The Forge

by S. M. Stirling

  "Little men in loincloths, and bigger men in pantaloons working stripped to the waist," he said.

  "Combat engineers, troops and labor-levies," Raj said. "I've read of this in some of the older chronicles. You warp the cables across on both sides, then slide… barges, purpose-made pontoons, even rafts… underneath and secure them. Brushwood and planking, then a layer of earth, and you've got a good solid bridge. It won't last forever, or even through a spring flood, but you can march an army over it like it was a firm made road for a couple of months. Much better than boats, faster, more secure … Get the banners, Barton: full sketches, so we'll know who's here."

  The great tent bore the green flag with the crescent and star. The Settler's banner, not just the national one, Jamal was here. But not Tewfik's black-and-crimson Seal of Solomon. A group of turtle shapes, down near where the supply boats were landing, armored cars.

  "Yer a great comfort t'me, ser, but twenty thousand ragheads is summat too many, I'd say."

  Foley nodded. "And that's a very impressive piece of engineering," he added, handing his modified notes over to Raj. "But all things considered, sir, I'd rather be in Sandoral."

  "We'll see what can be done about that," Raj said, rolling over onto his back and pulling out his watch. "Hmmm. First priority is to get the message back to the Army. They'll have that bridge up in a day or two, and it's not that far up the west bank… M'lewis," he continued, turning the notes over and scribbling a message.

  "Take this back to the heliograph." They had set it up on the reverse slope of a hill three kilometers back, the furthest it could go and still reach the southernmost outpost of the temporary chain on the west bank. "Tell them not to bother to encode it, just send it in clear and repeat until they get acknowledgement. And hurry."

  He nodded wordlessly and set off down the reverse slope, plunging over the lip of a gully in a controlled fall. Raj and the younger man followed a little more sedately, leopard-crawling backward down the slope to keep their heads below the line, then trotting in a crouch with their sabers held in their left hands.

  "It shouldn't take us nearly as long to get back, now that we know the terrain in detail," Raj said. "I added an instruction to have the ferry prepared, so—"

  He halted; Foley wasn't listening. His head rotated to the right with the delicate precision of an aiming screw, and Raj had learned to respect the younger man's eyesight. The lieutenant brought his glasses up again, turning the focus wheel with his thumb.

  "Shit."

  Raj followed suit, blinking against the low sun-glare to the east. A dust cloud, and a line of tiny doll figures on dogback, out in the flatter land away from the riverbank and its tumbled hills. Heading straight for the conical hill where the heliograph was waiting; not that they had seen the Civil Government detachment, from the leisurely way they were proceeding, but it was the best terrain feature for kilometers around, even so, a natural place to put in a watching post. Following straight in M'lewis' tracks would be futile. The little Bufford parish soldier rode lighter and with greater skill than most of Foley's platoon, good men though they were, and where one man could go undetected thirty-odd could not.

  "There's a draw, through there," Foley said with tight calm, pointing. If the heliograph team and the Colonist patrol were the bases of a triangle and the platoon the point, his arm bisected it. "We can get between them and the heliograph, I think."

  An ambush, but it would be very unlikely that a firefight would go unheard or unnoticed, this close to a major camp. It would give them time, provided that there were no survivors; the Colonists would have to find their men in the maze of rough country, and a stern chase was a long one.

  "Let's do it, then," Raj said.

  * * *

  The heliograph tower was the highest place in Sandoral, a slender pillar of concrete rising from the complex of government buildings at its center, the Legate's Palace. It contained nothing but a windowless spiral staircase and a two-story bulb at the end of that spindle; the outside was sheathed in marble, because this was the palace, after all. The inside was severely plain, a lower room with bunks and table and chamberpot, an upper with the signalling equipment. That was a contrast to the drabness, a great gimbal-mounted telescope and the intricate levers of brass and iron that controlled the mirrors and slides and big lighthouse-style lantern on the roof. Right now there was a smaller telescope as well, pointing south at the temporary chain set up down to the border.

