On the Oceans of Eternity

by S. M. Stirling

  "Jack?" Walker said.

  "Your Majesty, thirty-two rounds, four days' rations, no fodder," Morton said crisply, standing at parade rest.

  There was a faint bruise around one eye; the best way Walker had found to keep him on the wagon in the field was to simply, personally, beat the living shit out of him every once in a while when he started to forget the previous lesson.

  Walker swung around to face the others. "And that's about typical," he said. "Right now, we have just enough to get this army back to its sources of supply, If we're careful and start now."

  He ran a hand over the map. "One-third of our forces are strung out guarding our lines of supply along these miserable mud-track roads. Every mile we go forward we get weaker and they"-he pointed to the east, where the dull rumble of artillery marked a rearguard action-"get stronger, falling back on their bases. And everything will get worse now that the weather's consistently bad. This army is too big to live off the land in poor country even if it hadn't been stripped, and it needs continuous resupply of ammunition and spare parts to fight at all."

  About half of the dozen officers grouped around the map table looked as if they were getting it. The other half, Guouwaxeus worst of all, were staring at him as if he was reciting "Jabberwocky."

  Someday, he thought, I will watch you die on a cross, Guouwaxeus, and every last one of your wellborn shit-for-brains relatives beside you. But not yet, unfortunately. It was one thing to teach a man how to march and shoot and dig, or even how to handle a company of riflemen, and something else entirely to teach them a whole new way to think about conflict. Damn, if only I'd had another five years before this war!

  "Then…" one of the Ringapi chieftains said, with a speculative look. "You say we are defeated, Lord King?"

  Oh, somebody give me strength. "No, Lord Tautorun," Walker said. " 'Moving back' is also not the same thing as 'losing.' In fact, it's perfectly possible to move forward and win all the battles, and lose the war."

  Now he got a few glances of the sort you'd expect to see on a man who'd just turned a corner and come across a hyena eating a baby. Or the way a Baptist might look if he found he'd stumbled into a Wiccan orgy.

  "If we pulled back to here," he said, sketching a line on the map, "we could bring up supplies as fast as we consumed them. So we'll go a little further west, to here."

  He drew a line that included most of the passes up onto the plateau from the coastal lowlands along the Aegean and Sea of Marmora.

  "That means we'll be able to build up stockpiles over the winter. We'll also use the time to thoroughly pacify the areas we occupy, train new recruits, build roads and bridges, and to bring forward enough transport. Then, when we move east in the spring we can deny the enemy his harvests"-since grain ripened in late spring and early summer there-"and be well supplied right up to the Halys and past it. Once we've taken Hattusas, the enemy will have to fall back on Kar-Duniash. That will take another year, maybe two."

  He looked around. "We'll need a rear guard, of course. Lord Guouwaxeus, I think that'll be your job."

  The others drew a little aside, as if the Achaean had contracted some deadly, infectious disease.

  He sat brooding over the map after the rest had left; they'd pull out tomorrow. I hope we don't have too many frostbite cases, he thought. Transport and shelter were very short.

  Harold came up beside him. "They should not dare to oppose you, Father," he said hotly. "They are little men, without understanding."

  Walker chuckled and ruffled the boy's blond mop. "Yeah," he said. "Most of the time. There are reasons to listen to them, though. First one is it makes them feel better if they think I take them seriously."

  Harold scowled and clenched a small fist. "They should fear you!"

  "Oh, they do. But an actively terrified man doesn't make much of a general-for that matter, if he's easy to terrify, he won't make much of a general either. Capisce?"

  The boy nodded slowly. "I see. Father. They must be brave men to serve you in war?"

  "Yeah, more or less. And self-confident. I can't be there to look over their shoulders all the time. Plus… would you like to hear a story?"

  Harold perched on a chair, eyes bright; he was dressed in a smaller version of his father's black fur-and-leathers and looked comfortable in them despite the bitter cold outside the thin canvas.

  "Yes!" he said.

