Sooner than he'd hoped, he judged the army ready to use against Maniakes. Sharbaraz King of Kings had been right in thinking the officers Abivard had left behind could keep the men in reasonably good fighting trim. That pleased Abivard and irked him at the same time: was he really necessary?
Turan and Tzikas were getting along well, too. Again, Abivard didn't know what to make of that. Had the Makuraner succumbed to Tzikas' charm? Abivard would have been the last to deny that the Videssian renegade had his full share of that—and then some.
«He's a fine cavalry officer,» Turan said enthusiastically after he, Tzikas, and Abivard planned the move they'd be making in a couple of days. «Having commanded a cavalry company myself, I was always keeping an eye on the officers above me, seeing how they did things. Do you know what I mean, lord?» He waited for Abivard to nod, then went on, «And Tzikas, he does everything the way it's supposed to be done.»
«Oh, that he does.» Abivard's voice was solemn. «He's a wonderful officer to have for a superior. It's only when you're his superior that you have to start watching your back.»
«Well, yes, there is that,» Turan agreed. «I hadn't forgotten about it. Just like you, I made sure I had his secretary in my belt pouch, so a couple of letters never did travel to Mashiz.»
«Good,» Abivard said. «And good for you, too.»
However much Abivard loathed him, Tzikas had done a fine job making the cavalry under his command work alongside the infantry. That wasn't how the men of Makuran usually fought Light cavalry and heavy horse worked side by side, but infantry was at best a scavenger on the battlefields where it appeared. Those were few and far between; in most fights cavalry faced cavalry.
«I didn't think Videssian practice so different from our own,' Abivard remarked after watching the horsemen practice a sweep from the flank of the foot soldiers. «Or to put it another way, you didn't fight against us like this when you were on the other side in the westlands «
«By the God, I am a Makuraner now,» Tzikas insisted. But then his pique, if it had been such, faded. «No, Videssians did not fight that way. Cavalry rules their formations no less than ours.» He was playing the role of countryman to the hilt, Abivard thought. Thoughtfully, the renegade went on, «I've just been wondering how best to use the two arms together now that you and Turan have made these infantrymen into real soldiers. This is the best answer I found.»
Abivard nodded—warily. He heard the flattery there: not laid on as thickly as was the usual Videssian style but perhaps more effective on account of that. Or it would have been more effective had he not suspected everything Tzikas said. Didn't Tzikas understand that? If he did, he concealed it well.
And he had other things on his mind, too, saying, «This year we'll teach Maniakes not to come into Makuran again.»
«I hope so,» Abivard said; that had the twin virtues of being true and of not committing him to anything.
He moved the army out of Nashvar a few days later. Beroshesh had assembled the artisans and merchants of the town to cheer the soldiers on their way. How many of those were cheers of good luck and how many were cheers of good riddance, Abivard preferred not to try to guess.
Along with the chorus of what might have been support came another, shriller, altogether unofficial chorus of the women and girls of the town, many with visibly bulging bellies. That sort of thing, Abivard thought with a mental sigh, was bound to happen when you quartered soldiers in a town over a winter. Some lemans were accompanying the soldiers as they moved, but others preferred to stay with their families and scream abuse at the men who had helped make those families larger.
Scouts reported that Maniakes and the Videssians were moving southwest from Erzerum toward the Tib River and leaving behind them the same trail of destruction they'd worked the year before. Scouts also reported that Maniakes had more men with him than he'd brought on his first invasion of Makuran.
«I have to act as if they're right and hope they're wrong,» Abivard said to Roshnani when the army camped for the night. «They often are—wrong, I mean. Take a quick look at an army from a distance and you'll almost always guess it's bigger than it is.»
«What do you suppose he plans?» Roshnani asked. «Fighting his way down the Tib till he can strike at Mashiz?»
«If I had to guess, I'd say yes,» Abivard answered, «but guessing what he has in mind gets harder every year. Still, though, that would be about the second worst thing I can think of for him to do.»
