* * *
“We have what?” said General Zachary Taylor, looking at his Sergeant Major as if the man had grown two heads.
“German soldiers made contact with about a thousand of these Ellala from another kingdom,” said the NCO, a smile on his face. “It seems to be a kingdom that worships the Goddess of Life on this world, and is a mortal enemy of the one we’re engaged in fighting. And they are riding unicorns.”
“Fucking unicorns,” said the General with a sigh. “What are we going to run into next? Griffin riders. Amazons.”
“It would seem that we have a new ally, sir,” said Sergeant Major Cliff Jackson. “It doesn’t really matter what they are using for mounts. They are cavalry. And we will have need for cavalry as soon as our vehicles stop responding.”
“Wish we had brought about a hundred thousand Mongol horse archers with us,” said the General, grimacing. “It’s going to take us a generation to grow our own cavalry. At least any that’s worth a damn.”
“Not quite that long, sir,” said the Sergeant Major. “We might be able to train some of our more adept men to be horsemen in ten years or so. But not by the next campaigning season, which is when we’ll need some.”
“And our own heavy cavalry idea?”
“We might be able to find enough people with riding experience to come up with five hundred to a thousand knights,” said the NCO. “Beyond that is beyond me. Anyway, this cavalry column is on the road within our collapsing perimeter, and on its way to us. Should be here in two days, then you can confer face to face with this Fenris Hallanta, and see what he offers.”
“As long as I don’t have to hear any more about this damned prophecy,” said the General with a scowl. “I’ve had a belly full of it so far, what with the Elves, Dwarves and those damned so called immortals harping about it. Like I’m just supposed to turn over my command because something was written a thousand years ago by someone I’ve never met before.”
“Sort of like the Bible,” said the NCO with a smile.
The General scowled at him too, but Jackson allowed the feeling to fly over his head. The man knew his importance to the army, and knew that his commanding officer would not use him badly.
“There’s something else that was discussed that might be of interest,” said Jackson, turning the page on his notepad. “Though I’m not really sure what it means, or even if it was transmitted right. But the human who led the Elves in, who, by the way, is a biologist who just appeared in the world a couple of days ago. Which also means he has some news about how the war is going on the Earth. He had a half dozen very large wolves with him that he claims were genetically engineered to be as smart as apes. And they appear to have telepathy on this world, as well as the ability to bind their minds together into a pack intelligence.”
“That sounds pretty damned interesting alright,” said the General. “If they breed true I can see us having packs of scouts out in the field that are very hard for an enemy to spot. As well as having senses much greater than ours. If it’s true, again, as you said. Anything else, Cliff?”
“The nuclear attack on the fortress totally destroyed it and most of the force inhabiting it,” said the NCO, nodding his head. “Major McGurk said that the witnesses were suitably impressed and sent on their way. And he was able to send men with decon equipment into the ruins and found a lot of useful stuff deep in the mountain. Other than that, every other operation went smoothly. We took down a score of castles and habitations on our perimeter, which expanded about thirty kilometers. The enemy’s local forces are about as disrupted as we could hope.”
“And we only have to worry about the main forces he might send at us from far away,” said the General, again frowning. “Not anything we can do about those right now. We just prepare and fortify and hope we have enough left over to hold them when they get here.”
The NCO nodded again, of course totally in agreement with his commander.
The General had to admit to himself that they were making good progress with all the plans, even as they were making new ones on the fly.
“That Dwarven Priest also had some information,” said the Top Sergeant. “I hate to add more worries to your plate, but he had another one.”
“What now,” said the General, burying his face in his hands.
“He said those pyramids should be, neutralized, I think was his word. He said they are very evil, an affront to the Gods of Life and Law, and that they need to be cleared and blessed.”
“And how am I supposed to go about doing that?”
“He volunteered his services and those of his priests,” said Jackson with a smile. “As well as the warriors he has with him. As long as we can give him some men to augment his force.”
“OK,” said Taylor, dropping his hands and looking up at his Top Sergeant. “Give him that scout Lt. Marcus Jordan I think it was.”
“He’s a Captain now,” said Cliff Jackson. “Remember. You promoted him.”
“Then give him Captain Jordan and his men,” said Taylor with a nod. “And send those damned Immortals there as well. Who knows. Maybe I’ll get lucky and something big and nasty will take the big German one.”
“I doubt that, sir,” said Jackson with a frown. “From what I’ve heard he may be the biggest, nastiest humanoid on this planet.”
The General shook his head for a moment. “And we need him. And that ancient Jew, and even the still young woman. We need all the assets we can get our hands on, and they are each worth a battalion.
“How much more light do we have?” asked the General of his top NCO. The HQ tent was brightly lit, so he really couldn’t tell how bright it was outside. And within a day he would be moving into the new headquarters bunker, and would be sealed away from the outside while he toiled in relative protection.
“About three hours,” said the NCO. “Sun goes down about a little after eight local time. So the last of the units should be winding down offensive actions and going into lager soon. Except for the ones that like fighting in the dark.”
