The Savior - eARC

by David Drake

  “Thes’ll tha percussion cap be,” he muttered. “Las see whut lies baneath.” With his battered nails, he grasped what he took to be the cap and pulled it upward. Attached to the cap (with an extremely strong adhesive, Abel knew) was a papyrus cylinder. On its end was a dome-shaped bullet.

  “Tha cold hell!” shouted Kruso.

  He held the bullet up for all to see.

  Abel smiled. “Cap, powder, and ball in one package,” he declared. “It’s got a rifled barrel, and will fire six times before it needs reloading. It’s got Golitsin sights, for those who remember the breechloaders. And after you get the hang of reloading her, you can pull out the rod and unpin that cylinder from that armature then pop in a different cylinder with another preloaded six rounds—fast as a single shot with a musket. Maybe faster.”

  “Et shoot can ich, Commander?” asked Kruso.

  “Hell, yes,” said Abel. “Take it over to the long range and see what you can do with it.”

  He passed a woven reed box to Kruso. “One hundred rounds,” he said. “Not that a dirtkicker like you can count that high, Sergeant Kruso.”

  Kruso let out a guffaw and took the cartridge box. Then he looked down and considered the cylinder, still in loading position.

  “Und swabben whut of?” he said.

  “It uses a different kind of gunpowder,” Abel said. “Hotter burning. Comes from up north, Progar-way. Burns so hot it turns the papyrus to vapor and doesn’t smoke as much at all. You won’t need to clean the chambers or barrel for many, many reloads.”

  “Und thas pinkel?”

  “It’s a grip for your stock hand, to get it out of the way of the muzzle blast. Or a tough son-of-a-bitch like you could just wear leather gloves.” Kruso nodded. His main questions were answered, but Abel was sure that after testing out the gun, the Scout would come back with many more.

  He strode with the rifle, carefully pointed upward, through the crowd of Scouts, all of who were eager to have a look.

  “Cum yeh ta tha range thun!” he proclaimed loudly to the pressing Scouts. “Yeh cahn thar gawken!”

  I’ve got Kruso on my side, Abel thought. And if you’ve got Kruso, then you’ve got the Treville Scouts.

  Abel chuckled, remembering what a devout Irisobrian Kruso was.

  “Thank you, Lady,” he whispered softly.

  * * *

  Scouts didn’t exactly march, and the Treville Scouts had never in memory set out as one big unit. They were hardly used to moving in unison either on the ground or dontback in a company-sized unit, much less the brigade-sized band of men that Lausner was leading. But what they lacked in organization, they made up for in speed and the ability to remain fully operational in the roughest terrain. After calling in the entire force, there had not been enough donts to go around at High Cliffs. Abel hoped to rectify this as soon as they reached the rendezvous point midway along the Canal, but for now at least half the Scouts were on foot.

  Either on dont or on foot, they followed a path along the Escarpment and descended into the Valley near the Lilleheim pass, and over the very spot where, as Abel well remembered, Mahaut had received her near-fatal wound in battle.

  Abel led them north of Lake Treville. A march through Hestinga, which was on the southern shore, was bound to meet resistance from a portion of the Regulars. That would mean shooting and death in the streets. The thought of fighting against Treville Regulars, a force his father had built almost from scratch, churned Abel’s stomach.

  He camped among the sole remaining stand of cottonwood trees at the Canal inlet to Treville Lake. The Canal had once been lined with these beautiful trees, but they’d been cut down and made into chevaux-de-frise used to impale the charging Blaskoye horde during the Battle of the Canal. Prelate Zilkovsky had ordered the banks of the Canal replanted, but it would be a generation before those trees grew to full size.

  The next day, the Scouts swept westward, a league away from the Canal, and then took a sharp turn to the south and approached the prearranged crossing point.

  If only Center were here, he could tell me whether Landry has got there with the boats—or at least give me the odds, Abel thought. More than a friend—if friend he had ever been—Abel missed the presence of Center as a tactical advantage. Now he had no more farsighted, battlefield-encompassing visions. No more concise and frightening scenarios depicting in harsh detail the implications of a bad choice.

