Corean Chronicles 3 - Scepters

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  Alucius did not reply, but glanced northward. Perhaps three-quarters of a vingt ahead, the road passed through a stone-walled cut in a low rise that ran east and west in both directions so far as he could see. He strained to sense what might lie ahead. Was there a sense of a vague purpleness? He glanced at the road cut, then stood in the stirrups and half turned to look back southward. There were no hills or obstructions to vision on either side of the road to the south—except the knee-high to waist-high thornbushes that were even thicker than they had been farther south. His nightsheep could have taken care of those—although it wouldn't have done their wool any good.

  Alucius settled back into the saddle, looking at Skant. "Tell the overcaptain that we'll ride on about another half vingt and halt the column. Have him move the wagons to the middle of the column. I'll have Thirty-fifth Company move out beyond the road to provide additional fire. He's to engage as he sees fit once we halt. I'll hold Twenty-eighth Company in reserve."

  An expression of concern and puzzlement crossed Deotyr's face, but the captain said nothing.

  "Half a vingt and we halt," said Skant. "Wagons to the middle. He can engage, and Thirty-fifth will move out to the flanks with covering fire."

  "That's right, Skant."

  "Yes, sir." The lancer turned his mount and rode back along the shoulder.

  After a moment, Deotyr spoke. "Sir?"

  "Why did I only offer Thirty-fifth as covering fire? Look ahead. See that rise? Don't you think it's strange that we're being attacked from the south as we near that?"

  "You think they'll attack from the north as well?"

  "I don't know. If they don't, there will be time to pull Twenty-eighth out, but once a company's off the road here, with all that thorn, it takes time to re-form, especially if the rebels come charging down the road. But if I don't send Thirty-fifth off road and out, they don't have any angle to provide covering fire."

  Deotyr nodded.

  After riding back and providing Jultyr with detailed instructions, Alucius hurried back northward to rejoin Deotyr and Twenty-eighth Company. He kept studying the road, both to the north and south. Before long he could sense riders on both sections, but only about a company in each direction. Again, that didn't seem to make much sense, but Adarat or whoever was commanding might be thinking that the surprise of a rear attack would be sufficient. Like everything else in Hyalt, the situation bothered Alucius.

  The three Lanachronan companies covered the thousand yards, and the rebels to the north remained concealed. Alucius waited longer, another three hundred yards, until the column reached a point where the ground beyond the road on each side formed an almost imperceptible rise that was mostly clear of the thornbush.

  "Column, halt!" Alucius ordered. "Thirty-fifth Company! To the flanks!" He turned to Deotyr. "Captain. Have Twenty-eighth form into a staggered front from five yards out from the shoulder of the road on one side to five on the other side. If you get a rebel attack, don't open fire until they're within a hundred yards unless they're moving at gallop. In that case, you'd better start firing at a hundred and fifty yards. Is that clear?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "I'm moving back to the center so that I can see what's happening on both sides."

  "Yes, sir."

  Not without misgivings, Alucius moved back toward the middle of the formation until he was within yards of Jultyr and to the slightly higher ground beyond the east shoulder of the road, trying to see and sense what was happening both to the north and the south.

  Feran spread Fifth Company and waited until the rebels were within a hundred yards. Then Fifth Company opened fire. Although he could not see them, Alucius could feel the waves of death and the purple miasma that dissolved with each death. He could also sense the rebel forces to the north, moving southward into the shadows of the road cut ahead, as well as several wagons. The wagons bothered him, but he couldn't determine why or what they contained.

  "Rebels to the north!" The call echoed from one of Twenty-eighth Company's outriders, galloping southward. "They're forming up on the road."

  "Twenty-eighth Company, hold!" came Deotyr's command. "Rifles ready. Prepare to fire."

  Alucius half nodded. He noted that the northern force of rebels was still a good four hundred yards away. Then he turned his Talent to the south once more.

