The Eternal Front: A Lines of Thunder Novel (Lines of Thunder Universe)

by Walter Blaire

  South can’t have these guns. They can’t be that organized.

  Yet they did. And they were. How?

  Nothing remained of the 113th Sheflis Skirmishers but a handful of circling Tachba and the unit’s mobile command desk. The desk was a crate with legs that could be unfolded in the field. It fell on Sethlan to bring the desk back to Ville Emsa.

  It looked heavy, a job for Diggery, so Sethlan waited. Diggery didn’t appear. With nothing but impossible Southie artillery to think about, Sethlan finally opened the chest.

  At the top of the piled flags, insignia, and folders was a thick book with “Annals” impressed in the leather. The regimental diary of the 113th Sheflis, with most of the pages still blank.

  The final entry was unsigned, and written in a trembling hand:

  13th Merz, year 151 of the Local Empire

  Uncle Nestor: 113 est

  Tom Bonefire: 145 est with Nestor

  Stompfootie: 2,125 est derived

  Sister Sneeze: None

  Brutal Butcher found: 6.5 est

  Fled: 2 known, cursed

  Generally plinked: 322

  Unknown: 22

  Service: Midnight assault on high ground. Before we launched, we were granted a lovely continuance of children.

  We captured our objective but shortly retired, reduced to 5% strength by Southern deceit and cleverness. Unit disbanded by order of the Haphan Imperium, per General Sec Tawarna. Our brothers will speak from the fire.

  III

  The End Game

  Travelogue: On the Killcrack

  Perhaps the least charming creature on Grigory IV is the killkrack. Killkracken are arboreal creatures small enough to be held like a loaf of bread, and that is the last kind word to be said on them. The rest is a study in aversion. They are rarely seen up close, and deeply confusing when they are.

  Killkracken are something between a giant insect and a vicious lizard. Glossy brown chitinous rings encase the killkrack’s thorax and slide over each other like fish scales. From under each ring, however, a thatch of feathers protrude like quills, giving the creature a patchy look.

  Killkracken attach themselves to tree bark and other vertical surfaces with the sharp hooks in the quills, and then use their vantage points to spy out bird nests. They can also fling the quills and embed them in adversaries who draw too near. When cornered, they can open bloody cavities in their backs and rattle giant, vestigial beetle wings.

  The usefulness of killkracken is to eat eggs, which keeps the bird population low and prevents flocks of birds from swarming, or worse, combining. Birds being the maleficent, coalescing, claw-fisted thieves they are, killkracken have naturally developed to be even more savage. They are tough for their size, some say indestructible. A knife slipped between the layered scales of the shell will only occasionally kill the creature. They are either full of redundancies, or they have room to dodge knives inside their armor.

  (Childhood: Nana’s First Surprise)

  Young Nana

  On one of her secret trips outside the family compound, Nana discovered a clutch of giant, orphaned grubs in a rotten tree trunk.

  She visited the nest daily, risking life and limb not just from her father’s wrath, but from the dangerous forest as well. At the tree trunk, she tossed chopped baxxaxx meat into the swarm and drizzled eggs into the questing larval mouths that turned up when they sensed her.

  She tried to keep the grubs alive without losing fingers in the process. She tried and largely failed. She managed to keep her fingers, but one by one, the grubs succumbed and were eaten by their siblings. At the end of two months she was down to the final baby. The grub was eighteen inches long. It had a darling little beak and a lightning-fast telescoping strike.

  When it stopped trying to bite her hand, Nana worried about its appetite. Then she realized the truth: it had imprinted on her. Nana was a momma now, and the grub was her baby.

  The grub writhed over her hand in ecstatic loops while Nana fell in love, or at least fondness. The creature was revolting, after all. Lesson: she didn’t have to give birth to be a mother.

  Within days, the grub egged itself in a hard cocoon and went dormant for two more months. Nana kept her baby barricaded in the tree trunk, checking it as frequently as possible.

