The Amtrak Wars: Blood River

by Patrick Tilley

  ‘There aren’t going to be any signals! Do you think the Japs are going to trust the Kojak after sending us two over as guides?! C’mon!’

  ‘Yes … I suppose you’re right.’

  ‘Of course I’m right! They’re going to steam in hard and come charging off this boat like buffaloes with rockets up their ass! In a situation like that, anything could happen. She might get hit by an arrow or go down under a horse before she has time to react.’

  ‘That’s stupid. You saw what happened at the Heron Pool.’

  ‘You mean when she had all those samurai coming for her.’

  ‘Yes! When the power is upon her she cannot be harmed by man-made weapons! Talisman is both sword and shield!’

  ‘I’m not arguing about that. I’m talking about before she warms up. But okay, let’s say she gets her act together and succeeds in doing what we’ve failed to do. She blows this wheelboat apart, far enough out so that the Japs wearing armour are in deep shit but close enough in so that any horses who survive can swim ashore –’

  ‘I know what you’re going to say. This cabin’s below the water-line.’

  ‘Exactamente. When it starts to pour in, we’ll be the first to start treading water. But with all this junk on us, that won’t be for very long.’ Steve stood up. ‘From the weight of this board I’d say it floats like a slab of concrete.’

  Cadillac’s new-found confidence began to ooze away. He fell back against the plank wall behind the bunk. ‘This was what you foresaw when I read the stone – us drowning.’

  ‘Wrong. Not drowning – about to drown. There’s a big difference. All this talk has brought us right back to where we started. We can’t expect Clearwater to do everything. Her job is to help the Kojak deal with any Iron Masters who get ashore. The rest is down to us. We’ve gotta wreck this boat and then we’ve gotta get out of here.’

  ‘Shouldn’t that be the other way round? How can we –?’

  Steve cut him off. ‘Look – I’ll fix the boat, okay?’

  ‘But how?!’

  ‘Never mind how! If what I have in mind works, this thing is gonna go sky-high. But with luck, she won’t sink until everything above the main deck is ablaze. That’s when we leave – at the moment of maximum panic. So you’ve got from now till then to figure out how to get us out of this box – given that situation.’

  ‘Brickman, the sun was setting when they brought us down here. If they keep to their original schedule and sail this evening we have –’

  ‘Less than ten hours. I know.’ The cards were stacked against them but there was one person who might be able to help.

  Roz.

  It was time to try a little magic of his own …

  Chapter Twelve

  After taking leave of his wife and children, Izo Wantanabe was escorted back to the wheelboat by Kurabashi. A female domestic and a sea-soldier selected to accompany him as attendants sat with the baggage in front of the rowers.

  The unmasking of two assassins – a direct result of his initial suspicions – had served to raise him further in the eyes of Samurai-Major Morita and Captain Kawanishi. The three other assassins would soon be brought to book and the treacherous Kojak would be taught a bloody and dreadful lesson that would serve to remind their Plainfolk neighbours of what awaited those who betrayed their benefactors.

  All in all, the future could not have looked rosier. But Wantanabe was assailed by a nagging doubt that pricked his conscience like a sharp thorn. The discovery that one of the assassins understood the language of the Iron Masters had raised the possibility that the strength and timing of the raid might now be known to the enemy. Wantanabe knew that, besides being unable to read or write, Mutes were afflicted with unreliable memories and he now realized with the benefit of hindsight that the bark medallions carried by the returning boatmen could have contained a coded message for the other ‘travellers’. How stupid not to have confiscated them!

  But how could he have known one of these fake grass-monkeys was able to speak Japanese? It was absolutely forbidden, under pain of death, for slaves to utter a word of the sacred language of the Sons of Ne-Issan. Where had the outlander gained such knowledge? The answer to this and other questions would, without doubt, be elicited in the torture chambers that rumour placed beneath the palace of the Yama-Shita family at Sara-kusa.