  "Okay, this happened in a land far, far to the east-China." Harold nodded; his geography lessons had taken that in. "Well, in this empire of China there was a mighty emperor, who'd put down all his neighbors and made himself ruler of all the civilized kingdoms."

  "Like you, Father?"

  "Sort of, but I'm smarter. Anyway, this emperor-his name was Lu Pu-Wei-"

  He could see the boy silently mouthing the alien syllables.

  "-had a minister named Li Ssu. Now, Li Ssu was big into punishment. He had a saying: If light offenses carry heavy punishments, one can imagine what will be done against a serious offense. Thus the people will not dare to break the laws. So he had pretty well only one punishment for anything-death."

  "Okay," Harold said. "Yeah, I see… but where's the catch, Father?"

  Walker laughed. "When this emperor's dynasty was overthrown, it started like this. One day, some farmers who'd been called up for military service were sitting in the mud. Rainy season, you see."

  His hands sculpted the air, and Harold was bobbing up and down and grinning as his father went on:

  "So one farmer says to the others: 'What's the punishment for being late?' and the others all answer: 'Death.'

  "Then he says, 'What's the punishment for rebellion?' and the others all answer 'Death.'

  "Then he stands up and says: 'Well, brothers, I got news for you-we're late.''

  "Oh," Harold said. Then he laughed himself: "You mean, if they think you're going to kill them anyway, or might over some small thing, then they might as well rebel-they don't lose anything by it."

  "Exactly, kid. The other reason for listening to the generals is that sometimes, they're right." He gripped the boy by the back of the neck and shook him a little. "I'm not always right. Neither will you be. If nobody tells you when they think you're wrong, you'll make more mistakes-it's like blinding yourself. Now run along; you've got some studying to do."

  He leaned back and laced his hands behind his head, scowling himself, looking at the map. The temptation to try to smash them just one more time, and then they'd truly run… No. He might have been able to take Hattusas, but that would have been one bridge too far. Napoleon had taken Moscow, and look how much good it had done him.

  After a moment the flap opened, and Hong came in. "You sent for me, Will?"

  "Yeah," he said.

  He stood and swung his arm. The open palm caught her across the face and knocked her down with a flat heavy smack sound and a thump as she hit the ground without any of her usual grace.

  For a moment her face was fluid with surprise; then she smiled as her tongue came out and touched the blood at the corner of her mouth, then slowly wet her lips.

  "Oh, you have some frustrations to work off, do you, Will? I like that. It's been too long."

  "Maybe you won't like it this time," he said, kneeling.

  His left hand picked up a pillow and pushed it over her face with relentless strength, while his right tore her clothing open. Not until she stopped arching her body into the smothering weight and panicked, tearing at his hand and thrashing to escape, did he release the grip… and thrust into her in the same instant. The slight woman gasped and bucked under two hundred pounds of weight, unable to draw a complete breath into air-starved lungs.

  "Bet I can make you scream," he said, drawing back a little.

  Hong laughed and wrapped her legs around him. "Bet you can't," she gasped, deliberately hyperventilating; the dark flush of her face faded a little.

  "And maybe I'll forget and really kill you one of these days," he said, grabbing her legs and pushing them roughly
back until her knees were by her ears, rising and slamming down on her while only her shoulders and neck touched the ground.

  "Oh, yeah, I know, and I like knowing that, too."

  He set the pillow over her face again.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  December, 10 A.E,-Cadiz Base, southern Iberia

  December, 10 A.E.-Near Hattusas, Kingdom of Hani-land

  December, 10 A.E.-Walkeropolis and Rivendell, Kingdom of Great Achaea

  December, 10 A.E.-Cadiz Base, southern Iberia

  December, 10 A.E.-Black Mountains, south-central Iberia

  Clack. The bokken cracked together, slid free, whirled, struck. The world shrank to a strip of brightness under the helmet, cut by the bars of the face guard under it. Swindapa circled, then halted with the oak practice sword in chudan, the middle position, held out below the breastbone, angled up with the point at her opponent's throat level. She was motionless but not stiff; every muscle relaxed into a state where action could come immediately, weight borne by the bones rather than flesh, balance slightly forward on the balls of her feet but kept centered by the low stance.

