by Jeff Grubb
Mishra’s face clouded and he snapped, “I am not Fallaji, either, humble servant! Do you want to do without my outlander wizardry as well?”
Jarin’s voice stuttered, then finally fell silent. A long, tense moment passed, but no other voice came to Jarin’s defense. Even Hajar was a stone-faced enigma at his master’s side.
At last the war captain of the Ghestos clan knelt before his qadir and said, “I appreciate the opportunity to voice my concerns, Most Mighty One, and understand the wisdom of your puissant decisions.”
The talk moved to other matters, but Jarin did not raise his voice again. The other war captains, though they agreed with the old man, did not broach the subject.
In the morning there was a grand review. Mishra and his aides, including Hajar, gathered beneath their pavilion as the troops passed in review. There were Fallaji in the crowds, and Yotians as well, nervous and uncertain among the desert dwellers.
The troops were dressed in their best finery, armor and robes that would be packed away in the baggage train and only removed again when and if they reached Korlis’s capital. Three units of cavalry trotted past, bedecked in flowing red robes that flickered like flames. Despite his earlier outburst, Jarin was allowed to retain control of the Ghestos cavalry, and he rode, expressionless, at the head of his unit.
The sun shone off the wide brass helmets of the foot soldiers, moving in precision review past their qadir. Then came the skirmishers, younger and a bit less organized, most of them younger sons just entering the military. Then the scouts rode past on their nimble horses, cantering in ornate patterns back and forth before the pavilion. And with each the Fallaji cheered, and even the Yotians present remarked on the grandeur of the warriors and their relief that the troops were heading somewhere other than Yotia.
Ashnod arrived with her horde of transmogrants. There were nearly three hundred of the creatures lined up in orderly rows. They moved not with the precision of trained troops but rather with an eerie lockstep, for they were controlled by the same mind. Not a trace of individuality showed itself among them, as if they had been cast from the same mold. They looked as if they would topple over as they shambled forward, but they marched as a single unit. The beasts were clad only in rough tabards of brownish Yotian cloth, and those garments looked like an afterthought.
Ashnod rode at their head, astride a great black charger. Her cape matched her scarlet hair, and she wore an ornate set of black and red armor—custom-made, it was said, in Zegon. The armor bristled with spikes and was polished to snare the sun and blind the onlookers.
The cheers died as she passed before the stand, and the applause was sporadic at best. Mishra’s aides sat immobile as rocks next to the qadir and did not respond. The qadir raised his hand in benediction to Ashnod, and she returned the salute. Neither paid attention to the lack of enthusiasm among the others.
Last came the dragon engines, four new ones, operated by crews working within their bellies pumping the bellows and keeping the steam pressure high to drive them forward. There were renewed shouts of encouragement as they towered over the populace. Only two of the engines would be sent east with Ashnod. The other two would be sent south along the Kher Ridges, to be “spotted” by the Korlisians, drawing troops away from the Fallaji main attack.
The crowd’s spirits rose with the passing of the dragon engines, and after the review the qadir treated the populace to a feast. At the banquet Ashnod sat at Mishra’s right hand, and there was no doubt about the trust he placed in his general. Jarin was seated at the far end of the platform, but many of the other Fallaji, including Hajar, stopped to offer words of encouragement to the old Ghestos.
With the coming of the morning the army was gone, east into the mountains, into Korlis beyond.
The path they trod was similar to that Ashnod and Mishra had used to reach Korlinda many years ago. The journey was less smooth than hoped. In the first place, the new dragon engines were not as nimble as the originals; they moved slowly and required a great deal of space in which to turn. In addition, they were noisy, venting steam and clattering like sacks of old nails. This bothered the cavalry troops and made Ashnod realize that any element of surprise would be lost.
Then there were the transmogrants themselves: slower than the other troops, slower than the dragon engines themselves. Yet they were tireless. Each day the regular foot soldiers and cavalry outdistanced the shambling, demiliving creatures. And each day, around the midnight bell, the living automatons lurched into camp. Ashnod remained with them and spoke little to the other war chiefs during the journey.
