Hell's Gate-ARC

by David Weber

  "Not well," the regiment-captain amplified after a moment. "We're keeping him so damned busy relaying messages up-chain from chan Baskay and chan Tesh that he really doesn't have a whole lot of time to devote to the project. And even when he does, he's running into the same sort of non-cooperation Tobis seems to be encountering with this Thalmayr idiot."

  The regiment-captain paused, then forced himself to be fair.

  "I suppose, if I'd been captured—especially after the sort of massacre these people got put through—I wouldn't be in any hurry to cooperate with my jailers, either. After all, they're probably as imbued as our own people with the idea that it's their duty to refuse to give the enemy any useful information. And despite the total incompetence of their commander, it's obvious these are elite troops."

  "If you say so, Sir," Silkash said dubiously. Velvelig raised an eyebrow at him, and the surgeon shrugged. "I know I've only seen them since they got here, but they don't exactly look like 'elite troops' to me."

  "No?" Velvelig gazed at him speculatively, then snorted. "They seem a bit demoralized to you, do they? Sullen? Uncooperative? Silently resentful?"

  "Yes, Sir. All of those." Silkash cocked his head to one side. "Why?"

  "Because that's exactly the reaction I'd expect out of elite troops who'd suffered the sort of pounding these men survived. Think about it, Silky. From chan Tesh's reports, it's obvious they never even suspected we could fire on them through a portal. Their CO—such as he was, and what there was of him—went down in the first volley, which decapitated their entire command structure. The mortar rounds coming in on them must've been the most terrifying thing they'd ever experienced. chan Tesh was massacring them—literally—and they couldn't even shoot back. So how did they react?"

  Silkash's perplexity was obvious, and Velvelig waved his tea mug for impatient emphasis.

  "They charged, Silky. They came out of their fortifications, got up out of their protective holes under fire—which is harder than hells for anyone to do, trust me—and they charged straight into the fire that was killing them." He shook his head. "Whatever we may think of what they did to the Chalgyn crew, and however stupidly they may have been commanded when chan Tesh hit them, these men were magnificent soldiers. In fact, I'll absolutely guarantee you that that idiot Thalmayr didn't have a thing to do with training them. Not these men. They were so much better than he was that there's no comparison. And that's exactly why so many of them got killed. Instead of turning around and running away, instead of breaking, they charged in an almost certainly spontaneous effort to get their own weapons into action on the far side of the portal. It's probably the bloody-minded septman in me, but I'm prepared to forgive men for a lot when they show that kind of guts."

  "I guess I hadn't thought about it quite that way," Silkash admitted after a moment.

  "No, I didn't think you had. But it also explains a lot about their present attitude, I imagine. These men weren't used to the idea that they could be beaten. They expected to win. And if they were going to lose, they never would have believed that anyone could have simply . . . wiped them out for the loss of barely half a dozen men on the other side. They're smart enough to have figured out that it was because they were up against weapons they had no experience fighting and had an idiot for a CO, but that's an intellectual understanding, not an emotional one. It doesn't get down inside a soldier's guts and heart where his belief in himself lives. Defeat is one thing for an elite unit at that level; abject, humiliating, total defeat is something else again. So they're bitter, ashamed, and convinced that they've failed their country, their honor, and themselves. But instead of simply collapsing, what have they done?

  "They've dug in and refused to cooperate with us in any way, that's what they've done," Velvelig continued, once again answering his own question. "Maybe, in time—and especially if these negotiations actually go somewhere—that may change. I've been trying to help that change along; that's why I've been so insistent on our men treating them not just correctly, but with dignity. In the meantime, though, I'm not surprised by their attitude."

  "Now that you've got me thinking in the same direction, neither am I," Silkash conceded. "But Tobis is probably right that their lack of familiarity with Talented people is also a factor. First, because they don't have a clue what chan Tergis is trying to accomplish, which sort of automatically precludes the possibility of cooperating, even if they wanted to. And, second, because if any of them do have a touch of Talent of their own, they might well react the same way Thalmayr is."

