by Chris Bunch
The new dogleg took the squadron over one of the casting dragon bases. He blasted instructions, and the dragons climbed, hoping to get above the fog. Hal dove down, counting as he went. His palms were quite sweaty when he broke out at less than a hundred feet, almost over the base.
It was pitch-black, but he could see the dragon tents were open, and empty.
So at least one flight had obeyed orders, and was in the air, heading for the target.
Hal went back upstairs, climbing and climbing, and then broke into a starry sky, and saw the circling bulk of dragons not a third of a league distant.
Hal flew to them, and blasted the follow-me signal.
He took a slightly adjusted compass course east.
Toward Yarkand.
He couldn't see anything below, and couldn't tell when the squadron crossed the lines into Roche territory.
Hal was navigating by compass, and by his time in the air.
There were no other dragons visible, at least, none flying above the fog.
At dawn, they were deep inside Roche.
Hal thought they were well ahead of schedule, and chanced diving down on a deserted lake, and watering his monsters.
They wanted to eat, rest, were denied, and blatted their unhappiness.
Hal paid no attention, and the squadron flew on, very high, to ease the strain on the beasts.
Then the sun burned the fog away, and they could see clearly, league after league below of yet-unravaged Roche countryside.
Every now and then, Hal saw, far below, someone spot the dragons, and panic.
Their interest wasn't in killing farmers or burning villages, though.
Two hours before midday, he saw his first dragon. It was a Sagene beast, and was flying slowly toward him, to the west. The dragon was favoring one wing, and there was only the flier on its back.
Hal flew close enough to see rips in its side, and the flier was swaying in the saddle.
He straightened, seeing Hal and recognizing the uniforms, waved, shouted something Hal couldn't make out.
They flew on.
Now the navigation was easy—they found the main east-west highway leading to Yarkand, and followed it, curving through low foothills.
Then a wide valley opened, and there was Yarkand.
It was a city under siege, not uncommon, but the first time this had happened only from the air.
Sagene and Derainian dragons swooped and dove around Yarkand, and Hal could just see buildings struck by the magicked boulders crash into ruins.
But the battle was not going to the casting dragons.
Someone had talked, or sorcery or spying had found the plan out, for, tearing at the Deraine and Sagene forces were half a hundred black dragons.
As Hal watched, two of them attacked a single Derainian, one ripping at its wing, the second, coming from above, locking a deathgrip on the dragon's neck.
The three monsters slammed together, then apart.
But the two blacks recovered, spinning, and climbed for the heights. The Derainian dragon, its neck flopping limply, rolled over on one wing, and fell toward the earth.
The Sagene and Derainian casting dragons were trying to fight back, but without training or experience.
A line of casting dragons was coming up on the center of the city. From above, black dragons dove down, shattering the formation. The already-cast pebbles became boulders, smashed here and there in the city's heart.
Other casting dragons were trying to flee to the west, skimming the rooftops.
That was enough for Hal.
He blew the attack, and the First Squadron's sixty dragons dove into battle.
The Roche fliers had been intent on the battle, and were hit by surprise.
Black dragons screeched, flopped in the sky like fledglings, and died, or their fliers were torn from their perches by dragon claws or shot out of the saddle by the Derainians.
Hal looked for a Roche who looked like a leader to take out, saw a dragon, just above him, and the gold-fringed banner on its carapace, kicked Storm into a climb, toward the monster's stomach.
He hesitated, still reluctant to kill a dragon, then aimed his crossbow at the dragon's side, and pulled the trigger.
The bolt shot home, just as Hal recognized the dragon's rider.
Ky Yasin.
Hal grimaced, angry that he hadn't held his fire until the better target presented itself.
Yasin's dragon keened, rolled, and Storm was on him, ripping with his fangs at the other monster's neck, horns stabbing upward as his talons dug on.
The black dragon recovered, stabbed with his horns at Storm, almost took him in the throat.
Hal had another bolt in the trough, aimed carefully, fired at Yasin, just as Yasin's arrow whipped past him.
Kailas missed, and Yasin jerked his reins to the side, and the black tucked and dove.
Storm, eager for the kill, ducked, almost tossing Hal, and dove after Yasin.
Ahead of them was a great square, and Roche soldiers were setting up catapults.
Yasin pulled out bare feet above the stones, and catapults sent long bolts aloft.
Hal, shouting at Storm, pulled the reins, again, and, reluctantly, Storm banked, flying down a boulevard, below building roofs.
Hal brought his dragon back up and back in a climbing bank, looked for Yasin, didn't see him.
He swore—he'd missed another chance at the bastard.
His mind reminded him that Yasin had also missed, but that didn't matter that much, with the blood dinning in his ears.
He climbed up to a thousand feet, saw the black dragons still attacking the Sagene and Derainian beasts who'd given up the attack and were trying to escape east, back toward the front.
Hal let Storm climb higher, blowing commands on his trumpet—break off… assemble on me… cover the other dragons.
Reluctantly, his squadron obeyed, going for height, then, as they saw targets, going in, sometimes from below, sometimes at the same height, against the Roche blacks.
It was grim, as the casting dragons fled, and Yasin's beasts, faster, less weight-burdened, savaged them.
