Hope Renewed

by S. M. Stirling

  He smiled and held out his hand. “That goes for me, too, of course, Pierre.”

  The other man took his hand in a strong dry grip for an instant. Then he clicked heels and bent over Pia’s. “We’ve heard what you and your ladies have done for my people,” he said quietly. “We are in your debt, forever.”

  “We’re in your debt,” John said. “You’ve been fighting the common enemy for five years. And you’ll see more fighting before long, if I’m any judge of events.”

  Jeffrey Farr nodded. “Damned right.”

  Both men twisted sharply at the sound of aircraft engine. The planes coming up the valley from the west were Hawk III’s, over a dozen of them. They relaxed.

  “Most of the aircraft will be crossing further north,” Gerard said. “All the troops that are going to make it out here will be across by tomorrow. Except for the rearguard.”

  John nodded with silent grimness. Those would have to fight where they were until overrun, to let the civilians and what was left of the Brigades and the Loyalist armies break contact and retreat over the border.

  “The perimeter around Borreaux’s holding for now,” he said. “We’ve got ships shuttling continuously from there to Dubuk with refugees. Navy ships, too. My father created a precedent for that at Salini.”

  Gerard smiled wryly. “Wars are not won by evacuations, however heroic,” he said.

  John nodded. “I assume Jeffrey’s filled you in on the deployments for your troops?”

  “Oui. Rather far forward.”

  Jeffrey spread his hands in embarrassment. “If—when—the enemy attack, we’ll need men who can be relied on not to break,” he said. “The Brigades won’t, and neither will your men.”

  Gerard nodded. “The civilians, though?”

  “We’re setting up temporary camps around Alai, Ensburg, and Dubuk,” John said. “From there we’ll try to move people where there’s housing and jobs.”

  Gerard looked down on the mass of humanity filling the great pass below and the roads to the east. “We come as beggars, but we can fight, and work. Everyone but the children and cripples will. We have a debt to collect, from Libert and his allies.” He spat the last word. “Does Libert know he’s a puppet, yet?”

  John shook his head. “There’s an old saying,” he replied. “If you owe the bank a thousand and can’t pay, you’re in trouble. If you owe a million and can’t pay, the bank is in trouble. Libert and his army are saving the Chosen a great deal of trouble and expense, just by existing. I’m sure he’ll use that leverage.”

  Jeffrey nodded. “I think that’s why the pursuit hasn’t been pressed more vigorously,” he said thoughtfully. “Libert wants us to get enough men over the border to be a standing menace. That means that the Chosen have to keep him on, or risk having the whole population go over to the Loyalist side who’re waiting to return. They don’t have enough troops in the Union to hold it down by themselves, not and keep an offensive capacity. Not yet, at least.”

  Gerard shrugged and saluted. “I must get back to my men.”

  John shook his head again. “Visit my home soon,” he said. “You won’t do your people any good by collapsing.”

  The shrewd brown eyes studied him. “You will not be there?” he said.

  “No. There’s . . . trouble brewing. Exactly what I can’t say, but I can say that the board’s going to be reshuffled thoroughly, and soon.”

  “Citizens!”

  The sixth of the twelve-man Executive Council of the Sierra Democratica y Populara stood to address the seven hundred members of the Board of Cantonal Delegates. One of his colleagues passed him a ceremonial spear, the mark of the speaker, and pushed the button on top of a very modern timer clock.

  I do not believe this, Gerta Hosten thought to herself. She and the Land delegation were sitting in the visitors’ seats to one side of the Executive Council. An extremely ancient oak in the middle of the beaten dirt of the circle hid many of the delegates from her, and from each other. This was where the first representatives of the people-in-arms had met four hundred years ago to proclaim the Sierra, probably under the parent of this very tree, and so here they still met, where the city of Nueva Madrid had grown up. And met, and met, and met; the speeches had been going on for a week and looked good for another two.

