12 May 3961: Vernal
Bronlar’s fortunes deteriorated quickly with the arrival of the local presiding warden. He had been away in the capital when she had arrived, but when he returned he was less admiring than his ground crew. A list of crimes were drawn up:
* She was flying a wing that flouted the Sentinels’ limits.
* She was a commoner, yet she flew without a warden.
* She had killed at least five Bartolican wardens.
* She had murdered Bartolican nobility.
* All but two of her war duels had been without chivalric challenge.
* She was female, but had fought in two chivalric war duels.
As Vernal was a regional capital, she was taken to the town and locked within a tower of the Governor’s palace while the regional wardens and the Airlord of Cosdora flew in from elsewhere. Envoy Gilcron of Yarron arrived in a steam tram and went to interview the prisoner while a sitting of the supreme judicial court was being prepared in the assembly hall of the palace. He was a warden, but well past flying age.
“I have been hearing some conflicting stories of the raid on Condelor,” the envoy began. “Be good enough to give me your version, but remember that these walls are almost certainly listening.”
“The raid was sanctioned by Airlord Sartov of Yarron,” Bronlar replied in a stiff and awkward tone. “We became separated from the main flock during a war duel. Our orders were to support our super-regal in whatever attack it made. That turned out to be the Airlord’s palace in Condelor. We achieved this, at the cost of the super-regal. Wingcaptain Serjon Feydamor and his three crewmen died when the super-regal was hit by groundfire and crashed into a canal. My gunwing was damaged during another war duel over Condelor, and as you can see I was wounded.” She lifted her unbound hair to show the long scar. “I blacked out, flew off course, and awoke to find myself near Vernal.”
The envoy made notes as she spoke, muttering and exclaiming from time to time. He then related how a courier from Wind River had landed in the Cosdoran capital some days earlier with the Yarronese version of events. Naturally there was also a version from the Bartolican embassy that bordered on the hysterical. Serjon had managed to kill the Bartolican Airlord and wipe out most of his court. A distant cousin, Warden Samondel, was now Airlord. Yarron admitted the loss of the super-regal and one gunwing, while the Bartolicans claimed mote Yarronese down than had been in the entire flock and twenty losses of their own.
“I’m not that good,” said Bronlar without hesitation. “I destroyed three in clear air and three on the ground, then collided with another—but I don’t know its fate. Two more collided while trying to avoid me. That’s nine down, but only three in duel conditions. Why do the Bartolicans always attribute so many losses to me? Now Alion might have shot—Alion! He is a warden, he flew with our flock. That makes our raid an act of chivalric war.”
“Indeed, Semme Bronlar, but he flew a sailwing, as did you”
“Rubbish. Our aircraft have gunwing engines and gunwing reaction guns. All that they lack is the armor of gunwings.”
“To get from Wind River to Condelor and all the way here your supposed gunwing must have flown over three hundred and fifty miles. That’s double the range of a classic gunwing.”
“Yes, but ours are special.”
“The ground crews confirmed that. The engine has been bored out and supercharged to give half as much power again over the original design. The wingspan is thirty-three feet, and there are strange slots and grooves at the end of the wings. It’s almost as if you had disposable wing extensions which were dropped just before the attack—yet you should have been destroyed by the Sentinels were that the case. Is the glass and crystal thing bolted to the engine something to do with that?”
“Perhaps. Security binds my lips on such matters.”
“I understand. Remember, though, that this is not a game, Semme. Every one of the charges against you carries the death sentence.”
“Every mission that I have ever flown has carried a possible death sentence, sair Envoy.”
The court convened the following day. The ground crews who had tended Bronlar and her gunwing were called first. They testified that the wing’s configuration was very odd but that it could be called a gunwing as it currently stood on the wingfield. There was nothing to forbid such a wing, it was just that nobody had ever dared to fly one. The presence of Alion in the flock nullified the second charge. The dead wardens of the months past were harder to explain.
“That is a clear breach of squire discipline,” declared the Chancellor of the Convocation of Cosdoran Wardens.