«Ah?» His principal wife raised an eyebrow. «And what would be worse?»
«If he struck down the Tib and at the same time sent envoys across the Pardrayan steppe to stir up the Khamorth tribes against us and send them over the Degird River into the northwest of the realm.» Abivard looked grim at the mere prospect. So did Roshnani. Both of them had grown up in the Northwest, not far from the frontier with the steppe. Abivard went on, «Likinios played that game, remember—Videssian gold was what made Peroz King of Kings move into Pardraya, what made him meet his end, what touched off our civil war. Couple that with the Videssian invasion of the land of the Thousand Cities and—»
«Yes, that would be deadly dangerous,» Roshnani said. «I see it. We'd have to divide our forces, and we might not have enough to be able to do it.»
«Just so,» Abivard agreed. «Maniakes doesn't seem to have thought of that ploy, the God be praised. When Likinios used it, he didn't think to invade us himself at the same time. From what I remember of Likinios, he was always happiest when money and other people's soldiers were doing his fighting for him.»
«Maniakes isn't like that,» Roshnani said.
«No, he'll fight,» Abivard said, nodding. «He's not as underhanded as Likinios was, but he's learning there, too. As I say, I'm just glad he hasn't yet learned everything there is to know.»
Hurrying west across the floodplain from the Tutub to the Tib brought Abivard's army across the track of devastation Maniakes had left the summer before. In more than one place he found peasants repairing open-air shrines dedicated to the God and the Prophets Four that the Videssians had made a point of wrecking.
«He had some men who spoke Makuraner,» one of the rural artisans told Abivard. «He had them tell us he did this because of what Makuran does to the shrines of his stupid, false, senseless god. He pays us back, he says.»
«Thank you, Majesty,» Abivard murmured under his breath. Once again Sharbaraz' order enforcing worship of the God in Vaspurakan was coming back to haunt Makuran. The peasant stared at Abivard, not following what he meant. If the fellow hoped for an explanation, he was doomed to disappointment
Tzikas' horsemen rode ahead of the main force, trying to let Abivard know where the Videssians were at any given time. Every so often the cavalry troopers would skirmish with Maniakes' scouts, who were trying to pass to the Avtokrator the same information about Abivard's force.
And then, before too long, smoke on the northern horizon said the Videssians were drawing close. Tzikas' scouts confirmed that they were on the eastern bank of the Tib; they'd been either unwilling or unable to cross the river. Abivard took that as good news. He would, however, have liked it better had he had it from men who owed their allegiance to anyone but Tzikas.
Because Maniakes was staying on the eastern side of the Tib, Abivard sent urgent orders to the men in charge of the bridges of boats across the river to withdraw those bridges to the western bank. He hoped that would help him but did not place sure trust in the success of the ploy: being skilled artificers, the Videssians might not need boats to cross the river.
But Maniakes, who had not gone out of his way to look for a fight the summer before, seemed more aggressive now, out not just to destroy any town in the land of the Thousand Cities but also to collide with the Makuraner army opposing him.
«I think the scouts are right—they do have more men than they did last year,» Turan said unhappily. «They wouldn't be pushing so hard if they didn't»
«Whereas we still have what we started last year
with—minus casualties, whom I miss, and plus Tzikas' regiment of horse whom I wouldn't miss if they fell into the Void this minute,» Abivard said, Tzikas not being in earshot to overhear. «Now we get to find out whether that will be enough.»
«Oh, we can block the Videssians,» Turan said, «provided they don't get across to the far side of the river. If they do—»
«They complicate our lives,» Abivard finished for him. «Maniakes has been complicating my life for years, so I have no reason to think he'll stop now.» He paused thoughtfully. «Come to that, I've been complicating his life for a good many years now, too. But I intend to be the one who comes out on top in the end.» After another pause he went on. «The question is, does he intend to do any serious fighting this year, or is he just raiding to keep us off balance, the way he was last summer? I think he really wants to fight, but I can't be certain—not yet.»
«How will we know?» Turan asked.
