Great Kings' War

by John F. Carr

  Anaxthenes' supporters were rallying, as were Roxthar's faction. Those who feared Roxthar too much to go against him over what they could easily persuade themselves was a minor matter would join next. Soon those who were hungry for their mid-day meal would follow since Roxthar had been known to continue like this for candle after candle—even late into the night.

  Soon no one would be left opposing Soton except Dracar and his most determined supporters, who would gladly see Styphon's House fall into ruins as long as Anaxthenes were buried underneath.

  When Roxthar paused for breath, he looked into Anaxthenes' eyes and a brief smile broke his lupine visage. Anaxthenes' urge to grin suddenly vanished. Roxthar would demand a price for today's work—and what that price might be, for him and for the Temple, Anaxthenes did not really care to contemplate.

  THIRTY-ONE

  I

  Verkan Vall yawned and looked up at the chronometer over the control panel of the paratemporal conveyor. It showed that five minutes had passed since the last time he'd looked at it, which seemed to him like several hours ago. He yawned again.

  Why was this trip to Kalvan's Time-Line seeming to last forever? He doubted if the fatigue he was feeling helped; he felt as if he hadn't slept in a week—and come to think of it, he very nearly hadn't, making sure everything in Greffa would last through the winter without any further supervision by him.

  The Upper Middle Kingdoms were in a bit of an uproar as there were rumors that the nomads on the Sea of Grass were stirring. Rumors in the streets of Greffa talked about a Mexicotál attack on Xiphlon. Verkan already had an agent setting up a Xiphlon trading firm as cover for his Greffan operation and, maybe, when the old coot Tortha got tired of shooting rabbits, he could persuade him to come for an extended visit. He had a feeling that the ex-Chief and the Kalvan family would hit it right off.

  There were also tensions in Grefftscharr with Prince Varrack of Thagnor and further south with the Nythros City States City States over their growing influence in the Trygath and upper Saltless Seas. Volthus was another kingdom that was beginning to expand and flex its muscles at Grefftscharri expense.

  Grefftscharrer politics had long been dominated by four power blocs: the king, the Greffan nobility, the Grefftscharrer Princedoms and the merchant magnates. Not one of the four was strong enough to enforce its will on the other three, and for centuries Grefftscharrer politics had been shaped by constantly shifting alliances among the four power blocs. This was typical of most of the Middle Kingdoms, like Dorg and Xiphlon. But, in fact, Grefftscharri rule had been further diluted by three weak kings in the last century, which had allowed their princes, such as Varrack, to act like independent rulers.

  Unfortunately for King Theovacar, this power vacuum had allowed other peripheral kingdoms and princedoms time to build trade routes along with their own armies and navies. In a sense, this competition had created a thriving mercantile atmosphere and population boom, but—now that there was a strong ruler on the Greffan throne—war, and not just trade war, was on the horizon.

  More changes were on the way. Kalvan's formula for fireseed was quickly spreading throughout an area that had few handguns and even fewer cannon due to Styphon's unpopular prohibitions against selling fireseed to the Middle Kingdoms. Of course, there had been fireseed smuggling going on for centuries, but there were few smoothbores in the Middle Kingdoms—and even fewer gunsmiths to make new ones. The crossbow was still the predominant missile weapon of choice.

  Once the Fireseed War was over, Verkan saw opportunities for a steady trade between Hostigos and the Upper Middle Kingdoms in retired arquebuses, muskets and calivers. While lacking in firearms, the Upper Middle Kingdoms had much more history and were more sophisticated politically than the Great Kingdoms. Verkan expected there would be some interesting exchanges, both culturally and militarily in the coming decades between the two areas. He was going to enjoy watching it all unfold.

  It bothered him to be leaving a friend before he'd done everything that could be done for him, even though his rational thoughts told him that he himself couldn't do much more for Kalvan and indeed not much more needed to be done.