  Rigidity means a dead hand, flexibility means a living hand. One must understand this fully.

  That was from the book that Marian liked so well. Very true, like most of it… although there was something repellent about that Miyamoto Musashi, an unhumanness. She could not imagine him dandling a baby, or carving a cradle on a winter's evening, or sitting beneath a tree after the harvest drinking beer and singing with his friends. His words felt like a man with a single huge eye who did nothing but see just one thing.

  But he saw that one thing very clearly…

  Marian's bokken came up to jodan no kame, over the head with hilt forward. Her hands stood wide-spaced on the long hilt, gripping lightly with thumb and forefinger, more firmly with ring and little fingers, delicate as a surgeon's hold on a scalpel. Swindapa moved forward from bent knees, both feet pushing at once as the sword came up, twisting her wrists as she thrust for the face. That put the cutting edge uppermost, a strike at the vulnerable tendons of the inner wrist at the same time as the point menaced the eyes, motion smooth and fast with a hunza of exhaled breath.

  The other's head turned, just enough to let the point of the bokken slide over the enameled metal of the flared helmet. The sword came down one-handed, the fisted right hand snapping aside to put it out of danger for an instant. Then both slapped onto the hilt and she cut from the side, looping up to slice at the younger woman's armpit. Swindapa bounced backward, in again; Marian was using minimal movements and counterattack against her partner's youthful speed and endurance. The Fiernan felt herself grinning as she fought despite the savage concentration of effort and will; this was as beautiful as a Star-Moon dance, in its way. That was how she'd seen it that first time, watching secretly at night as Marian performed kata with the sword on the deck of the Eagle. Dancing with the silver steel beneath the Moon…

  There was a final clatter and crash of wood on wood, on steel armor, oak blurring in fast hard whipping arcs. Marian relaxed one leg, pivoted as she fell-stepped aside and snap-kicked the other on the back of a knee. That was hard to counter, wearing the weight of the armor; Swindapa went crashing on her back. Winded, she brought the sword up just a fractional second too late. Marian's came down in a flashing overarm stroke, left hand sliding down the back of the blade for an instant to add force, then clamping on to the hilt as the bokken came to rest across Swindapa's throat, motionless. Swindapa rolled her eyes to the side and met her partner's, grave and dark as she kept the crouched bent-legged posture for a further instant.

  "I think that's pretty unambiguous," the Fiernan said.

  "Sometimes I think you let me win, these days," Marian grumbled.

  "Oh, I would, except that you might get hurt in a real fight if I did that," Swindapa said, grinning.

  They knelt facing each other, laid down the blades and bent their foreheads to the ground between their hands, then sat back on their heels and emptied their minds, letting their breath go slow and deep. Marian said she used the image of a still pond to quiet her inwardness. That was hard for the Eagle People; they were always… busy… inside.

  Swindapa listened to the Silent Song, the song that the stars danced to with their mother the Moon. Sometimes it was hard to hear it, but then you must try less, not more, and it came.

  Voices murmured outside the canvas cubicle; Raupasha recognized King Kashtiliash's. Her hearing was still very sharp.

  "You did not know, my brother?" he said in that bull rumble. Then Kenneth Hollard's voice, a murmur she couldn't make out.

  "Among the Mitanni, a ruler must be perfect in body-at least, must have the use of all their limbs and senses. I grieve, too. She has served my House well, and she was brave and very fair-such another she-hawk as my Kat'ryn, with an honor I once did not believe a woman could hold."

  Words I would much have given much to hear, Raupasha thought. I have given much for them. I have given all I have, save my life-and that would be a little thing beside the cost. Then: No. I did what honor required. I must not count the cost. Ah, but that is hard!

  Hands touched her face, and she flinched an instant before steeling herself.

  "The burn will heal faster with a light gauze covering," Justin Clemens said gently, putting down the mirror he had been holding for his patient.

  Raupasha daughter of Shuttarna let her head fall back on the pillow; it still felt odd, shorn. So is the fleece of all my hopes shorn and lost, she thought. The words did not hurt much, no more than the dull background ache of her face and hand and side.

