Siege of Tarr-Hostigos

by John F. Carr

  “You are gambling too much on your notions of what the Styphoni might do,” Kirv replied. “I say they could be here much sooner than that. We need to guard against what the Styphoni can do, not what they might do.”

  The old argument of capabilities versus intentions. Three years ago Sirna had barely heard of it. Two years ago it was still a theoretical question, even if Aranth Sain could talk about it for hours. Now it was a life-and-death matter.

  “Captain Kirv,” the Study Team Director said, using his most formal classroom voice. “We not only have a large number of computers and recording machines to remove, but also a number of priceless tools that were obtained from other time-lines at great expense. I would like to transport as much of this material as possible to Fifth Level so that future Kalvan Study Teams will have a chance to become familiar with these tools and not waste time importing them from the Kalvan Control Time-Lines.

  “I’ll hold off posting the sentries for another half-day,” Kirv said reluctantly. “We do have a number of charges to set around the Foundry. Kalvan does not want the Foundry to fall into Styphoni hands. We’ll have to deal with the ‘protected’ conveyer storeroom later; after a war like this what will one more big explosion mean to the survivors? But hear this, Talgan: get your people organized for the moving party! I’m posting sentries where they’re needed, and may Galzar’s Mace strike anyone who argues.”

  “You start posting sentries without my orders and I’ll report you to Chief Verkan!”

  “I don’t care if you report me to Great King Kalvan. Anything they’ll do to me for disobeying your orders isn’t half what they’ll do if I neglect my duty!”

  Kirv turned away from Talgan Dreth and walked straight past Sirna without seeing her. As he passed, he muttered in a voice obviously not meant to be overheard, “If any of us live that long.”

  Sirna was about to hurry after him and ask for an explanation when she sensed someone behind her. She turned, to see Urig, the senior warehouse foreman.

  “Mistress Sirna. I thought I’d best warn you. Some of the lads--they’re talkin’ about makin’ off with the horses on their own.”

  “Thank you for the warning, Urig. We’re going to want everyone to help move equipment for at least two or three candles; what can be moved goes into carts. What can’t be moved goes into the warehouses, with tar and fireseed laid ready. Then we’ll be dividing up the extra horses, food, money--everything. Those who have given good service won’t be forgotten. And who knows? Even if Kalvan loses this one battle, he may win the next.”

  Urig’s look told her that the last sentence had been a waste of breath, but he jerked his head. “I’ll give ‘em your words, Mistress Sirna. It’s grateful they’ll be. The lads trust you, you’re not like some of them--” He made a pointed glance over at some of the senior faculty.

  Sirna didn’t know if that was the actual plan, if indeed Talgan Dreth had any plan at all. His habit of being close-mouthed made it impossible to tell. Sirna only knew she was going to see that something was done for the Foundry workers--even if it meant defying the Director.

  She could be sure of trouble back at the University if she did. But here-and-now, she could be sure of help from Aranth Sain and Captain Kirv, at least. And, when he recovered his health, Chief Verkan.

  Sirna jumped again as a soft footfall sounded behind her. It was Aranth Sain, who greeted her outraged look with a soft laugh.

  “If you can find anything to laugh at in this--!” Words failed her. She took a deep breath and added more gently, “At least try not to sneak up behind me.”

  “I wasn’t sneaking. I’ve just been trying not to be noticed by our dear Director, and I guess the habit stuck.”

  Having a potential ally on hand made Sirna breathe easier. “Will you help me keep my promises to Urig? If he begins to doubt me, we’ll have a mutiny on our hands right when we’re trying to get everything to safety.”

  “I will. But I’m going to spend the next four hours on the roof of the main forge. One extra pair of eyes on sentry can’t hurt. If I know Kirv, he will have his men on sentry duty, but they’ll have to stay hidden. I’m not one of Skordran’s people, so Talgan can’t fume at him over me.”

  Sirna’s mouth went dry. “Are the Styphoni that close?”

  “The main body, no. They’ll be coming on in a day or two. Phidestros is a damned good general, but he’s working with a divided command, Arch-priests up to his bellybutton and an army that’s taken a pounding.

