.
“Spread out,” Rinharte ordered. “Don’t run in a straight line.” She took a deep breath; and yelled:
“Charge!”
She was off, running down the hill, stumbling on the uneven ground, brandishing her sword. She ran at an angle to the slope, then turned through ninety degrees after some thirty paces. Her hussars remained behind her and followed her lead in zigzagging towards the enemy.
The field-piece fired again, but missed her men, hitting ten yards to the side and spraying them all with a thin shower of burning soil.
Another shot narrowly missed Rinharte. She felt super-heated air against her cheek. Behind her, someone screamed. Something hit her back with a wet slap. She ignored it.
The enemy were in a single line. In moments, Rinharte was among them. Reaching one trooper, she bowled into his chest. He fell over backwards, his mace flying from his hands. She stabbed him in the eye before he could rise. Spinning about, she dodged a mace before it reached her shoulder. She rotated her wrist down and out. The mace swung away. Pulling her elbow back, she twisted and lunged, spearing her enemy in the gut.
A figure in dark-blue appeared at her side—one of hers? Yes, she saw the white facings on his jacket. He swung his hammer. An enemy trooper catapulted backwards, his helmet rang like a gong, blood bursting from beneath it. Behind him, another tripped and fell.
Someone bumped into Rinharte. She stumbled forwards, narrowly missing a mace swung in her direction. She drove the point of her sword into her attacker’s jaw. He fell backwards off her blade, his eyes rolling up into his skull.
A handful of figures in green charged up the hill towards them. Their uniforms were blackened, their features smeared with dirt. An officer brandishing a sword ran at the head of them. He reached the platoon milling about the Hussars and began laying about him with his sword. His face was black with soot but Rinharte recognised him: Kordelasz! Her heart lifted. He had survived being dropped amongst the enemy. And behind him, Boat-Sergeant Alus and Marine-Corporal Valka, clubbing Provincial Foot to the ground and hacking at them with their boarding-axes. Rinharte speared a yellow-jacketed soldier who popped up before her. She dodged a swing from a mace. And kicked out at a knee. Her attacker fell to the ground and was trampled by a squad of hussars rushing past her.
A voice yelled out: “For the Admiral!”
Rinharte saw Kordelasz back-fist a Provincia
l Foot as he shouted, spun and lunged. A space opened up about him. The air hummed. A blinding flash threw those about Rinharte into stark relief. Kordelasz came apart in an explosion of light and blood. A bright beam engulfed his torso, drove on into packed troopers. Head and arms flew wide. His legs toppled. There was no sign of the rest of him.
“No!” screamed Rinharte.
She leapt forward, felt something smash her in the side. The Provincial Foot in front of her twisted away, momentum from his swing pulling his weapon from Rinharte. She took him in the face with the point of her sword. She stumbled and fell to one side. A smash from another mace missed her. Alus loomed over her. His meaty fist knocked the enemy trooper to the ground. The boat-sergeant’s boarding-axe followed it and half-severed the attacker’s head.
Hauled to her feet by Alus, Rinharte looked about her. The tide had turned. There were as many dark blue hussars on the ground as yellow Provincial Foot, but with the marines more of the Admiral’s men remained standing than the Serpent’s. She pushed her way through the mob surrounding her until she reached the point where Kordelasz had fallen. She found a pair of white-clad legs, the waist a charred and bloody mess, nothing above the abdomen. Kordelasz had been the only marine officer in the immediate area. The remains could only be his. She fell to her knees, reached out a hand and gently touched one stiff thigh.
Kordelasz: dead. He had seemed indestructible. Winning every duel he had fought, a master swordsman. Taken by a field-piece. Dead before he knew it.
She scrambled to her feet, tripping on the bodies sprawled about her. A line of enemy troops in the valley bottom stood with their hands in the air. Regimental soldiers and marines of Skaria’s army wandered amongst the fallen, hunting for comrades. Field-surgeons in blood-red coveralls searched for those they could save.
“There’s still scattered fighting, ma’am,” Alus told her.
As if to prove his words, a pair of lines, one red and one grey, clashed on the opposite slope.
“General Gwupek threw down his baton,” he continued. “Major Skaria’s sent runners to everyone on the field.”
“We’ve won?” asked Rinharte faintly.
Moments ago, she had been fighting for her life. But for Kordelasz’s arrival, her platoon would surely have been over-run. And then, suddenly, victory was declared.
“What happened?” she asked, still not believing it.
“I’m not sure, ma’am.”
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
As the launch banked over the battlefield and came in to land, Ormuz peered out of the scuttle by his seat. He saw a shallow valley of green peppered with black craters and scarred by rips of dark earth. Everywhere sprawled small figures. Even from a hundred or more feet above the ground, Ormuz could see that not all of the bodies were whole. Surgeon’s mates in red worked their way from casualty to casualty, but they did not stay long at each.
Ormuz turned away. He had seen more than enough death—close and personal—when he fought his way aboard Empress Glorina. Afterwards, not all of the battleship’s crew had surrendered so readily as their admiral. It had taken several hours before all resistance on the battleship was quelled.
And there were many who had perished with Vengeful. Some he had known—the ship’s surgeon, Lieutenant Ishë had been killed by a hull breach while ministering to a wounded rated. Lieutenant Pismo, Vengeful’s lieutenant of signals, had died in the hand-to-hand fighting aboard Empress Glorina. There were others—rateds, petty officers, masters, even midshipmen. He could not mourn them but he could rue their deaths.
