The Regiment-A Trilogy

by John Dalmas

  Ibang laughed aloud. "Imagination or not, none of us could masquerade as a local, here or on any world but Tyss."

  * * *

  The general's elite guard, now only a section with two ten-man squads, had been moved to a single large two-story house. Though twenty-two men shared it, Carrmak, as commanding officer, had a small, second-story room for himself.

  He'd put together items that would be useful, when the time came, for escaping to Smoleni territory. They were in a pack which hung in his closet, with his greatcoat hanging over it. Tonight his web belt, with its holstered pistol, was also in the pack.

  He hadn't known what to expect when the two T'swa walked past him into Undsvin's office. But he'd decided to stay, see what happened. By the time they'd walked out, twenty minutes later, he'd become optimistic. When his shift ended, twenty minutes after that, and nothing had happened, it seemed clear that they hadn't said anything. And if they hadn't then, they weren't likely to later.

  Nonetheless he was prepared to go out the window, jump into the back yard, and run for it if anything seemed to threaten. For a while he waited ready. After an hour, he undressed and went to bed with his pistol in easy reach.

  58

  Undsvin had never intended to fight the Smoleni in the northern forests. From the beginning, his strategy had been to shut them off from effective supply sources and starve them out. That was the reason he'd allowed his troops to abuse the local populations as they captured one southern district after another. And why he'd allowed refugees to move north, even though they were an impediment to his advancing army: Stories of murders and rapes would spread with them, and many in the towns ahead would flee northward, putting much greater pressure on the limited Smoleni supplies.

  Meanwhile the serfs who made up more than half the Komarsi army had broad competencies of their own. They'd worked with their hands from childhood, doing almost everything there was to do on the estates they'd been part of. Besides field work and barn chores, they'd built and repaired almost everything required, except the manors themselves and their furnishings. And there was no shortage of lumber in Smolen: the sawmills along the Rumar and other major rivers had had many stacks of it dried or drying when the war began. Thus by summer's end, the Komarsi army in Smolen was housed mostly in barracks it had built outside the towns. In-town billeting was limited largely to headquarters personnel; discipline and training were more readily maintained in units barracked in the countryside.

  Now that winter had arrived, the troops stayed close to their camps. They were drilled enough that, along with camp chores, they were kept busy, but their main function now was to be there, to occupy southern Smolen. For one thing, they weren't equipped to operate in the northern winter. Their supply of snowshoes was limited, although that was being remedied, and skis were nonexistent. Units along the Eel-Strawstack border with the Free Lands skirmished rather frequently with Smoleni raiders—particularly rangers practicing their new, T'swa-style tactics—but they took no offensive actions.

  Even the T'swa were not particularly aggressive now. On Tyss there'd been no opportunity to train in snow and cold. Here they'd been issued snowshoes, and were learning to use them. They were discovering the nature of the landscape in winter—what the operational problems and opportunities were in different landscape types. But T'swa learn fast, and even before the solstice they were out hunting and destroying Smoleni recon teams.

  59

  With the war essentially on hold, Undsvin had gone home for the first time since before the invasion began, to spend the solstice holidays with his family. His daughter had given birth to his first grandson, whom he hadn't yet seen, while his younger son, who'd turned sixteen, had grown what seemed like four inches.

  Then, on his second week back at Rumaros, a royal order had come, to fly to the palace at once. It didn't say why. Undsvin felt ill at ease about it, but the king was the king; the general was in the air inside an hour.

  It was sleeting that day in Linnasteth. Streets were glazed with ice, and traffic was nearly nonexistent when Undsvin's floater arrived at the palace. The guards who met him stood beneath large umbrellas, to whisk him up the cindered walk and through the ornate entrance.

  The king didn't meet him in a reception hall or audience chamber. They met in Engwar's office, just the two of them. (Engwar's bodyguard didn't count; he was a necessary cipher.) Undsvin knew at once that Engwar was deeply agitated. The pouches and dark smudges beneath his eyes told of hours spent rehearsing and dramatizing his troubles instead of sleeping. Still, the king was clearly making an effort to control himself.

