by Roland Green
Of course, there was one way of taking Hos-Agrys out of the picture. If those unknown Agrys western princes were really interested in revolting, and a little help could tip them over the edge, King Demistophon's temper might do the rest. Of course, Demistophon might eventually want to take vengeance on Hos-Hostigos, but "eventually" might not mean this year. Also, if by some chance King Sopharar of Hos-Zygros could be persuaded that Demistophon's army moving so far west to suppress the rebels was somehow an a threat to him…
Very neat. Except that some of those western princes of Hos-Agrys had claims on Zygrosi lands too, or at least said they had. If they seized those lands, and even worse, if they insisted Hos-Hostigos recognize the seizure in return for their support against Styphon's House, then Great King Sopharar would be persuaded that it was Hos-Hostigos threatening him. If that happened…
Too many 'ifs,' Kalvan decided, and too little solid evidence. Not even the names of those princes! File the whole question of raising a rebellion against Demistophon and get back to the business at hand.
Kalvan discovered that while he'd been speculating the discussion had turned to the best strategy. Ptosphes was arguing for the southern strategy, for meeting what was coming at them from Hos-Harphax, that Kalvan and Rylla had worked out in their bedchamber.
"An army in Beshta is close to Harphax City, which is the best way of making Kaiphranos fidget. It will be on the flank of any army coming through Arklos or Dazour. If our cavalry knows its business, we'll have warning in time to cut off either advance."
And if the cavalry didn't know its business, they were all dead-much deader than Lee's hopes of victory at Gettysburg, killed because Jeb Stuart forgot that he was supposed to scout before anything else.
"What about two advances, one along each possible route?" Prince Balthar of Beshta asked his cadaverous face growing even longer. Balthar wore a food-stained black robe and wooden peasant clogs. He looked exactly like what he was: the Ebenezer Scrooge of the here-and-now princes, and the butt of ribald songs and jokes throughout the Five Kingdoms. Last year he'd been happy enough to loot the vaults of Styphon's temples in Beshta but was now beginning to regret letting greed overcome his usual foot-dragging paranoia.
"Then each force will be weaker than our united army," Ptosphes replied. "We will fight them one at a time and smash them both."
"And if they come through Nostor?" Balthar squeaked. "Or what if the Army of Hos-Agrys moves far to the west, then rides into Hos-Hostigos? What of Nyklos and Sask then?"
Sarrask of Sask snorted. "If they come through Nostor, half of them will starve and Prince Pheblon can knock the rest of in the head. Sorry, Pheblon, from what I've heard a mule crossing Nostor would starve unless he carried his own rations."
Pheblon's bleak expression was all the reply anyone needed.
"As for the advance all around Yirtta's potato patch, to come from the west-Balthar, do you think we're fighting fools who will try to reach a man's brain by the way of their arse hole?"
The only man who didn't laugh was Balthar, and Kalvan didn't entirely blame him for not seeing the humor of the situation. In last year's war his lands had escaped the fighting; this year, no matter how he wriggled, Beshta seemed to be the main battleground.
They didn't discuss taking the offensive, but Kalvan didn't worry. An army in the south with good scouting on either flank could be as offensive as it wanted to be against what had to be the objective: the Styphoni army. An offensive movement before the enemy's plans became clear could only be aimed at real estate, and there was only one piece of real estate whose capture would be decisive-Harphax City itself. Unfortunately, there was no way the Hostigi were going to be equipped to storm and besiege a city of two hundred thousand residents.
They did discuss garrisoning the forts in Beshta, Tarr-Veblos and Tarr-Locra, and southeastern Sask so the Hostigi could start raiding and scouting as soon as the roads dried.