  This time the rebels attacking Fifth Company did not continue to charge blindly forward. After the shock of the first volleys shredded through their ranks, they turned their mounts and rode off the road, half east and half west. That worried Alucius, especially when he saw that they were re-forming two hundred yards away. He turned the gray and shifted his study to the north, where the oncoming maroon-clad rebels were less than two hundred yards out from Twenty-eighth Company.

  From the north, it seemed, a burst of crimson emptiness flashed over Alucius, along with a momentary, but intense, chill. He forced himself to infuse the shells in his rifles with darkness, even as he had the first rifle out of the holder, his eyes scanning the skies and the land beyond the road. He forced himself to ignore what happened to the north—at least for the moment.

  A wild pteridon appeared some seventy yards to the southwest, almost a hundred yards into the sky. Alucius could tell that it was about to dive directly at him, even before it half folded its wings.

  He concentrated on the pteridon, squeezing off one shot, then a second.

  A ball of blue flame exploded from where the Talent-creature had been and plummeted into a thornbush, which exploded in flame.

  Alucius turned, catching sight of something else, a single horned sandox lumbering toward the eastern flank of Jultyr's lancers.

  It took Alucius a single shot, but the creature had appeared so close to the last of the lancers that the bluish flames surged over the outermost lancer, enveloping him in flames. His screams were brief, but Alucius shuddered. He continued to search for more of the Talent-creatures even as he heard Deotyr's command.

  "Twenty-eighth Company! Fire at will!"

  The cracks of shots from north and south echoed around Alucius as he searched for another Talent-creature, and he almost missed the pteridon coming in from the north.

  "Look out!" someone yelled.

  He twisted in the saddle and used the last two shots in the first rifle to hit the pteridon, but once more the bluish firebolt resulting from his successful shot flared downward, barreling into the chest of a lancer's mount. The man, quick of thought, jumped clear, but the horse's scream was agonizing.

  His second rifle out, Alucius scanned land and sky, but the crimson emptiness, that legacy of the Duarches, was gone.

  The rebel company from the north continued to ride southward, lancers falling to the fire of Deotyr's men, until the rebels were less than thirty yards from Twenty-eighth Company. Abruptly, at that moment, a single long trumpet blast came from somewhere. The single note wavered but held. As one, the rebel lancers who had attacked from the north threw down their rifles, turned their mounts, and galloped back along the eternastone road, back to the north.

  "After them!" ordered Deotyr.

  Alucius wheeled the gray as Twenty-eighth Company rode in pursuit of the fleeing rebels. Should he countermand the order? How?

  From the slight ridge on the side of the road, Alucius looked northward, watching as Twenty-eighth Company closed on the rebels, feeling that something was not right.

  Why were they fleeing, when they had never done so before?

  The rebels neared the road cut made by the ancient road through the low rolling hill. There, Alucius saw a low line of what appeared to be packed clay that ran from one side of the road to the other, and the road behind the clay appeared to be shiny. Something splashed from the hoofs of the mounts of the retreating rebel riders.

  At that instant, he knew. He forced himself to ignore the bullets from the south, and concentrated on extending a thin golden green line of fire northward, toward the liquid in the road cut. His thinnest of lines of Talent-fire touched t
he liquid held behind the miniature dikes at the same moment that the leading riders of Twenty-eighth Company crossed the first one.

  Whhhssst! A flare of flame erupted from the eternastones, bathing at least half the rebels in flames, turning them and their mounts into living torches. The first three or four ranks of Twenty-eighth Company's first squad also flared into flame.

  Alucius's guts twisted. But there was little more he could do, not after Deotyr had ordered the charge.

  He twisted in the saddle, looking south, but with the fiery gout to the north, the remaining rebels turned their mounts and fled, pell-mell, south.

  "Fifth Company! Thirty-fifth Company! Re-form! Forward!" Alucius urged the gray forward and onto the road, riding northward quickly.

  Deotyr had re-formed Twenty-eighth Company, well back from the wall of flame.

  The few remaining rebel lancers rode eastward along the ridge. They were already a vingt away when Alucius neared Twenty-eighth Company. His Talent sensed no one nearby besides his own force—no one living. Both a single glance and his senses told him that there was enough of the oil or whatever it was to turn the dead mounts and men into little more than ashes, and the fire might well continue for at least a glass.