The day wore on, dragons attacking, being attacked.
Hal saw, all too often, one of the casting dragons torn out of the skies and, worse, one of his own fighters.
He saw no sign of Yasin, guessed that his dragon had been wounded seriously enough to break off action.
Hal took Storm into a patch of cloud, brought him back and around, and surprised a black harrying a wounded casting dragon.
He aimed carefully, shot the Roche flier out of his saddle,
and the black broke off, flying back toward his base. Hal nodded in satisfaction—a dragon he didn't have to kill.
He heard a high scream that had become too familiar that day, saw two dragons clawing at each other, stabbing with their horns.
The Derainian black was a bit smaller than its enemy, and the Roche monster pulled away, and its long tail whipped the other.
Again the scream came from the Derainian beast, and now Hal recognized its flier was Farren Mariah.
Hard hit, Mariah's dragon dove for the ground, open farmland, with workers in the field.
Mariah tried to pull it up, but the dragon was too badly wounded.
Its wings flared, and it slammed in, hard, went limp.
Mariah sagged in his saddle, then bleared up.
The workers had recognized the Derainian uniform of the flier, and, waving scythes, hoes, were running toward Farren, shouting rage.
Farren pulled himself out of the saddle, drawing his sword. He stumbled, nearly fell, in shock.
There were at least a dozen farm workers running toward him, too many for even a warrior to deal with.
Hal's standing orders were to avoid suicidal acts and sentimental bosh.
What he was going to do was clearly in those categories.
He sent Storm spiraling down toward Mariah, and his motionless dragon.
Hal came
in behind the running workers, and Storm's talons slashed at them, and his tail whipped back, forth.
Then Storm was on the ground, and the graceful killing beast became a waddling behemoth.
"Get on!" Hal shouted.
Farren hesitated. A worker hurled a rock, hit Mariah in the chest.
Hal shot the man down, recocked his crossbow as Farren came back to himself a little, and stumbled toward the dragon.
Another farmer threw a spade, which narrowly missed Mariah, then the small man was beside Storm, weakly pulling himself up behind Kailas.
Hal shot down the nearest farmer, gigged Storm into motion. He ran ponderously forward, and there was a farmer in front of him, waving a scythe.
Storm trampled him, and his wings thrust down, and he was in the air.
A rock thumped Hal's leg, but he paid it no mind, bent over Storm, talking to him, getting him to climb.
Then there was a flashing shadow overhead, and a Roche black dragon dove on them, jaws widen.
Hal sent a bolt fairly blindly at the beast, and made one of the luckiest shots of his life.
The bolt thudded directly between the dragon's fangs, into his throat.
The Roche dragon screamed, its talons clawing at its mouth, then it rolled on its back and dove straight into the ground.
"I suppose we're even-out for my saving your ass back in Aude, then," Mariah said. "Sir."
"Damned right," Hal growled. "Now here, take this damned crossbow and keep the Roche off my ass."
The Derainian and Sagene dragons flew on, limping, exhausted, wounded.
Then, ahead, was the brown, mucky, bare ribbon that marked the front.
Derainian dragon flights were waiting, and Yasin's squadron, almost as weary as the Derainians, broke off, flying back into their own territory.
The casting dragons were escorted back to their fields and, eventually, the remnants of Hal's squadron found its base, and succor.
Someone helped Farren Mariah down.
"Are you all right?" Hal asked.
Mariah nodded.
Then Hal noticed tears in the man's eyes.
"There's no godsdamned reason I ought to feel this way about a godsdamned smelly beast," he said fiercely, and stamped away toward his tent.
Hal had no idea how much damage had been done to Yarkand, and didn't much care.
The day was an unmitigated disaster.
Forty casting dragons were lost, including both commanders of the flights. Three or four fliers managed to work their way to the lines afoot and across the lines.
Of the sixty dragons in Hal's squadron, twenty had been either smashed from the skies or were gravely wounded enough to be retired.
As usual, most of the casualties were the newest replacements, although three experienced fliers had gone down.
Hal tried not to think about the magnitude of the catastrophe, and busied himself with letters to the next of kin, pleas to Garadice, back in Deraine, for replacement dragons, requests for more fliers.
He was interrupted by a courier, with new orders.
Hal, and the survivors of the squadron, were to withdraw from combat and proceed, with all expediency, to Deraine and Rozen for further orders.
The command was signed by King Asir.
33
Hal went to Cantabri while the squadron packed, and asked him if he had any idea what was going on.
Lord Bab shook his head.
"Nary the slightest, and I'm not pleased to be losing you in the middle of this offensive, especially after we got our head handed us trying to level Yarkand.
"We need to come up with a counterstroke that'll destroy whatever triumph they're feeling, and you're generally a good source for that.
"All I've gotten about your recall to Deraine was a formal notification from the king, with no explanation, and I've learned when His Highness does something this abruptly you're wasting your time protesting his decision."
"True enough," Hal said. He thought of the disastrous invasion of Kalabas, which had been the king's great idea, and hid his wince.