  "Probably," Velvelig agreed. "Which, I'm afraid, brings us back to Thalmayr." The Arpathian's lips twisted briefly with all of the contempt he refused to feel for Thalmayr's unfortunate subordinates. "Just what is his prognosis?"

  "Physically?" Silkash shrugged. "I can understand why Petty-Captain chan Rodair sent him on to us here at Fort Ghartoun, but I really wish he hadn't. For several reasons."

  "Such as?"

  "As much as I've grown to dislike the man, Sir, I'm a Healer. My Healer's Oath requires me to treat any patient with compassion and respect, and to offer him the very best treatment possible. That's why chan Rodair wanted him here at Ghartoun, because he thought the damage to Thalmayr's spine might be amenable to surgical intervention. Well, he was wrong. For that matter, I was wrong when I first examined the man. I think it may have been because I wanted so badly for chan Rodair to have been right, but that doesn't change the fact that we were both wrong. So we subjected him to a completely unnecessary—and useless—operation. That's bad enough, but even worse, whatever it is that's causing him to be so resistant to Tobis' efforts to get at his mental and emotional traumas is also hampering our efforts at pain management. So we've inflicted that additional suffering on him, as well."

  "That's hardly your fault," Velvelig said. "You were doing the best you could for him, under very difficult circumstances."

  "Oh, I know that, Sir. And so does Tobis. The problem is, I rather doubt Thalmayr does. And it doesn't change our responsibilities towards him, either."

  "Well, we already knew the man was an idiot," Velvelig said comforting way. "No reason he shouldn't be an idiot about that, too, I suppose."

  "I hadn't . . . quite looked at it that way, Sir." Silkash found that he was experiencing an unanticipated difficulty not smiling.

  "Then you should. But I noticed that you prefaced your remarks by referring to his physical recovery. So, how do his mental and emotional prospects shape up?"

  "It's really hard to be sure about that when our Talented Healer can't even reach the man. Still, as near as Tobis can tell, he's at least managed to divert Thalmayr's drive towards suicide."

  "Which even Thalmayr should admit is a positive step!" Velvelig snorted.

  "Assuming that he gives Tobis credit for it, yes, Sir. Of course, if he doesn't understand what Tobis is doing in the first place, he probably doesn't."

  "No, I'm sure he doesn't," Velvelig said glumly. "You know, I really wish Prince Janaki hadn't brought us this particular guest."

  "At least dropping him off with us helped get the Prince out of the combat zone, Sir. That's got to be a plus, however you look at it."

  "It certainly does." Velvelig sipped more tea, gazing ruminatively out the window once more. The sun was almost gone, he noticed, leaving the mountain summits etched dark and black, looming against the afterglow. He was going to have to light the lamps, he thought.

  "If you don't mind my asking, Sir," Silkash said out of the gathering dimness after a moment, "you mentioned how busy chan Tergis is passing messages back up-chain. How well are the negotiations going?"

  "I don't mind your asking, but if I had the answer to that, I wouldn't be a regiment-captain sitting out here at the ass-end of nowhere," Velvelig said dryly. "I'd be making my fortune as a Precog back home."

  He drank a little more tea, set his mug back down on the desktop, got out a box of matches. He lit the lamps, replaced the glass chimneys and adjusted the wicks, then tipp
ed his chair back and folded his hands behind his head.

  "chan Baskay and Rothag are still convinced these people are lying about entirely too many things for my peace of mind," he admitted. "What bothers me most about it isn't that diplomats . . . shade the truth. Gods know, they do that back home whenever they can, and if our diplomats didn't have Talents on the other side to keep them honest, they'd probably do a lot more of it. But if they're as urgently interested in negotiating some sort of permanent cease-fire as they claim to be, then I'd think they should have a lot more incentive to be at least forthcoming, if not completely honest. But they haven't really given us a lot more information. They seem almost obsessed with the little stuff, the fine details about how we're supposed to go about negotiating, rather than more substantive questions like what we're supposed to be negotiating about. And I don't much care for the attitude their military escort seems to be showing. There've been a couple of potentially ugly incidents already."