  Now I’m just as blind as any other commander, Abel thought. But I was taught by the best.

  As he neared the Canal, his worst fears began to be realized. There was no line of boats along the shore waiting to take a large force across. As far as Abel could see, there was only one boat.

  “What the cold hell has happened to Major Landry?” he said. Lausner, riding beside Abel, could only shrug.

  Nevertheless, they moved forward, Abel contemplating the long march ahead if they must skirt the Canal. Then, when they were a fieldmarch away, Abel heard the Scouts in the leading party give out a yell. Were they under attack? But the yell had a different timber.

  Then it repeated itself, and he recognized what he was hearing: a cheer. Abel pushed forward toward the boat, if that’s what it was. It was only after the Scouts parted and let him through that he could make out what had brought on the cheer.

  What he’d seen was, indeed, a single boat. It was turned sideways, parallel to the Canal. And a few paces behind it, also parallel to the Canal, was another boat, and behind that another.

  And there, walking across the planking that connected all the boats together strode Major Landry Hoster with a shit-eating grin on his face.

  “So you finally got to make your pontoon bridge,” Abel said to him when he got within shouting distance. “How does it feel to walk on water?”

  “Come across and find out!” Landry shouted back at him.

  He didn’t cross immediately, but waited for Kruso and some rear elements, and rode with them.

  “It’s good to have you with me, my friend,” Abel said to Kruso.

  “Redlands brak and brin ever tha same, sir, und ever same isse Kruso.”

  There was a great deal of commotion when Abel got to the south side of the bridge. He left Lausner to sort it out and rode on toward a small rise where Metzler, his Cascade Regulars adjunct, had set up a command post. As he rode toward the spot, he saw a flash of gold ahead of him. He looked again, and saw it was the jackets of several men standing around a table drinking what smelled like pungent hard cider. It took him a moment to understand what he was seeing.

  Goldies.

  He dismounted, handed Nettle’s reins to an orderly, and waited as one of the men dressed as a Guardian strode toward him. The man wasn’t smiling, and he didn’t seem at all agitated, either. He turned for a moment, and Abel saw the unmistakable armless silhouette of Timon Athanaskew. He’d grown a beard.

  “You? Whiskers?” Abel said.

  Timon came to attention and saluted. “Colonel Athanaskew reporting for duty, sir,” he said. “I bring with me portions of the Guardian Corps Third and Second Battalions and a company of cavalry. All together about two thousand men, sir. We call ourselves the True Goldies and fly the blue and yellow.”

  “Two thousand Guardians,” said Abel. “Major Athanaskew, it is good to see you.”

  “Likewise, sir.”

  “So, the whiskers?”

  “It’s the fashion among command staff in your army these days,” Timon answered.

  “I wasn’t aware of that.”

  “It’s about to be,” Timon said. “Because, frankly, I got tired of one-handed shaving.”

  Abel laughed, and then became more serious. “And von Hoff?”

  “Regrettably, he is the leader of the forces gathering in Ingres.”

  Abel shook his head sadly. “Ingres. He always hated that district.”

  “Yes, sir,” said Timon. “General von Hoff is not really himself these days. At all.”

  “And you?”

  �
��I avoided the Inner Sanctum. After seeing what happened to von Hoff in there, I know I made the wise decision.” He clapped Abel on the shoulder. “Also, to join you seemed to me the way of righteousness.”

  “Where will that path take us, Timon?”

  “After we are done down south, it will take me into the Redlands.”

  “You mean to find the children of Progar?”

  “I mean to free every last one of them.” This thought finally got Timon to crack the faintest of smiles. “Besides, you need somebody to turn your crazy ideas into fact on the ground.”

  “That I do,” said Abel. “And your brother and sister? Your family?”

  A darkness came into Timon’s face. “My brother is gone. Zentrum…broke his mind, I think.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  Timon shook his head. “He calls me a zealot. But I’m not the one willing to let the world burn just because a voice in a pyramid tells me I have to.”