“The night belongs to us,” said the General in a low voice. He looked up at the NCO with a frown on his face. “That was true back on Earth, when we had the tech advantage over everyone else. Or at least parity. When our forces could hit at midnight as if it were midday, while our enemy ran around in confusion. But not here. Not now. Not with Elves and Dwarves who can see in the dark, or undead creatures who only move at night. We’re not quite helpless. But we’re not quite the world beaters we were on Earth either.”
“No sir,” agreed Jackson with a nod. “But we’re holding our own at night. The bastards we’re fighting can’t actually say the night belongs to them either.”
“I’m so damned tired Cliff,” said Taylor, rubbing his eyes. “It seems like the pressure will never end.”
“Lee handled the pressure, sir,” said Jackson with a smile. “So did Washington. They faced hopeless odds and persevered. One to confound his enemies for years before defeated. One to triumph.”
“Would that I were Washington and not Lee,” said Taylor, shaking his head. “I fear I am neither. But I’m what we have. Right here and right now. Unless I let that damned German have command. Which is tempting, Cliff. It surely is.”
“I don’t think you have it in you to quit, sir,” said Jackson. “You might burn out eventually. Or even succumb to the pressure in some other way. But quit? I don’t think so.”
“Me neither,” said Taylor, putting his head in his hands, then looking up at his Top Sergeant with renewed vigor in his eyes. “Me neither. But I’m ready to knock off for a while. So let’s say me and you go have us a bite to eat, of whatever the mess hall has to offer.”
“I would be glad to share a meal with the General,” said Cliff Jackson, “though I be a mere enlisted man.”
“Not for long, my siege and fortification master,” said the General, getting up from his desk. “Not for too much longer, my senior centurion.”
* * *
&n
bsp; Beate Terbourg looked out the window of the car as it moved down the road. She held the box in her lap, one hand stroking Gertrude. Hans Walthers, the engineer, drove the vehicle, while two of the older refugees sat in the rear seat. The Army had kept its promise, and they had been given fuel that morning. She looked at the walking refugees, many of whom gave her angry looks, and she felt guilty at being one of those who could still ride.
“You shouldn’t be,” said Hans when she told him of her feelings. “There are only so many vehicles to go around, and you are as worthy as any to ride. And you have the cats.”
“I’ve seen other cats,” she said, thinking about the orange tabby and the Siamese she had seen earlier that day. “These aren’t the only ones.”
“They are still valuable,” said the engineer. “The larger the gene pool the better.”
She looked ahead and some people, five in all, riding horses. The saddles and tack looked like what she was familiar with on Earth. She nodded at the animals and riders as they moved past them. “Now those are valuable animals, one that we will need when the machines stop working.”
“There are already plenty of horses on this world,” said the engineer. “In fact, I’ve already seen more than I ever wanted to.”
Beate nodded her head as she thought back to the attack four days before, when the Elves had swept up the road and attacked the refugees. And the Army and the Immortals had repulsed them with heavy losses. As she was thinking that she saw some other riding beasts ahead, ridden by men in armor. As they closed up with them she let out a cry as she saw the faces of the riders.
“They’re Elves,” she said, feeling panic. Then she noticed the mounts, and the horns protruding from their snow white heads. “And those are unicorns.”
“Then they must be allies,” said the engineer with a smile.
“Because only good people can ride unicorns?” said Beate, looking over at the man.
“I thought it was virgins,” said one of the elderly ladies laughing. “So is it a whole regiment of virgins.”
“Not everything is the same on this world as our legends,” said the engineer. “Though I’m glad some aren’t.”
Yes, thought Beate, nodding her head as she continued to look at the captivating sight of unicorn after unicorn, beautiful men riding every one. Thank God that Priest told us that my method was one they used to prevent lycanthropy from spreading. And his blessing was sure to help too.
“No,” said Hans with a smile. “I know they are allies because the soldiers are not shooting the crap out of them.”
Beate nodded at that, and looked back at the unicorn riders, seeing the largest wolf she had ever heard of trotting along with them. Allies are good, she thought.
Chapter Fifteen
It will be dark in a couple of hours, thought Lt. Franz Sturgil, looking up the valley at the encampment of Ellala soldiers. With a couple of hours of daylight the Elves had opted for setting up their camp for the night, instead of moving another ten or twenty kilometers down the road. He judged there were about a thousand of them, all cavalry, with their horses picketed near the stream that ran down the center of the valley.
Wish we could have got a look at what was behind them, thought the Company Commander, still not used to leading anything but his own platoon of tanks. But all of the drones they had sent that way had quickly gone off the air, fuzz and static leading into nothing. And the radio transmissions had been horrible this far from the center of human activity. Engines had been acting up. It was as if everything that used Earth technology was malfunctioning.
He sighed, thinking about wishes and horses. There could be a whole army behind this one regiment and he wouldn’t know it. Of course, he should be able to wax the regiment and use his firepower to keep the army off of him while he got away, if that was necessary.
Everybody should be in place, he thought, as he reached up to his throat mike and pressed its switch. He had placed his platoon of tanks and the two platoons of grenadiers with care, and had four mortar tracs in support. On his order he would unleash hell.
