Mamelukes

by Jerry Pournelle

  “I don’t care.” Rick’s voice was even flatter. “I’m done.”

  “No, Lord Rick,” Publius said, speaking for the first time since Saxon had begun. “You are not.”

  “The hell I’m not!” Rick glared at him, then jabbed an angry forefinger at the window and the bodies beyond it. “I’m through, Publius. Through! Let somebody else do all the killing. I’ve spent fourteen goddamned years just trying to keep my feet under me, keep the people I care about alive, and I just proved I’m not really very good at that, am I?”

  He heard the quiver in his own voice, but he didn’t care.

  “I’ll get you back to the Empire. Hell, I’ll keep the University going, give Mr. Saxon here a place to hang his hat while he invents interstellar flight! But that’s it. I came to this world with over thirty men—my men! I think about thirteen of them are still alive. That’s not a very good proportion, and I will be damned if I get the rest of them killed!”

  “You have no choice.” Publius’ voice was almost compassionate.

  Almost.

  “While I was raised a Christian,” the Roman continued, “I was also forced to study Greek and Roman legends. I recall the details of the Titanomacy and Prometheus only too well. You star lords are the Titans. And that one”—Publius pointed at Saxon—“is Prometheus. He brings the fire, the knowledge of the gods.”

  “As I recall, things didn’t go well for Prometheus.”

  “Yes, he suffered. But eventually he was freed by Hercules, during one of his twelve labors.”

  “I don’t like where this is going.”

  “I know that. But it changes nothing.”

  “I’m not Hercules!” Rick snapped. “And I’m tired. I’m tired of always having to watch my back. I’m tired of fighting every goddamned time I turn around. I’m tired of seeing people I care about die. And I’m tired of being the one who decides who lives and who dies when half the damned time I’m guessing about what I’m doing! So, no, I’m not Hercules. I’m Cincinnatus.” He laughed mirthlessly. “Except I can’t even do that right, can I? I can’t just retire to my farm, because half the lords in Drantos want me dead and my farm is full of madweed. But I can damned well stay on it, defend what I care about, and let the rest of the world, the rest of the galaxy, take care of itself for a change!”

  “You can play the part of Achilles and hide in your tent, if you desire. For a time,” Publius said. “But not forever, my friend. Achilles retired from battle because he was full of pride, but you have little of that. Far less than I, for example. No, in your case it is doubt and despair that drive you like the Furies. You have just won one of the greatest battles in the history of Tran, and possibly the most important one ever fought here. But it means little to you. You say you are tired? I believe that. Yet even though we are very different men, you and I, I can recognize what is truly consuming you, and it is not just fatigue of the body. Your soul is weary. Perhaps that is because you are a better man than I. I do not know about that, but this I do know: Bishop Polycarp would agree that there are prices to be paid for giving in to the sin of despair.”

  “Worse than the ones I’ve already paid?” Rick asked bitterly.

  “I think . . . yes,” Publius said softly. “You can hide in your tent for a time, but while you do that someone else—someone like Major Baker, or Major Mason, or I, will be forced to become Patroclus. We will die trying to do what only you can do, and then you will be compelled to step forward anyway, knowing that we did.”

  Rick stared at him, his heart like a stone, and Publius shook his head.

  “No man can outrun his fate, even if he has the feet of Mercury, and this is your fate. It may be hard, but it is yours. Your men followed you here willingly. The people of Nikeis looked to you to save them, and my legionnaires were inspired to fight and die at your side. None of them were here to fight because of this man or what is in those boxes. They were here to fight alongside the man who, will he or won’t he, must become—has already become—the Warlord of Tran, not simply Drantos, to free us from the capriciousness of false gods.”

  The Roman shook his head again, holding Rick’s gaze.

  “I think, my friend, that perhaps you are the only man on Tran who has not already realized that. Or perhaps I should say who has not already accepted that. The rest of us have known for years.”