  He gestured at the chair before his desk, the motion a nervous twitch. "Sit, cousin, sit!"

  Undsvin sat.

  "What are you doing to win the war?"

  "I'm depriving the Smoleni of their farmlands and goods, forcing them to use up their limited supplies."

  "They are getting supplies through Oselbent! Both food and munitions! By sleighs over the swamp country!"

  "I'm aware of that, Your Majesty. But all that buys them is an extra dek. Two or three at most. They can't bring in enough to begin feeding their people."

  Engwar sat heavily, contemplating what his cousin had said. Then, more calmly: "What are the T'swa doing? Why don't I hear of them attacking the Smoleni?"

  "T'swa companies have begun harassing Smoleni units weekly now. And they've effectively eliminated the Smoleni surveillance system."

  "I didn't hire them to harass, or to destroy surveillance systems. I hired them to destroy the Smoleni."

  "Engwar," Undsvin said almost gently, "the T'swa are marvelous fighting men, but they are human. Their world has no snow or cold; they've had to learn to travel and fight in the northern winter. They are already damaging the Smoleni; in time they will demoralize them. And they may yet play a decisive role in shortening the war. But they cannot destroy them."

  Engwar gnawed a lip. "The Assembly is complaining about the war. The treasury has shrunken badly, existing taxes are far from adequate, and the Assembly has refused to authorize new. Rich though they are, they have cried and complained at the inflation of currency. They care nothing about their king or country, only their own wealth! So I froze prices, and the merchants rose up screaming! Some have even publicly burned stacks of their goods in protest, while others have closed their doors. Supposedly withholding their goods from sale, though I have no doubt they are selling them on the black market and getting richer than ever."

  He exhaled tiredly. "The freedmen have rioted in their disreputable townships, and that fool Nufkarm has publicly urged our royal assistance for them. While that greater fool, Arbendel, has stated that no one should receive assistance without signing an agreement of serfdom. The upshot of that was a wave of arson that resulted in merchants distributing food, a terrible precedent that will have who knows what long-term effects."

  The king paused then and looked beseechingly at his older cousin. "Dear Undsvin, I need a victory. I truly need a victory. Something that will excite people, make them glad for the war."

  My god, dear cousin, Undsvin thought. What world do you live in? "Your Majesty," he answered, "I will come up with something. Let me have a week, and I will let you know what my plan is. Though it may well require a dek or two to carry out."

  * * *

  He left the palace wondering how he could have said that. But by the time he landed again at Rumaros, he had the basic idea.

  60

  Undsvin appreciated the potentials of enemy spies, especially in occupied territory. Potentials some of which were positive.

  In Rumaros, about seventy percent of the people had stayed when the Komarsi took over. Their situation was poor. There was poverty and hunger. An important part of their income came from the taverns and girls who entertained the Komarsi soldiers, and from those who kept house and cooked and otherwise served the officers. Thus there were abundant opportunities for careless talk to reach the Smoleni intelligence lines that the general had no
doubt existed.

  So he told no one what he really had in mind, not even Viskon, who in most matters was his confidant as well as his aide. There'd be time enough later to let them know. Instead he called his staff together to give them orders, and false premises for those orders. The T'swa commander was requested to attend.

  It was not a conference: opinions weren't asked for; joma wasn't even served. When they were all seated, he gaveled them needlessly to order in a way that was quite bizarre: he rapped the table with the butt of his pistol. What, they wondered apprehensively, was going on with their commander?

  "Gentlemen!" The room fell silent. "I've brought you here to tell you about the coming offensive!"

  The groan was silent, a psychic protest. Every one of his officers agreed with Undsvin's so-called siege policy, of waiting and letting the Smoleni starve. And they all remembered the ill-fated strike northward in early Sevendek, that began so well and ended so terribly.

  "By late winter the Smoleni will be hungry, their morale and their physical strength low, and their guard down. They won't expect us to move before the snow has melted and the roads dried out. Also, by the equinox, the severe cold will be past, and the days longer. But the roads will still be frozen, and the Eel will be locked beneath at least twenty inches of ice, more likely thirty or more. The rivers in the north perhaps fifty.