«If he gets across the river somehow—and he may, because the Videssians have fine engineers—he's out to harass us like last year,» Abivard answered. «But if he comes straight at us, he thinks he can beat us with the new army he's put together, and it'll be up to us to show him he's wrong.»
Turan glanced at the long files of foot soldiers marching toward the Tib. They were lean, swarthy men, some in helmets, some in baggy cloth caps, a few with mail shirts, most wearing leather vests or quilted tunics to ward off weapons, almost all of them with wicker shields slung over their shoulders, armed with spears or swords or bows or, occasionally, slings. «He's not the only one who's put a new army together,» Abivard's lieutenant said quietly.
«Mm, that's so.» Abivard studied the soldiers, too. They seemed confident enough, and thinking you could hold off a foe was halfway to doing it. «They've come a long way this past year, haven't they?»
«Aye, lord, they have,» Turan said. He looked down at his hands before going on. «They've done well learning to work with cavalry, too.»
«Learning to work with Tzikas' cavalry, you mean,» Abivard said, and Turan, looking uncomfortable, nodded. Abivard sighed. «It's for the best. If they didn't know what to do, we'd be in a worse position than we are now. If only Tzikas weren't commanding that regiment of horse, I'd be happy.»
«He was—harmless enough this past winter,» Turan said, giving what praise he could.
«For which the God be praised,» Abivard said. «But he's wronged me badly, and he knows it, which might tempt him to betray me to the Videssians. On the other hand, he tried to kill Maniakes, so he wouldn't be welcomed back with open arms, not unless the Avtokrator of the Videssians is stupider than I know he is. How badly would Tzikas have to betray me, do you suppose, to put himself back into Maniakes' good graces?»
«It would have to be something spectacular,» Turan said. «I don't think betraying you would be coin enough to do the job, truth to tell. I think he'd have to betray Sharbaraz King of Kings himself, may his years be many and his realm increase, to buy Maniakes' favor once more.»
«How would Tzikas betray the King of Kings?» Abivard said, gesturing with his right hand to turn aside the evil omen. Then he held up that hand. «No, don't tell me if you know of a way. I don't want to think about it.» He stopped. «No, if you know of a way, you'd better say you do. If you can think of one, without a doubt Tzikas can, too.»
«I can't, the God be praised,» Turan said. «But that doesn't mean Tzikas can't.»
Abivard positioned his men along the Tib, a little north of one of the boat bridges drawn up on the far side of the river. If the Videssians did seek to cross to the other side, he hoped he could either get across himself in time to block them or at least pursue and harass them on the western side.
But Maniakes showed no intention of either crossing to the west bank or swinging east and using the superior speed with which his army could move to get around Abivard's force. His scouts came riding down to look over the position Abivard had established and then, after skirmishing once more with Tzikas' horsemen, went galloping back to give the Videssian Avtokrator the news.
Two days later the whole Videssian army came into sight just after the first light of day. With trumpets and drums urging them to ever greater speed, Abivard's troops formed their battle line. Abivard had Tzikas' horsemen on his right flank and split the infantry in which he had the most confidence in two, stationing half his best foot soldiers in the center and the other half closest to the Tib to anchor the line's left.
For some time the two armies stood watching each other from beyond bowshot Then, without Abivard's order, one of the warriors from Tzikas' regiment rode out into the space between them. He made his horse rear, then brandished his lance at the Videssians as he shouted something Abivard couldn't quite make out.
But he didn't need to understand the words to know what the warrior was saying. «He's challenging them to single combat!» Abivard exclaimed. «He must have watched that Vaspurakaner who challenged Romezan the winter before last.»
«If none of them dares come out or if this fellow wins, we gain,» Turan said. «But if he loses—»
«I wish Tzikas hadn't let him go forth,» Abivard said. «I—» He got no further than that, for a great shout arose from the Videssian ranks. A mounted man came galloping toward the Makuraner, who couched his lance and charged in return. The Videssian's mail shirt glittered with gilding. So did his helm, which also, Abivard saw, had a golden circlet set on it.