  “What I’m worried about is his sending cavalry on ahead. We’ve heard rumors that armed bands of Roxthar’s torturers are taking hostages and killing peasants--in fact, Kirv showed me a few pictures of the Investigators in action.”

  “Can I see?”

  He shook his head. “You don’t want to see these pictures! They’re not for civilians.”

  Sirna felt a shiver make its way up her back.

  “The cavalry we don’t need to worry about,” Sain continued. “But a few regiments from Phidestros’ reserve could raise havoc in Hostigos Town. At least among those stupid enough to dally this long.”

  It was a physical impossibility for Sirna’s mouth to go drier. Her knees couldn’t decide between knocking together or folding under her.

  “Come on. I’ll walk you over to the forge. Tandar Volth is inside, making sure what we can’t move is melted down. Varnath Lala tried to stop him, but Tandar had two of the smiths throw the old crow out and bar the door against her.”

  “Pity I didn’t see that.”

  “You’ll see even more entertaining things before you get to Home Time Line, I’d wager.”

  “Dinner at the Constellation House?”

  “Done.”

  It had still been a stalemate and she’d gone to her bed, long before Captain Kirv and Talgan Dreth’s arguments had wound down. From the sounds outside it appeared they all might have to pay for the ritual antagonism between University and Paratime Police.

  There was a loud WHUMMPH! which shook the old farmhouse like an earthquake. She peered out the window and saw the foundry turned into smoldering fiery ruin! How are we going to escape now, she asked herself? Had Kirv set off the demolition charges without warning anyone to beat Talgan at his own game? No, that didn’t sound like the Paratime Policeman. Maybe his sentries had spotted a major force of Styphoni coming toward the Foundry!

  There was another loud explosion, as though someone had set off a casket of fireseed; only this one was right below her and she felt the floor underneath shiver and then collapse, sending her downward in a tangle of bed, furniture and stones. She landed in a sprawl and was hurting all over, but everything was still working--even her fingers.

  She heard someone shout, “Capture the foreign dogs. Roxthar wants to investigate them himself. Beware of all demonic arts!”

  “Dear Father Dralm!” Sirna whispered, as she tried to compress herself into a tiny little ball amongst the rubble and ruin of the second floor. There was something wet running down her arm and she was certain it was her own blood. She felt around and winced as her fingers found a deep scratch in her upper arm.

  She heard Lala screech, “We can talk about this! I demand to see your superior. I am an important personage. I know things the Inner Circle wants to know. I order--”

  Lala’s words were cut off by a gunshot and a shrill scream.

  She saw a big figure, which she recognized as Aranth Sain, moving through the rubble toward the back door. She tried to call out, but all that came forth was a croaking sound. Then Aranth was gone into the shadowy night.

  There were more screams and the sounds of fists hitting flesh. “Take this fool in chains. He will answer to the Investigator for killing the woman.” Suddenly there was a fusillade of shots and more screams.

  A voice that sounded like Captain Kirv’s said, “Move back, away from the Styphoni, so I can get a good shot!”

  There was another barrage of gunfire and she heard Kirv’s voice turn into a womanish s
cream. Her heart dropped into her stomach. She was alone!

  There were more screams and cuffs, she recognized the voice of Talgan and said a quiet prayer.

  “Please don’t hurt me!” Talgan shouted, his pleas cut short by a wet thud. She had never liked the administrator, but no one deserved to provide sport for the Investigation!

  Sirna felt around in the dark and found her musketoon. She’d heard too many stories about Roxthar and his Dralm-damned Investigation. Holy torture was what it was. It was no wonder that on Home Time Line religion was considered a plague on mankind, a verbally transmittable mental illness.

  Sirna had never felt so alone in her life.

  Suddenly some men entered the room with bright torches and burning sticks covered with tar. They were searching through the rubble for survivors. Several of the men were mercenaries, but one wore the white robe of the Investigation and she saw several Temple Guardsmen in their shiny armor and red capes. The Red Hand, isn’t that what the Hostigi call them?

