Marching Through Georgia

by S. M. Stirling

  And the family portraits, back to Freiherr Augustus von Shrakenberg himself, who had led a regiment of Mecklenberg dragoons in British service in the American Revolution, and taken this estate in payment. Title to it, at least; the natives had had other ideas, until he persuaded them. Six generations of Landholders since, in uniform, mostly: proud narrow faces full of wolfish energy and a cold, intelligent ferocity. Conquerors…

  At least that was the face they chose to show the world, he thought. A man's mind is a forest at night. We don't know our own inwardness, much less each other's.

  His father was standing by the cabinet, filling two brandy snifters. The study's only trophy was above it, a black-maned Cape lion. Karl von Shrakenberg had killed it himself, with a lance.

  Eric took the balloon glass and swirled it carefully to release the scent before lifting it to touch his father's. The smell was rich but slightly spicy, complementing the room's odors of books, old, well-kept furniture, and polished wood.

  "A bad harvest or a bloody war," the elder von Shrakenberg said, using the ancient toast.

  "Prosit," Eric replied. There was a silence, as they avoided each other's eyes. Karl limped heavily to the great desk and sank into the armchair amid a sigh of cushions. Eric felt himself vaguely uneasy with child-hood memories of standing to receive rebuke, and forced himself to sit, leaning back with negligent elegance. The brandy bit his tongue like a caress; it was the forty-year Thieuniskraal, for special occasions.

  "Not too bloody, I hope," he continued. Suddenly, there was a wetness on his brow, a feeling of things coiling beneath the surface of his mind, like snakes in black water. I should never have come back. It all seemed safely distant while I was away.

  Karl nodded, searching for words. They were Draka, and there was no need to skirt the subject of death. "Yes." A pause. "A pity that it came before you could marry. Long life to you, Eric, but it would have been good to see grandchildren here at Oakenwald before you went into harm's way. Children are your immortality, as much as your deeds." He saw his son flinch, swore inwardly. He's a man, isn't he? It's been six years since the wench died!

  Eric set the glass down on the arm of his seat with immense care. "Well, you rather foreclosed that option, didn't you, Father?"

  The time-scored eagle's face reared back. "I did nothing of the kind. Did nothing."

  "You let her die." Eric heard the words speak themselves; he felt perfectly lucid but floating, beyond himself. Calm, a spectator. Odd, I've felt that sentence waiting for six years and never dared, some detached portion of himself observed.

  "The first I knew of it was when they told me she was dead!"

  "Which was why you buried her before I got back. Burned her things. Left me nothing!" Suddenly he was on his feet, breath rasping through his mouth.

  "That was for your own good. You were a child— you were obsessed!" Karl was on his feet as well, his fist smashing down on the teakwood of the desk top, a drumbeat sound. They had never spoken of this before, and it was like the breaking of a cyst. "It was unworthy of you. I was trying to bring you back to your senses!"

  "Unworthy of your blood, you mean; unworthy of that tin image of what a von Shrakenberg should be. It killed John, and it's hounded me all my life. When it's killed Johanna and me, will that satisfy your pride?" He saw his father's face pale and then flush at the mention of his elder brother's name, saw for a moment the secret fear that visited him in darkness; knew that he had scored, felt a miserable joy. The torrent of words continued.

  "Obsessed? I loved her! As you've never loved anything in your reptile-blooded life! And you let me go a month at school without a word; if my favorite horse had died, you would have done more."

  The shout bounced off the walls, startling him hack to awareness of self. There was a tinkling, a stab of pain in his right hand; he looked down to see the snifter shattered in his grasp, blood trickling about glass shards. He brought his focus back to his father. "I hold you responsible," he finished softly.

  Karl's eyes held his. Love? What do you know about it—you're a child. It's something to be done, not talked about. Aloud:

  "God's curse on you, boy, pregnancy isn't an illness—she had the same midwife who delivered you!" He fought down anger, forced gentleness into his voice. "It happens, Eric; don't blame it on me because you can't shout at fate." Sternly: "Or did you think I told them to hold a pillow over her face? She knew your interests, boy, better than you did, she never stepped beyond her station. Are you saying that I'd kill a von Shrakenberg serf who was blameless, to punish my own child?"

