"I'm not after an apology, Sergeant Major. I want an assessment of the situation."
"Sir." He looked at the ceiling for a moment. "Colonel Parsons had not yet attempted to plant surinomaz, but it's reasonable to suppose he'd have done no better at that than he did in holding the land," Elliot said. "While he was in command, we lost Corporal Hartford to guerrilla activity. Five more troopers were severely wounded. A total of twenty-three successfully deserted.
"Since you took command, Private Reznick has been killed in action, and three others have been severely wounded, all in battles. There have been no losses to guerrillas. Ten former deserters, eleven counting Mr. Mason, have returned to duty, and nobody has run off. Troop morale is high. We have over six hundred acres in surinomaz, and I guess there's no revolt brewing out there even if the peasants aren't too happy about growing the stuff." He shrugged. "On the evidence, your way works."
"And the men realize that?"
"Most," Elliot said. "All that count."
Meaning there are things you aren't telling me, Rick thought. But no point to that now. "The key to 'my method' has been to cooperate with the legitimate rulers here."
"You have done more than this. You have become one of us," Tylara said.
"The point is, I've tried to regularize our positions. One key to that is Wanax Ganton. Another has been the triple alliance of Drantos, Tamaerthon, and Rome."
"I would place your friendship with Yanulf and the Priesthood of Yatar at equal importance," Tylara said. "Especially as The Time approaches. Husband, no one has more admiration for you than I. I also know that you do not recite your accomplishments to gather praise from us. What is it you wish to say?"
"I have a policy question," Rick said. "But I wanted everybody to look at it from the right direction. The question is-what do we do about Ganton?"
"What should we do?" Gwen asked. "I mean, what are the choices?"
"You've watched him with Octavia. That's the first question, do we encourage this match? Beyond that. Do we want him to be Caesar?"
"Does he want to be?" Gwen asked. "Not that it would be automatic. The position isn't really hereditary."
"True," Rick said. "Look, here's the situation. The Westmen are coming down off their plains. Lots of them. They're pretty good troops. Probably can't take castles-" he looked to Mason for confirmation.
"Not by storm," Mason said. "Not stone ones, anyway. But they can wipe up anything else. Murphy had the best ditch, logs, and earth system I've seen on this planet, and he wouldn't have been able to hold much longer-would have lost already if it hadn't been for the battle rifles."
"So what'd you do with him?" Warner asked.
"He's set up in that castle Harkon used to have," Mason said. "With a lot of peasants to guard. He'll be okay until the food runs out."
"So we can hold castles, but not the land," Warner said. "So how do we feed those people?"
"Going to be worse than that," Mason said. "Below the Littlescarp things are too wet. Up on the high plains, that hot wind that comes down from the desert is drying things out."
"Probably the source of some of our rain," Warner mused.
"Could be," Mason said. "But for sure it won't do the crops much good. I don't know what the climate's going to be like, but up in the high plains it's been the driest spring anyone can remember."
Gwen was studying the map on the far wall. "Could we abandon the high plains?"
"It is my land," Tylara said. "Mine and Rick's."
"It's nobody's land if there's nothing to eat," Rick said.
"Captain, you have to hold it anyway," Mason said. "Otherwise the Westmen will ride right across to the Littlescarp and come down into Drantos proper. I'd rather fight them up there where they don't have so much room to spread out."
"The legends are relatively clear," Gwen said. "The Westmen swept all the way to the gates of Rome during one of the times of turmoil. Possibly the last one."
"So we'll have to stop them. Only who commands?" Rick asked. "Me?"
"You can't," Elliot said. "The Shalnuksis are coming, and you've got to deal with them. And somebody's got to keep the surinomaz crop growing-"
"There's the University situation, too," Gwen said. "It really is getting serious."
"Tylara told me," Rick said.
"Yes, the minor clans see much booty and little danger," Tylara said.
"Which makes for sticky diplomacy with Mac Clallan Muir, and you'll be personally needed," Gwen said.