At the end of the tenth slow day in the mountains, the advance scouts spotted an ornithopter. It sighted them as well and retreated back down the pass, flapping its oversized wings in panic.
That evening, after midnight, the generals held council. It would take two days to free themselves from the mountains entirely and to reach the relatively open land of the upper Kor valley. The Korlisians, probably with Argivian support, would be waiting for Mishra’s forces before they could extricate themselves fully from the highlands. A tight battle would be disastrous for the normally mobile Fallaji cavalry.
“Alas and alack!” said Jarin, turning his palms upward, “we seem to be undone. For the merchant nation’s mercenaries will be rushing for the pass, seeking to hold it against us! And we cannot turn back in good faith without so much as a single drop of blood being spilt. To press on is folly, and to turn back smacks of dishonor!”
“There must be another way,” muttered Ashnod, almost to herself.
“If there is,” said Jarin, “I have no doubt you will find it. It was for exactly this reason that our qadir, mighty may he be in his wisdom, chose you to lead us.”
Ashnod looked into Jarin’s face for the slightest hint of insincerity, but there seemed to be none. She thought for a moment, then said, “We must get out of the passes before the Korlisian troops arrive.”
“Aye, but we are too slow,” complained Jarin. “Would that our engines had wings, so that we might arrive there sooner, but they do not.”
Ashnod pressed her fingertips together, and said, “Then we leave the dragon engines behind.”
Faces fell around the table, and the arguments began. The engines themselves were useful tools, said one war captain, invaluable in battle. They were mobile forts, said another, a solid center about which men could cluster for defense. A third officer noted they provided protection for the army from the ornithopters, whose pilots had learned the dangers of straying too close.
A smile flitted across Jarin’s face, but he said nothing.
“The engines are too slow,” said Ashnod finally. “We have the transmogrants to provide a solid center to the line.”
“Your abominations are slow as well,” noted Jarin.
“Then they will leave now,” stated Ashnod. “They will be waiting for you at the entrance of the pass.” She turned to Jarin. “Unless you have a better plan?” she asked silkily.
No one did. The meeting was over, and Ashnod was gone again, leading her shambling creations ahead of the army and leaving the mak fawa to catch up as best they could.
The army reached the vale of the upper Kor before the Korlisians could respond fully. Still, word reached Ashnod of a large force of Korlisian troops coming up the valley. Scouts had spotted ornithopters in the skies above the Korlisian troop column, proof—if there still were any doubt—of that nation’s complicity with Urza’s Argivians. The Korlisians would be within striking range the next morning.
That was more than enough time for Ashnod to lay a trap.
The plan was simple. The foot troops were drawn up in the center of the plain, flanked on one side by all three units of cavalry. The transmogrants stood in the center of the line, serving as an anchor, hidden behind a thin line of foot soldiers. The skirmishers would engage the enemy van, drawing it to attack the line. The transmogrants would be revealed, and on Ashnod’s signal the cavalry would sweep in along the flank, destr
oying the Korlisians utterly between the swift-moving horses and the unyielding transmogrants.
Jarin was politely unimpressed. Fallaji cavalry was made for quick strikes, he observed, not for running down entire units of the enemy.
“New uses for old tools,” said Ashnod, who was thoroughly tired of the older Ghestos war chief.
“And if the Korlisians do not take your offered bait?” asked Jarin. “If they encamp and wait for reinforcements?”
“Then the dragon engines catch up, and we fight a more traditional battle,” snapped Ashnod. “Tell me, Captain, would you question Mishra’s orders so often and so heartily?”
The older war captain stiffened, then replied through clenched teeth, “I have my orders, which are to follow you. We will deploy along the flank and await your signal.”