  "I say—" Eric began, and stopped. His father's face was an iron mask, but it had gone white about the nostrils. Something inside him prompted sayit-sayitsayit, a hunger to deliver the wound that would hurt beyond bearing, and he forced his lips closed by sheer force of will. Blood kin or not, no one called Karl von Shrakenberg a liar to his face. Ever.

  "I say that I had better leave. Sir." He saluted, his fist leaving a smear of blood on the left breast of his uniform tunic, clicked his heels, marched to the door.

  Karl felt the rage-strength leave him as the door sighed closed. He sagged back into the chair, leaning on the desk, the old wound sending a lance of agony from hip to spine.

  "What happened?" he asked dully. His eyes sought out a framed photograph on the desk—his wife's, black-bordered. "Oh, Mary, you could have told me what to say, what to do… Why did you leave me, my heart? This may be the last time I see him alive—John and—" His head dropped into his hands. "My son, my son!"

  Chapter Six

  . . decision to attack the German forces was a risk, but a calculated one. The Nazi armies were large, but their armored/ mechanized spearheads were less than 10 percent of the whole. For example, in the spring of 1942. the Werhmacht's total inventory of tanks was barely 4,000. including many obsolete light models and captured Russian vehicles; the Domination had more than 14,000. all modern Hond III types. The average German infantryman was lucky to get an occasional ride in a truck; even the Janissary units of the Draka forces had wheeled armored personnel carriers. The technological gap was exemplified by the rival powers' standard infantry weapons: a bolt action Mauser designed in 1898 versus automatic assault rifles.

  Yet the Third Reich had already defeated the Soviet Union, a power with comparable superiority in numbers and materiel, if not skill. Once allowed to consolidate and exploit their conquests, the Germans could have become a terrible threat Even as it was. the Draka troopers found "Fritz" a formidable opponent and a tricky, ruthless fighter. Particularly in the opening phases of the campaign, the decisive factor was the combat qualities of small units operating in comparative isolation…

  ―Fire And Blood: The Eurasian War VI, Tiflis to Warsaw. 1942-1943, by Strategos Robert A. Jackson (ret), New Territories Press., Vienna. 1965

  Ossetian Military Highway, Soviet Georgia April 14, 1942: 0500 Hours

  Eric stood, the steel folding stock of his rifle resting on one hip, looking downslope. The forest was mostly below eye level from the plateau where the paratroops had landed. Black tree limbs twisted in the paling moonlight, glistening with frost granules, the first mist of green from opening buds like a tender illusion trembling before the eyes. Breath smoked white before him; the thin cold air poured into his lungs like a taste of home. Yet these mountains were not his; they were huger, wilder, sharper. To the east across the trough of the pass the peaks caught rosy light, their snowcaps turning blood red before his eyes.

  "Right," he said. The tetrarchy leaders and their seconds were grouped around him, squatting and leaning on their assault rifles. It had taken only a few minutes to uncrate the equipment and form the Century: training, and a common knowledge that defeat and death were one and the same.

  "First, two minor miracles. We hit our drop zone right on; so did Cohort, chiliarchy, and legion." Southward, higher up the slope of the pass, man-made thunder rolled back from the stony walls. "So, they're engaging the main Fritz units farth
er up. Should go well, complete strategic surprise. Also, the communications are all working right for once."

  There were appreciative murmurs. Vacuum tubes and parachutes simply went ill together, and fragile radios had cost the experimental paratroop arm dearly earlier in the war. Experience was beginning to pay off.

  "Which is all to the good; we aren't fighting Italians anymore. In fact, there seem to be complete formed units up there, not just the communications and engineering personnel we were hoping for. Now for the rest of it. The gliders with the light armor came down perfectly—right into a ravine. Chiliarchy H.Q. says they may be able to put a rubble ramp down for some of it; take a day, at least."

  "Zebra shit!" That was Marie Kaine, in charge of the reinforced sapper and heavy-weapons tetrarchy. Sorry, sir. Look, Eric, this new recoilless stuff has its advantages. But it isn't very mobile, there's no protection for the crews, and the backblast's so bad you can't dig it in much. We needed that armor."