  Wantanabe would have liked to inflict a memorable measure of pain on the two assassins himself for having created the gnawing anxiety which had ruined his sleep since he’d found them lurking below his quarters on the houseboat. Their unmasking had relieved him of most of that anxiety but he now faced a difficult choice. Should he confess that he might – albeit unwittingly – have allowed vital information to be taken back to the enemy or should he say nothing? The truth might bring in its wake a charge of negligence and seriously damage his future prospects, whereas if he remained silent, as his wife Yumiko suggested …

  Why risk everything? Even if the Kojak Mutes were alerted to the impending arrival of the wheelboat, how could they, a bunch of savages, and the three remaining assassins – two females and a semi-invalid male – resist the overwhelming might of the Iron Masters?

  When lines from the dory had been secured to the gangway of the wheelboat, Sergeant Kurabashi bade a respectful farewell to his master, wishing him fair wind and good fortune. Wantanabe, who had formally passed over command of the out-station before the assembled crew of the houseboat, thanked him in a haughty tone that hinted of the preferment to come and urged him to take the utmost care of Yumiko and her two children. Not that there was any likelihood of them being neglected in his absence; Kurabashi knew that despite being named as the officer in charge, he’d be kept on the hop like everyone else.

  Wantanabe supervised the unloading of the baggage by his two attendants to make sure that nothing had been forgotten then strode imperiously up the ramp with his left hand resting on the hilt of the single sword thrust through the dark sash around his waist. A sword which, as far as Kurabashi knew, had never drawn blood.

  The sergeant, whose fighting experience ranged from drunken back-street brawls to murderous clashes with river-pirates, watched him mount the deck with mild amusement. These half-castes were all the same; always trying to prove something. He nevertheless wished him a safe and speedy return; the prospect of being saddled for more than three or four days with a sharp-tongued shrew like Yumiko was distinctly unappealing.

  *

  Throughout the same day, the Kojak had been preparing their defences along the stretch of beach on which the Iron Master landing was expected to take place. Having never seen horses, they had never fought against mounted warriors and it was here that Clearwater’s experience was invaluable. She described the appearance of the two-headed, six-legged beast and assured the Kojak warriors that although a line of charging horsemen was a fearsome sight they could be defeated if the warriors held their ground. Those who stood firm were in less danger than those who turned and fled like startled fast-foot. They could not outrun their pursuers and with their backs to the horsemen’s swords they could not defend themselves. To help meet the coming threat she showed them how to make halberds using the blades of their machetes and long staves then taught them how to counter and deliver blows using the knowledge she had gained from watching Steve practise with his quarterstaff.

  The actual landing was due to take place just before dawn – a propitious moment for the Iron Masters because of their mythical links with the rising sun – but the Chosen Ones had promised that the wheelboat would be consumed with fire while it was still dark. With their great vessel ablaze and sinking, the dead-faces would be at a disadvantage as they struggled out of the shallows. Better still, they would be silhouetted against the flames whilst their attackers would be cloaked in darkness.

  Given this situation, the beach formed the ideal first line of defence and it was here that the Kojak warriors hoped to inflict the maximum damage. Being hunters as well as fishermen they were already well versed
in the art of digging pits to trap game and in a short while, the beach was dotted with a mixture of potholes and trenches designed to bring down rider and horse. The holes were overlaid with a light framework of branches strong enough to support criss-crossed layers of leaves and a thin topcoat of sand and shingle. When each one was completed its position was marked by thin twigs stuck upright in the sand but in the grey pre-dawn twilight the pitfalls they enclosed would be invisible.

  A second line of defence was erected using the clan’s fishing nets mounted on poles that leaned towards the water. Stretched out along the beach, with the bottom edge raised high enough to enable a warrior to duck underneath it, they too would be invisible until horse and rider found themselves entangled in the coarse mesh.