  Clemens's hands were as gentle as his voice as he administered the ointment and laid the light covering on the left side of her face. The message of the mirror was burned into her, the thickened red scar tissue, the empty, sightless white eye.

  "Will the healing… make the skin better?"

  "Somewhat," Clemens said.

  She turned her head-knowing she would have to learn to do that to see, with only her right eye-and watched his face. It held a compassion that hurt like fire, but also honesty.

  "The scars will become less red, but the tissue will remain thick and rigid over about a third of your face."

  Feather-light, his finger traced a line from one cheekbone across her eye to the forehead.

  "Nor will the hair grow back here. I am very sorry, Princess, but all I can do is give you an ointment that will keep the damaged skin supple."

  "Thank you," she said; he touched her shoulder once as he gathered his instruments.

  "This will help you sleep," he said, and she felt the sting of an injection in her arm. A curtain seemed to fall between her and the pain, as if it was still happening but to someone else.

  "My thanks again," she murmured, as he led on his rounds.

  There are others who need his care more than I. Those with no eyes at all, or faces; those lacking limbs; those with worse woundings who yet could not die-it was not altogether a blessing, the healing art of the Island folk. It could save you for a life that was worse than death.

  But at least I may weep alone. There was another murmur of voices outside, and Clemens saying something in a grudging tone.

  Then the canvas door was pushed aside again, and she must be brave again. Then she saw who it was, and her hand made a fending gesture.

  "No-" she said.

  Kenneth Hollard came in and sat on the stool by her cot, catching the hand between hers. "Hello, Princess," he said calmly. His eyes did not waver…

  Well, he is a warrior. He has seen worse. But not on the face of a woman who-I hoped-he looked upon with the gaze of desire.

  "Hello, Lord Kenn'et," she said listlessly.

  "Is the pain very bad?" he said, a trace of awkwardness in his voice. This too must be endured…

  "No," she said.

  "You-" he cleared his throat. "You did very well. You may have saved us all."

  And I won his gratitude, when it is
useless, she thought. Then, thrusting the bitterness away: I would have given my life for his, she thought. What I had to give, I gave. Let it be enough. Let him remember me… perhaps name a daughter for me. It is enough.

  "Thank you," she said. "My father-and my foster father-would not be ashamed of me, I hope."

  "Any man would be proud of such a daughter," he said. Then he took a deep breath, as if steeling himself for a difficult task: "And… any man would be proud of such a woman."

  Her one gray eye sought his. The medicine against pain is giving me dreams, as they warned me it might.

  "My lord?" she whispered. Then with a flash of anger her hand rose and lifted the gauze. "You saw me when I was fair-saw all of me, at the place of hot springs. Now look at me! I am a thing of horror-and princess no more."

  "I have seen your face," he said. He leaned closer. "At least it isn't the face of a coward, like mine." She was struck wordless, and saw him force himself to go on. "Who wouldn't speak, because he was afraid… of politics, complications, of himself."

  "Oh," she said. "This is a matter of honor."

  "No, it's a matter of belated good sense," he said harshly, and squeezed her hand. "I faced the prospect of a life without you in it, Raupasha, and as for your kingdom, that was never more than a hindrance to me."

  Now she did weep, as he bent forward to softly touch his lips to hers. "There it is, for what it's worth. If you spit in my face, I'll understand." A hint of his boyish grin. "Although I'd be very disappointed."

  "Never," she said, her free hand going up to touch her lips and then his. The IV rattled as she moved. "Never in all the world."

  "We're meeting him here!" Arnstein said incredulously.

  "Yes," Odikweos replied, with that slight secret smile of his.

  Walkeropolis had recovered with surprising speed from the Emancipator's raid; the firefighting service seemed to be efficient, and they were already in the middle of so many construction projects that repairing damage just meant slowing the schedule on new buildings. He got a few glares as they rode downtown in Odikweos's chariot, and winced a bit at one long row of bodies laid out by the sidewalk to wait the corpse-wagon. Some were very small…