by John Carr
The crackle of distant gunfire rent the air once more as Wheelock’s army drew courage from their indiscriminate fire into the darkness. The bad news to John was that they evidently had ammunition to waste, which meant they were better armed than the Baron had surmised.
The Hamiltons’ second line of defense was the armored tin pots, his Grandfather’s men-at-arms, in durasteel plate armor, armed with pistols, lances, and swords. It had taken his most skilled persuasions - and surprisingly, those of Ingrid Cummings as well - to keep the Baron from commanding his Iron Men, as he called them, himself. John doubted they would be of much help, these armored anachronisms, seated on former dray horses.
He had about two hundred of these mounted men-at-arms in reserve, should the raiders breach their position. True, the Iron Men had once proved useful against King Steele’s invasion force, but that had been a fluke. John expected little help from the tin pots in today’s battle against an enemy comprised mostly of what could only be considered light cavalry. The Iron Men were there to provide a screen for him and any survivors, if the battle took so disastrous a turn as to require a retreat back to Whitehall.
John wondered what kind of man sacked and burned defenseless villages, and then took all their foodstocks and women? A barbarian to be sure. King Steele had been a power-hungry wolf; yet, he had kept to the codes of civilized warfare. According to the refugees, Wheelock knew no restraints. The stories of rapine and torture that followed in the raiders’ wake were like those out of Terra’s early barbaric history - Genghis Khan or Timur the Lame would have understood this creature.
His brother-in-law held the third force, a small body of some hundred and fifty men. According to the plan, they were to strike from behind once the battle on the ridge began in earnest. It might give the nomads pause, let them think treachery within their ranks, or that they fought two foes. It was a good plan for a force outnumbered five-to-one, but only if events cooperated. Captain Mazurin liked to quote the Imperial maxim that no battle plan ever survived contact with a Sauron, and apply it in blanket terms to all combat. John hoped this fight would be an exception.
There was a reserve of about three hundred armed men at the castle, mostly older soldiers and retirees, who would have to hold the castle if their plan failed. Cut-off from the main force, he doubted they could hold the castle a week.
If only he had some real guns. It was cannon they needed, but the ones at the castle were all too large and no one had thought to design gun carriages. True, they all had expected things to grow worse as Haven descended into de-civilization, but not so damn fast! The arrival of the Saurons had removed the last restraints that had kept Haven’s various factions from taking the final plunge into darkness. Now, instead of working together against the common foe, everyone was out to grab what little they could take by force before the Saurons got it first.
John began to make out the enemy’s distant war cries as a scout came bursting over the ridge, riding hell-bent for leather. John’s heart began to quicken. He took several deep breaths and checked to make certain his gun was loaded, charged, the safety off. He looked down at his watch - about an hour to go.
“Marshal, shall I give the orders?” Master-At-Arms Cromwell asked, as he turned his head, grinned and sighted his automatic rifle.
“Tell them to aim at the whites of their eyes,” he ordered, some half-remembered phrase out of a dusty history book. “Maybe, if we tell them now, it’ll sink in and they’ll remember when the heathens rush the ridge.”
“Yes, sir,” Cromwell answered.
Surprise and superior firepower were their twin advantages. He prayed the rumors of bow-shooting nomads were more fact than fiction. If the raiders were adequately armed with rifles and automatic weapons, this battle might prove to be too close to call. The bursts of gunfire they kept shooting off through the night were not reassuring, at all. He began a prayer he half-remembered from childhood.
Forty-Six
I
Groundmaster Houten checked his chronometer and reviewed the night’s accomplishment: an hour yet to Trueday, and the landing zone was as bare of people and equipment as if it had never been occupied. He turned and followed the first group of load animals and personnel, winding their way up into the pass toward the Citadel. Toward... home,
Diettinger found himself looking again at the face of Second Rank, sleeping on the cot next to him. Even more than most Saurons, he was a realist; a moment’s consideration would have told him that it would have come to this, but he had simply not taken the time. Or perhaps he had been determined to avoid the truth of the matter.