  “He’s right, Colonel,” Baker said, speaking for the first time. Rick glanced at him, and the Brit shrugged. “I’m a soldier, Colonel. All I ever wanted to be, all I ever expected to be. All I ever trained to be. You aren’t, but what you are is something more important than that. You’re a commander. You’re not thinking about battles, Colonel Galloway. You’re thinking about wars, and about what comes after the wars, and I could never have built the alliances, the relationships, you have. You think you aren’t up to the job?” It was Baker’s turn to bark a laugh. “For a bloody ‘amateur,’ you just performed brilliantly. You may not see that, but I damned well do. If you aren’t up to the job, then nobody else is, and this isn’t the sort of task we can leave to someone who isn’t up to its weight. No matter how unfair to you that may be. I’ll be your military commander, if that will take some of that weight off you. Your Major Mason and I, we’ll command in the field, go where you need us, do what must be done. But we can’t do the rest of your job. The only one who can do it is you.”

  Rick looked back and forth between him and Publius.

  “How long has this conspiracy of yours been in the works, Publius?”

  “You planted the germ of the idea on the day you told my father of the coming Time and he realized how you must have arrived on Tran. Then there were the ancient texts and their warnings. These new arrivals”—he waved one hand at Baker and Saxon—“have only accelerated our plans, Lord Rick. They have not changed them.”

  “What plans?”

  “We are at war with the gods. Or perhaps it would be more accurate to say that they are at war with us, and have been for millennia. We know that Rome will be one of the first targets should the skyfire fall again—perhaps the second one, after you. Yet legends hold that when men unite, when they stand together, sometimes they can defeat even gods. I do not understand all of the changes Lord Bart has described to me, but I do not need to. The changes of the Time alone will be terrible enough. All I need to know is that what the sky demons propose to do to us will be even worse. To survive that—to have any hope of surviving that—we must stand together. And my father realized from the very beginning that only someone from outside our squabbles and our historic rivalries and hatreds can unite us. We must stand together . . . ”

  “‘Or we shall certainly hang separately . . . ’” Rick murmured.

  “Quid est?”

  “A group of men said something like that on Earth over two hundred years ago. They also said ‘give me liberty or give me death,’ and they banded together to free a new country from what was probably the most powerful military in the world. That country is where I was born. Now I’ve learned that after we were brought to Tran, that same nation won a half-century conflict—what we called a Cold War—against another powerful nation that spat on the very idea of individual liberty. Major Baker here told me about a leader who stood up to what he called an evil empire . . . and won.”

  “I do not know if we can do the same,” Publius said. “I suspect the odds we face are worse than the ones he faced. But I also think we have no choice other than to try, and you are the only one everyone—Rome, Drantos, Nikeis, even the Five, in the fullness of time—will agree to follow. It will not be easy, and some of us will follow only if we are compelled to, but we will follow. So the only question is whether or not you will lead us.”

  Rick looked at the other three. Quiet wrapped itself about the chamber, perfected and not interrupted by the distant murmur of voices, street traffic, and seabirds, and he felt the weight crushing down upon him.

  I’m not Hercules, he thought. I’m Atlas, with the entire damned world on
my back. And in the end, whatever else happens, I’ll be Rodin’s Caryatid, crushed under its weight. And do I have the right to take Tylara there with me? Or will I find out she’s been in agreement with Publius and Marselius from the beginning?

  “I’ll . . . think about it,” he told them finally. “That’s all I’ll promise, all I can promise. But . . . I’ll think about it.”

  * * *

  “Your pardon, Lord Rick,” Haerther said, “but it is time.”

  “I know,” Rick sighed, and straightened from where he stood, leaning against the window frame, looking down on the harbor and the wreckage of battle. The familiar weight of chain mail and flak vest pressed down upon him like a shadow of the greater burden waiting for him to take it up.

  He absently patted the butt of his holstered .45, lips quirking as he considered how Art Mason would react if he’d dared to leave the weapon behind. He turned from the window, and Haerther examined him critically. The squire reached out and adjusted the strap of Rick’s shoulder holster, then nodded in satisfaction and opened the chamber door for him.