"More than that, Captain," Elliot said. "If you send a sizable army up into drought country, the logistics are going to get sticky. With Apelles and his clerks to help I can probably handle most of the administration, but somebody's got to enforce our decrees. There's nobody except you to stand up to the barons."
"Can Caradoc command?" Warner asked.
"I suppose he must go," Gwen said.
"Yes, he'll be needed out there, but he can't be commander," Rick said. "He hasn't enough rank yet. We can groom him for promotion after this. But it'll be a long campaign."
"Then you certainly cannot go," Gwen said.
"Yeah," Rick said. "But more than one empire has come apart because it couldn't solve the problem of nomad light cavalry. We've got better armor and equipment, but Murphy says there'll be a lot of Westmen. It'll take discipline to beat them."
"For a long war that requires discipline, count not on Drantos warriors," Tylara said. "Even those of Chelm."
"That's the problem. The Westmen won't fight until they've got an advantage. We can win every ten-day and get nowhere, but any defeat can be disaster," Rick said. At Manzikert the Byzantines won the day but at dusk became scattered. They were cut up in detail. After that Alp Arslan's Turks ravaged Asia Minor so thoroughly that when the Crusaders went through a generation later they found brambles growing in what had once been thriving cities.
"If you want disciplined troops, you need Romans," Gwen said. "You could ask Caesar for a legion or two. Oh-of course! There are only two men in Drantos who could command Romans. You and young Ganton. And if he leads Roman soldiers in a successful battle, then he really is eligible to become Caesar."
Tylara looked at Gwen in surprise, then nodded agreement. "So this is what you meant when you began. When you asked what we are to do with Wanax Ganton." She shook her head slowly. "To ask such a question is high treason-my lord, you have been with Ganton these past four ten-days. You must know better than we what we must do. As you always do."
"I don't know," Rick said. "But I don't see we've much choice. Can we put together a disciplined force without Romans?"
"Only if you lead it," Tylara said. The others nodded agreement.
"So we need Romans. Can anyone command except the Wanax?"
"Only Publius," Tylara said. "He might command both Romans and our bheromen." Rick winced, and Tylara nodded agreement. "Aye, he is quarrelsome and likes not 'barbarians.' And I think he will like even less this conceit of Ganton as Caesar."
"There's an understatement," Gwen said. "But you won't get Publius to come west anyway. He's got all he can do as Marselius's proconsul."
"I agree," Tylara said. "But though Romans will obey their officers, the bheromen will not follow Roman legates. And we cannot trust the defense of our western lands to Romans alone."
"What's the rest of it, Captain?" Warner asked. "You obviously thought this far already." Elliot gave Larry Warner a sour look, but still nodded agreement.
"First thing, if we've got Roman armies in the west, we want Dravan held by somebody trustworthy, which means Tylara."
There were murmurs of agreement.
They all agree. Why not? They won't be separated from their families. Well, Caradoc will. And Reznick's kids won't ever see him again. We didn't even ask them. Rick lifted a small bag onto the table. "These are Reznick's personal effects," he said. "Some of the stuff goes to his wives."
"What'll happen to them?" Warner asked.
"Dirdre wants to take the kids and g
o stay with Murphy," Rick said. He shrugged. "She thinks the kids will do better with their father's partner. There's nothing left for her back south, and she's not happy here."
"That's Honeypie," Warner said. "What about Marva?"
"She has no plans."
"They don't have any status here in Drantos," Gwen said. "Both would be welcome at the University, where it's not so important-"
"We'll ask Marva. Dirdre's pretty well decided," Rick said. He opened the bag. "The point is, most of his personal gear goes to Dirdre and Marva, but we decide who gets star weapons." He took out a.45 Colt automatic and opened the action. "Unless somebody objects, this goes to Tylara. She'll need it."
Rick hadn't expected any objections, and there weren't any. He slid it down the table. Mason caught it and handed it on to Tylara. She let it rest on the table in front of her.
"Lafe had another personal weapon," Rick said. "This Browning automatic. I think we ought to give it to Ganton." He worked the action a couple of times. "Nice piece. Elliot, do you think the troops will object?"