  PART THIRTEEN

  The War

  The Present

  1

  Lindron

  477 Post Tercium

  Mahaut had been busy in the weeks after learning of the presence of Hiram Zilkovsky and Joab Dashian in the dungeons of the Tabernacle Security.

  She began to build an army. Not by some definitions. Not a cohesive mass of armed men. First, it wasn’t all men, and there were precious few weapons to go around. Bows and arrows, hot oil, rocks—partisan’s weapons.

  Second, an expert communication force consisting of Lindron street urchins. And, third, since most of her trusted contacts were merchants, wagons. Lots and lots of wagons.

  Smuggling wanted men out of Lindron would be demanding, but hardly impossible.

  The impossible part was breaking them out of the dungeon to start with.

  With time, planning, and—most of all—imagination on Marone’s part, the plan to free Joab Dashian and Hiram Zilkovsky had formed. It was far from perfect. It was simply the best plan Mahaut and Marone could devise, given the information and resources they had. Mahaut was aware that every moment lost might mean the men’s death, and it certainly meant their prolonged agony and despair. But the plan had taken time. This was unavoidable.

  It started with the whores.

  There was a barracks of armed men available to stop you if you attempted to go into the dungeon via the main entrance. There was, however, more than one way into the Tabernacle prison, if a person knew where to look. And it seemed every whore in the Quarter knew about the jailers’ back gate. Prison duty was tedious, and there was ample time between watches to go around the corner for a drink and a bit of flesh, not necessarily in that order. The guards worked in rotating shifts, with two on and two off at any time. They might be dealt with.

  The biggest problem was the priest-soldier Head of the Tabernacle Security Service. He, and only he, had the key to every cell. No one else wished to even touch them. The locks were metal and the keys—

  They were ancient. They were cold to the touch. They were nishterlaub.

  * * *

  Zilkovsky never knew that he would feel so alone without Zentrum in his mind. For so many years he had longed to be rid of the presence that was always listening, always demanding consultation on the slightest issue to be decided, always ready to override his will with its own without explanation, apology, or seeming remorse.

  And at any moment expressing his godlike will, lighting Zilkovsky’s mind with fire as if it were an oil-rich wick. The process was known, in the priestly jargon, as “scanning.”

  Now that scanning had been taken away, pulled from him physically when the wafer was removed from the pallet of his mouth, and he felt…as empty as a pitcher drained of wine. Dry. There was no more voice in his mind. There were no voices at all here in the dungeon except for the one that belonged to the man who had arrested him. That voice was cold, inhuman. It did not count as company of any sort.

  And all was dark. Not dark like night, but utterly dark. So dark that any conception of where he was, the position of his body within the space, the slight traces of the material world in peripheral vision that told him he was in a real place, had a physical body—all that was missing. Complete darkness. He was nowhere. He had taken to hugging himself, curling up in a ball and holding his knees to his chest to feel its warmth, to avoid the creeping suspicion that he was no one, that existence itself had been yanked from him. A part of him—a small voice of what remained of sanity and humor—noted that he’d lost so much weight that assuming a fetal position was possible.

  The only other thing that reminded him that he was real was feeding time. Once a day the bucket of mashed gruel was shoved into the cell. It was water and meal combined, and it was all he was going to get that day. If the time between feeding was a day. He had lost count, lost all track of time. The only thing that reminded him that time was passing was growing hunger and the need to urinate and defecate. For these, he was made to use the same bucket he ate from after the food was finished, and he passed it back out when the new food was delivered.

  He had been a man who oversaw a district of the Land. He did best among men, wheeling and dealing for the power to accomplish things, both important and mundane, a consummate political animal. Now he was no one and nowhere. The shock of being taken from the social world was perhaps worse for him than anything else. His identity, who he was, was bound up with being the chief prelate of Treville District. He had no family, no home life other than interaction with several old and trusted retainers. All he had was his job, his position. And that had been taken in an instant. Now there was nothing but darkness to replace it.

  No wonder that he was going mad.