  He could feel his entire body beginning to shake, and his eyesight blurring. He forced himself to steady his hands as he fumbled out the water bottle and drank, then unwrapped some travel bread for a quick bite. What else could he have done? He didn't know any way to have stopped the conflagration, and if he'd simply waited, he might have lost all of Twenty-eighth Company. Why hadn't he seen what was coming more clearly?

  He shook his head. He'd known something was wrong. He never would have ordered the charge, but, as Feran had said, he couldn't be everywhere. No one else could have dealt with the pteridons.

  His hands were still shaking as he took another bite of travel bread. Was his shakiness his reaction to the flame trap? Or was it overuse of Talent? Had he used that much Talent? He decided that it had taken more effort than he had realized to extend his Talent to fire the oil or whatever had been used to create the deadly flames. But his decision to use Talent still troubled him, much as he could see no other alternative.

  By the time he finally reached Twenty-eighth Company, the blurred vision and the shaking had subsided. Alucius kept his face impassive as he reined up close to Deotyr.

  The captain's countenance was ashen.

  "Captain?" Yes, sir…

  "Casualties?"

  "Twelve men dead, sir, three others burned, two wounded."

  Before Deotyr could say any more, Alucius spoke. "I don't recall ordering a charge. But what is done is done. We'll talk about it later." Alucius dared not say more, not with the rage seething inside him at Deotyr's stupidity.

  "Yes, sir."

  "Finish forming up. We'll have to circle the road cut on the west. We'll probably have trouble with the wagons. Pick a detail to help with them." Alucius glanced at the low flames still flickering from the road cut ahead. He could feel the heat. As he turned to head back to check with Jultyr and Feran, he just wished he could turn away from the stench of burned flesh.

  Alucius rode back southward, both to meet with Jultyr and to avoid saying anything he would later regret.

  As Alucius neared the older captain, Jultyr studied Alucius's face before speaking. For a moment, Jultyr did not speak. Then he said, "One man dead, sir. One man wounded, sir. Looks to recover."

  "Thank you. You handled your company well, Captain."

  "Thank you, sir."

  "Majer!" called another voice—that of Feran.

  Alucius turned his mount and waited for Feran to join them.

  "Just two men wounded. One took a shot to the shoulder," Feran reported. "The other took a bullet in the calf."

  "Fifth Company did well," Alucius said. "As always." He could feel some of the anger subsiding. "Twenty-eighth Company lost twelve men, had five wounded." His words came out flat.

  "Lucky that the rebels set that fire too early," observed Jultyr.

  "They probably didn't plan it that way." Feran looked hard at Alucius.

  Alucius knew Feran understood, and he merely replied, "I wish they'd been even earlier. Twenty-eighth's first squad didn't deserve that."

  "Captain Deotyr? " asked Feran.

  "He may have gotten singed, but he was just far enough back."

  "What was that stuff? Do you know, sir?" asked Jultyr.

  "Some kind of oil, maybe the kind that you can find in pitch ponds. It was dark and shiny, but not too thick. Their mounts splashed some of it before it caught fire." Alucius gestured to the road ahead and the low rise. "We'll have to ride around. I told Captain Deotyr to form a detail to help with the wagons."

  "Ah… the men… ?"

  "It's still burning. There won't be anything left but ashes. There's not much we can do."

  Jultyr shook his head. "What a horrible… way to go."

  Alucius agreed, but he wasn't sure that any way to die was good, notwithstanding all the legends of glorious heroism. Dead was dead.

  Chapter 60

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  In the dim light of early evening, Alucius and Deotyr stood at the edge of the camp, little more than rows of lancers and bedrolls on a low rise twenty-some vingts north of Hyalt and less than half a vingt to the west of the high road. All the campsite had to recommend itself was a creek with cold and clear water that ran along the bottom of the swale to the north of the rise, and the slight elevation of the low hill—and the fact that men and mounts needed the rest and that there had been nothing better in vingts.