  He shrugged. "No help for it. Right." He pointed downslope; they were high enough to catch glimpses of the road over treetops still black in the false dawn. Morning had brought out the birds, and a trilling chorus was starting up. The troopers waited quietly below, a few smoking or talking softly, most silent.

  "That track, believe it or not, is the Osserian Military Highway, half the road net over the mountains." He gestured southward with his mapboard. "The rest of the legion is up there, fighting their way into Kutaisi and points back toward us."

  His hand cut the air to the north. "Down there, the Fritz armor is regrouping around Pyatigorsk. We're not sure exactly what units—the Intelligence network is shot to hell since the Fritz got here and started liquidating anything that moves—but definitely tank units in strength. If they're up to form, we should be getting a reaction force pretty damn quick."

  The Centurion's next gesture was due east, to the unseen S-curve of the two-lane "highway" that hugged the mountain slope on which they stood. "And a kilometer that way is Village One. Dense forest nearly to the road. Stone houses, and a switchback starts there. Our objective. Tom?"

  "I head up the road, cross above the village, spread 1st Tetrarchy as a stop force."

  "And don't let them get past you into the woods. Marie?"

  "15mm's and the 120mm recoilless along the treeline; mortars back; flamethrower and demolition teams to key off you and move forward in support."

  "Einar, Lisa, John?"

  "Left-right concentric, work our way in house-to-house. You coordinate on the rough spots."

  "Correct. Any questions?"

  Tetrarch Lisa Telford shifted on her haunches. "What about locals?"

  "Ignore them if they're quiet. Otherwise, expend 'em. Synch watches: 0500 at… mark! Go in at 0530, white flare. Nothing more? Good, let's do it, people, let's go!"

  * * * *

  The Germans in the Circassian village were wary— enough to set sentries hundreds of meters in the woods beyond the fields. Eric stooped over the body, noted the mottled camouflage jacket, glanced at the collar tabs, up at the trooper who stood smiling fondly and wiping his knife on the seat of his trousers.

  "Got his paybook?" he snapped.

  "Heah y'are, suh."

  Eric riffled through it. "Shit! Waffen-SS, Liebstandarte Adolf Hitler! I was hoping for a logistics unit, or at least line infantry." The soldier had been nineteen, and an Austrian; for a brief instant the Draka officer wondered if the Caucasus had reminded him of the Tyrol.

  If wishes were horses, we'd all have lovely rose gardens, he thought. Quickly now, Eric-me-lad, they're not going to give you time… There was a field telephone beside the sprawled figure in its improvised blind of branches; someone was going to notice the lack of a call-in soon. On impulse, he reached down and closed the staring brown eyes.

  With luck, there were ten minutes before the Fritz noticed; they were probably expecting attack from the south. The noise there was peaking, the narrow walls of the pass channeling a rapid chatter of automatic-weapons fire as well as the boom of heavy weapons; that would be the rest of first and second Cohorts… or even the legion. Heavy fighting riveted the attention. Even so, the Fritz in the village had an all-around perimeter, for anti-partisan defense, if nothing else.

  Their CO is probably getting screams for help. They might pull out… No, too chancy.

  Ducking through thickening underbrush of wild pistachio, he made his way toward the treeline. The sun was well up now, but the mountain beeches wove a canopy fifteen meters above, turning the air to a cool olive gloom. Nearer the edge of the woods sunlight allowed more growth and the thicker timber had been logged off; there were thickets of saplings laced together with wild grapevines and witch hazel and huge clumps of wild rhododendron.

  He dropped to his belly and leopard-crawled forward. The support teams were setting up, manhandling the tripod mounts of the heavy 15mm machine guns into position, the long, slender fluted barrels snaking out of improvised nests of rock and bush. The heavy snick sounds of oiled metal sounded as the bolts were pulled back. The three 120mm recoilless rifles were close behind, wrestled through by sheer strength and awkwardness; working parties clearing the way with bush knives, others following, bent under loads of the heavy perforated-shell ammunition.