  One day, she pulled away the last panel of tree bark, and found a horrible little beast waiting for her. It recognized her immediately and rattled its spiky feathers with excitement. Nana was momentarily put aback. It was obviously a killkrack, but so little was known about them it was the last thing she expected. She thought she’d merely get a giant forest bug out of her effort.

  Feeling magical and otherworldly, Nana scooped the revolting creature out of its creche tree and let it crawl up her neck. The spines on its legs twisted her curls until its small body was buried in her hair like an ill-tempered land mine.

  She named it Soft, a trick on the Old Tachbavim word Zsalft which even her brothers might appreciate. Zsalft meant something was either inedible or merely chewy; it indicated repugnance.

  She strolled through the forest with Soft vibrating in her hair. The animal was tame to her touch, and it clung to her like a child. She’d have to feed it somehow. She couldn’t leave it alone in the forest, even if she could disentangle it from her hair, which didn’t seem possible at the moment. If she left Soft alone, it would be dead or gone when she returned. It was just a sweet, terrifying baby, after all.

  Nana would have to bring it home.

  Problem. No one in the Naremsa compound knew how frequently Nana escaped. No one guessed how well she knew the woods. Perhaps her father suspected, but what he knew in public always won over what he knew in private. She would be punished just as if he didn’t know a thing, no one the wiser.

  Nana was fifteen years old, and a growing source of tension in the house. The adults were uncomfortable ordering her around like the child she technically still was, but they were also unwilling to treat her like a young woman. Since Nana was slight, she was increasingly expected to issue orders and settle family squabbles. However, she was a child, so she lacked the authority. But she didn’t look like a child. Against every expectation, she had grown lovely—and since she was slight, her beauty wouldn’t simply fade after adolescence like her sisters.

  For Soft to live, and for Nana to take care of her vile new baby, Nana would need to claim her independence. Nana would need to well and truly become an adult.

  Nana returned to the Naremsa family compound by the main forest path, not one of her many secret ones. She made sure the trigger-happy guards at the gate could see her clearly.

  She approached with a light step and a knowing smile that put the guards ill at ease. That was fine. She felt utterly ill at ease herself. Soft was invisible in her hair. Nothing of the killkrack showed except its two primary eyes, which had stretched out on unexpected stalks and now hovered like red berries at the edge of her vision.

  “Nanatique Naremsa, without an escort!”

  Japhamalon, the day guard, was a Gullard boy a few years older than her brother Gole. He shouldered his carbine and blocked the gate with a spear.

  “Nana goan’ trouble!” said Japha’s brother, Phajaja, who was the blood-fed twin.

  Nana gave them a hard look. “May I not enter my house?”

  “Tell us what you were doing.”

  “Why should I tell you?”

  “Perhaps you were skinny-dipping?” Japha asked.

  “Why would I skinny-dip?”

  Japha grinned. “A man can dream.”

  This was why Nana liked the boy; he was all flattery. She was a slight girl and he was kind to pretend interest.

  “A man can dream?” she teased back. “You’re a thirteen-year-old boy. We can’t even tell if your balls have fallen yet.”

  Japha nodded equably. “True. We all have trouble seeing past my tremendous manhood.”

  “Boyhood,” Jaja cackled.

  “Still, you were in the woods without esc
ort. What were you doing?”

  Nana had no good answer for that. She thought furiously, and the boys drew quiet with interest. Then she settled for the truth. “I was mothering.”

  “Mothering.”

  “Mothering the forest. The little animals.”

  “The forest doesn’t want you mooning in it,” Japha said, less certain now. “A bird bear will tear you apart. A croaker will drop a rock on your head if it likes your white hair. You’ll get quilled, trampled, snared, or just plain killed.”

  “I made a discovery in the forest,” Nana said. Japha and Jaja’s faces shifted into distinct unease. The less she said, the more they supplied themselves. Whatever their polluted boy-brains provided seemed much more compelling than what Nana could invent on the spot.

  “Discovery, huh?”

  “I discovered I can be a mother, Japhamalon. I can be a mother to the animals in the forest. The forest animals love me.”