  Every one of them carried a rifle and wore a bandolier. That was about the only uniformity. Dress ranged from fringed leather to Santander-style business suits, with a predominance of berets and ferocious waxed mustaches. There were no women, since females didn’t have the vote in any of the Sierran cantons, although they weren’t badly treated otherwise.

  Every adult male did have the vote, and every delegate here could be recalled at any time by the cantonal voters meeting in open assembly. Any hundred men could call an assembly. The delegates chose the twelve-man executive, but the voters could recall them at any time, and often did.

  I do not believe anything this absurd has survived this long, she thought. Whenever I think our councils are cumbersome, I should remind myself of this.

  The speaker shouted in an untrained bellow, with a strong up-country peasant accent to his Ispanyol: “Citizens! For four hundred years, no enemy has gotten anything but disaster from attacking us. We drove out the Imperials!”

  Well, that’s no particular accomplishment, she thought. Then: To be fair, that was when the Empire was a real power. They drove us into the ocean back then.

  “We drove out the Union! We threw the Errife back into the sea when their ships ranged every coast! We made the Republic withdraw from our island of Trois! In the Sierra, every one of us is a fighting man, every one!”

  Funny, in most places half the population are women, Gerta thought as the delegates cheered wildly.

  “So let the cunt-whipped Chosen perverts fuck themselves!” The speaker’s mountain-peasant accent grew thicker. “Let the dirty money-grubbing Santanders fuck themselves! The Sierra pisses on all of them!”

  Eventually the timer rang, loud and insistent. The president pro tem of the Executive Council—each member held the office in rotation for a week—cleared his throat as he took back the spear.

  “We must, in courtesy, listen to the arguments of the honorable Thomas Beemer, Ambassador Plenipotentiary to the Sierra from the Republic of the Santander.”

  Assistant head of the Research Department of the Foreign Ministry, Gerta reminded herself. That made him the equivalent of the second-in-command of the Fourth Bureau back home, although the Research Department didn’t have the internal security functions the Fourth Bureau did. A very high-powered spook. A rabbity-looking little man, bald and peering out through thick glasses. Important not to underestimate him because of that.

  “Honorable delegates,” Beemer said. “The Chosen took the Empire fifteen years ago. Over the last five they have conquered the Union. Only you Sierrans and we in the Republic remain independent.

  “The Republic does not intend to let the Chosen eat the world, not all in one gulp or one nibble at a time. I am here to announce that from this midnight, the Republic of the Santander declares a total naval blockade of the Union. This blockade will be maintained until all foreign troops are withdrawn and a legitimate government chosen by free elections under Santander supervision. The Republic will regard it as a grave breach of friendly relations if the Democratic and Popular Sierra allows overland transit to evade this blockade.”

  Johnny was telling the truth, Gerta thought, still mildly surprised. First a blockade, and then the seizure of the Sierra in cooperation with pro-Santander and anti-Chosen factions among the cantons. Those slightly outnumbered the neutralists, which wasn’t surprising considering the position the Sierra found itself in. Nobody here was actually pro-Chosen, of course. That would be like expecting a pig to be pro-leopard.

  This time the roar went on for twenty minutes. Delegates milled, shouted into each others faces, shook their fists or used them and were clubbed down by their neighbors. Occasionally someone would fir
e his rifle, into the air, thankfully, although the bullet had to come down somewhere. The Chosen embassy sat in stolid silence, upright and expressionless, their round uniform caps resting on their knees. When the noise eventually died down, Ebert Meitzerhagen stood, walked forward three precise steps and stood at parade rest.

  He was a vivid contrast to Beemer, one reason he’d been chosen for the role. His cropped pale hair and light eyes stood out the more vividly for the deep mahogany tan of his skin; his face and bull-neck were seamed with scar tissue, and the massive shoulders strained at his uniform jacket. The great hands dangling at his sides were equally worn and battered, huge spatulate things that looked capable of ripping apart oxen without bothering with tools. All in all, he looked to be exactly what he was: a brutal, methodical, merciless killer. The Sierrans wouldn’t necessarily be intimidated, but they weren’t fools enough to believe all their own bombast, either.