  I don’t want to do this, Rick thought. But I have to. Whatever I finally decide about . . . anything else, I have to do this.

  He stepped through the door into the borrowed palace’s great hall and paused as Publius turned to face him. A dozen others were also present—Art Mason, Clyde Baker, Caius Julius, Publius’ bodyguard—but Publius reached out to clasp forearms with him in the Roman fashion.

  “Hail Rick, Friend of Caesar and defender of the alliance,” he said. “I thought we should see to our wounded together.”

  “I agree,” Rick said, and the two of them walked out of the palace, surrounded by the others, and across the square to the larger structure which had been converted into Sergeant McCleve’s field hospital. One of the acolytes of the new United Church who served as medical corpsmen met them at the door.

  “Greetings, Lord Rick. Hail, Heir of Caesar.” The acolyte bowed to both of them. “I regret that Lord McCleve is in surgery. He will join you as soon as he may. In the meantime, he has asked me to be your escort.”

  “Thank you,” Rick murmured, and the acolyte beckoned for them to follow him into a large hall which had been converted into a ward.

  Rick stopped beside the bed nearest the door. The Roman legionnaire in it attempted to rise when he saw Rick and Publius.

  “As you were,” Rick said gently. “You’ve earned your rest.”

  He noticed that the young soldier’s right arm was heavily bandaged and splinted.

  “How are you?” he asked.

  “Well enough,” the Roman replied. His eyes were heavy and his words slurred a bit. “I hope your doctor McCleve can save my arm. It was crushed in the fighting in the North Channel.”

  Rick’s mouth tightened as he realized this youngster had been with Warner on the ship raft. He started to say something about that, then stopped himself as he saw the soldier’s eyes droop before he fought them back open again.

  Painkillers. Maybe the madweed-derived one, he thought.

  “If anyone can save your arm, Doc McCleve can,” he said instead.

  “If not, I know it will be restored on the last day. I only hope I can remain in service to the Alliance.”

  Rick could actually hear the capitalization of “Alliance” in the legionnaire’s voice. I’m standing here with Publius, and the kid says Alliance, not Rome. Is Publius right about all this crap? God help me, is he right?

  The continued their tour of the ward. Nikeisian militia, Tamaerthan warriors, Roman soldiers, even mercs lay side by side. Those who were conscious seemed genuinely pleased and enheartened at the thought that Rick and Publius had come to visit them. Yet Rick was even more aware of the stretcher bearers who passed them periodically, taking still figures with blanket-covered faces out or bringing recently triaged patients in. Everywhere, acolytes were busy treating the wounded. Some prayed with those who needed help, but too many prayed quietly with those who would soon be taken outside.

  Eventually, they moved from the common ward to the private rooms. Rick stepped into the first one and paused as he saw Sergeant McCleve. The doctor was bent over the bed, but he straightened at Rick and Publius’ entrance, and Rick saw Jimmy Harrison lying in it, unconscious.

  “Sorry, Colonel,” McCleve said. “When I got out of surgery, they told me you were headed this way, so I figured I’d come ahead and check in on Jimmy while I waited for you here.”

  “How’s he doing?” Rick asked.

  “Not good. He’s got a bad bruise on his chest from a javelin, but his vest stopped that. It’s the only reason he’s still alive. But what has me worried is the bruising to his brain, not his chest. According to Goodman and Signorina Torricelli, they hit him with a damned brick, and I believe it. If he’d been wearing a helmet instead of just a damned beret, maybe—” The medic cut himself off and shrugged. “I’m pretty sure he’s got a depressed skull fracture, but without x-rays I can’t tell how bad it really is, and I don’t like how long he’s been unconscious.”

  “Is he going to make it?”

  “I don’t know. He’s in a coma. I can keep him alive with IV fluids and other techniques, but the longer he’s comatose, the more likely we are to see something like pneumonia set in, and that could be the real killer. We’re in better shape for antibiotics than we were before Major Baker and Mr. Saxon got here, but we’ve also got one hell of a lot more wounded to spread them between. And even if he doesn’t get pneumonia, I don’t know what mental capacity he’ll have after taking a hit like that. He could be fine, but—”

  The doctor shrugged again and Rick nodded.