  “We’em all love Nana,” Jaja announced.

  Japha knocked Jaja’s shoulder with his spear. “Run inside, Jaja. Find a grown-up. Tell them Nana is at the gate, circling.”

  “Nana always circle.”

  “If no one listens to you, say she’s naked as a rock. That will get the boys running out, and the grown-ups will have to chase them. Otherwise we’ll wait for hours.”

  Jaja ambled off, forgetting and then remembering his mission as they still watched. He wavered again by the kitchen, but finally made it to the main hall where the boys were training.

  “I’m sorry you have to be naked,” Japha said.

  “You always tease me,” Nana said. “Aren’t you afraid of me? After all, I’m going to be a pharmacienne witch. The woods told me to warn you about this.”

  Japha’s eyes flickered to the tree line beyond the fields. “Warn me of what? What harm if I think you’re lovely?”

  Nana raised her hand in the mudra of the Closed Eye Opening. “The full girls will scorn you, because you are not serious. You want to cast seed on barren ground. The other boys will question your service, because you are easily distracted by nothing, by a slight girl. The army will never fight you against the South. Instead, they’ll put you in an office and you’ll do math all day until you die.”

  The Closed Eye Opening gave Japha a moment’s pause. The hand motion was used in early training, with the Deep Tongue, to make male children receptive to new knowledge.

  “Let’s get back to the girls,” Japha said. “You say that girls will think I’m not serious?”

  She cocked her head in a way she hoped was fetching. “The girls will think you’re superficial. A wastrel.”

  “Well. What’s all that, when I could have you?” He tried to sound gallant, but failed. “The woods told you all this? Really?”

  They paused as Old Grueff approached from the compound. He strode through the gate, his old service revolver in hand, and wasted no time putting the cold barrel against Nana’s forehead.

  “Speak,” Grueff said.

  “I brought Grueff!” Jaja supplied.

  “I hope you told someone else too,” Japha said, eyes fixed on the gun.

  “Yes, la! Big bunch boys know Nana naked!”

  Grueff tapped Nana’s forehead with the barrel. “Speak or be killed.”

  “The woods will be cross with you,” Nana finally said.

  The gun left her forehead.

  “I’m pleased to not have to kill our little witch,” said Grueff, sounding thoroughly displeased. He turned his glare upon Japha. “What is the meaning of this?”

  “Nana went into the woods and something odd happened,” Japha said. “I’m getting nothing but slight-stuff from her. She says the woods talked to her.”

  “And you listened, Japhamalon? She’s supposed to fuck with you. She’s a slight girl. That’s how they waste your time. Throw her in the stockade and send Phajaja to fetch the colonel.”

  “I can’t lay a hand on Nana when she’s being weird. That would be an Affront to the Exterior.”

  Grueff rolled his eyes. “She’s still a child. She’s not a real witch yet. Just…”

  He broke off at the sound of running footsteps, and turned. Nana’s brother, Gole, was the next at the gate. He was Nana’s learning charge, and worse, he had grown into a youngster with astonishingly high function. Old Grueff was not old by accident. He had to know what this looked like: Nana blocked at the gate, and he with his revolver in his hand. Grueff shifted into a defensive stance as Gole quickly collected the scene.

  Gole gave them all an easy, confident smile, his feet sliding in the dirt as he shed speed and turned through the gate. Then he blurred into action.

  Tachba action.

  For a second, Nana thought her brother had been hit from behind by a charging baxxaxx. One moment he was in front of them, and the next he was flying at Grueff, his body in the air and almost horizontal to the ground.

  “Wait—” Nana said, too late.

  Gole didn’t connect with Grueff. Instead, he was instantly on the other side of the old veteran. Nana struggled to put it together: Grueff had guided the tip of Gole’s knife safely past his chest with a sweep of his sidearm.

  Knife!

  Nana belatedly registered the clink of metal on metal, and then the roar of the service revolver’s discharge. The sounds were so much slower than the Tachba.