  Ptosphes was cleaning out Nostor very nicely; by the time winter came Prince Pheblon should be ruling over an untroubled Princedom—one still almost a desert, but a peaceful desert nonetheless. Prince Armanes was still recovering from his grievous wounds and his eldest son was acting in his place while his father recovered. It would be a year at least before Armanes sat in a saddle again.

  In Hos-Agrys, Prince Aesklos was going to have to spend the winter by the fireside recovering, but he would be spending it with both legs—a near miracle for Aryan-Transpacific. His voice would be heard against the notion that there was anything demonic about Kalvan's knowledge. King Demistophon was blaming his disaster in Hos-Hostigos on incomplete intelligence and a lack of support by Styphon's House. Demistophon better be careful; he was making enemies on both sides of the conflict!

  In Beshta, Prince Phrames was taking charge with a vengeance, and Harmakros and Hestophes were commanding the Army of Observation on the border with Hos-Harphax. Not that they had much to do; Galzar himself couldn't have made an army out of men who wouldn't stand and fight, guns that wouldn't shoot even if there was fireseed to load them and beasts who wouldn't carry or draw a load, which was all the Harphaxi had left.

  The only man who might have tried, Grand Master Soton, was on his way back to Tarr-Ceros and his Knights for the campaign in the Sastragath next spring against the latest nomad incursions. Verkan had hoped Soton would be returning in disgrace with Styphon's House, although it would have been monumentally unjust to disgrace a fine soldier for common sense and loyalty to his soldiers. Instead, so rumors ran, the Inner Circle had done an about face and Soton was again considered the anointed champion of Styphon's House against the servant of demons. Once again pointing out the necessity to plant an agent at the top of the Balph hierarchy, although that was easier to say than to accomplish.

  What bothered Verkan most was another rumor that Soton had been saved from disgrace at the price of an alliance with Archpriest Roxthar. If the best soldier and the most fanatical Archpriest—who was said to be a true believer in Styphon!—were now working together, the war would do worse than go on; it would very likely take an extremely ugly turn the next time Styphon's House marched.

  He'd better send Ranthar Jard a few more men for his Paracop squad assigned to the Kalvan Study Team before that happened. Then he'd have enough people on the spot to take care of that majority of the University Team who couldn't take care of themselves, and meanwhile he'd be able to keep scholars like Varnath Lala and Gorath Tran from committing egregious follies—or at least he'd be able to try harder. If nothing really nasty happened, he'd at least have more people to carry messages, which would reduce the need to use possibly contaminating First Level techniques and leave the Paratime Police smelling a lot sweeter legally.

  Whatever happened, Ranthar Jard was going to be much more on his own next year, because his Chief was going to have to spend most of his time on First Level until the Dralm-damned business of pulling out of Europo-American was settled, one way or another. The Study Group had been appointed, and was now sitting and talking. It showed signs of being willing to go on sitting and talking until entropy reversed itself, and meanwhile all Verkan Vall's enemies would be sharpening their knives and loading their guns to take advantage of this situation. He was just going to have to keep a close watch on the Study Group in order to get anything useful out of it, or look like a fool for appointing it in the first place.

  What else could he do on Home Time-Line? Pick some more reliable subordinates who could be trusted to hold the fort when he had to go outtime, for one thing. Otherwise, it would be mostly a question of looking as though he were on the job, an image he could present much more effectively from behind his desk—a desk that didn't need a power excavator to be dug out from under accumulated paperwork.

  The t
hought of that paperwork made Verkan look at the chronometer again, then at the display showing the parayears remaining to First Level. He'd thought of going straight to his office and making a start on at least sorting the backlog into broad categories. He'd be too tired to do even that unless he took a nap in the conveyor, and there wasn't enough time to make that nap a good one.

  He'd do better to go straight home, get a good night's sleep in a proper bed and make his start at getting back to work in the morning. Sleep was something too precious to sacrifice to presenting an image, and if he ever forgot that, well, the Paracops would not only need a new Chief fairly soon, they'd deserve one.