Balthar's face grew even longer, if possible, but he'd noticed Rylla's eye on him and kept his mouth shut. That was further reason for putting reliable garrisons into Beshta as soon as possible-to keep an eye on Balthar. There were rumors (note: have Skranga and Klestreus investigate independently) that Beshta had been buying grain in Hos-Harphax. If Balthar had been paying for it in information…
The Council ended by appointing Duke Harmakros Captain-General of the Army of Observation and they christened the garrisons. He was to be based at Tarr-Locra and Kalvan showed Harmakros and the Council his design for rebuilding it into a star fort. Then it turned into a party, with only tough venison, potatoes, succotash, salt pork and rabbit stew, but plenty of wine. Kalvan kept wishing for bourbon, but also held his cup out every time a servant passed by, and they came by every time they saw it empty. He was in the middle of his tenth cup and a long dissertation on the difference between an enemy's capabilities and his intentions, when Rylla squeezed his hand.
"Kalvan, I think it's time we were to bed," she whispered into his ear.
"Bed?" He realized he'd spoken louder than he'd intended and tried unsuccessfully to lower his voice. "I'm not sleepy, but-"
"I know that you idiot! Do you think I'd ask you to come to bed if I want to sleep?" She pinched him on the ear and kissed the side of his neck.
Kalvan felt his face turning the same color as the wine and started to swear, then heard the stifled laughter all around him and saw Ptosphes nodding slowly to Rylla.
Kalvan kissed Rylla, then led her toward the door. Not quite so stifled laughter followed them out.
Score one for Rylla! In a week it would be all over the Great Kingdom that the King and Queen were still like lovers on their wedding night. Who couldn't think that was a good omen and proof that there was nothing to worry about in the spring campaign?
On-the-job training in kingship might be hard on a king's subjects; with teachers like Rylla, it wasn't so bad for the king.
II
Danar Sirna found herself a seat in the section reserved for the Kalvan Study Team in the University Presentation Hall. Today was the last of Scholar Danthor Dras' lectures on Kalvan's Time-Line. The Chancellor of Dhergabar University in his usual natty charcoal-gray tunic stood to one side. Half a dozen newsies, including Yandar Yadd, and several she didn't recognize, fussed at the technicians working the lights and recorders.
She searched for the distinctive profile of Danthor Dras, Scholar Emeritus, Chairman of the University Department of Outtime History and supreme authority on Fourth Level Aryan-Transpacific, Styphon's House Subsector. But he was nowhere in sight. No doubt the time for a properly dramatic entrance hadn't arrived. Sirna's former husband had taught her about those, even if he'd only called himself a politician…
Enough of that, she told herself firmly. She tried to find a seat as close to the front as possible. I spent twelve years in the Outtime History Department and never saw Danthor once until appointed to the Kalvan Study Team. She shook herself mentally. Enough complaining, already! You won't have to worry about University politics and faculty game playing for five long years. It's time to get ready a new life-an outtime life on a barbaric world!
Sirna sat down next to a striking woman with unusually blond hair. She wondered if the woman was an adopted prole until she turned, then Sirna recognized the familiar profile of Baltov Eldra, the First Kalvan Study Team's Historian and member of the Second Team.
While she was debating whether or not to strike up a conversation, Eldra said, "Hello. My name is Eldra. What's yours?"
"Danar Sirna."
They touched hands in greeting.
"You must be a new member of the Team."
"I am. How did you know?"
Eldra laughed a pleasant chiming. "You're one of the few around here who doesn't look like a stuffed shirt."
"A what shirt?"
"Stuffed shirt. A colloquial expression from a semi-civilized Fourth Level time-line. It means someone who's overflowing with himself, or stuffed into his shirt."
"Oh.
I should have guessed. What was it like on Kalvan's Time-Line."
"Fascinating-if you don't mind no hot and cold running water, no decent heating, food that's either undone or burned-"
"I have that every time I try to cook for myself," Sirna said. They both laughed. "What about King Kalvan? What's he really like?"
Eldra sighed. "He's handsome, regal, charismatic, brilliant-just about everything you could want in a man."
"It sounds as if you got to-well, know him rather well…"
Eldra shook her head. "Not that I didn't want to, but Queen Rylla's a she-wolf protecting her cubs when it comes to her husband! Furthermore, Kalvan's Time-Line is like most Indo-Aryan descendant cultures-a strong paternalistic moral tradition, with virgin icons and sub-legal houses of prostitution. Any woman with healthy, natural urges who doesn't sublimate them to marriage and motherhood is considered a harlot. Unless you find a lover on the Team-and I wouldn't recommend that-be prepared for a long, lonely five years."