  “Sierrans,” Meitzerhagen said. “We wish no war with you. We have no territorial demands on you.”

  Yet, Gerta thought. General Meitzerhagen was being truthful enough: the Chosen Council wanted a decade of peace now. If they could get it on their own terms, which did not include giving up the fruits of victory in the Union.

  “If you join with Santander in attacking us and our allies, do not expect us to meekly endure it. When someone strikes us a blow, we do not just strike back—we crush them.”

  He held out a hand palm up and slowly closed it into a fist, letting the delegates look at the knuckles, scarred and enlarged.

  Gerta called up a mental map of the Sierra. Mountains north and south, high ones—too high for dirigibles, except in a few passes, and they’d have to come uncomfortably close to the ground even there. A spine of lower mountains down the center, joining the two transverse ranges and separating two wedges of fertile lowland on the west and east coasts. The eastern wedge was drained by the Rio Arena, from here at Nueva Madrid to Barclon at the rivers mouth. The Arena valley was the heartland of the Sierra, where most of the agriculture and population and trade lay, although the national mythology centered on the shepherds and hill farmers of the mountain forests.

  This is going to be very tricky, she thought. And we don’t have much time.

  Fortunately, good staff work was a Chosen specialty.

  Admiral Maurice Farr tapped the end of the polished oak pointer he’d been using on the map into his free hand. “Gentlemen, that concludes the briefing. The blockade begins as of midnight tonight.” He looked out over the assembled captains of the Northern Fleet. “Any questions?”

  “Admiral Farr.” Commodore Jenkins, commander of the Scout Squadron of torpedo-boat destroyers spoke. A thickset, capable-looking man, missing one ear from a skirmish in the Southern Islands. “Could you clarify the rules of engagement?”

  “Certainly, Commodore. No ships, except Unionaise fishing vessels, are to be allowed within four miles of any of the Union ports on the list, or to within five miles of the coast, or to offload or load any cargo. You will issue warnings; if the warning is ignored you will fire over the vessel’s bow. If the warning shot is disregarded, you may either board or sink the vessel in question at your discretion.”

  “And if the violator is a warship?”

  “You will proceed as I have outlined.”

  There was a slight rustle among the blue-uniformed men in the flagship’s conference room.

  “Yes, gentlemen, I am aware that this may very well mean war. So is the Premier.”

  And not a moment too soon, if there’s going to be a war, he thought. The Republic’s lead in capital ships was shrinking, as the Chosen finally got their building program under way. At a fairly leisurely pace, since they’d been planning on war a decade hence, but they had some first-rate designs on their drawing boards. One in particular had struck his eye, a huge all-big-gun ship with twelve twelve-inch rifles in four superimposed triple turrets fore and aft of the central island, and a daunting turn of speed. If it worked the way John’s intelligence report said it would, nothing else on Visager’s oceans could go near it and live. Fortunately, they hadn’t even laid down the keel, and this conflict would be fought with existing fleets.

  Santander’s fleet was as ready as he could make it. That left only the personal question. Am I too old? Fleet command in wartime needed a man who could make quick decisions under fatigue and stress. Maurice Farr was within a year of the mandatory retirement age. Should he be at a desk in Charsson, or at home working on the book? I’m a grandfather with teenage grandchildren. He took stock of himself. He’d kept himself in trim, and he didn’t need to shovel coal or heave propellant charges into a breech. No failure of memory and will that he could detect. No. I can do it. He spoke again, into the hush his words had made.

  “You will accordingly keep your ships on full alert at all times, with steam raised and ready to weigh anchor at one hour’s notice. All leaves are cancelled, and naval and other reservists have been notified to report to their duty stations.”

  Jenkins nodded. “If I may, Admiral, how are we going to maintain a blocking squadron along the Union’s south coast? Bassin du Sud and Marsai are the only good harbors or fully equipped ports between Fursten and Sircusa.”

  “The Southern Fleet”—a grand name for a collection of candidates for the knackers yard and armed civilian vessels, with only two modern cruisers—”will blockade Bassin du Sud and Marsai. At need, they can be reinforced from the Northern Fleet. Any more questions? No?”