"The only thing I can tell you is that King Asir has had some secret plan abubbling ever since the conference with the Sagene barons, something that's got little to do with this offensive," Cantabri said. "And he's not talking about it with anyone."
"Well," Hal said. "I guess I'm off. Try to have a nice war without me."
* * * *
"I suppose it's a measure of how things have improved," King Asir said, "that I am able to greet you openly, instead of having you snuck in through the back gate."
Hal made a wry face. "Possibly, sire. But I don't know about improvements, since everyone who hears of my summoning no doubt thinks it's because you want to tear an enormous strip off me for Yarkand."
"Oh dear," the King said in what appeared to be honest bewilderment. "That's not the case at all. The notion was entirely mine, and it was catastrophic enough that I certainly don't want anyone dwelling on it.
"I must start learning that repeating something generally leads to a debacle. Not to mention that your raid on Carcaor was mounted secretly and swiftly, and I'm afraid the commanders of my casting unit were rather lumberous, if there's such a word.
"Pour us both a drink, and I'll explain what my scheme is.
"I think it's good, but I've not exactly been the best strategist in this war, so I would honestly appreciate it if you tell me I'm once again playing the fool."
Hal hid his surprise at the king's honesty, went to a nearby sideboard, while the king walked to a large map, covered with a sheet of cloth.
Kailas hesitated. All of the spirits were in crystal containers, without labels.
"Oh," Asir said. "It's confusing when there's no markings on the chart, isn't it. The brandy is the second from left, the old brandy is third from left, and all the way on the right corner is the really old brandy, twenty years in the cask. Which I'll have, and so will you, for it's unlikely even a lord with elaborate properties and wealth will ever be able to find something that rare.
"Yet another thing the damned war has ruined.
"You might want to fill another glass with charged water to chase the alcohol with. There is a bit of a bite in the aftertaste."
Asir waited until Hal handed him a pair of glasses, then pulled the cover off the map.
There was no legend, but it was clearly part of Roche's north coast. There was a broad river delta, a city at its mouth.
Asir noted Hal's change of expression.
"No," he said. "I'm not proposing another river invasion. I learned my lesson at Kalabas.
"That is the River Pettau. It's a distance from the Zante, where you were a prisoner. It's in fact around the peninsula to the east of the Zante.
"The Pettau, we've discovered, is one of the main trading passages for Roche, to the eastern lands, which appear most unsettled.
"I'll make a confession here. It is one of the failings of my family that we have little interest in matters that don't concern Deraine, which is why we've never had much of a navy, and have made few explorations beyond the lands we have always dealt with.
"I might also add, speaking personally, that I have never had the slightest interest in war, thinking it a matter for men who are bloody-minded and like to dress strangely.
"That was utter stupidity on my part, and may account for the mistakes I've made. But I'd prefer not to dwell on that, but on the subject at hand: my, and Deraine's, ignorance about our world.
"That ignorance, once the war is over, will not be allowed to continue," Asir said grimly.
"Now, stare at that river, because, unless you think my plan is idiotic, you and your squadron will be committed to the area.
"Good brandy, is it not?"
Hal came back, realized he hadn't touched his snifter, and tasted the brandy. It was mellow fire, that went down easily, then warmed the throat with a gentle flame.
"Yes, sire," Hal said. "It's very good."
"Back to the subject
at hand. I desperately want peace, as quickly as possible, for three reasons. The first, of course, is that I'm losing the finest Derainians, and we'll be paying for these deaths for the rest of this century. Second is the same concern for Sagene. And the third might surprise you.
"That's my worry about Roche. I proposed the General Offensive because I hoped Queen Norcia and her damned barons would see the light, and sue for peace.
"Thus far, there's been no such light on the horizon.
"Roche is our enemy, but if the war continues, and we reduce the country to a wasteland, we'll have done ourselves a great disservice.
"If Roche falls into complete anarchy, then who knows what can happen to our own land?
"And what about invaders from the east, from beyond?
"Roche as a desert, or if it falls back into a web of feuding petty baronies, such as it was three hundred years ago, would be a catastrophe for everyone."
Hal had never thought of that. His mind growled at the concept—it would suit him fair well for Roche to be reduced to barrens. But he grudged the king might well be right, yet another reason he was glad soldiers stayed out of politics, if they had any brains.
"In the middle of the conference in Fovant," Asir continued, "it came to me that I had no other position in mind if the General Offensive failed… or succeeded too well.
"Quite suddenly I came up with one, and, in the final days of the conference, discussed it with Sagene's Council of Barons.
"They thought it a good idea, one which might accelerate victory and, best of all, one that wouldn't significantly increase the slaughter. At least, not for our side.
"When I returned here to Rozen, I very quietly began building small, light ships, almost boats, that can hold a platoon or so of infantrymen, and reconditioning and converting fishing boats. I also set about finding the men and women to man them, preferably people with knowledge of the Eastern Sea, which the Roche call the Wolda.
"Briefly, I propose to mount a blockade on Roche. Sagene's fleet will cover the Southern Sea, Deraine the north."
"What about land caravans from the east?" Hal said.
"I don't know, " Asir said. "I can theorize that they're not that important, since, before the war, Roche had few large trading cities along its eastern border.