  II

  Outside the keep of Tarr-Hostigos, the autumn wind rose until Kalvan could hear it moaning past the battlements. From somewhere a draft found its way around the wooden shutters over the windows. One of the candles on Kalvan's table flickered and went out. He contemplated re-lighting it with a coal from the brazier, then decided he could finish the letter with the light from the remaining candle.

  Two wax candles would have been extravagant for anyone but the Great King of a victorious but battered Kingdom. Kalvan hadn't entirely mastered the art of writing the Zarthani runes with a quill pen, but he didn't want to risk spoiling parchment, and above all he couldn't entrust this letter to Colonel Verkan in Grefftscharr to a secretary.

  Kalvan moved the wine cup and jug so that they stood between the nearest window and the candle, then went on writing:

  The most recent shipment of grain has arrived safely in Ulthor and is now on the road to us. One of the shipmasters who rode ahead with the messenger said that the sailing season on the Saltless Seas may end before another convoy of potatoes and grain can make the voyage from Greffa, let alone go and return.

  I have promised him, and through him his fellow masters, that any of them who are obliged to winter over in Ulthor shall have the wages and rations of their crews paid out of the Treasury of the Great Kingdom. I have also indicated that I will buy outright any sound ships whose masters may wish to sell them. The masters and crews may take Hostigi colors, or return home at the expense of the Throne.

  That would be a start on the Royal Navy of Hos-Hostigos. Only a start, and indeed he couldn't hope for anything more as long as Hos-Hostigos didn't have a port on the Great Eastern Ocean, but it was better than nothing. Much better than nothing, considering that the grain route to the Upper Middle Kingdoms looked as if it were becoming the lifeline of the Great Kingdom, and that the Prince of Thagnor (here-and-now Detroit) was showing signs of taking his nominal allegiance to Hos-Agrys more seriously than before. Of course, that same Prince Varrack was also a vassal of King Theovacar of Greffa, which demonstrated a state of conflicting alliances and vassalage in the Upper Middle Kingdoms that would have fit comfortably in Otherwhen Renaissance Italy!

  We will not be too badly off even if there is no more Grefftscharrer sausage, potatoes and grain this year. In those parts of the Great Kingdom not involved in the fighting, the harvests were good. The worst of the fighting was over before harvest time and we were able to release many more of the troops than we had expected. In addition, many of the mercenaries who remained in our service were willing to work in the fields for extra pay. We have been able to ship some of the surplus food to Sashta, Beshta and Nostor.

  Prince Phrames is also hopeful he can purchase grain in Syriphlon through the same grain merchants who supplied the late lamentable Prince Balthar last winter. Phrames has been granted one-quarter of Balthar's hoard to begin his reign; he should be able to accomplish much with that.

  Since Balthar's hoard had been counted at a million ounces of gold and more than three million ounces of silver, Kalvan was quite sure that Phrames would be able buy all the grain he needed with a portion of his share. What gold and silver couldn't do would be done by less polite means; it was no secret that most of the grain merchants had private stockpiles ready for the expected famines. Kalvan remembered listening from behind a tapestry to Phrames' explicit lecture to the grain merchants about the penalties for hoarders and speculators.

  Afterward, he stopped worrying about Phrames being too noble to make a good here-and-now ruler. Where his new subjects were concerned, Phrames had the determination of an old mother cat with one kitten and the ruthlessness of an Archpriest of the Inner Circle.

  It also seems unlikely that anyone in Harphax will be able to prevent Phrames from purchasing grain where he will. King Kaiphranos refuses to leave his bedchamber and hasn't conducted a Royal Audience since his son's death. Prince Selestros is no more fit to rule than ever, and Grand Duke Lysandros appears to rule Hos-Harphax in all but name. He is far abler than Kaiphranos, but it would take Styphon's Own Miracle for Lysandros to quickly restore order to a Great Kingdom with no army, no treasury, no revenue, many enemies and few allies.