“Objection!” cried the Yarronese envoy. “That discipline should be meted out by Warden Alion Damaric, the presiding warden in her flock within the Air Carbineers.”
“Objection upheld,” agreed the Airlord. “That charge is outside the domain of this court unless the accused admits to it directly. Proceed.”
The bloodstained orders were tendered next. They were difficult to read, but they clearly showed the seal and signature of Airlord Sartov. Bronlar was unquestionably flying under the orders of her monarch, and that monarch was certainly at war with the Airlord of Bartolica. There was an order to attack a wingfield at Twin Falls, but default orders told her to support the super-regal no matter what.
Fortunately for Bronlar, Bartolican atrocities and violations of the months past had eroded sympathy for them in neighboring dominions. Cosdoran nationals had given firsthand accounts of unprovoked duels and unchivalric ground attacks. Under the circumstances it was judged that the Bartolicans deserved what they got from the Yarronese, who were responding in kind.
The remaining charge was rather more difficult to answer. During the course of the war she had certainly fought in two of the rare but documented war duels that had been conducted under chivalric rules. Names of victims and descriptions of engagements were read out by the Bartolican envoy while Bronlar and the envoy sat in silence. Everything that he said was true, but within Yarronese law. Women were specifically forbidden to engage in clear air combat in Cosdora, however. It was a new law, drafted by conservatives in response to the Yarronese liberalization of the previous year.
At around noon a distant Calltower’s bell sounded and the people of Vernal began to retire to their homes and Callshelters while those in the palace adjourned to endure the Call in the comfort and safety of their rooms. Oblivion followed, and lasted three hours. It was past three in the afternoon when the sitting of the court resumed. At the end of the presentation of evidence the Yarronese envoy took the floor to conclude the case for the defense.
“Airlord, Chancellors, Wardens, we live in dark and extraordinary times,” he began, holding the lapels of his judicial gown, whose hood was thrown back to emphasize the authority of his white hair. “Within these times there are certain truths that cannot be ignored. Facts are facts. One fact is that the new Yarronese superwings have a wingspan of one hundred feet and six gunwing engines. Clearly the Sentinels do not burn them out of the sky. Clearly Air Carbineer First Class Semme Bronlar Jemarial flew a gunwing that had disposable wing extenders that increased its span and more than doubled its range, yet the Sentinels did not burn it out of the sky.
“There are other extraordinary facts that are less apparent. One is that while Yarronese flyers shoot seven Bartolicans out of the sky for every Yarronese wing lost, the Bartolicans usually triumph on the ground. There are lucky explosions of ammunition stores, mysterious explosions under fortifications, whole battalions of Yarronese found to have faulty Call tethers after a Call has passed. Why? Airlord, I contend that Bartolicans make use of Callwalkers, agents that can defy the Call.”
The courtroom erupted into bedlam for many minutes, and it was only with difficulty that order was restored. The envoy concluded the defense.
“Yarron contests that Bartolica has violated the most basic tenets of warfare and chivalry. Thus, as a rogue directorate it should be considered outside the rules of civilized
warfare. Yarron did not violate a single law of chivalry in the conflict with Dorak, you must concede. It is only with Bartolica that the problem exists. Airlord Sartov is justified in using Bartolican tactics against Bartolica, and Semme Bronlar Jemarial is thus innocent of any crime in fighting as Airlord Sartov decrees her to.”
The envoy sat down amid a buzz of voices. These ceased as the Airlord’s herald banged the floor with his mace.
“Chancellors, Wardens, you have heard the evidence and testimonies both attacking and in support of Semme Bronlar Jemarial. It is now up to you to advise me in the pronouncing of my verdict. I warn you in advance, however, that the most serious of the charges has been answered with no better than a vague theory that the legendary Callwalkers have in fact stepped out of their legends and into the war on the side of Bartolica. I shall be displeased if serious consideration is given to this matter in your advice.”
The court rose and the Airlord took his leave. Bronlar was escorted by two guards to a holding chamber, and the envoy joined her there.