  Kirv hadn’t been prepared for a Temple band of Styphon’s Guardsmen. She held her breath and squeezed against the wall as though she could will herself to disappear.

  She watched as a soldier found a leg under some fallen masonry. It took three men to drag the body of a woman out of the rubble; it was Mrytta the housekeeper. “By Galzar’s Teeth, she’s an ugly one! Almost as old and withered as the hag the Captain shot.”

  “And just as dead,” someone else finished.

  “Shut up,” another soldier commanded. “There’s somebody else in here, I can feel it.”

  Suddenly a light flashed in her eyes, temporarily blinding her. Sirna heard a shout. She closed one eye and aimed the musketoon at the priest in the white robes, hoping that all the shooting lessons Aranth had given her had taught her something.

  Her shot was deafening in the quiet tomb of what had once been a prosperous farmhouse. The priest screamed and clutched his stomach. Good, she thought, he’s gut-shot! There was a salvo of returning fire and something struck her head like a hammer--

  THIRTY

  Chief! I think you’d better see this now,” Paratime Police Inspector Andron Veral said as he bulled his way into the Chief’s office.

  Verkan looked up from his screen, saw the message ball in Andron’s hand, and thought, what now? His chest was still a mass of bruises from where the gunshot had struck, but the lung graft was fine and his ribs had already knitted back together. An occasional sharp pain would remind him that he’d come awfully close to termination at an anonymous mass gravesite a few days ago. Dalla had been hovering over him like a mother cat tending a wounded kitten ever since they’d arrived on First Level. He’d forced himself to come to work today just to escape her well intentioned but smothering concern.

  Andron first handed Verkan the data wafer that was held in his other hand. “Chief, this just arrived from Aryan-Transpacific, Kalvan’s Time-Line. It was red-flagged. I just got through running it in my viewer.”

  Verkan felt his stomach sink. In his mind an army of doubt and uncertainty attacked his mental wall of control. The years of training took command and Verkan remained impassive. He pushed the wafer into his desk viewer.

  “This is their last feed.”

  It was a feed from the sky-eye above Hostigos. He could see the two armies poised on either side of the valley in almost perfect geometric precision, like toy soldiers or a computer battle simulation. It was hard to think of them as real men, some friends, many of whom were about to die or be horribly maimed for life.

  The camera showed a close-up and he could see the Royal Banners of Hos-Hostigos blowing in the wind, a dark green keystone on a maroon field. The picture was too grainy to identify faces but he could discern individuals. The next shots showed the two armies’ opening moves, with Kalvan’s field artillery tearing holes in the front ranks of the Grand Host.

  He watched as the Hostigi right wing moved forward and chased the Styphoni out of the valley and into the next. Meanwhile, the two centers were locked in an embrace of death. Then he watched in surprise as the Hostigos left wing gave way to a determined attack from the Grand Host’s right wing and was enveloped by the Styphoni cavalry, who looked remarkably like the Roman cataphracti he had once seen close hand on Fourth Level, Alexandrian-Roman. They must be the Ros-Zarthani I’ve heard so much about.

  Fortunately, the left wing’s reserve was able to stop the envelopment long enough to allow a retreat that took them out of the valley, but no longer supporting Kalvan’s center.

  While the Grand Host’s right wing cavalry chased Kalvan’s left wing, the infantry turned and joined the assault on the Hostigi center, already under heavy attack. The camera sped up to cover action that must have taken hours. The two armies were locked in hand-to-hand combat. For a while it looked as if the Hostigi were surrounded until a reserve force joined the main body. For the first time it looked to Verkan as if Kalvan had a chance to push the Styphoni back.

  The camera moved to the next valley where the missing Hostigi right wing was thrashing the remnants of the Styphoni left wing’s foot. Both armies were devoid of cavalry support and he suspected the troopers were chasing each other over the ridges of the mountains that were called the Appalachians on Europo-American.

  Like most pre-mechanical armies, where command depended upon line-of-sight, the Hostigi right wing did not realize the rest of the army was in dire peril. Verkan wished he were there, instead of here shuffling paper; he would have found some way to warn them.

