by David Drake
They’re drifting too far, he thought for a moment. They’re going to get cut off.
But the men in the squares themselves seemed to spontaneously correct for their drift. They were worried about being cut off and cut apart, too.
Then he pushed forward along with everyone else, and rode down a defile and out of sight of the larger force. It was over a series of rises in front of him, and spread in all directions. This was, in some ways, like fighting in one of the box canyons of the Redlands: a terrain with odd quirks and turns to the landscape.
But this was not the Blaskoye homeland. It was his. He’d served in troops that had done maneuvers here. He sure as cold hell had put in enough time for a lifetime wandering around the Giants with a squad, a day’s rations, and a minimal set of orders. He might not have the place memorized, but he knew what to expect. There were no ridges, for instance, just a series of mounds covered with huge broken stones. You couldn’t take the high ground without worrying that you’d exposed yourself to being surrounded. The terrain broke up large masses into smaller groupings. It rewarded trained units.
It was a better battleground for an army than a horde.
* * *
He crested the rise, and Lausner, who had, with a vanguard of Scouts, broken free and climbed to meet Abel, arrived breathless and bleeding from a shoulder wound.
“Looks they’re trying to concentrate, throwing more than half their numbers at us ahead to the left, sir,” the captain said. “We’re up against the hill yonder in a half-circle, more or less. We’re getting pounded, that’s for sure. I’ve got more killed and wounded than I have fighting. We’ve had to contract and leave some poor bastards outside the perimeter. You should see the looks on their face when we’re stepping over them and abandoning them. It’s something terrible.”
“I know, Lausner,” Abel said. The arc below was crumbling at the flanks where the Blaskoye were directing their runs. Clumps of twenty or thirty Redlanders on dontback charged diagonally at them. The men who were unlucky enough or brave enough to be positioned on the end took the brunt of their fire.
It’s not a bad tactic on the enemy’s part, Abel thought.
“The only break we’re getting is that the dead bodies are piling up, both ours and theirs,” the Scout captain continued. “The donts are having to jump them, and that’s slowing them down. Plus it gives us some cover. But the ground’s slick. I never would believe sandy shit like this could get slippery. The blood soaks through, but you lose your footing on the guts. They’re everywhere and greasy as hell.”
“I’ve got a couple of companies coming up right behind us,” Abel said. “How many do you have fighting?”
“I’d say a hundred or so.”
“We’ve got to last until those others get here.”
“Yes, sir, we’ll do it,” the captain replied, although his eyes were haunted, as if he doubted the assurances coming from his mouth even as he uttered them. Suddenly, Lausner sat up straight in his saddle with a gasp. He stretched his hands behind himself, groping at his back. With a final glance at Abel, almost apologetic, the man fell from his dont and landed with a thud on the ground. Abel leaped down and examined him. Dead. A bullet had broken his spine.
It likely would have hit me, Abel thought, had I not had this man as a shield.
Abel mounted back up, aided by an orderly who practically pitched him onto the dont. Another look down the hill revealed that the semicircle of men was actively dissolving. He glanced to his rear. No way to see beyond the gulch behind them. His reinforcements might only be moments away, or might not.
“That arc has got to hold,” Abel said.
“Pardon, sir,” said Metzler. “These men need orders.” The other company officers sat their mounts stunned. Their commander was dead, and no one seemed to know what to do next.
“We have to fall back and hold out for reinforcements,” Abel shouted at them.
No movement, no answer.
“Shall I go down?” asked Metzler.
“You stay. Bring down those reinforcements when they get there.”
Metzler looked confused for a moment, then chagrined. “Sir, you’re not meaning to—”
Abel smiled. “We’ve beat them. You and I know we have this battle in hand. But that doesn’t matter to our thrice-damn boys down there getting the shit kicked out of them.”
No Center. No Raj. A doubtful position. But he was needed…
Abel drew his sword, waved it in front of the company officers. “Metzler stay. The rest—we go. Now.” He brandished the sword up in the air. “Come on!”
He reined his dont into a trot down the hill. Bullets filled the air around and set off small puffs from the sandy ground nearby. The defensive arc was tight now, filled with wounded. There was no room to bring in the donts. He got off Nettle and turned her so that she faced in the direction from which they’d come. He took his rifle from its scabbard, slung it around his back. Then, with the tip of his sword, he poked her in her hind muscles. She snorted bilious snot at the provocation then charged away, instinctively distancing herself from the noise and chaos behind her. After a quick prod, the other donts followed her. Abel and the officers with him plunged through the line and into the square.
He tried to be everywhere, throwing men into gaps, taking turns firing himself. They were far more a clump than an arc now, but there was order enough to keep up a steady fire, to keep reloading. The Blaskoye dead were piling up with wave after wave of attack.
But his men were running low on ammunition. As if to confirm this, several troops to Abel’s right ran dry simultaneously and a Blaskoye on a huge dont stallion, its plume erect, its skin mottled in angry black and red markings, broke through. Its rider had reserved fire and got off a shot in Abel’s general direction, then tossed aside his carbine and drew a long, wicked-looking knife. A trooper charged him, snatching at the Redlander’s leg, and the Blaskoye viciously slashed the man across the face, sending him reeling back clutching at the ruin. Abel raised his rifle and took aim. If he’d counted right, he had four shots remaining in his barrel.