  There was a swift murmuring as team leaders picked targets; the infantry "sticks" spread out, shedding their marching packs for combat load.

  Carefully, Eric nudged his rifle through the last screen of tall grass and sighted through the x4 integral scope. The view leaped out at him. Half a thousand meters of cleared fields stretched around the village, more downslope to the north, bare and brown in the spring, still sodden from melting snow. The fields themselves were uneven, steeply sloped, studded with low terraces, heaps of fieldstone, walls of piled rock: much of it would be dead ground from the town. Closer to the tumbled huddle of stone houses were orchards, apple and plum, and walled paddocks for sheep.

  Distantly he was aware of his body's reaction, sweat staining the field jacket down from his armpits, blood loud in his ears, a dryness in his mouth. He had seen enough combat to know what explosive and flying metal did to human bodies. The fears were standard, every soldier felt them—of death, of pain even more. Stomach wounds particularly, even with sulfiomide and antibiotics. Castration, blinding, burns; a life as a cripple, a thing women would puke to see… Draka officers were expected to delegate freely and lead from the front; a Centurion had a shorter life expectancy than a private. Almost without effort, training overrode fear, and his hands were steady as he switched to field glasses.

  Standard, he thought. The village might have been any of a thousand thousand others in High Asia, anywhere from Anatolia to Sinkiang: flat-topped structures of rough stone with mud mortar, some plastered and whitewashed, others raw; sheds and narrow, twisted lanes. The military "highway" went straight through, with the burnt-out wreckage of a Russian T-34 standing by the verge on the northern outskirts, the blackened barrel of its cannon pointing in silent futility down toward the plains. There was a square, and a building with onion domes that looked to have been a mosque, before the Revolution, then until last fall a Soviet "House of Culture." There were a few other modernish-looking structures, two nondescript trucks in German army paint, more horse-drawn vehicles parked outside.

  Movement: chickens, an old woman in the head-to-toe swathing of Islamic modesty… and yes, figures in Fritz field grey. He switched his view to the outskirts, almost hidden in greenery: spider holes, wire, the houses with firing-slits knocked into their walls… it wasn't going to be a walkover.

  He reached a hand behind him and Sofie thrust the handset into his grasp. Senior Decurion McWhirter and the five troopers waited behind her. He clicked code into the pressure button and spoke:

  "Marie."

  "Targets ranged, teams ready." Along the firing line, hands clutched the grips and lanyards; a hundred meters behind, she stood with her eyes pressed to the visor of a split-view rangefinder. The automorta
r crews waited, hands on the elevating screws, loaders ready with fresh five-round clips.

  "Tetrarchy commanders."

  "In position."

  Eric forced himself to half a dozen slow, deep breaths. Hell, he thought. Why don't I just tell them I'm going for a look-see and start walking to China? Because it would be silly, of course. Because these were his friends.

  "Well, then." He cased the binoculars, hooked the assault sling of his rifle over his head, watched his wrist as the second hand swept inexorably around to 0530. When he spoke, his voice was quiet, conversational.

  "Flare."

  It went up from the observation post with a quiet pop and burst two hundred meters up. Magnesium flame blossomed against the innocent blue of the sky, white and harsh. Plop-whine, the first mortar shells went by overhead, plunging downward into the pink froth of apple blossom along the edge of the village: thump-crash fountains of black earth and shattered branches, steel and rock fragments equally deadly whirling through the air. Crash-crash-crash-crash, without stopping; the new automortars were heavier, on their wheeled carriages, but while the ammunition lasted, they could spray the 100mm bombs the way a submachine gun did pistol-bullets. Century A's teams had been practicing for a long time, and their hands moved reloads in with steady, metronomic regularity.

  From either side the heavy machine guns erupted, controlled four-second bursts arching toward the smoke and shattered wood on the town's edge. Red tracer flicked out, blurring from the muzzles, seeming to float as it approached the roiling dust of the target zone. The firing positions here at the treeline overlooked the thin net of German defensive posts, commanded the roofs and streets beyond. They raked the windows and firing slits, and already figures in SS jackets were falling.