  "What sort of incidents, Sir?"

  "That's just it, they're the stupid kind. People who take umbrage or even insult from innocent remarks. Or people who insult our people, apparently by accident. Three times now, this Skirvon of theirs has suggested postponements in the talks themselves in order to 'let tempers cool.' I'm not there, of course, but I'm inclined to back chan Baskay's view. I think their troopers are actually under orders to provoke incidents as a deliberate delaying tactic and I've said as much in my own reports up-chain."

  "But why would they be doing that, Sir?" Silkash's puzzlement showed.

  "That's what neither chan Baskay nor I can understand," Velvelig admitted. "Logically, if all they want to do is waste our time, then why talk to us at all?"

  "So you don't have any idea why they might be doing it?"

  "Actually, chan Baskay's come up with one possible explanation that sort of makes sense. After all, one of the reasons we haven't pressed them harder is the delay in message turnaround between here and Sharona. We don't know exactly how these people communicate over long distances, but if they don't have Talents, they obviously don't have Voices. They may use this magic of theirs to do the same sort of things our Voices can do, but they may also have to physically transport messages, as well, and chan Baskay's suggested that their communications loop may well be even longer than ours. He thinks this Skirvon may be trying to kick grit into the works to slow things down until he can get definite orders—or maybe even until a more senior diplomat can arrive at Hell's Gate with official instructions from home about exactly what they are and aren't willing to settle for when it comes to possession of the cluster."

  "And they're bothering to talk with us in the meantime because—?"

  "I'm not sure, although I suppose it's possible they want to make sure we don't press on with our own exploration beyond the swamp portal. From Voice Kinlafia's Portal Sniffing, we know their entry portal for that universe isn't very close to the swamp portal, but that's really all we know. They might have some particularly important installation or colony much closer to it than that, and they might be trying to divert us from any exploration in its direction."

  Velvelig shrugged, clearly unhappy with his own hypothesis.

  "I don't say that's the only explanation. It's just the only one I can come up with. And, at least while we're negotiating, we're not shooting anymore. So, in some ways, it's as much to our advantage as to theirs to just keep right on talking. Besides," he grinned suddenly, "it gives us some time to get a 'real diplomat' in here to relieve poor chan Baskay!"

  Commander of Two Thousand Mayrkos Harshu looked up from the paperwork in his PC as someone rapped gently and respectfully at the frame of his office doorway. His dark, intense eyes focused like a hunting gryphon on the officer standing in the open door. Then he laid his sarkolis crystal stylus on his blotter, much the way another man might have sheathed a sword.

  "Enter," he said, and acting Commander of Five Hundred Alivar Neshok obeyed.

  "I assume you're here for the afternoon briefing?" Harshu said, raising his eyebrows, and Neshok nodded.

  "Yes, Sir, I am. May I go ahead and set up for it?"

  "Of course you can, Five Hundred," Harshu said testily. "Unless my memory fails, that's why you're here, isn't it?"

  The two thousand had a near-fetish for not "wasting time." Especially with what he considered pointless, unnecessary questions. Of course, he also had a reputation for cutting people off at the knees if they made mistakes because they were too stupid or too lazy to ask questions. Which could make things rather . . . difficult upon occasion.

  "Yes, Sir," Neshok said, and moved quickly, uncasing his own crystal and bringing it swiftly on-line. He Felt Two Thousand Harshu's impatient eyes on him while he made his preparations, but he found them far less intimidating than some of his fellow officers did. He had an even more powerful patron of his own, after all. Besides, he was far too well aware of the opportunities of his present assignment to worry about the two thousand's famed temper tantrums.