He pulled the trigger. Click.
I’m out? How could I miscount that badly?
But glancing down he saw that his tunic sleeve had gotten jammed in the barrel-turning mechanism. He resisted the urge to yank it free—it might or might not come loose—and carefully pulled the barrel pin out and with the thumb of his free hand pushed at the barrel until it came loose and released the fabric. He slammed the barrel back in place, rose up and—
Shot point-blank into the black and red stallion’s charging forehead. He dove out of the way just in time as the animal’s momentum carried it past him and a few steps more before the dont collapsed.
The Blaskoye bounded off even as his mount was falling—they truly were remarkable riders—and came at Abel. There was no time or space to get a shot off. The Redlander led with his knife held high in a murderers grip, blade pointing downward.
Intimidating, but not the best stance, Abel thought.
The Blaskoye brought his knife down. Abel raised his rifle crosswise to block it. The Blaskoye’s wrist smashed into the gunstock when the knife was inches from Abel’s chest, and his hand involuntarily released the blade. Abel thrust out with his right and smashed the rifle into the Blaskoye’s neck. The other men stumbled back. Abel swung his rifle around and, almost leisurely, took quick aim and killed the man with a shot to the chest. The Blaskoye fell staring with surprise into Abel’s eyes.
Reload, Abel told himself. Get it done while you’re catching your breath.
He reached for his cartridge box, pulled out a handful of papyrus cartridges and spaced them between the fingers of his hand. It was a trick his Scouts had discovered (or rediscovered, as Center had informed him) when they’d first fought with breechloaders.
Though his hands were shaking, he slid the bullets into chambers easily enough, and clicked the revolver barrel back into place. Try as he might, though, he couldn’
t stop breathing hard. Soon it was worse, and he was gasping.
There was a tingling in his left arm, and suddenly, though he kept a grip on the rifle, he could barely feel the arm. He carefully slung the rifle around behind him on its strap and began methodically running fingers under his jacket and tunic.
It didn’t take long to find where the bullet had entered.
Just under his right ribcage, to the side of his abdomen—a hole about as big around as an arrow shaft. A finger pressed inside found no resistance. It was deep, and oozing blood.
Not spurting, he thought. At least there’s that.
He painfully reached around, groped at his back. He gathered his concentration and tried to be methodical in his probing. There was no exit wound that he could find. Which meant the bullet was inside him somewhere. On the other hand, he would only need to apply pressure to the one wound.
With that thought, his strength ebbed and he collapsed to his knees. He yanked open his cartridge box again and pulled out a swabbing cloth. It was not dirty, a testament to how little he’d needed to use his gun recently. This he wadded and held onto the wound with as much pressure as he could apply.
Soon even staying on his knees was too much and he fell backward onto his rear, his legs splayed out before him. Breathing was becoming harder still. With one hand he propped himself up, with the other he kept pressure on the wound.
Around him, all he could see were the scrambling backs and legs of men. Above him, the late afternoon sun beat down through the cloudless sky of the Land.
I may die.
But he’d always known this.
I may die today. Now.
He slumped out of his rifle strap and let its fall to his side. Its weight on his shoulder had become unbearable.
Need a weapon. I’m a soldier and I need a weapon, thrice-damn it.
He braced himself, drew in another painful breath. Breathed out. He wiped the spittle from his lips, examined his hand for blood.
There were red patches. It could be from a bitten lip. It could be from a pierced lung.
I do have a weapon.
He tried to smile, but it became a grimace. Then he reached down and laboriously pulled his sword from its scabbard. He laid it across his lap.
A great clatter of fire behind him. The trampling of sandaled feet around him.
A shout, seemingly from far away.
“Fall back!”
He watched, concentrating and attempting to comprehend what was happening, as men continued to stream around him, away from him.
My back is to the Blaskoye, he thought. I’m facing uphill.
Which meant the soldiers were retreating.
Someone reached down, grabbed his arm. “Come on, sir!”
Abel shook the other’s hand off. “No you don’t. Get out of here!”
“Can’t do that, sir.” Abel looked up, but could only raise his head high enough to take in the man’s command sash. He was a sergeant.
The sergeant moved behind Abel and attempted to hoist him up. He had raised Abel an elb or so off the ground when his grip suddenly slackened. Abel fell down hard, and agony crashed through his body at the impact. He fought through it, and twisted around to see what had become of the sergeant.
He lay twisted and dead. Abel raised himself enough to look over the man’s body.
A dark line of Blaskoye dontback riders, moving toward him.
He turned away from them, looked back to his men. They were moving up the hill in a fairly orderly retreat. And higher up, behind them—another line of silhouettes. The reinforcements had arrived.
Not soon enough, he thought. But they had other things to deal with, I’m sure. No blame. Brave men. All brave men.
Huffing of dont blowholes, shouts in the Redlander tongue behind him. Abel gripped the sword hilt with his right hand, his left hand still applying pressure to the wound in his side.