  "We will move at the equinox, striking northward with perhaps five divisions, up every road between the Kumar and Road 45. Snowshoes for five divisions are being produced in Komars even as I speak, made of a cold-resistant plastic."

  His officers glanced at one another out of the corners of their eyes. By then there might well be four feet or more of snow, on the roads as well as in the woods. To move and supply artillery—to supply large forces at all—would be a monstrous task. And even at the equinox, subzero weather could be expected—not thirty, forty, or fifty below, but bitter weather for large-scale operations. None of them had operational experience or training in such conditions. And if breakup came early, the snowpack melting before operations were complete . . .

  "Other forces will follow," Undsvin continued, "to secure the territory taken. We will continue in this manner all the way to Burnt Woods, capturing the refugee camps on the way. The people will either submit to us, or be forced north past the last villages and camps, to freeze and starve in the snow. If the Smoleni government doesn't surrender then, a force, perhaps of brigade strength, can be sent north up the Granite River, the north branch of the Rumar, to the hamlet of Jump-Off, to close the supply road from Oselbent."

  He looked them over, his expression implacable, and they ceased exchanging glances, though none of them met his eyes.

  "The planning and preparations for this offensive will be much more demanding than any to date. We'll need to build up major supply and ordnance depots on the Eel Valley Railroad, probably near the villages of Meadowgreen and Eel Fork."

  His voice became more conversational now. "I realize there are problems inherent in this. We will develop plans to deal with them. Anoreth, you will prepare a basic operations analysis. Have a draft of it in my hands by next Twoday. On Fourday we will have another meeting to discuss that analysis. Between now and then, the rest of you will give thought to this. I expect you all to take a useful part in that discussion. Afterward I'll assign a planning mission to develop a complete operating plan, from which we'll go to logistical planning."

  His voice became imperious again. "I'm going to demand the utmost in careful speed in the whole planning operation. And it requires speed! The equinox is less than a quarter away! You will work harder than you ever worked before. If anyone lags, obstructs progress in any way, I'll find other duties for him. Specifically he'll be leading a penal platoon in the offensive.

  "Any questions?"

  Faces had paled. Middle-aged staff officers grown fat and soft, leading penal platoons into combat? If the Smoleni didn't kill them, their own soldiers were liable to! Such a threat to noblemen was unprecedented.

  Among the Komarsi staff officers, only Colonel Sharf, Undsvin's intelligence chief, seemed unflapped. "The Smoleni will learn of these depots," Sharf said, "and may very well deduce from them the basic features of our plans."

  "It will be your responsibility to see that they deduce incorrectly," Undsvin answered, and looked them over. "Anything else?"

  No one spoke.

  "Very well. Sharf, Colonel Ko-Dan, please remain. The rest of you are dismissed."

  When they'd gone, Undsvin said to Sharf: "Colonel, regardless of what I said before the others, I do, do want the Smoleni to learn of this. And I have no doubt that some of the gentlemen who just left will feel constrained to talk about it to their friends. Particularly stressed as they are by my threat of penal platoons. Word will spread. Let it. Do you understand?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Good. You are dismissed."

  He watched Sharf out the door. You understand enough to follow orders. Beyond that you are utterly mystified, and burning with curiosity. Well. Enjoy! He turned to Ko-Dan. "Colonel, what is the status of the Smoleni surveillance system?"

  "It no longer exists, General. We tracked down and killed most of the men they had operating. A few escaped us; we lost their tracks in a snowstorm. However, the Smoleni may simply discontinue it temporarily, expecting us to withdraw our hunter teams."

  "Exactly. I'm depending on it. When they do, I want you to leave them alone. Do not visit the north shore of the Eel. Raid northward along the Upper Rumar if you wish. Any questions?"

  "None whatever, general."

  Undsvin looked at the T'swi curiously. "Well then, I believe our business is over for the day."

  When Ko-Dan had gone, Undsvin sat wondering. Did the T'swi have no questions because he wasn't curious? That seemed unlikely. Surely his orders regarding the Smoleni surveillance system must have seemed strange to him. Just what had he surmised?