As it happened, he seemed the only one in the crew surprised at this turn of events. When, after the long and fruitless argument with Second Rank over her decision, he had finally admitted the wisdom of it, he had called Breedmaster Caius.
“Second Rank is to be removed from the roster of Cyborg mating personnel, Breedmaster. You may list her as officially mated to me hereafter.”
“I have already taken that liberty, First Rank,” Caius had matter-of-factly informed him. Diettinger had raised an eyebrow.
“Indeed? And would you care to share your justification for such an act with me?”
Caius was utterly blasé. “Your Genetic Preference Rating is A-3, Fertility Rating two, well within the parameters you established for breedworthy personnel. Second Rank’s qualifications and genetic code complement your own very well. Far better than they do those of any Cyborg in the pool.” Caius paused a moment. “I had merely prepared the matchup as a hypothetical one. Purely as a guideline.”
“Of course,” Diettinger said dryly. “You would agree, then, that the mating of myself and Second Rank, and any issue resulting therefrom, would help in establishing a stabilizing influence for our presence here on Haven?”
Caius nodded. “It would have the added virtue of offsetting the considerable influence the Cyborgs have among the troops as well, First Rank.”
Diettinger nodded, smiling thinly. “Yes, something like that was pointed out to me by Second Rank herself. Thank you, Breedmaster. Diettinger out.”
And now he watched as Second Rank - Althene, he reminded himself; her name is Althene - turned in her sleep, moving towards his warmth. With an awkwardness he sensed he was rapidly losing, Diettinger gathered her into his arms, pulled her close, and closed his eyes.
Better late, he thought, than never.
He woke at the bridge summons signal to find himself alone in the bed. The sounds of a woman in his bath were unfamiliar, yet utterly unmistakable. Diettinger keyed the intercom.
“Diettinger.”
“Groundside secured, sir. Citadel signals ready to receive the Dol Guldur whenever we are ready to send her.”
Diettinger scowled. As always when he had slept too long, he awoke irritable.
“Communications, we are about to end the life of what is probably the last ship of the Sauron Home Fleet; pass the word to all ranks that henceforth she will be given the courtesy of being referred to by her true name.”
“Acknowledged, First Rank.” Communications’ tone reflected his humility.”Engineering reports the Fomoria ready for drop.”
“Very good. Muster all remaining shipboard personnel in the shuttle bay in half-an-hour.”
“Acknowledged, First Rank.
Diettinger cut the bridge link for what he suddenly realized was for the last time. He looked at the communications console in reflection for a moment, then turned to see Althene in the doorway to the bath. Silhouetted in the dimness of the cabin by the bright light behind her, she presented a romantic image as old as humankind.
Diettinger thought of the jokes cattle made about Sauron matings; none bore repeating. Cattle would never appreciate that the Saurons were just as emotional as any other race of men; more so, since they were trained not to deny the basic nature of the human species. Non-Saurons saw Diettinger and his people as sexless automata. The prejudice had likely not spared any captured Sauron femal
es in the ruined Home System from rape at the hands of Imperial soldiers.
“Althene,” Diettinger said her name aloud.
He could only sit and look at her for the moment. This is the price of three decades and more of solitary living, he thought. The speaking of emotions was a skill that required practice, and he was sorely lacking that.
“Yes, Galen,” she said quietly, her tone one of affirmation. Cattle would have said it sounded like “Acknowledged, First Rank,” but Diettinger knew the difference.
“It’s time to go.”
She nodded, went to the desk where she had left her kit bag. Diettinger watched her every move. How had he lasted this long, he wondered? Relations among crewmembers on Sauron ships were inevitable, and if the genetic potential was promising, encouraged. Yet in the years she had served with him, not once had he considered his former Second Rank in anything more than a professional light. Perhaps there had not been time. Or perhaps he had known that the first step toward intimacy with this particular woman would be a very, very steep one. And the last.