«That's Maniakes!» he exclaimed in a hoarse voice. «Has he gone mad to risk so much on a throw of the dice?»
The Avtokrator had neither lance nor javelin, being armed instead with bow and arrows and a sword that swung from his belt He shot at the Makuraner, reached over his shoulder for another arrow, set it in his bow, let fly, and grabbed for yet another shaft. He'd shot four times before his foe came close.
At least two, maybe three, of the shafts went home, piercing the Makuraner champion's armor. The fellow was swaying in the saddle when he tried to spear Maniakes off his horse. The lance stroke missed. The Avtokrator of the Videssians drew his sword and slashed once, twice, three times. His foe slipped off his horse and lay limp on the ground.
Maniakes rode after the Makuraner's mount, caught it by the reins, and began to lead it back toward his own line. Then, almost as an afterthought, he waved toward the Makuraner cavalry and toward the fallen champion. Pick him up if you like, he said with gestures.
He spoke the Makuraner tongue. He might have said that to his opponents with words, but his own men were cheering so loudly, no words would have been heard. As he rejoined his soldiers, a couple of Makuraners rode out toward the man who had challenged the Videssian army. The imperials did not attack them. They heaved the beaten man up onto one of their horses and rode slowly back to their position on the right.
«If Maniakes didn't kill that fellow, we ought to take care of the job,» Turan said.
«Isn't that the sad and sorry truth?» Abivard agreed. «All right—he was brave. But he couldn't have done us more harm than by challenging and losing, not if he tried to murder you and me both in the middle of the battle. It disheartened us—and listen to the Videssians! If they were still wondering whether they could beat us, they aren't anymore.»
He wondered whether Tzikas hadn't set up the whole thing. Could the Videssian renegade, despite his fervent protestations of loyalty and his worship of the God, have urged a warrior forward while sure he would lose, in the hope of regaining favor back in Videssos? The answer was simple: of course he could. But the next question—would he?—required more thought.
He had everything he could want in Makuran—high rank, even the approval of Sharbaraz King of Kings. Why would he throw that away? The only answer that occurred to Abivard was the thrill that had to go with treason successfully brought off. He shook his head. Videssians were connoisseurs of all sorts of subtle refinements, but could one become a connoisseur of treason? He didn't think so. He hoped not.
Abivard got no more time to think about it
, for as soon as the cavalrymen had returned with their would-be champion, horns sounded up and down the Videssian line. The imperials rode forward in loose order and began plying the Makuraners with arrows, as they had at the battle by the canal the summer before.
As before, Abivard's men shot back. He waved. Horns rang out on his army's right wing. He had cavalry now. Were they loyal? They were: Tzikas' men thundered at the Videssians.
Maniakes must have been expecting that. After the fact, Abivard realized he'd advertised it in his deployment—but given the position he had had to protect, he'd found himself with little choice.
A regiment of Videssians, armed with their usual bows and javelins, peeled off from the left wing of Maniakes' army and rode to meet the Makuraners. Being less heavily armed and armored than Tzikas' horsemen, the Videssians could not stop their charge in its tracks as a countercharge by a like number of Makuraners might well have done. But they did blunt it, slow it, and keep it from smashing into their comrades on the flank. That let the rest of the Videssians assail Abivard's foot soldiers.
Maniakes' men did not hold back as they had in the battle by the canal. Then they'd wanted to keep the Makuraners in play till their fellows could circle around and hit Abivard's force from an unexpected direction. Now they were coming straight at Abivard and the assembled city garrison troops, plainly confident that no such army could long stand in their way.
Because they wore mail shirts and their foes mostly did not, their archery was more effective than that of Abivard's men. They drew close enough to ply the front ranks of the Makuraners with javelins and hurt them doing it.
«Shall we rush at them, lord?» Turan shouted above the screams and war cries of the fight.
Abivard shook his head. «If we do that, we're liable to open up holes in our line, and if they once pour into holes like that, we're done for. We just have to hope we can stand the pounding.»
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