“Fire,” he bellowed into the mike. His tanked bucked when Hanz fired the gun, sending out the HE round. Other guns sounded from nearby.
Sturgil thought the tank didn’t buck enough when the gun was fired, then knew that something was definitely wrong when the round hit the ground three hundred meters ahead, exploding in a smaller than normal ball of fire. Several other rounds struck short of the target, some throwing up dirt without detonating. The four mortar rounds came arching in, but only one actually hit the camp, detonating with a less than stellar performance. The other three fell five or six hundred meters short.
A couple of auto cannon barked, then went silent after a dozen or so rounds, all of which went short of target. Machine guns of lesser caliber did the same.
He waited for his tank to fire again. A couple of short rounds went out from other vehicles. He thought it strange that Joseph hadn’t gotten a round loaded. His gunner and assistant were the best in the company.
“The round’s a dud, sir,” came the voice of the gunner when the officer looked down his hatch. They were pulling the round out of the breech with sweating and cursing. It was always a dangerous business working with a misfire, but they had to clear the gun, and several tries at firing the round had led to nothing. Joseph laid the misfired round into a rack while Hanz pulled out the next ready round and slammed it in the breech. Making sure the assistant was out of the way, Hanz pulled the trigger. The tank bucked slightly, and the round went out to hit the ground at three hundred meters, throwing up dirt as it failed to go off.
“Nothing’s working right, sir,” came a call over the radio. The voice was then blurted out by a burst of static.
In the valley the Elves were starting to move. Men quickly saddled horses and began to mount. A mortar round and an HE tank shell came down in the encampment. The mortar round exploded at about a third of its normal fury, killing several men and horses. The tank round killed the horse it hit, then went through to kill a pair of men, before rolling inert on the ground.
“Retreat,” called the Company Commander over the radio, wondering if anyone could hear him.
His own tank’s engine rumbled to life, then died. It repeated this several times before the driver was able to keep it engaged and pulled back from the firing position. By that time hundreds of the mounted Elves were headed toward the German positions. A Mage threw a fireball, which caught an APC which was sputtering backwards with stops and starts. The APC went up in a ball of flame. No one got out of the inferno.
The cavalry came on. One machine gun put out fifty rounds or so before it jammed, knocking a half dozen Elves out of their saddles. A few rifles barked, and a few more of the Elves fell. A cannon barked, and a round fell short.
As they came within three hundred yards of vehicles and men the powerful horse bows sent out arrows that pierced body armor and killed men. Some more fireballs took out vehicles.
From there it was a running battle while the light was still good. Fifteen kilometers up the road the remnants of the company rolled, their engines getting stronger as they pulled closer to their own center. About half the vehicles made it out, and maybe about half the men. As the light was low Sturgil’s tank took a last shot at the following Ellala. The shell sped from the gun, to hit right where it was aimed, twenty meters inward from the leading horseman of the column. The round detonated like it should, killing a score of horses, a score of riders, and stopping the pursuit in its tracks.
God in heaven, thought the Leutnant as his tank continued back, to meet with the rest of the battalion. He thought of how it might have transpired if they had been hit by the Elves from ambush while the weapons and vehicles malfunctioned. There might have been no survivors.
* * *
Master Sergeant Paul Baurieth had to admit that the Gimikran people knew how to throw a party. This was the last village of this tribe, and in the morning the men of Third Gebirgsjager D
ivision and the 509th Airborne would be back in Indian territory. They would have a hundred Conyastaya scouts, and their own weapons, so they shouldn’t have any trouble getting through to the valley. In fact, they had heard over the radio that Americans from another airborne unit had made it to the valley without trouble.
“Thank you,” Paul said in the native tongue of the Gimikran to the young Dwarven woman who brought him a plate of steaming beef and potatoes. She smiled back and said some words in return, half of which he understood.
Paul was a natural linguist, something that had come in handy on the Teams. He spoke a dozen Earth languages, including such difficult and disparate tongues as Russian and Mandarin Chinese. And Girison Tortural had cast a spell on him to make the learning even easier. Now he could understand about five hundred words of the forest Dwarf language.
“It must be costing these people a lot to feed us,” said Senior Sergeant Johan Schmidt. He took a bite of his beef and continued to talk around the food in his mouth. “There are only a couple of hundred people in this village, and over two thousand of us.”
“They see us as part of their salvation,” said Paul, picking up a mug of good village ale and taking a swallow. “They will do whatever is within their power to make sure we can help them.”
“You still thinking about joining that Priest?” asked Schmidt after he swallowed his food.
“The Lieutenant didn’t seem to like that idea,” said Baurieth, looking up at the roaring fire that marked the center of the celebration.
“But the Colonel put him in his place,” said the German Sergeant with a smile. “And my Captain said the General agreed with him.”
Yeah, thought Baurieth, nodding his head. He thinks it will help to forge the bonds we need with these people. And he likes the idea of a magic using Priest of his own people. And he had to admit that he really liked the personable Gimikran Priest. Plus I’m already thinking in their terms.
Refuge: The Arrival: Book 2 Page 18