In the morning the Korlisians arrived, a force equal in number to the Fallaji forces. Two ornithopters were present, though one darted east at the first sight of the Fallaji troops. Reporting back to Urza and Tawnos, thought Ashnod. Surely neither artificer would be present here. There was no sign of war machines among the troops, nor did she see additional ornithopters.
The skirmishers engaged the leading edge of the Korlisian troops, firing slings and light bows. Several units of the Korlisians charged forward but were mastered by their captains and brought back, and the enemy formed into regular units. The Korlisians made extensive use of mercenaries, Ashnod recalled, so they would be better disciplined than most of the Yotian rabble. Then again, there were likely Yotian sellswords among the Korlisians, and that might cause them to charge prematurely.
The enemy force as a body heaved forward slowly. Its center held through tight discipline, but the units along its flanks were already ahead of the main van. They were in a perfect position to be cut off and defeated.
Ashnod smiled as the enemy neared. The transmogrants were in place behind a thin line of swordsmen. To her right, the cavalry rode into view, waiting only for her signal to charge.
The two armies collided like prehistoric beasts, and men began to die. Brass hats with spears kept a number of mercenaries at bay, while swordsmen engaged in a deadly close combat.
Ashnod shouted an order, and the swordsmen at the center of the line parted. She gave another cry, and her transmogrants raised their weapons and began to lumber forward.
Something happened on the opposing side. The center of the main van, where the commander normally would have his own elite guard, parted to reveal a new set of creatures. There were two types among the Korlisians: humans in beetlelike armor, and hulking brutes looking like soft, misshapen ogres.
Ashnod suddenly realized that the beetlelike armor was the outer coverings of humanoid devices, and the soft flesh of the ogres was some type of mud. Automatons, she thought, like Urza’s avengers. The Korlisians had prepared their own surprise at the center of their line.
Ashnod cursed as the two centers collided. The transmogrants would have broken a line of normal humans, but these were no ordinary warriors. The beetle men worked with clockwork precision, raising and lowering their razor-tipped blades like farmers threshing their wheat. Alongside them, the huge earthen statues waded into the transmogrants, crushing soft skulls with their great hands.
The transmogrants would neither retreat nor regroup. Ashnod had not given them the capacity to understand such orders. However, it was clear to the red-haired general that they were overmatched, a fact equally clear to the other Fallaji footmen and skirmishers. Already they were losing ground, only a few steps away from a full retreat. Ashnod’s position was a bubble extending into the Korlisian lines, surrounded on three sides by mercenaries and automatons.
Ashnod gave the order, and heralds gave the signal for the cavalry. A sudden assault on the flank would still break the Korlisian army and allow her own human troops to recover, she told herself. The signalman unfurled a great crimson banner and waved it to the cavalry.
The cavalry did not move. Ashnod stared in disbelief, but her eyes had not deceived her: the cavalry had not abandoned its position. A unit of mercenary archers from Korlis had taken up position opposite it, but the three units of cavalry did not charge.
Ashnod cursed again, and shouted at the signalman. He waved his banner again frantically.
Still the cavalry did not move.
Ashnod looked around. The left flank, farthest from the cavalry, was already crumbling, the Fallaji footmen abandoning their spears, and in some cases their helmets, and falling back. Ahead of her the blades of the beetle men were ripping the transmogrants to shreds. As she watched, an earthen statue picked up a transmogrant, lifted the creature over its head, and pulled it apart by the legs and arms. The rotted remains cascaded down on the statue, but the clay automaton suffered no damage. Indeed, the cuts inflicted on the statues seemed to heal as Ashnod watched. The transmogrants had better success against the beetle warriors, and along the ground lay scattered remains of both dead human flesh and dismantled mechanisms.
Ashnod looked to her right to the cavalry. Now it was finally moving.
Then she cursed. It was moving backward. An orderly retreat in the face of mere archers. It was pulling away.