  “No!” she cried.

  Gole had the barrel of Grueff’s gun in his free hand. He’d directed the bullet into the dirt between them. He lashed at Grueff’s throat with his knife but Grueff wanted none of it: he was already swinging. His club-like fist punched through Gole’s knife hand and kept going, connecting with Gole’s face.

  Gole was only eleven years old.

  He spun in the air. The knife was lost but he kept his grip on the barrel of the gun. To lose it would return it to Grueff’s complete control, meaning Gole would be dead.

  Gole bounced in the dust, his head knocking the ground with a sound like a dropped rock. Still, he spun and scissored Grueff’s leg between his knee and foot, and levered the older man off balance.

  Japha used the opening to step in and stab at Gole with his spear, but Gole was too fast. He already had one leg under his body, and he used it to fling himself away from the serrated spear-tip.

  He wasn’t stronger than Grueff, but his body weight let him twist the barrel of the revolver toward Japha. Japha pivoted aside just in time. Gole squeezed the old man’s finger into the trigger, and the revolver discharged again.

  Grueff landed another fist on the boy’s face, and finally won his weapon free.

  Gole feinted one direction but pushed the other, kicking gravel and dirt where he had seemed to be going. The ruse worked on Phajaja, who sprayed the empty ground with his carbine. Bullets piffed every direction, ricocheting off buried rocks.

  “Fucking stop, Jaja!” Japha shouted.

  Grueff reeled away from the gunfire, giving Gole a valuable moment to slide his hand through the dust. When Gole’s hand fell on his lost knife, he flung it at Jaja using sound alone.

  The blade flew at Jaja’s throat, but the blood-fed was lucky. His foot rolled on Japha’s spear, and a minor shift in balance made the knife miss. It drew a bloody line across Jaja’s throat and buried itself in the wood of the palisade gate.

  Right next to Papa’s head.

  12

  Sethlan

  The club was emptier than when Sethlan left it. Cephas still stewed in his corner. A few other officers dotted the chairs.

  The fire had been built up, which Sethlan liked because its heat reached his table. An entire morning could be gotten through merely by staring at the flames.

  A scull brought his regular tea, but he sent it back for bourbon; Tejj had worried he wasn’t drinking enough. He tossed books, notes, pencils, slide-rules, and his dirty occlusor on the table.

  Nana breezed past, bearing a wide serving tray. “Your load is lighter.”

  “Tejj left service. I have no idea abou
t fucking Diggery.”

  He tried not to notice their absence as he dug into his notebook.

  Transferring the notes to a clean situation map took a good hour. Parsing out locations, like his observation crater and the Tachba paths up the hill, took even longer.

  He knew this was all delay. He did not want to think about Tejj, and now possibly Diggery too. He finally turned to his measurements of the barrage.

  The math was not difficult. Based on the spread and angle of the incoming shells, he could derive their origin. All he had was eyeball observation and the verbal count for how long it took the dim shapes of the shells to emerge behind his raised thumb. If he hadn’t been so distracted last night, he would have remembered his proper observer tools. When he dropped his gear in the trench before his sortie between the lines, he’d left his scallops and scales in his pack.

  Beside his notes on the table was a pre-landing survey photograph from space, provided by Haphan Intelligence. As with most things Haphan, the photo caused a big problem. Sethlan’s eyeball measurements showed the shells originating from deep in the land held by the South. Unlike the North, which had made a stand on the rocky, granite-richland around Ville Emsa, the territory behind the Southern lines was laced with water, canals and swamp. South didn’t have enough solid ground to support massed artillery. They couldn’t bring their heaviest field guns in range of Ville Emsa or the Northern trenches without having them sink out of sight.

  No way in hell were they firing those shells from a swamp. Sethlan would need more measurements. He must have made an error somewhere.

  “Any progress?” Diggery slid into his seat with no less than three steins of beer. His face was black with soot, and his hair stood straight up. Based on his ashy and fragmented greatcoat, he had been on fire not too long ago.