  Close to the water’s edge, a small fire would be built. Around it, a group of Kojak fisherfolk would lie asleep alongside their up-turned boats while two of their number kept watch in the normal manner. It was known that the dead-faces had hollow brass sticks containing magic eyes through which they could see distant objects as if they were only an arm’s length away. The fire, built close to where Wantanabe had landed, would – it was hoped – draw the wheelboat towards the same spot; the centre of the beach defences.

  The peaceful scene – with two sentinels watching for the red fire that was to appear in the night sky – was designed to lull the Iron Masters into thinking that the clan were adhering to the original plan. But underneath the hulls of the upturned boats, Kojak warriors with crossbows would be lying in wait, ready for any false move.

  The return of Raging-Bull and Death-Wish with details of the coming attack gave a physical and temporal dimension to the danger but did little to reduce Clearwater’s anxiety. For Cadillac and the cloud-warrior, reaching the out-station was only half the battle. The livid scar round Death-Wish’s neck from his near-strangulation underlined the unpredictable nature of the enemy. The Iron Masters’ thinly-disguised contempt for ‘inferior persons’ placed Mute slaves under constant threat of death. Cadillac and the cloud-warrior were not officially in that category but as long as they remained in the clutches of the Iron Masters they were in mortal peril – especially in view of what they had set out to do.

  She offered prayers to Mo-Town for their deliverance but she knew that they first had to sink the wheelboat. She was tempted to use her powers to help them but because they were on board and she was on shore, only they could choose the moment. Did they realize, she wondered, how much depended on them?

  Clearwater had penetrated Carnegie’s mind and strengthened his will to resist. The wordsmith, in turn, had passed that resolve on to those around him but she could not control the whole clan. Even though they were in awe of her powers she could not force them to fight – and that was another source of anxiety.

  Their reluctance had its roots in the past. Apart from a few initial skirmishes, the Plainfolk clans had avoided armed conflict with the Iron Masters. The decision had caused individual clans a great deal of heart-searching as it gradually became clear that the little yellow men from the eastern lands had no territorial ambitions. Their landings on Plainfolk turf had only one purpose: trade – an exchange of goods and bodies beneficial to both parties, but which gradually became weighted in the Iron Masters’ favour.

  The early confrontations had demonstrated that the dead-faces were highly-disciplined, well-armed warriors with no qualms about taking on a force several times their number. Plainfolk Mutes were justly proud of their courage and prowess as warriors but they quickly realized that, in attacking the Iron Masters, they had – to use a Mute phrase – bitten off more bone than they could chew.

  Conflicts over disputed turf were usually small-scale affairs involving bands of warriors numbering no more than two or three hands. Ambushes and ‘zaps’ – hit-and-run attacks – favoured by some of the D’Troit clans, were frowned on by the She-Kargo who adopted a more flamboyant style. Combat was preceded by a lengthy verbal confrontation in which each side exchanged taunts, mocking each other’s manhood, and this was accompanied by a great deal of aggressive posturing; a process known as ‘strutting the stuff’.

  The ensuing battle usually consisted of individual conflicts and where one side outnumbered the other those without an opponent did not enter the fray unless one of his clan-brothers fell. This ritualized style of combat was not always adhered to in clashes between warriors of different blood-lines and when fifty or more were involved on either side the battle that ensued often became a sprawling, messy affair.

  Unless they were led by a gifted wordsmith – and not always even then – Mute clans did not fight in disciplined formations and never evolved a tactical battle-plan. This lack of a coherent military command structure was probably the reason why large-scale conflicts rarely developed between rival clans. The last one involving the M’Calls had been fifteen years ago when Clearwater’s father, Thunder-Bird, had kissed the sharp iron of the D’Vine during the battle of the Black Hills.

  With room enough for everyone in a world where the resourceful and energetic need never go hungry, Plainfolk clans had no desire to annihilate each other. The important thing was to maintain their ‘standing’ – the recognition, by his peers, of a warrior’s courage. But a warrior with a knife, however brave, was no match for a sword-wielding samurai and once this had been established, along with the benefits to be derived from regular trading contacts, a cautious partnership had developed. A partnership on which the Mutes had come to rely, for besides a range of useful domestic items, the Iron Masters supplied better knives with sharper cutting edges to replace the precious relics handed down through countless generations, cross-bows for hunting and, last year, rifles – to be used against the Mutes’ real enemy, the sand-burrowers.