Now, he thought, there would indeed be time. Time for himself, and for Althene. There still was much to do before the subjugation of the world below them was complete, and more beyond that before the Sauron Race was safe and could begin to rebuild. But that would be resolved by his heirs.
No matter. He had done the hardest part, he knew. He had given his people a chance, if a slim one. Time now to keep some small part of his life separate from his duty as a Sauron and a Soldier. And Althene would be that part.
“Ready?” he asked.
Althene nodded.
Smiling, he slid the door open and held it for her as she passed through.
II
It was almost an hour after sunrise before the raiders raised a great howl and began their charge. The first nomad to come over the ridge was completely unlike anything John Hamilton had expected. The man was wearing a brown flight jacket and blue jeans; he could have been one of the Hamiltons’ neighbors, except for the snarl on this face and the hate that glowed in his eyes. He crumpled in a hail of bullets.
“HOLD YOUR FIRE!” shouted the Master-at-Arms.
John looked down at his rifle, it was still at rest. He took it up and aimed.
Six raiders topped the ridge at once and a concentrated volley pitched them from their mounts. The next group to come over was ten times that number and not so easily stopped.
“MACHINE GUNS, FIRE!” cried John, and he watched as the ridge was suddenly emptied of the enemy. A moment later the ridge was swarming with their replacements and the line of fire was so crowded the machine guns were doing double duty. Some of the nomads hid behind fallen horses or used their dead allies as shields.
John shot one bearded muskylope rider right out of his saddle, and was aiming at a second, when he toppled from his mule. Then the ridge top was covered with so many raiders that he didn’t even bother aiming. Their coats and half-armors were every color of the rainbow and only a few were shooting bullets; the vast majority were armed with archaic but potent recurve bows, and shot arrows.
Hundreds died in volley after volley of concentrated fire, but Hamiltons’ liegemen were taking casualties as well. Steven Hammond dropped over with a red kiss in the middle of his forehead and Robert Frisse’s body just slumped over in final repose. Within what seemed seconds - but judging from the carpet of bodies on the ridge front, must have been minutes - the raiders were upon the stone wall that the Hamiltons were using as a barricade.
A logical part of his mind reasoned that the moment they breached the stone wall the melee would occur and then the raiders numbers would give them an incalculable advantage. John turned to the snarling Master- At-Arms, who was using his empty rifle as a club. He shouted, ”Call the Iron Men!”
A large caliber bullet pinged off his helmet and he felt dizzy for a moment. He shook it off, grabbed hold of the Marshal’s arm and repeated his command.
A film of bloodlust visibly cleared from Cromwell’s eyes and he turned to a young trumpeter and gave the signal. There was a loud trumpet blast and for a moment the crazed killing ground froze in front of John’s eyes. There were more than two thousand raiders on the killing floor, filling the twenty meters from the ridge top to their barricade. At least half that many casualties littered the stones, some caught in grotesque poses on bramble bushes they had strewn around the wall to stop the raiders’ mounts.
The machine guns and Gatling guns were still taking a terrible toll, but as he watched, the nomads overran one machine gun and fought to take another. John knew that if the Iron Men didn’t turn them back, the tide of battle would turn completely and he’d be lucky to survive with his skin intact.
Then from the Hamilton right flank came a sight out of a history holo: a mass of gleaming armor charging forward on massive horses, with the Hamilton banner at the fore. He felt his chest swell with pride. The enemy seemed to be caught in a quick freeze as the massive tide of armor and horseflesh slammed into the raiders’ left flank. His liegemen, suddenly heartened by the carnage, regrouped and began to fire on the massed raiders who were caught between an iron wall on the left and a hail of bullets in the center. To the right was a sheer cliff face and already scurrying raiders were careening to their deaths over the stone lip.
The raiders coming over the ridge were now stalled, both by bodies and by their own amazement at the sight of a living wall of armored steel. One or two of the Iron Men toppled from their mounts, but most were as oblivious to the hail of bullets headed their way as their mounts were to the bodies they trampled underneath their hooves. Suddenly hundreds of raiders were being pushed, thrust and carried over the ledge. Those reinforcements bold enough to top the ridge crest were met with a renewed and invigorated volley of small arms. The press of battle had turned.