"I was just wondering about that, Captain," Elliot said. "No, I don't think so. It makes sense, the way you've got things set up. We can probably outdraw him anyway…"
"There is perhaps a better way," Tylara said. "Have the Ladies Dirdre and Marva give it to Wanax Ganton in the name of Lord Murphy. If he accepts it before the Council it will settle the question of their nobility-and by inference, that of all the consorts of starmen."
"He's sure not going to refuse," Rick said. "You don't mind this wholesale elevation of commoners?"
Tylara laughed. "What was I, except the daughter of Mac Clallan Muir, until I married the Eqeta of Chelm? Of all on Tran, I am least likely to object to giving widows their rights."
"All right. That's two problems done. One more. The University. I'll send some Drantos troops up- maybe their officers can become students. But I'm also going to ask Marselius for a cohort of Romans."
Everyone looked at Tylara. She spread her hands. "I like not legions coming west, and I like this no more. Romans in Tamaerthon! But I see the need, and I believe my father and my brother will also. But there may be trouble with the other clans."
"Maybe some of them would like to volunteer for the war," Mason said. "Come west with Caradoc."
"Why would they go?" Warner asked.
"Loot." Mason reached into his pocket and came out with a length of intricately plaited golden wire. "The Westmen carry everything they own, and most have some gold."
"That is well conceived," Tylara said. "It may be that no small number of landless ones will come." She laughed. "I think they will cause no problems in Chelm!"
They'd sure as hell better not, Rick thought.
"Might even settle some of them up there," Mason said. "There's lots of good land gone to ruin. Be more by the time the Westmen get done. Not much rain this year, but it's good land even so. Parts are a lot like Tamaerthon."
"That takes care of some of the hotheads," Warner said. "But what we really need is to unify Tamaerthon under Mac Clallan Muir."
"It will not be," Tylara said. "There is too much jealousy. Lord Rick has brought a crown to the clans, but he cannot give it to my father. Nor can he take it himself."
"Not and work with Ganton," Elliot agreed.
Another problem, Rick thought. Like a ticking time bomb. Cross that one when we come to it. "We are agreed, then?" he asked. "Then I'll send for the others." One meeting done, two to go.
25
The field stank, and from within it came strange sounds: snarls, wild birdsongs unlike any Rick had heard elsewhere; mysterious rustlings of leaves.
"I would go no closer, lord," Apelles said. The blue-robed priest gestured expansively. "This hill is safe, but closer the wild things might reach us. Lamils, grickirrer, even the birds. When they have been long within the madweed, they fear nothing, and even a scratch can be death."
"Necrotic products," Rick said. He took out his binoculars and examined the field of madweed. It seemed ringed with small rotting corpses; the lamils, which ate madweed pods and died in frenetic convulsions. O.D.'d on joy, one of the mercs said. The stench was overpowering even here, fifty meters from the field.
In front of him were hundreds of acres of madweed, the largest patch anyone in living memory had ever seen. Keeping that patch growing took work; left to itself, madweed grew until choked out by a tough, thorny vine that acted much like a predator, living on the decay of madweed and lamil alike until it produced a tangle of poisonous madweed and thorny vines impenetrable to anything larger than a rabbit. One of the major tasks of Tran farmers was to root out the madweed and destroy it with fire while being careful not to breathe the smoke.
Here they were required to grow it, and they didn't like the job. That was obvious: from Rick's hill he could see a dozen mounted men-at-arms watching the field, and he knew there were more nearby.
Rick scanned the field. Peasants wearing leather leggings and aprons and thick leather gloves moved carefully with machetes. They trimmed pathways through the plants. Behind the machete wielders came women and children with hoes to chop out the vines and other weeds. Behind each group of women and children were adolescents armed with spears. Despite the thick leather armor they moved carefully and alertly.
Rick dismounted and moved toward the field. Apelles reluctantly followed.
"Must we get so close?"