  In the eastern sky, halfway to the zenith, was the small green disc of Asterta. That the moon of misery shone down on Deotyr and Alurius was entirely appropriate, although the dark-haired young captain was obviously unaware of that coincidence as he shifted his weight from one boot to the other.

  "I said that we would discuss the events of the afternoon later. I did not say that we would dismiss them." Alucius kept his voice mild. "Why did you order the charge? "

  "They had thrown down their rifles, and they were retreating in disorder, sir. It seemed like the best tactic."

  "Did I tell you to engage them?"

  "No, sir."

  "Did you hear me relay orders to Overcaptain Feran granting him the leeway to engage the rebels?"

  "Yes, sir."

  "Did I give you similar orders?"

  "Ah… no, sir."

  "But I didn't forbid you to order a charge, either," Alucius pointed out. "That's the first lesson, Captain. Discretion always rests with the company commander, but so does responsibility for the use of that discretion. If you choose to ignore orders, and there may be a very few times that you should, or if you decide to take an initiative, you should have a very good reason for doing so. You should have a definite plan for what you intend to do, and you should understand the situation in which you find yourself." Alucius paused only briefly. "Explain to me why you thought charging this particular fleeing enemy was a good tactic."

  There was a long silence.

  "Come, Captain… if you did not have a good reason when you ordered the charge, and if you cannot come up with a good reason after having thought about it all afternoon… why exactly did you give that order?"

  "I just… well, sir, it felt like the thing to do. I can't explain why."

  Alucius nodded slowly. "I've done that myself. But there's a problem with that. If you can't explain why you did what you did, even afterward, then you didn't have a good reason. Now… consider this. We've fought the rebels a number of times. Before this afternoon, have they ever retreated?"

  "No, sir."

  "Did you ask yourself why they were retreating? They didn't just turn and break. They turned just before reaching the company, and they were ordered to retreat by the sound of a horn. That signal alone should have told you that the action was planned."

  "Did you see that, sir?"

  "As soon as I heard that horn signal,
I knew that whatever they were doing was planned, but I was too far away to countermand your orders, Captain. I thought that trying to do so from a distance could have created even greater confusion and left the company scattered and even more vulnerable." Alucius let the silence drag out for a time. "You were extremely fortunate to have lost only twelve men. Had they set that oil on fire a few moments later, most of Twenty-eighth Company would have died." Alucius did not hammer home the point that Deotyr would have been among the dead. Nor did he voice his own regrets that his own options had been constricted by his own limitations. "You need to know what your own company can do. You also have to be aware of what your enemy has done, what he can do, and what he might do."

  "Yes, sir." Deotyr's look at Alucius was almost accusing, as if Alucius were responsible.

  Alucius was responsible. He hadn't given Deotyr clear enough orders, or orders that could not have been misunderstood. Yet, in one respect, he shouldn't have had to give such orders. In another, he should have known that Deotyr was too inexperienced. But it was better not to say that. And, in the end, for whatever happened Alucius would be the one held responsible.

  "Captain. I could have given you orders to stand fast no matter what happened. And what would have happened if another company of rebels had appeared? Or if one of those pteridons had crashed into the ammunition wagon and set it on fire? Every order is a balance. If I make the order too firm, that can be as deadly as making it too general."

  "Pteridons?"

  "The Fifth and Thirty-fifth Companies were attacked by them, along with the rebels. That's why I moved southward. When they're fatally wounded, they explode in nasty bluish flames. You might ask Jultyr about them. Fifth and Thirty-fifth Companies had as many casualties from them as from the rebel lancers."

  Alucius still had no idea why the pteridons had appeared when they did, or why there had been so few that afternoon, compared to the larger numbers on the previous occasions. He wished he knew if other forces or herders had been attacked, but he had an uneasy feeling that there had been few, if any, such attacks where he—or perhaps Wendra—had not been present. But he had a hard time believing that someone would send such beasts after someone as insignificant as he was.