  Tran’s a rough place to have a mental disability, he thought. If he does, what will his wife and kids do when they find out? I’ll have to make sure he gets a pension that’s tied to him but still takes care of them if he dies. Will angels sing for Jimmy?

  “Do your best, Doc. Anything you need—anything—you tell me or Major Mason.”

  “Yes, Sir.”

  Rick laid a hand lightly on Harrison’s lax shoulder. Then he turned and headed for the next room on his list.

  * * *

  An hour or so later, Rick descended the stairs from the hospital’s upper floor with Publius. He’d been a little surprised when the Roman walked every step of the way with him. He didn’t normally think of Publius as a fountain of humanity, yet the heir to the Roman throne had shown another side as they visited the wounded. Perhaps it was simply a case of his playing the part he knew was demanded of a military commander, but Rick thought it went deeper than that.

  A sense of obligation, at least, he decided. Maybe even genuine compassion. That’s a quality I never associated with him before! But maybe there’s more to him than I thought. I’ve always known he’s smart, but until he and Baker and Saxon dropped that damned conspiracy on me, I hadn’t really thought about how much he worries about his responsibilities, not just his position. Of course, protecting the position sort of requires the discharge of the responsibilities, I guess.

  He smiled at that thought, amused despite his exhaustion and the decision looming before him, as they crossed the main ward again, headed for the exit.

  Baker and Mason had excused themselves to attend to their duties some time before, and Rick envied them. He didn’t doubt they really were as busy as a pair of one-armed paper hangers. God knew he’d dropped enough of the responsibility for dealing with the battle’s aftermath on the two of them! But in many ways, he would have preferred to be dealing with those himself. At least it would have kept him busy . . . and spared him from this face-to-face confrontation with the human cost of his decisions.

  They reached the door, and Rick paused. Bart Saxon stood just inside the door, waiting for them. Rick raised an eyebrow at him, but Publius had obviously expected the other star man’s presence. The Roman only waved for Rick to precede both of them out the door, so he stepped through it—and froze.

  “Tennnn-hut!” Master Serg
eant Bisso bellowed, and Rick heard hundreds of boots slam together.

  Mason, Baker, Martins, and young Cargill stood in a row just outside the door, and assembled on the quay beyond them were hundreds—thousands—of men. It looked as if everyone not currently on guard duty was there. Mercenaries, Gurkhas, Drantos musketeers, Tamaerthan archers, Roman legionnaires, Nikeisian militia—all of them, in orderly ranks. And beyond them, the surviving sailors and marines of the Roman and Nikeisian galleys.

  “Preeeeeeeesent, Arms!”

  Weapons and hands rose as every one of those assembled men saluted, each nation in its own fashion. A combined band of drummers and trumpeters played an inspired, if rough, flourish, and a Nikeisian militia drummer boy kept time with the other drummers in the band.

  I’m going to get Mason for this, Rick thought, but he realized he was smiling as he returned the salute.

  Then the music stopped. A Roman centurion—Rick remembered he was first spear of Publius’ cohort, stepped forward and extended his right hand high in the air, palm forward.

  “Ave! Ave, Galloway Imperator!” He shouted. “Hail, Imperator!”

  Rick’s smile disappeared.

  My God. This has to be Publius’ doing or was it the troops’ idea? He darted a look at Publius, but the Roman only looked back levelly. Either way, he damned well knew about it. Christ, what do I do now?

  He remembered the day Roman legionnaires had proclaimed Ganton Imperator on another field of battle. It wasn’t the same as emperor, but only one who’d been proclaimed Imperator could claim the purple.

  “Ave, Imperator!” the cry thundered up, not a single centurion now, but the massed voice of the entire formation, and he knew. It was the troops’ idea. It was coming from the men he’d lead into the holocaust. It was coming from them, and he felt the terrifying future roaring towards him, like the storm which had ravaged Nikeis, and knew now that he couldn’t avoid it.