  And that asshole Olderhan probably thought he'd spiked my career with his godsdamned shardonai, the acting five hundred thought with a mental sneer. Gods! He's even stupider than Two Thousand mul Gurthak told me he was.

  Neshok hadn't enjoyed the reaming-out mul Gurthak had given him in front of Olderhan and the two diplomats. Nobody would have, and he'd labored under the additional suspicion that mul Gurthak intended to leave him swinging in the wind if Olderhan lodged any formal protests about Neshok's behavior when he got back to Garth Showma. But he'd wronged the two thousand. mul Gurthak had simply been covering his own back, and Neshok's brevet promotion to his present rank and his assignment as Two Thousand Harshu's senior intelligence analyst was sufficient proof of mul Gurthak's continuing confidence in him.

  And if it hadn't been for Olderhan's insistence on extending shardon to that arrogant little bitch and her husband—and 'Magister Kelbryan's' backing him up—the two thousand's plan would have worked, he reflected. We didn't know she'd already managed to learn a civilized language, but that only would've made it easier to get her to talk. She'd damned well have told me anything I wanted her to by the time I got through with her.

  He let the fingertips of one hand brush the unsleeping eye insignia of the Intelligence Corps on his collar. He'd taken that off, at mul Gurthak's instructions, before he ever went to "greet" Olderhan and his prisoners. Aping the part of a line officer hadn't been all that difficult, however distasteful it might have been, and the two thousand had hoped a fellow line officer might have found it easier to separate Olderhan from his prisoners. And once they'd been separated and "administratively lost" somewhere at Fort Talon, it would all have turned out to have been a completely honest case of confused orders at a junior officer's level. Most unfortunate, of course, but just one of those things. Neshok had never doubted that Olderhan would have been furious, even if he'd gotten his prisoners back with only minor damage, but his own Intelligence superiors would have been quick to protect him, if only behind the scenes, if he'd managed to extract vital information first.

  Well, that hadn't happened, but mul Gurthak clearly recognized the debt he owed Neshok for having made the attempt. That was why he'd been promoted and assigned to his present duty, which should allow him to acquire at least as many career points with his superiors.

  And one of these days, I'll be in a position to give that smug, sanctimonious prick Olderhan exactly what he fucking well deserves, he thought viciously. Yet even as he thought it, he felt a tingle of remembered fear as he recalled the cold, fleering contempt in Sir Jasak Olderhan's dark eyes. And the fact that Olderhan's precious Second Andaran Scouts flunkies had actually been willing to take on his entire detachment if he'd so much as laid a finger on that little bitch.

  He pushed the thought aside with a fresh promise of vengeance . . . and wished he could push aside the memory of a crackling corona of combat magic ready to strike and the steely-cold promise in Gadrial Kelbryan's lethal almond eyes, as well. Unfortunat
ely . . .

  Behind him, Two Thousand Harshu cleared his throat in his patented "get on with it" style, and Neshok shook himself free of his brooding thoughts.

  "Beg pardon, Sir," he said. "I'm ready, now."

  "Good." Harshu's tone added an unspoken "and it's about time," and Neshok ordered the office's spellware to dim the lights. Then he tapped his PC with the stylus, and a moving, living image glowed into being above Harshu's desk. The fidgeting two thousand stopped fidgeting instantly, as his fiercely intelligent eyes darted from place to place, carefully comparing the present image to the ones he'd seen before. As always, once the keen intellect behind those eyes had a fresh task to engage it, most of the affected impatience and hyperactivity disappeared quickly.

  "As you can see, Sir, we're still getting very good imagery," he began.

  "Yes, we are," Harshu agreed thoughtfully. "In fact, are we sure they don't know we are?" His eyes darted up from the small moving images of Sharonian soldiers to impale Neshok. "Could they possibly be setting all this up to show us what they want us to see?"