“So my chances are not good?” she asked as he stood before her with his head hung.
“On all charges save those of being female your chances are extremely good. Yarron’s justification for going beyond the rules of chivalry is a matter of great controversy among the neutral dominions, however, and here we have a serious problem. Some surviving Yarronese wardens have continued to fight in a chivalric fashion, while the vast majority of others destroy Bartolican aircraft in whatever way they can. Technically, all such flyers are rogues and felons, and as such are criminals in the eyes of the Council of Mounthaven Airlords. Being female and fighting flouts an exclusively Cosdoran law, and just now you are in Cosdora.”
“But the Bartolicans fight that way too.”
“Were you a Bartolican, your predicament would be no different.”
“So what is to become of me?”
“I can make a plea for mercy, Bronlar, given your unquestioned bravery. That may make the difference between being hung as a commoner felon and being shot as a rogue warrior.”
“Neither has much appeal.”
“Like it or not, we are forced to work within the rules this time, my dear Semme. I note that you are a Lateric Christian. You could pray for a miracle, just as I shall be praying to Allah.”
The court was scheduled to reconvene at the fifth hour past noon, and several minutes before that time the guards came to Bronlar’s door, unlocked it, and ushered her out. As they walked along the corridor Bronlar noticed that a lot of commoners were flanking them, most wearing the guild crests of the ground crews. The faces of most were familiar, as many had worked for free to repair her gunwing. Some still wore the strips of silk or canvas stained with her blood on their arms.
At some unseen signal the guildsmen moved forward as one to overwhelm the guards and seize Bronlar. She was hurried back the way they had come and out into the open. As they made for the gate tower the alarm bells began to ring and the gates rumbled shut on weight-loaded pulleys. The defenses were primarily designed to keep intruders out, however, and the ground crew swarmed up the steps and into the gatehouse. There was an exchange of shots that took the lives of several guards and guildsmen, but the gatehouse was quickly taken.
The nobles and their airlord had been in the throne hall when Bronlar had been rescued, but now they came out and gathered in the ante-yard behind the gate.
“What is the meaning of this outrage?” demanded the Airlord. “Return the prisoner at once.”
“With deference, Lordship, we be the ground crew of Semme Bronlar, who be Yarronese in turn,” Farrasond declared, terrified but determined.
“What?” shouted the Chancellor of Vernal. “You’re ancillaries of my air guilds.”
“We’re freemen, Warden, we can choose to forsake your service and enter that of another if a majority vote holds it so. We’ve voted to enter the service of the refugee Bronlar Jemarial and come hell’s thunderbolts or eternal Call we’ll stand with her.”
“You are taking no more than a right to die with her,” cried the Airlord. “You—”
He was cut off by a deafening blast behind them, and the throne hall belched smoke, glass, and debris before collapsing in upon itself. Dust and smoke roiled out over them and the alarm bells began ringing again as the nobles scrambled for cover. The Airlord found himself huddling beside the Yarronese envoy.
“God in heaven, were it not for those guildsmen we would have been in there,” gasped the Airlord.
“This is just as it happened in Forian,” said the Yarronese envoy. “The cream of Yarronese chivalry were under a single roof when a bomb murdered them. It was just after a Call, too.”
“Callwalkers!” whispered the Airlord. “Are they real, and not just bogies of nursery stories?”
Just then a distant droning became audible from the north. The Airlord shouted for a runner to go to the lookout tower, then noticed that the guildsmen of the ground crew was escorting Bronlar out of the gate tower.
“We had nothing to do wi’ that, Lordship,” began Farrasond, but a lookout began calling from one of the towers.
“Eight dozen Bartolican gunwings and five regals! They’re coming straight for the palace!”
The Airlord took only a moment to ponder the situation.
“Run up flagstrings for the squires at the wingfield!” he shouted back. “On my authority as Airlord of Cosdora they are to ascend in whatever gunwings are to hand and engage the Bartolicans. By my express order, they are free to use nonchivalric tactics.”