  Mess stewards entered, with trays of the traditional watered rum, one for each of the officers. The toast offered by the senior officer present was equally a matter of tradition.

  “Gentlemen—the Republic and Liberty!”

  “The Republic!”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  “Dammit!”

  Commodore Peter Grisson raised his binoculars again. The dawn light was painting the Chosen dirigible an attractive pink, a tiny toy airship at the limit of visibility to the north. Far out of range of anything the ships below it could do. They all had the new high-angle antiaircraft guns, but the distance was far too great.

  I hate that bloody thing, he thought, wishing for a storm. You could get some monsters down here south of the main continent, with nothing but the islands between here and the antarctic ice and nothing at all all the way around the planet east or west to break the winds. His ships, some of them at least, could keep station better than that floating gasbag.

  But the ocean was like a millpond, only a trace of white at the tops of the long dark blue waves. The McCormick City and the Randall steamed on, heading east-northeast for their blockade stations off the southern Union coast. They were making eight knots, well below their best cruising speed, because most of the gunboats and naval reserve yachts and whatnot around them couldn’t do any better. Certainly the pathetic hermaphrodite—wood-hulled and iron-armored—relics that made up the other six cruisers couldn’t. Neither of his two best ships were new, but at least they were steel-hulled and armored, and they’d both had extensive refits recently, virtual rebuilding.

  Then a light began to flicker on the nose of the Land dirigible. Grisson smoothed his mustache with a nervous gesture. What would Uncle Maurice do? he thought, and looked at the captain of the McCormick City.

  The captain lowered his own binoculars. “Coded, of course,” he said neutrally.

  “Of course. But Land scout dirigibles carry wireless.” The Land’s armed forces didn’t make as much use of that on land as the Republic’s did, but they had plenty for sea service. “So whoever he’s signaling is close.”

  Grisson thought for a moment. The rules of engagement and his own orders from the Admiralty gave him virtually complete discretion. One thing Uncle Maurice wouldn’t do was sit with his thumb up his ass waiting for things to happen to him.

  I can’t run, he knew. Intelligence on the Land naval forces in the area and their Unionaise allies was scanty, but whatever they had was likely to have the legs on
his motley squadron. Therefore . . .

  “Squadron to come about,” he said, giving the new heading. “Signal battle stations and sound general quarters. My compliments to Commander Huskinson, and the torpedo-boat destroyers are to deploy. Tell him I have full confidence in his ships’ scouting ability. No ship is to fire unless fired upon or on my order.”

  Bells rang, signal guns fired, yeomen hoisted signals to the tripod mast of the McCormick City. “Oh, and general signal: The Republic expects every man to do his duty.”

  Armored panels winched up across the horseshoe shape of the fighting bridge, leaving slits for viewing all around. A signals yeoman bent over his pad near the wireless station, decoding a message.

  “Sir. From the destroyers.”

  Grisson took the yellow flimsy.

  Am under attack by Land heavier-than-air twin engine models stop more than a dozen stop smoke plumes detected to northeast eight ships minimum approaching fast stop.

  For a moment Grisson’s mind gibbered at him. The distance to shore was more than twice the maximum range of any Land-made airplane. Stop that, he told himself. It’s happening. Deal with it.

  “Signal: Wait for me stop am proceeding your position best speed stop.”

  The key of the wireless clicked as the operator rattled it off. Eyes were fixed on him from all over the bridge; he could taste salt sweat on his upper lip. He’d known this moment had to come all his professional life—ever since he was a snot-nosed teenage ensign on this very ship, when Maurice Farr faced down the Chosen at Salini and saved fifty thousand lives. I expected this, but not so soon.

  “Signal to the fleet. Maximum speed.” All of ten knots, if they were to keep together. “Add: We are at war. Expect hostile aircraft before we engage enemy surface forces. Plan alpha. Acknowledge. Stop. Repeat signal until all units have acknowledged receipt.”