  Highest place and the dullest, thought the watch-stander resentfully. Learning the code and equipment was like learning to read, a great way to get promoted… and stuck up here, he thought. He looked out of the corner of his eye at the woman who sat quietly smoking in a corner, looking cool and aristocratic in white linen riding clothes. With the commander's wife hovering over them they wouldn't be able to rack out or start up the usual friendly dice game, from which he'd made a fair bit of wine-and-girl money. Nice piece, though, if you like 'em skinny, he thought idly.

  She smiled and spoke, with a crisp Messer-class East Residence accent. "I'm not here to pull an inspection, boys. Just do your jobs as usual and ignore me."

  A head rose through the circular railed stairwell. "Hey, Corporal Stainez? Gotta raghead down here, says he works for Wenner Reed an' gots a message fer Lady Whitehall?"

  Stainez sighed and nodded. "Send t' wogboy up," he said.

  * * *

  Abdullah al'Azziz bowed low before Suzette; it amused him to do so openly, when it was so deeply secret who he served, almost as much as it amused him to use his given name. It had been a long time since most of those about him knew him as "Slave of God."

  "My master, the Honorable Messer Wenner Reed, Commander of Reserve Forces for the City District of the County of Sandoral, sends greeting, Lady Whitehall, and wonders if there is some delay that prevents you from joining him on the excursion to his country house that was planned for this day."

  "I am ill," she said. "My apologies to your master, perhaps another day." The Arab bowed again, catching the signs of furiously throttled worry and impatience.

  "I will return to my… duties, Messa, and convey your regrets—"

  "Holy Spiritshit!" The soldier glancing through the telescope to the south blurted. "Priority message!"

  The corporal pushed the man aside and sat in his chair. "Kearstin, Hainez, get yer arses up here! Mefford, take it down."

  The soldier grabbed up a writing board and began scribbling in shorthand:

  "Relay… stop Contact with main Colonist field force thirty kilometers south last west-bank relay station stop pontoon bridge under construction suitable for rapid crossing whole force nearing completion stop estimate Colonial force eight thousand cavalry ten thousand foot one hundred light fifty medium field guns siege train engineers and support units in proportion—oh, holy shit no don't take that down, ye dickhead—to above stop Jamal leading force in person stop no indication presence Tewfik and southern field army stop estimate main Colonist force arrive vicinity Sandoral five days plusminus two stop relay to East Residence stop order full mobilization highest alert stop will attempt to reach eastbank ferry point eight hours soonest stop Gerrin have fullest confidence in your judgment Foley doing well stop be home soon Suzie darling stop."

  "Shall… shall I sound the general alert, corporal?"

  The men at the main unit were already wrenching at their controls, and the big machine on the roof was clacking out its pulses of reflected sunlight to the north. The information would be in the Governor's hands before nightfall, across more than a thousand kilometers.

  "Dickhead! Why'd ye think the commander has 5th men up here and not the regular crew? Them cityfolk pussies wouldn't stop runnin' till they hit the Oxheads, er they'd burn down the whole city while they run around screamin'. The Alert list is in the duty book, start makin' copies." He spun on one heel. "You, raghead—"

  "I'll be responsible for this man, corporal. And we'll get out of your way right now, don't worry."


  Corporal Stainez closed his mouth. I'd worry a lot less if his wog arse was in irons, he thought. "Messa," he continued aloud.

  * * *

  "Messa Whitehall," the artillery commander said. "Ah, Messa Whitehall, with all respect, you're not, ah—"

  "In the line of command, I know, Captain… Grammek Dinnalsyn?" He nodded; a group of gunners looked up from dragging a rope and cleaning wad through the barrel of a 75. "Nevertheless… " She held out a piece of paper. "I am taking full responsibility for giving you movement orders; you'll note that this is stamped with my personal seal."

  Dinnalsyn met her slanted green eyes and swallowed. Merciful Avatars of the Spirit, he thought. Why me? There was something going on, you could tell that even from the palisaded camp outside the wall. A half-dozen carriages had left on the north road, light racing-shells crammed with city men in drab clothes that looked utterly out of place. And a suspicious number of peasants from the farms west and north were coming in, with food and what looked like household goods on their oxcarts and pushcarts and backs.

  "Messa," he said. Then turned and bellowed, "Lieutenant Harritch! Turn out; I want batteries one through four hitched with full teams and ready to roll in twenty minutes."