The sight of the cavalry’s retreat destroyed the remaining right flank. The troops wavered and then broke into a run. Both flanks were in full rout, and the only thing holding the center was the remains of Ashnod’s unit of transmogrants.
Ashnod wheeled her own horse, a pained look on her face. To abandon her creations felt to her as if the very heart was ripped from her flesh. Nonetheless, they would be destroyed. There was no one else to save them.
She spurred her black charger and left the devastation behind her, hoping that the transmogrants would do enough damage to at least slow their pursuers until the Fallaji were once more under the safe protection of the dragon engines.
* * *
—
The transmogrants had done that part of the job well, for after repelling the Fallaji invasion force the Korlisian advance halted entirely. The enemy might have been more hurt than Ashnod had thought, or they were waiting for resupply. Possibly the mercenaries had clauses in their contracts excusing them from pursuing enemies into the mountains. Perhaps their own commanders were afraid of ambush, thought Ashnod.
Regardless, there was no pursuit, save for the lone ornithopter that trailed them west for a day until they reached the dragon engines. Their surprise shattered, their forces demolished, their transmogrants slain or lost to the last being, the troops gathered around the engines, reversed their course, and began the slow crawl back to Fallaji territory.
* * *
—
Half a month later, Ashnod stood in Mishra’s workshop before his dark oak throne. She was sputtering in rage.
“Treason!” she shouted. “I gave a direct order, and Jarin here ignored it! Because of that we were routed!”
“Most Revered One,” said Jarin calmly, “we did not see the signal flag for the assault. We had been told by our most revered war general not to attack until we saw the flag. When we saw the battle was going against our forces, we pulled back to provide a screen to protect our retreating troops. More would have perished if we had not done so.”
“We were defeated because he ignored the signal flag!” shouted Ashnod.
“I did not see the signal flag,” said Jarin, his face impassive. “Nor did the other war captains.”
Mishra patted the tips of his fingers together. “Do you say that my trusted assistant is lying?”
“No, Most Wise Among Us,” said Jarin, quickly, “only that we did not see it. Such are the fortunes of war. A daring plan often comes to naught because of a simple thing.” He looked at Ashnod and added, “Or because of a simple mistake in judgment.”
Ashnod looked daggers at the Ghestos chief but said nothing. Jarin added, “We did retreat in good order. Most of the cavalry was unharmed, and the dragon engines were undamaged. There were, however, heavy losses among the footmen, and th
e brevet general’s own…special forces…were lost.”
“What a surprise,” muttered Ashnod. Mishra ignored the comment and dismissed the war captain.
“Can you believe his lies?” the red-haired woman shouted as the door was still closing behind Jarin.
Mishra’s face was tense and concerned. “I had hoped your endeavor would prove successful. Success ennobles many an experiment. If you had pressed into Korlis, if your creations had secured us a beachhead, then the war chiefs would be lining up to tell me how they knew you could do it all along. Needless to say, they are not doing so.”
“It’s all lies,” replied Ashnod. “They’re afraid of me. Of us. Of what we can do. Of our creations. The battlefield does not belong to human warriors. The dragon engines proved that. The transmogrants proved that.”
“The battlefield is still theirs,” said Mishra. His voice held no expression. “Their swords succeeded where your mindless creations did not. But you leave me with another problem. Some of the chieftains think that I listened to you too much in this matter, that I showed weakness by depending on you.”
“Weakness!” shouted Ashnod. “Let them try to run an army in the field.”
“I will,” said Mishra. “Because I am sending you to Sarinth.”
There was a long pause.
“Sarinth is on the other side of the empire,” said Ashnod at last.
“Hard on the shores of Lake Ronom,” agreed Mishra. “A nation rich in metals and wood, material that we need here. I want you to secure the fealty of their leaders.”
“You want me out of the way,” accused Ashnod.
Mishra held his hands open. “You are the most trusted of my lieutenants. I fear for your safety among the other chiefs.”
“You should fear for their safety instead,” spat Ashnod.