  Clearwater was acutely aware that this deferential relationship and material dependence, built up over several decades, was at the back of the clan’s collective mind along with the realization that they were about to ruin it. It was not courage they lacked but conviction.

  Having seen proof of their power, the clan had welcomed them as The Chosen. The initial deceit, concocted by Carnegie-Hall, had become a reality. The thought that they, the Kojak, had been plucked from obscurity to play a key role in the events that heralded the birth of Talisman had been thrilling. But now the euphoria had worn off. Cadillac’s promise that their name would be linked forever with the advent of the Thrice-Gifted One had gradually lost its appeal as the fatal day approached. The clan had worked hard to construct the defences that Cadillac and the cloud-warrior had planned before leaving, but as the day drew to a close, she sensed they were becoming increasingly concerned about the long-term consequences of defying the Iron Masters.

  Moving from group to group she had made their eyes glow by telling them of the weapons they could seize and the treasures to be recovered from the wreck of the sunken vessel. This, she knew, would persuade them to take up their positions on the shore but it would not keep them there. Only a brilliant coup by Cadillac and the cloud-warrior could put the iron back into their souls.

  On board the wheelboat, Captain Kawanishi and Samurai-Major Morita stood on a portable dais in the centre of the through-deck and watched as four pairs of Shinto priests and their acolytes worked their way around the stalls where the two hundred and fifty samurai stood by their saddled mounts.

  The ceremony was designed to render Morita’s troops invulnerable to the evil kami called into being by the ‘white witch’ at the Heron Pool. Morita was the only man there who had witnessed the terrifying effect of her power upon the troops assembled there. No sword, arrow or spear could harm her. Seeing this, many turned tail and fled; those samurai who held their ground perished. Had he not been trapped in the shattered grandstand, he would have perished with them. But not this time. After delving into ancient documents, the priests had prepared a number of powerful incantations guaranteed to turn the witch’s magic back upon herself.

  Morita and his officers had already been blessed in a priv
ate session and soon it would be the turn of the three-hundred red-stripe infantry. Being of lower rank, they would receive a simultaneous blessing from all eight priests at group rates.

  Izo Wantanabe, who had been in the back row when Morita had received his spiritual armour plate, watched from the sidelines. Despite his grand title of Emissary to the Outlands, he was only an administrator and a relatively junior one at that. Unless they were involved in a last-ditch stand during a civil insurrection, administrators did not usually wage war with anything sharper than a writing brush. Their swords were badges of rank but their function was not purely ceremonial. At a certain awkward moment, when your career as a functionary took a sudden downturn, they provided a quick and efficient way of saving yourself and everyone else from further embarrassment.

  As a special honour, Captain Kawanishi had given Wantanabe permission to watch the coming landing from the bridge. Once the three remaining assassins had been safely locked away below, he would go ashore to witness the execution by beheading of all captured Mutes and the impaling of their treacherous wordsmith. Only one man, woman and child would be spared to relate what lay in store for those who dared to challenge the Sons of Ne-Issan.

  When all the troops had been blessed, Morita drew a cheer from their throats with a short, upbeat address then returned to the bridge with his aides and personal guard. After being assured that they were still on course for a dawn landing, Morita called for a celebratory cup of sake for everyone on the bridge then retired to his second floor headquarters in the centre of the galleried superstructure.

  Passing his helmet and swords to a retainer, Morita lowered his armoured-plated body into a reclining chair which he always took with him on military expeditions, closed his eyes and fell asleep. It was a knack he had acquired many years ago. In two hours it would be time for the troops to assemble for the landing. The same knack would wake him, without prompting, in an hour and a half and he would spring from his chair ready for action.