  He watched as the camera returned to the main battle and saw part of the Styphoni army break off, probably to prepare for the return of the missing Hostigi right wing. Too bad! Someone in the Grand Host camp knew what he was doing--either Grand Master Soton, or that mercenary Grand Captain-General Phidestros.

  While hundreds of smaller actions took place unnoticed, the two centers pushed back and forth strewing the ground with piles of their dead. He estimated the casualties in the tens of thousands: not atypical in this kind of engagement when one side or the other did not break off. Some of the Hostigi field artillery guns were still firing, inflicting scores of casualties with each shot in the tightly pressed ranks.

  Then he saw the Hostigi right wing return to where the Grand Host’s right had once been. There it was met by the Ros-Zarthani reserve. The Hostigi still had most of their mobile artillery and, without cavalry support, their guns tore the Ros-Zarthani infantry apart.

  For a moment, Verkan began to believe in miracles. Then he watched in disbelief as the Zarthani Knights, who’d just returned from pursuing the Hostigi center, slammed into the fray. Surprisingly, the Hostigi right wing, now hit on the flank, did not break. It was hard to imagine the thousands of heroic acts that made for such resolution.

  Yet, it wasn’t enough to save the day. The right began to slowly wheel and then continue its march around the entire Grand Host!

  With the support of the Temple Guard, the Styphoni suddenly seemed to redouble their battle against the beleaguered center. A few small bands of Hostigi soldiers began to break off and Verkan suspected they were mercenaries who had given their oath to Galzar. There was to be no grace for the Hostigi regulars, only Roxthar’s Investigation, and they fought on as though they understood exactly what that meant. Then suddenly, on the fast motion feed, the center re-formed itself into a hedgehog, with pikes all around the perimeter holding the Grand Host at bay.

  Slowly the center began to retreat. Verkan wondered if Kalvan was still alive. Probably, or the entire center might have broken, with each man for himself. Certain suicide. But Kalvan had taught his men well; they were leaving with an intact battle-line.

  Verkan shut off the viewer. “That’s enough! Veral, is there anything we can do to help Kalvan and Rylla?”

  “How could we find them? They’d be impossible to locate, Chief. There must be two or three hundred thousand Hostigi refugees, and that’s not counting the Hostigi Army. The roads have been clogged for days with fleeing Be
shtans and Sashtans. Once word reaches Sask and Nostor there will be a half-million refugees fleeing Hos-Hostigos. Kalvan’s subjects are that scared of Styphon’s revenge squad and Arch-Butcher Roxthar! Anyone with half a brain is taking whatever he can carry and bugging out.”

  “But Chief, that’s not our problem.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “This battle took place yesterday! The inspector who was supposed to scan these tapes was a day behind. When he saw this he moved like a bee-stung grizzly.”

  Verkan threw his left hand up to his forehead “What about the Kalvan Study-Team?”

  “That’s what I’m worried about, Chief. There hasn’t been a conveyer out of the Foundry in days. I don’t even know if they’ve received word about Kalvan’s defeat.”

  Verkan shook his head. One way or another, they know.

  Andron handed him the message ball. “Take a look. It’s a day old, but it’s our most recent communication.”

  Skordran Kirv’s wan face filled the viewer. “Chief, it looks like your friend Kalvan was killed, at least that’s what the rumors are saying. But then, according to rumor you’re dead, Rylla’s dead and Galzar’s Great Ghost has been seen walking through the battlefield.”

  Kalvan! No, it couldn’t be true. Verkan needed hard data and he needed it now.

  Kirv continued. “The Study Team is all in an uproar. Lala wants to try and negotiate with the Styphoni. Talgan Dreth wants to leave, but he still remembers the joshing he got when the entire team deserted the Foundry after Kalvan’s victory at Phyrax. The others are torn between these two competing personalities. And I can’t get either side to listen to reason. I’m all for getting everyone the Regwarn out of there!

  “I’ve stationed perimeter guards and nothing short of a regiment and a battery of guns will pry us out of the Foundry so I’m not worried about security. Still, if Kalvan loses this battle we’re in big trouble.