"It wouldn't be the first time," Sirna said. She hadn't had a relationship with a man since her marriage foundered.
The sudden appearance of Danthor Dras ended their conversation. Today he had his long silver locks combed dramatically back in great waves. As he greeted acquaintances among the newsies, his voice was low and gravelly, never missing a dramatic emphasis or pause.
He probably keeps his hair long so he doesn't have to resort to implants or wigs when he's back on Aryan-Transpacific…
After an overlong introduction by the University Chancellor, the Scholar strode to the podium. "Usually my Outtime Preparation Seminars are not so well attended, at least by non-students not seeking credit." He paused for the expected wave of laughter, then continued, "After several centuries of promoting Outtime Historical studies, I'm gratified by this sudden surge of public interest-even if it was brought about by the bumbling of the Paratime Police."
Both the newsies and the University people applauded.
"I hope you don't mind a little repetition, class, but I'd like to frame this talk so the public doesn't get the wrong idea about what we're doing here." He paused to wink at a clot of newsies who smirked like old friends hearing a familiar story. Like most of the professor and politicians of her acquaintance, newsies held the public in smug contempt.
Danthor continued, "Kalvan's Time-Line is of special importance to paratemporal studies, because we can pinpoint the precise moment that Kalvan's Time-Line split off from the parent Styphon's House subsector. Usually we do not spot the creation of a new time-line for months, years or even decades. The discovery of the Kalvan Time-Line is a unique event in Home Time Line history.
"What makes Kalvan's Time-Line even more important is that it is limited to a single time-line. This means the University can place the time-line under detailed surveillance, comparing any changes with the five adjacent time-lines we have chosen as controls. I do not believe it is possible to overstate the importance of this discovery. At the least, it should revolutionize our understanding of Paratemporal processes and social change. If the 'Kalvan Effect' makes long-term social and technological changes on Kalvan's Time-Line, we will be very close to the day when we can prune, graft and trim outtime societies to our own specifications by the selected introduction of 'gifted' individuals. The end result will be an enormous increase in the outtime resources that can be safely brought to Home Time Line and our Fifth Level Industrial and Service Sectors as well as greater protection of the Paratime Secret."
To say nothing of giving University historians and sociologists more control over outtime activities, thought Sirna. The University had been fighting the Paratime Police for that for over a millennium. Remembering some of the faculty dinners she had attended, she questioned whether the academics would do as well overseeing Paratime as the Paratime Police had done over the past ten thousand years.
She frowned. That was a heretical thought for a future faculty member and a supporter of the Opposition Party. Maybe her bad marriage had soured more than just her outlook on men; it was probably just as well she would soon be too busy to worry about such things.
Danthor Dras went on to explain how he'd become an authority on Aryan Transpacific, Styphon's House Subsector. Several hundred years ago he'd been involved in a survey of Fourth Level Indo-Aryan Religious Studies when he'd happened upon Styphon's House Subsector, at that time virgin territory. Danthor had spent about a third of his time since his discovery either on Styphon's House studies or outtime. Twenty of those outtime years had been spent as an upperpriest of Styphon's House.
At the Great Library of Balph, Danthor had discovered scrolls chronicling the Zarthani migrations from the west coast of the minor landmass to the east coast. The roots of this migration began in Upper Middle Kingdoms over fifteen hundred years before, when the Great Lakes'-or Saltless Seas'-iron ore deposits were discovered. Until that time, trade between the iron-poor city-states of the Pacific Coast and Middle Kingdoms was sporadic and of no great importance. Soon the Iron Trail was upgraded and large convoys from Greffa were making the transcontinental trek for California gold. The Grefftscharri kings made treaties with some of the barbarian tribes, conquered or exterminated others and paid bribes only when necessary.
Trade with the Upper Middle Kingdoms brought increased wealth and power to the west coast city-states and aggravated tensions between the northern kingdom of Echanistra and the city-states of the south. This rivalry broke out in open warfare when iron was found in Great Desert, putting the Iron Trail out of business and ruining the economy of Echanistra. The northern city-states banded together to conquer the south and thereby turn it back to a captive market. The southern city-states allied against the northern kingdoms and defeated their army. Twenty years later a great southern land and sea force sacked the great city of Echanistra.