When most of the raiders had been pushed over the cliff, the wall of steel pulled up, wheeled and turned to the ridge top. In the twinkle of an eye, they were over the ridge and down the mild incline. John, along with most of his men, except for a small reserve held there by the Master-At-Arms, ran to the crest to witness a sight straight out of the thousand-year s-gone Hundred Years’ War. The armored wave broke the nomads’ charge, going through and over the smaller horses, and turned the entire army into rout. Hundreds of bodies and mounts lay tossed in their wake.
The Iron Men were now in hot pursuit, shooting nomads out of saddles with their pistols, riding them down with their lances and cutting them out of their saddles with sabers.
Then out of the gully where they’d been hiding came the Hamilton reserve straight into the face of the fleeing raiders. The main body of the Wheelocks were enveloped and destroyed almost to a man. No prisoners, no mercy. Those who tried to surrender were shot out of their saddles or cut down by swords. Those who tried to flee were run down and trampled. The wounded were dispatched with blades across the throat.
A half an hour later, going over the body-littered ridge, John estimated that there were four to five thousand nomad casualties. Of the thousand or so that had departed, he doubted more than a few hundred would escape their pursuers. As with most battles, the vast majority of casualties occurred when the enemy broke formation and were killed by the pursuing victors.
Still, one had to give the raiders credit; they had left more than a thousand dead on the ridge crest and at least that many again had been pushed over the cliff. He felt a little lightheaded all of a sudden and forced himself to sit down. The Master-At-Arms came over to report. “We got most of them, Marshal. I don’t think more than a hundred or two will escape the pursuit and, with the tales they’ll tell we shouldn’t have any trouble from the nomads for a long time.”
John nodded.”How do you explain their courage? I thought the machine guns would stop them cold.”
Workman held up a suede pouch and pipe. “Most of them had kits like this. Their leaders had them smoke hashish before the attack. It’s a concentrated resin from the hemp plant. Under the right
circumstances and if enough is smoked, the warriors come to believe they are invincible and feel almost no pain during the battle. It’s use dates back to old Terra and the Muslim hashshashin. We were damn lucky!”
John felt his vision begin to blacken. He felt dizzy, too.
“Marshal! What’s wrong - ”
III
The corridors of the ship resonated with the sound of their passage; all material that could be stripped from the Fomoria was long gone, particularly anything flammable. Diettinger and Althene’s boots rang on the naked durasteel decks. Power was at a minimum, so they took the access ladder to the shuttle bay.
Waiting at the bay were Engineering with two of his assistants, Communications, Navigation, and the Shuttle pilot, a Fighter Rank whose name patch identified him as ‘Stahler.’ Diettinger remembered the name from the Battle of Tanith.
“Stahler.” He read aloud.
The Fighter Rank cracked to attention. “Yes, First Rank.”
“You were on the mission that lost one of our craft to the locals. I understand the enemy pilot rammed your wingman?”
“Yes, First Rank. Brilliant compensatory maneuvering by the enemy pilot flying an utterly obsolete ship.”
Diettinger had been impressed by the news the moment he’d heard it. Stahler’s personal rendition did nothing to dampen that earlier regard. Haven evidently bred hearty sons and daughters. All to the good for breeding purposes, but such resolve to fight would bear close scrutiny of those “subjugated” peoples waiting below on the surface of the new homeworld.
“Everyone accounted for, then?” Diettinger asked Engineering, after he had dismissed the Fighter Rank to begin preparing the shuttle for departure.
Engineering nodded, held up a portable computer. “This is our remote piloting device. Fomoria has sufficient fuel left to maneuver and brake for most of her descent. After that, the engines will have drained the fuel tanks dry to avoid igniting residual hydrogen in the heat of entry into Haven’s atmosphere.”