  * * *

  In his own office, Ko-Dan had described the meeting to his aide. "You realize what he plans, of course."

  Grinning, Ibang nodded. "The Smoleni will learn of the big depot at Meadowgreen, and with their supply problems will be greatly tempted to raid it. No doubt bringing a sleigh column down the road to carry away what they get. And presumably moving major elements of their army with them to protect the sleighs.

  "This will, of course, require considerable effort on the part of the Smoleni, and the commitment of much energy and resources, of which they have little to spare. Once their columns are well underway, say past Shelf Falls, they'll be increasingly reluctant to discontinue, except for compelling reasons. Then I suspect the general will want us to clean out their surveillance teams again. After which he'll situate forces at the Eel to ambush their strike force and destroy their sleigh columns.

  "That accomplished, he may or may not launch an offensive at the Equinox. I suspect he will not."

  Ko-Dan nodded, smiling. "Anything further?"

  "He will, of course, have to take certain commanders into his confidence, but that will be quite late in the sequence. His assumption will be that the Smoleni will not learn of the planned ambush." He reached for his cup and sipped the joma, grown tepid during their talk. "Through his Smoleni employers, Colonel Romlar will learn of the supposed offensive. And as deeply as he obviously perceives, will suspect that something is amiss, and send scouts to investigate. A probability our general may well overlook. It is quite possible then, even probable, that some of them will avoid our re-inserted hunter teams, discover the Komarsi ambush forces, and warn the Smoleni away."

  Ko-Dan chuckled. "An apt analysis. But there is another possibility, let me say probability. Because the Smoleni truly need supplies, and I suspect they need successes to nourish their spirits. I visualize Romlar warning them in advance that they are being baited, and the Smoleni deciding to try the raid anyway. In which case they'll plan a surprise attack on the Komarsi ambush force."

  He got to his feet and replenished his j
oma from the pot on his sheet-iron stove. "Consider that the Iryalans are training Smoleni woodsmen as what they term 'rangers.' In some numbers. From our own limited experience, there is no doubt that these so-called ranger units will prove much better than anything General Undsvin can field. Much more mobile and confident in the forest and the snow, much more energetic and responsive to situations, and more skillful with their weapons." He sat down again. "And of course, the Iryalans are likely to involve themselves. I would rather expect the Komarsi ambush force to be savaged."

  "Ah!" Ibang's eyes brightened. "And we will prepare a counter-ambush of our own. Perhaps even engaging the Iryalans in a decisive fight!"

  The colonel's upper lip dipped cautiously in the scalding drink. "Exactly. Of course, we've made a long and involved series of assumptions, any of which may be in error. But it feels right, as right as the T'sel gives me to feel about something that hasn't yet set up in the reality matrix."

  61

  Kelmer Faronya took off his skis and leaned them against the porch rail. Then he stepped up onto the porch, spoke cheerfully to the guard, and rang the president's doorbell. The butler answered.

  "Good evening, Mr. Faronya. Step inside please." Kelmer did, and the butler closed the door against the cold. "We haven't seen you for a time. Shall I tell Miss Lanks you're here?"

  "If you would, please." He waited while the man left. A minute later, Weldi came smiling down the stairs and put her hand on Kelmer's arm. As always, the touch speeded his pulse.

  "Kelmer, dear," she said as she guided him toward the guest parlor, "we've missed you. I've missed you." She frowned. "And when I heard about the attack on the supply train . . ." They sat down on the settee. "Were you in danger?"

  "I wasn't. Not really." He looked back at the experience. He'd gone to Jump-Off again, this time to record a sleigh train coming with supplies from Oselbent. "Hanni Distra took me out the supply road in a cutter pulled by an erog. We'd gone about twelve miles when we heard rifle fire about half a mile ahead. We stopped, of course; couldn't see what was going on. There was a stretch of tall reeds in the fen just ahead. After the shooting stopped, we waited for a few minutes, not knowing what to expect. Then there was more. This time it sounded like machine guns and rifles both. Soon after that was over, there was a big explosion, and after that two really big ones.