  From my intelligencers in Harphax City, I hear that the Elector Princes of Hos-Harphax would as soon put one of Styphon's fireseed demons on the throne as Lysandros. The succession crisis in Thaphigos, brought about by the death of Prince Acestocleus, is the most serious of the problems Lysandros faces, as it threatens to embroil the Harphaxi with Hos-Agrys, which also has claims upon the Princedom, but it is not the only one.

  Lysandros has the open support of Styphon's House, to be sure, but this does not appear to be an unmixed blessing. A good many of the Harphaxi nobles and populace are convinced they lost at Chothros Heights because the Inner Circle would not send the Holy Host north to march with the Army of Hos-Harphax. On the other hand, Grand Master Soton is said to be bitter about the loss of his Lances through what he feels was inexcusable incompetence on the part of the Harphaxi. Since his word now carries more weight in the councils of the Inner Circle, his ill will toward the Harphaxi is not something Lysandros can ignore.

  It was more than ever a pity that there was no way for Hostigos to take advantage of the mess in Harphax this winter, but the year's battles had cost too much. Half or more of the men who'd marched out under Hostigi colors in early summer were dead or wounded; not to mention the cost in gold, silver, weapons, fireseed, armor, cavalry horses and draft animals, even in things like bandages and canteens... Kalvan now understood exactly how King Pyrrhus had felt.

  The second sheet of parchment was almost filled; Kalvan drew a third toward him, smoothed it out and checked it for tears or thin spots. Finally, the work at the paper mill was beginning to show tentative results; Ermut had kept at his experiments right on through summer and into fall, only leaving the mill when the Holy Host was less than an hour's ride away. He'd had all his results written down by a scribe, too, although Ermut was illiterate; work was already starting up again right where it left off. By next spring maybe, just maybe, they'd have usable paper.

  Then they'd need iron or steel pen nibs, because if paperwork multiplied the way it usually did, there wouldn't be enough geese in the Six Great Kingdoms and Grefftscharr put together to supply quills! Not to mention more schools to produce literate clerks to do all the paperwork and those schools would need teachers, who could possibly be trained at the new University. That would mean more work for Mytron that wasn't connected with his duties to Dralm, and what Xentos would have to say about that—

  "Kalvan are you writing a letter to Verkan or a chronicle?" Rylla's voice from the curtained bed had the note of a woman with a grievance.

  Kalvan looked back over the pages to see if he'd left out anything. Nothing that couldn't wait, or that wasn't too sensitive to be written down in a letter even to somebody as trustworthy as Verkan. A letter could go astray on the way to Greffa, and it would do no good if the world learned, for example, that Chartiphon's elevation to the rank of Great Captain-General of Hos-Hostigos was intended to keep him off future battlefields.

  No, there was one thing he'd forgot to mention, and not a little thing, either. He dipped his pen and wrote:

  Prince Phrames has finished dividing the estates of the Beshtans who died without heirs or who were executed
and attainted for their treason to Hos-Hostigos. He has granted one-third of them to the Great Throne—a useful step toward giving Kalvan his own lands—"one-third to loyal Beshtans and one-third to distinguished soldiers of the realm. These include Duke Harmakros, Baron Alkides and yourself.

  Being able to promote Harmakros and give Alkides and Verkan titles had been the second happiest moment of the year. The only happier one had been when he first saw Princess Demia.

  I have been assured that the patent of gift for your new Beshtan estates has been drawn up and should be on the way to me even now. If the weather holds so that the roads do not dissolve in the next two days, I may be able to send it along with this letter. If not

  "Kalvan! My feet are getting cold."

  —rest assured that you now have lands of your own in Hos-Hostigos, which you have served so well and valiantly, along with the rank of Baron. Her Majesty joins me in wishing you and your lady wife health and prosperity this winter and a swift return to us in the spring. Farewell.

  Kalvan

  The Great King sprinkled sand on the last few lines, then shook it off, slid all three pages into a pile, weighted it down with a wine cup and blew out the candle.

  THE END

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