The launch slowed to a halt and gently descended until it hovered just above the grass. One of the crew cracked the hatch, and a stink of burning earth and scorched vegetation filled the interior of the boat. Ormuz climbed to his feet and scowled. The smell reminded him of the aerodrome on Linna.
But the slaughter here had been greater.
The Admiral was the first of them onto the soil of Geneza. Ormuz clambered down from the hatch in time to hear her being greeted by Major Skaria. No, Army Marshal Skaria, as he was now.
“You have done well,” the Admiral said. “And against greater odds.”
Now, thought Ormuz, was not the time to ask after losses. The group gathered behind Skaria—Ormuz recognised only Marine-Captain Najib—were clearly enjoying their moment of honour, their faces shining with self-glory. He saw jackets in dark blue, light green, dark green, white, grey and tan. Most were so neat they could have stepped that instant out of an officers’ mess.
Where, he wondered, was Marine-Captain Kordelasz? Why was he not here with Skaria and Najib? And Marine-Lieutenant Kiserö: she too was absent.
He left the group gathered about Skaria and the Admiral, and walked to the bow of the launch. Some fort yards away, an encampment spread across the meadow. Dirt lay across the canvas roofs of tents, but pennants fluttered merrily, as if the battle had yet to begin. A handful of colourful pavilions seemed to hover over the centre of the camp, suggesting to Ormuz more a sporting event than a battlefield.
A lone figure in blue marching along the lines in his direction drew his attention. He watched it leave the tents behind, striding determinedly but wearily towards him. Only when he saw the black hair, did he recognise her.
Rinharte! What was she doing here?
She wearily made her way across the meadow to the Admiral, Skaria and the other officers. Her jacket was filthy, smeared with blood and dirt. There were black, red and green smears on her white coveralls.
The Admiral saw her, stepped forward from those gathered about her, and said, “Rizbeka. I had not expected to see you here.”
To Ormuz’s ears, there was a familiarity to the Admiral’s tone she had never used with him. For one brief moment, he felt jealousy. Then he saw Rinharte’s face. He could not have imagined a greater contrast to the smug features of the officers with Skaria.
“Ma’am,” she said to the Admiral. Turning to Skaria, she added, “Boat-Sergeant Alus tells me the enemy have yielded.”
“They have indeed. General Gwupek sent a signal some twenty minutes ago.”
“Did he,” Rinharte said, her tone flat.
Ormuz stepped forward. “Where’s Garrin?” he asked.
Rinharte looked at him. “Dead.”
For a brief moment, he did not understand. “Dead?” Marine-Captain Kordelasz dead? He said the first thing to pop into his head: “I thought he could never be killed.” And winced afterwards.
“So did he,” Rinharte replied expressionlessly. She blinked, shook her head, and then added, “He was hit by a beam from a cannon.”
The Admiral and Skaria were still talking behind him, but he tuned them out and focused on Rinharte. “Was it really bad?” he asked.
She sighed, and it seemed as if whatever it was which kept her upright, kept her going, lost some of its power. She gazed down at the ground. “I’m Navy, Casimir. I can’t do this. I should never have done it.”
Abruptly, she looked up and peered at him. “Is it true Vengeful’s gone? And Empress Glorina is now the flagship?”
He nodded.
“You captured the enemy flagship in the middle of a battle?” She clearly found it hard to believe.
“Something like that.” He shrugged modestly.
He explained how Vengeful had rammed Kantara just as the enemy cruiser was being warped in to dock with Empress Glorina. They had been incredibly lucky.
Rinharte had apparently not been so fortunate. Ormuz listened as she described how she had lost Tempest: the troop-transport’s hidden main-gun, destroyers firing at them, the last-minute rescue by Kordelasz…
Both had lost their ships; neither should have survived.
Neither fact made them unusual on this day.
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
A line of pinnaces perched on the top of the hill, bows wide like so many hungry marine creatures. Two abreast, the surviving troopers of Marshal Skaria’s army marched into
the boats. Rinharte watched them and thought about what she had lost. Marine-Captain Kordelasz. An inglorious death, blasted apart by a cannon. But was any death glorious?
A passing colour sergeant glanced at her and she realised she had spoken aloud. She waited a moment, almost expecting a laughing reply from Kordelasz. But he would never speak again. Sadly, she turned to gaze across the battlefield. Regimental surgeons and surgeon’s mates were still cataloguing the wounded and dead. She saw one surgeon’s mate prod a corpse in the torso with a sharp-pointed staff. If the soldier still lived, she would respond. Judging by the speed with which the surgeon’s mate moved onto the next body, the trooper had given no sign of life.
There were more craters scattered across both slopes of the lea than Rinharte had expected to see. She wondered how she had managed to avoid being hit by cannon-fire. She could remember little of the battle itself. Charging downhill. Seeing Kordelasz blasted apart in a flash of brilliance…
After that: nothing. A blur of figures, aching arms, labouring for breath, legs that hurt. She had killed, she knew she had killed, but she could not picture any of her victims. She could not even recall what colour their uniforms had been.
A figure approached from the top of the hill, appearing between two pinnaces and then picking its way down the slope. Rinharte smiled on recognising Mate Romi Maganda. The young woman had black smeared across her face, and dirt and blood sprayed across her blue jacket.
“It’s good to see you, Romi,” Rinharte said, wanting to reach out and grab the young woman and assure herself that she was really truly there.
“You too, ma’am,” Maganda replied, with a grin which said Rinharte’s survival was greater cause for happiness.
“How did the battle go for you?” She didn’t want to know. She felt as though she were reading some script. But she had heard the exchange too often not to fall into its easy comfort; and to recognise that it was a way of dealing with the death and destruction they had all experienced.