"Yes." The whole damned country is in an uproar over this stuff. I can at least see it up close. Rick contemplated the nearest plant. Three stems formed a triangle nearly ten feet on a side, and rose over six feet high. The ground inside and around the triangle was thickly overgrown with spotted, scaly creeper. There were two dead lamils inside the triangular mass. Another animal, about the size of an Earth rabbit and very much alive, peered at them from the tangled edge of the madweed plant. Its face wore an expression of complete stupidity, almost a cartoon of idiocy. One of Rick's troops had dubbed it "dumbbunny"; it wasn't hard to see why.
"Careful," Apelles whispered. He held his staff like a spear pointed toward the animal. "Back away, slowly."
The young priest was very serious. Rick slowly drew his pistol and slipped off the safety as he followed instructions. After a moment the dumbbunny wriggled out of sight into the creeper.
"The leaves are not yet strong and the seed pods not yet developed," Apelles said. "I doubt that the grickirrer would have attacked us. But one does not know, and when they are mad from chewing the pods, they fear nothing. Of those bitten by them, one of three dies in agony."
Rabies? Rick wondered. No Pasteur treatment here, and McCleve didn't know how to develop it. "Pretty hard on the harvest workers," Rick said.
Apelles nodded.
"Who are they?" Rick asked.
"Some are convicts promised a full pardon after two seasons," the priest said. "Others are landless, who have been promised fields of their own. And slaves purchasing their freedom."
"It can't be much fun."
"No, Lord. And even with leather greaves and leather aprons, we will lose some. That is why we need cavalry, to prevent them from running away."
"Be certain they know they'll be rewarded," Rick said. They reached their horses, and Rick mounted. "Give them plenty to eat. Tell them their families will be cared for if they are killed. And see that our promises are kept."
"Aye, lord," Apelles said. "We do this already."
"Yeah." Rick reined in and looked back over the fields. We reward them, but it still takes cavalry to keep them working, and I damned well don't blame them.
He rode back to the castle at a gallop.
Mad Bear of the Silver Wolf clan kept the old custom this morning. He rose well before dawn, when the Child of Fire and the Death Wind Bringer were still in the sky. They gave more than enough light to let him find the highest place near the camp. He climbed to the top of the rise, and there raised his lance to the east, west, south, and finally north from whence came cooling winds and
gentle rains. Then he kept watch until dawn.
He had not done this since before the Warriors' Meeting of the Silver Wolves judged that the clan should move east, into the Green Lands. If human enemies came, the four warriors who watched by night would be enough to give warning. If other enemies came, no warning or battle would save his people.
And perhaps there would be no demons. Certainly there could be none from the west, where the Death Wind already blew. Not even a demon could live in a land where no man could travel longer than his waterskins would last.
Now the families who had chosen him leader were camped farther east. They had not yet gone down through the Mouth of Rocks and into the Green Lands themselves, but the grass was no longer a brittle brown stubble underfoot. The horses could carry their riders when needed, and the babies no longer wailed all the day at their mother's dry breasts until they died. It might even be possible to take old Timusha along some days' journey farther instead of leaving her to die. She had great wisdom. Something she knew might save all of Mad Bear's people until they reached the Green Lands.
So Mad Bear walked out under the night sky and kept vigil. He hoped it would prove a wise use of the strength he would need for the fighting that awaited them in the Green Lands.
He was thirsty by the time the sun rose. He'd been much thirstier in days past, and compared to the ordeal of his initiation, this thirst was nothing. He watched as the Father Sun gave color back to the plains and drove away the Child and the Bringer and all the lesser stars. A light breeze puffed against his bare chest, bringing the scent of horses and dung fires and the sounds of the camp waking to the day. For a band which numbered no more than three bands of tents and thrice as many mounts, they made much noise. They would have to make less in the Green Lands, where they would have enemies again.
After the horses were led out to graze, Mad Bear saw Hinuta climbing up to him. He would not have admitted it to anyone save the Father Sun, but he was glad to see that he carried a waterskin.
"What news?" he asked, after drinking.
"A rider has come from the camp of the Two Waters, a half day north of us. He bears a message from their High Chief. Will we ride with him as far as the Mouth of Rocks? If we ride well together that far, he will let us go on with him until we reach the other Silver Wolves."
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