  Ten guns, twelve if 3/3 and 4/1 hadn't been pulled with a stripped breech-screw thread and a cracked trail respectively.

  "Load, sir?"

  The captain opened his mouth to order standard shell, then closed it for a second. "Twenty standard, ten cannister," he said; thirty shells was a full load for the two-wheeled caissons on which the trail of a field gun rested while it was in motion. He didn't like the ass-dangling-in-the-breeze feeling of galloping the guns off down the road without support.

  Just in case anything unpleasant happened at close range, having the cannister rounds along would make him feel a whole lot better. And anyone who tried to fuck with his guns would feel a lot worse.

  * * *

  There were twenty men in the Colonist patrol, men subtly different from those Raj had seen before. Their jellabas were in a mottled pattern, a few of the beards red or brown-blond, and the faces beneath were fairer-skinned compared to the general run of Colonist, or Descotters for that matter. Berbers, Raj decided. Kabyle berbers from the Gederosian highlands, the Jebal al-B'heed. Irrelevant, except that they looked uncomfortably alert, and most had their carbines out across their knees. The first man was about to leave the slough just as the last entered it, winding south and west to reach a dry watercourse running due west to the hill that was their objective. The lower slope the Civil Government platoon had chosen was scrub-covered, and the steeper one behind unclimbable.

  Now, Raj thought. As if to echo his thought, Foley's clear voice shouted.

  "Fire!"

  Not a volley but almost as close-spaced, as the troopers rose from beneath the cloaks and scrub that concealed them. A few shots missed; more of the enemy were struck multiply. Their commander shouted a single sentence, and then the survivors were down behind their dogs in a short-range firefight with the Descotters. All except for two, who wheeled their mounts and broke into a gallop back down along their path of march; the Colonist officer had told them to retreat, while he and the others bought time with their lives. It was the response Raj would have given, and the reason he was here at the east end of the line.

  The reason he slid down, blocking the only exit. The two Colonist soldiers were coming at a flat-out run, their dogs tucking hindlegs through forelegs and leaping off into each jump. Raj extended his pistol and fired carefully five times, bringing the muzzle down each time recoil kicked it back. The first punched the rear Colonist in the shoulder; he dropped his sword, and the next two took his mount in chest and neck. It went over with a howling yelp and a thud that shook the ground and ended in a crack of neckbone. That left the other uncomfortably close, and if Colonist dogs ran a man weight or so lighter than the Civil Government's cavalry breeds it could still brush him aside like a twig.

  Two more shots. One creased the dog's neck, making it check its stride and snap to one side with a doorslam chomp of jaws. The next took it squarely at the junction of neck and shoulder; it slowed for three more strides and folded from the front, rolling in a cloud of dust. The Colonist had his feet out of the stirrups before then, tucking and rolling forward with the massive inertia of the gallop. Astonishingly, he managed to come out of it after a dozen yards, conscious and on his feet. Even more so was the fact that he had managed to keep his sword.

  "Die, kaphar!" he shrieked, coming in with a blurring overarm cut, too fast for a stop-thrust.

  Raj met it with a high parry, and saw the Berber's green eyes flare wide at the shock of the strength in the Descotter's wrist. These are fighting men, he thought. I wish all mine were as good. His left hand punched forward with the fingers locked into a blade, sinking into the vulnerable spot below the breastbone where even a fit man's belly is unarmored with muscle. Something gave and tore before the blow; Raj unlocked the hilts of the swords and punched the other man in the face with the basket guard of his own. Bone crumpled and snapped, and the Colonist lurched back three steps and fell splay-armed.

  "Sorry, I've got business first," he muttered, panting with the sudden adrenaline-wash of combat, noticing the bruises and scrapes of the quick plunge down the hillside. And the stinging in fingers; he shook his wrist. "Never hit a man with your bare hand if you can help it."

  Silence fell, broken only by the whimper of wounded dogs; then a crackle of shots as the platoon finished them off. A pity to make so much noise, but nobody in their right mind would go within bayonet reach of a hurt carnivore that size if they could avoid it. Smoke hovered, blowing away in clots, as Foley's voice snapped orders.