“Your pardon, Lordship?”
“You heard me! Nonchivalric!! Now! Do it!”
The Bartolican regals came in over the palace in a line, flying at about six hundred feet. Each dropped a single improvised bomb, while the gunwings came in low to strafe. The palace guards fired their assault reaction guns back, but to no effect. The Airlord’s prompt warning had allowed several Cosdoran gunwings to get into the air, however, and these came in like hawks among pigeons. The lumbering regals were cut down ruthlessly as they tried to flee north, and the Bartolican gunwings coming in to strafe the wingfield found themselves being set upon from behind.
More and more Cosdoran gunwings ascended while angry wardens took the galley carts on the tramway or ran the two miles to the wingfield in a frenzy of outrage and hatred. The Airlord pointed down the road as he stood beside Bronlar and the Yarronese ambassador.
“Sair Envoy, as Airlord of Cosdora I declare war on Bartolica. Will you be good enough to order your Air Carbineer into the air in the defense of the Dominion of Cosdora?”
“With all my heart, Lordship. Semme Bronlar, get to your gunwing and ascend.”
Bronlar was still weak from all the blood she had lost, so she was pushed to the wingfield by her ground crew in an abandoned costermonger’s cart. The compression engine was warm by the time she arrived, but by then the Bartolican wings were either destroyed or gone. The warden in command led ten gunwings north along the tramway tracks for the Yarronese border, and was rewarded with the sight of three dozen steam trams crossing the border from occupied Yarron.
The gunwings attacked, strafing the steam trams and halting the Bartolican advance south in its very first steps. The leading and trailing trams were destroyed first; then the others were picked off as the carbineers that they had been transporting fled for the cover of the fields, firing skyward in no real order. By sunset Bronlar was back in Vernal, and the Airlord had convened a makeshift court on the wingfield. Nine Bartolican gunwings, five regals, and thirty-six trams had been destroyed for the loss of twenty-eight Cosdoran gunwings on the ground or in the air.
“The remains of the Bartolican envoy were found in the ruins,” the Airlord announced to an open-air court. “Evidently he had returned to the roof to try to reset the bomb when he realized that we had all gone outside. He had not been in time. The envoy for Yarron was right. Bartolican Callwalkers do exist, and they plant bombs in the palaces of their enemies
while the rest of us are in the Call’s oblivion.
“Semme Bronlar Jemarial, my judgment is that you are innocent of all charges. Further, I extend clemency to your guildsmen. It was their brave defense of you that drew me and my nobles out of the throne hall in time to escape the blast that would otherwise have wiped us out.”
Bronlar was invited to stay and teach the Cosdorans the arts of unchivalric air combat. She accepted after a decree arrived from Sartov appointing her as a war liaisory to Cosdora. Far from surgically conquering yet another easy dominion for Bartolica, the bungled strike had made an enemy which boasted a major wingfield just eighty miles from the Bartolican capital and considerable resources. Unoccupied Senner quickly allied itself with Cosdora and Yarron against the Bartolicans, and Airlord Samondel was faced with a war on four fronts. At the suggestion of Stanbury she decreed that the remains of Yarronese resistance were to be crushed as a matter of the very highest priority.
Being a Bartolican had not endeared Rollins to the Yarronese carbineers who captured him, but he had been careful to empty his pockets of looted gold beforehand, leaving only a few more innocent silver coins. The dead flyer’s collar and colors tipped the balance in his favor, however, and he lied that she was lying wounded behind enemy lines. He was taken to see a merchant officer, then to a more senior officer, then to a warden in Casper. When he was finally taken to the adjunct at Casper wingfield he poured out the truth about who and what he really was at last.
Three more days passed; and a squad of elite woodsmen carbineers returned from the crash site with the hidden papers and smashed machines from the black tram. By now a Bartolican invasion from the north was in full cry, and although Rollins and his papers were guarded with great care there were higher priorities for shipment to Wind River.
7
THE WINGS OF RETRIBUTION
The Miocene Arrow Page 39