I’ll take one with me. At least one. Let me take at least one.
But he couldn’t concentrate. His grip was slackening.
“They won’t catch him, he’s the Carnadon Man,” she sang gently.
His mother. He heard her as clear as day.
“Mamma,” he said, realizing he was hallucinating, but unable to stop himself. He’d missed her so much. He’d hidden it even from his father, or thought he had. But how could it be that she was gone, that she had left him?
“A toothache,” he said, shaking his head once again as the old anger rose within him.
A toothache and then a light in his world brighter than the sun was suddenly snuffed out, never to shine again. So many years ago. Before he even knew what it meant, when he could only feel her absence, uncomprehending, alone.
“I’m right here,” she said. “Don’t worry about those carnadons. They can’t bother you, because you’re him.”
“Who, Mamma?”
“Why, the Carnadon Man, of course.”
The Blaskoye found him with his sword hilt still in his hand. Despite the fact that their enemy was now recovered and was charging down upon them, their leader saw the command sash and ordered them to carefully lift this one, and secure him across the back of a dont. He had orders to bring the Dashian to the Council. Maybe this was him, maybe not, but he’d take no chances. The leader, a clan headman, and a few of his followers, took the reins of that dont and charged away on his own, making for Lindron.
He did not look back once as the counterattacking Regulars overwhelmed and slaughtered the remaining riders, who had only moments before believed they had victory.
* * *
Lindron
Afternoon
In the heat of late afternoon, a group of determined Blaskoye—no more than twenty strong—circled to the east and threw themselves on a boulevard blockade. It was unexpected and brutal. Before the breach could be filled, they were through.
Still, observers followed the Redlanders. The Blaskoye made straight for the Tabernacle.
“Before we knew it, they was through. Not sure what they was doing,” the eastern sector leader reported with a shameful face to Mahaut. Ford owned one of the city’s largest tanneries and ran the partisan forces in the eastern sector. “They had a man, a Regular by the look of his dress, slung over a dont like a sack of flour. Saw it myself. Nope, wasn’t one of their own. He was Black and Tan, he was.”
“A Regular?”
“Looked to be some high officer,” said Ford. “Had the sash of one, at least.”
Ford held up a dirty, bloodstained commander’s sash and presented it to Mahaut. “It fell off. Maybe a urchin or two helped it fall with a tug.”
When she clutched the sash, examined it, she lost her breath for a moment.
“Do you know it, Land-heiress?”
“I have seen it before,” she said. “This high officer—was he alive or dead?”
“Hard to say, your grace. He weren’t moving when he passed by. Like I said, we followed a ways behind, and I got another good look. That saddle they had him on was bloody when they took him off.”
Mahaut glared at Ford. “Tell me truly, was this man alive?”
Ford shook his head. “No, your grace. I’m pretty certain he was dead. Dead or real near to it.”
PART FOURTEEN
The Sacrifice
The Present
1
Lindron
The Tabernacle of Zentrum
Late afternoon
Cold water on his face. Abel awoke. He blinked, but his eyelids couldn’t break free from a crust that held them closed. Another torrent of cold water.
He opened his eyes. He lay on a litter. Around him were walls of stone. Sandstone. He recognized its texture, its style. He’d spent five years living with it around him, after all.
This was the Tabernacle of Zentrum.
His side ached, but he now had feeling in his arms. He reached down. The wound was bound tightly with a bandage around his torso.
“Drink.” Abel turned to see a priest in orang
e robes. He held out a clay cup. Abel took it, tried to sit up. Pain shot through him, but with the other arm behind his back, he was able to do so. He took a sip.
Water. He drained the cup. He handed it back to the priest, who refilled it. Abel drank again, each swallow followed by a stab of pain in his chest. But he got the water down.
He was in one of the antechambers near the Inner Sanctum. He’d stood, likely in this very spot, on guard duty more than once. He’d walked past it on the way to his audience with Zentrum. The walls seemed to be covered in a white tapestry, though—
It took him a moment to resolve the white fabric into the forms of Blaskoye men. He was surrounded by at least ten of them crowded into the room. Several held rifles, and they were pointed at him.
One of the Blaskoye broke from the group and stood over him.
“Who are you?” Abel asked in Redlander. It came out as a croak, but must have been intelligible, for the man answered.
“I am called Kerensky. That does not matter.”
“The Blaskoye Council Law-giver.”
The slightest smile of pride played over the Blaskoye’s lips. “I have that honor.”
“What do you want? Cut a deal, you get out?”
Then the other really did smile. “Hardly.”
“Why am I alive?”
“Because Taub wills it. Because of what you’ve done.”
“Get shot?”
Kerensky abruptly switched from Redlander to Landish. “You have plunged this world into chaos. You have toyed with the balance of blood and dust.”
Abel sat up straighter. His side ached, but some of his strength had returned. “This world? Are there others?”
“I have been shown…many things…by Taub. He speaks to me from the dust. There are other worlds. I know who you are.”
“A man.” Abel looked at his bandaged side, touched it. A slight pressure and pain shot through him. “That’s all.”