  Yet there was a trace of hope. Through the watches of long darkness there were occasional tappings that came to his cell through the walls, or through the slightest rattling of the door. Someone was out there trying to communicate. He did not know the mirror code used by the military, but he could recognize the sound of it in sonic form. This meant that a military man was nearby. Joab Dashian had been brought with him as a prisoner in the wagon from Treville. He assumed it was Joab who was tapping now.

  And it was that tapping that kept any sanity he had alive. Then one day—he could not say how long since he been taken prisoner—the cell door opened and torchlight flickered inside for that brief moment. The world around him was momentarily re-created. Instead of rapidly depositing the food, taking the waste, then leaving, this time the guard lingered for a moment.

  Zilkovsky, nonplussed, took the bucket and went to a corner to eat. Still the man remained, holding the torchwood and its blessed light.

  “I have a message for you,” the guard finally said. “You’re Hiram Zilkovsky, are you not?”

  “Yes,” Zilkovsky answered. I think I am.

  “There will be people coming to get you out,” said the guard.

  “Why are you saying this? Are you trying to go to lure me so me you can kill me?”

  The guard let out a low chuckle. “Now that could be what I’m up to, and I guess you’re right to be suspicious,” he said. “But I’m telling the truth. In two days’ time my companions will break you out. It will be during the midnight watch, although you may not realize when that is in here. You must be prepared, though. Do not let anyone else know of this arrangement, not even Joab Dashian.”

  “I don’t think that’s going to be a problem,” Zilkovsky answered with a shaky voice. “I haven’t seen my friend Joab for several months now. At least I think they are months. It could be years.” He shook his head. “I’ve lost count,” he mumbled to himself.

  “Be ready,” said the other. “Tell no one.”

  For a time, Zilkovsky’s heart filled with joy. Then nervous anticipation took its place. By the time the door unlocked and another figure stood holding a torch, he was shaking with excitement. Salvation was at hand.

  But it was not salvation. It was the interrogator. The security man, his face twisted into a wicked smile.

/>   Cloutier.

  “You look as if you were expecting someone else,” Cloutier said. “Let’s find out who that might be.”

  With a gasp of dismay, Zilkovsky stumbled backward as his interrogator made his way into the cell. He fell into his bucket of slop and lay in his own waste, quivering in fear.

  This was the end. This was the end.

  But it wasn’t. It was only the beginning of the pain.

  And, in the end, he told all.

  * * *

  The woman let out a cry of agony and betrayal as the guards dragged her down the dungeon corridor to the chambers of the Chief of Tabernacle Security.

  They had known she was coming! There was no other explanation.

  “Fuck him,” she said. “Fuck that boy priest! He told you, didn’t he?”

  Cloutier nodded his head sadly. “Athanaskew is a fool about women. He believes you are in love with him since you sent him his note. But no, he only confirmed what I already knew.” The security man touched his chin. “Out of curiosity, are you in love with that boy?”

  “I…I don’t know how I feel.” She hung her head, suppressed a sob. “I thought not. I thought my heart belonged to another. Then Reis came along and…now I suppose it doesn’t matter anymore.”

  “No. It does not.”

  “But Reis didn’t know the exact time! How did you know it was tonight?”

  Cloutier made a tsking sound, accompanied by a slow shake of the head. “I’m amazed that you got this far. But it all ends here, of course. Land-heiress.”

  Mahaut reached for the obsidian dagger she carried near her back, under a fold in her robe. She raised the knife and attempted to put the blade to her own throat. But the guards had hold of her before she could position it. The older guard on the left shook her arm violently, and the little dagger flew from her fingers and shattered on the stone floor into a dozen dark shards.

  “Foolish,” said Cloutier. “But understandable.” He bent down and picked up one of the pieces of obsidian, the tip of the blade, broken about midway from the hilt.

  “Hold her against the wall,” he said. The two guards slammed Mahaut against the stonework, momentarily knocking the breath from her lungs. She attempted to kick out at one of the guard’s legs, but her soft sandals, worn to make the least noise this evening, cushioned the kick, and it did no damage.