  "Get their water," he said. "Dump everything you've got on your saddles but weapons and water. Water the dogs now and feed them the last of the fodder. Move." Even now the men would probably lift the enemy's coin pouches and pockets, but there was no sense in wasting time trying to stop it. They scrambled back up to their dogs, festooned with the sewn goatskins the enemy used for canteens.

  The platoon sergeant came over to Foley; it was Fitzin Sherrek, one of the gentleman-rankers Raj had taken into the Companions. Have to get him a commission as soon as I can, Raj thought.

  "Sir," he said to Foley. "We've got a casualty."

  The three men scrambled down to the bush-shielded firing position. Raj could see at a glance that this was one man—boy, rather, he was probably no more than seventeen—who was never going any closer to home than this Spirit-forsaken gully. One of the new crop of boys out from the County to bring the 5th back up to strength, awed and envious of the veterans of El Djem and the Valley of Death, eager to prove themselves. The entry hole was through the lower stomach just to the right of the navel; not much blood yet, but nobody survived a wound like that. Although it might take days to kill.

  "Ser," he gasped, as Foley knelt by his head, then made a keening sound as two of his friends tried to move him. "Ser," he said again. The young Lieutenant gripped his hand; the trooper was grinning, a rictus as much as a smile, face grey with the effort and with pain, as the shock wore off.

  A man lives by his pride, and dies by it, Raj thought: an old Descotter motto. Worth the effort, he supposed, if it gave you something else to do than think of fifty years you'd missed out on.

  "Know… I'm gone," the dying boy said to the living. "I'st… no priest… "

  "Don't worry," Foley said, loudly and clearly; the injured trooper's eyes had not started to wander yet, but best to make sure. He reached inside his tunic and laid his own amulet in the other's free hand; it was a piece of circuit board, overlaid with gold and crystal. "Any who fall defending Holy Federation achieve unity with Paradise."

  "Thanks… ser," the weakening voice said. "Wayezgate Farm… Messer Jorgtin's estate… m'Da rents it. Tell 'im… I died game." The teeth spread wider. "Mam said I'shd wait another… year. Right jist loik allays." A second's panting. "Ye can't stay, ser. Finish it
quick, would yer?"

  The trooper brought the amulet to his lips and closed his eyes, praying in a breathy mumble. Suicide was a mortal sin, but if his comrades left him here he would likely live long enough for scavengers to find, or the enemy.

  "I'll tell them," Foley said, gripping tightly on the hand lying in his. "On my honor." The hammer of his pistol clicked back.

  * * *

  "I can't take the ferry across now, Messa," the man said, wringing his hands. "That's Colony territory over there, and with war coming, the owners would crucify me. Anyone could walk up and seize it."

  Presumably he was speaking metaphorically, since only the stokers in the hold of the steam ferry were slaves and liable for private punishment of that extent. Suzette shaded her eyes with a palm and looked across the two kilometer width of the Drangosh, over to the cluster of shacks and the dirt ramp on the other side. Water threw back the noon sun with a hard blinking glitter that hurt her eyes, but she could see there was very little activity there, the few Colonists resident had pulled out weeks ago. The river marked the border, but the east bank here was too high to irrigate and held little population; most trade went down with the water, and the road was a minor one.

  She turned to the ferry. It was nothing very complicated, a big flat barge with plank drawbridges on either side. The machinery was on the port, a two-cylinder steam rocking-valve engine driving a shaft that ran across the hull under the deck and worked two paddle wheels, one on either side.

  "I," she said, stepping closer to the sweating man in a mechanic's leather tunic and cotton-duck trousers, "am Messa Suzette Emmenalle Forstin Hogor Wenqui Whitehall, Lady of Hillchapel. My husband is Honorable the Brigadier Messer Raj Ammenda Halgern da Luis Whitehall, Whitehall of Hillchapel, Hereditary Supervisor of Smythe parish, and commander of this territory under martial law."

  Her voice was very calm, almost friendly. "Goodman, your employers can have you dismissed and beaten. My husband can actually have you crucified, and will if this boat is not ready to move very shortly." She reached out with an index finger, tapping the air in front of his nose in time to her words. "Do-you-understand-me?"