An uneasy peace held for a few decades; unfortunately, four hundred years of intermittent warfare had depleted the treasuries of the southern city-states and led to the deforestation of much of the Pacific Northwest which had been supplying the lumber for uncountable war ships and stockades. With the trees cleared, the land changed from forest to meadows and pasture lands and the population continued to grow. When there was no longer enough land, they began to move south. The southern city-states saw this folk migration as another invasion of northerner barbarians, with uncouth ways and a corrupt tongue, and went on the offensive.
Meanwhile, the Upper Middle Kingdoms, much richer from their sales of arms and iron, began to expand into the Ohio River Valley. Here they collided with the newly formed Iroquois Confederacy, the fiercest and most organized Amerind resistance the Zarthani had faced. King Childrek the Red of Grefftscharr knew full well he didn't have the manpower to defeat the Iroquois while simultaneously containing the Crow and Shawnee to the south. To counterbalance the Confederation, Childrek invited the northern Zarthani to migrate to the Atlantic seaboard. They came over the Iron Trail in families, tribes, clans and nations.
The Zarthani immigrants quickly became embroiled in long and bitter war against the Iroquois. The Zarthani had the advantage of better arms and armor as well as Grefftscharrer military aid. The Iroquois were fighting for their homeland, their families and their lives. It was a savage war with no quarter given or asked. After a century of warfare, the Zarthani armies under the command of Simocles defeated the Iroquois army at the Battle of Sestra. Within fifty years the victorious Zarthani had scoured the native Amerinds from every mountain and valley in what was to be Hos-Harphax, Hos-Agrys and Hos-Zygros.
The last migratory wave came after the entire Pacific Northwest was subjugated by the south. The new Zarthani refugees found the lands of the Northeast already occupied or war-torn. So they moved down the Potomac River into Maryland and Virginia. Here, aided by adventurers and experienced fighters from the north, they build a line of forts and proceeded to subdue the Tuscarora, Powhatan, and other local tribes. In the south, internal turmoil, mistrust and conflict made the Indian resistance less det
ermined than in the north. Many fled west or were assimilated-most died. Within a few decades there were hundreds of small towns and villages dotting the lush southern tidal lands.
"We now come to a day, thirty years after the founding of Ktemnos City," Danthor Dras said, with a toss of his head that made his silver hair ripple and catch the lights. "A village highpriest of the minor healer god, Styphon, experimenting with various medicinal compounds mixed together a batch of saltpeter, sulfur and charcoal. The results were explosive, but not fatal. Once the formula was perfected it didn't take very long for the hierarchy of Styphon's House to see the military and political potential of this 'miraculous' explosive, 'fireseed.'
With an ironic raising of the eyebrows, he added, "In the beginning their motives for guarding the secret of gunpowder may have been the noble desire of the follower of a healer god to protect their world from the ultimate weapon. Whatever they were we shall never know. We can be sure they have descended to the basest of motives now."
A picture of a Styphon's House temple-farm appeared on the screen behind Danthor's head, displaying a priest in black robes lashing at several temple slaves with an iron-tipped whip.
Sirna heard gasps of horror and disgust around her. Religion and other pseudo-philosophies hadn't flourished on Home Time-Line for at least five thousand years. Many at the University believed that First Level culture and psycho-hygiene should be spread among the less enlightened time-lines as a matter of duty. That they were successfully opposed at every point by the Paratime Police and their supporters had fueled the fierce hatred of the guardians of the Paratime secret among the University Faculty and leaders of the Opposition Party.
Weren't the Paracops just as callous and self-serving as the outtime primitives who subjugated and enslaved their fellow beings through pseudo-religions?-or so the argument ran. Sirna didn't know the answer herself, but she hoped a few years on Aryan Transpacific, Styphon's House Subsector might provide her with an answer to that question and a few personal ones-like what she was going to do with the rest of her long life.