by Rob Preece
Most of the ninja were still shooting into the towers, but several had gathered around her.
She picked out two she recognized as having good throwing arms and passed each of them one of her improvised bombs.
"Heave these through any openings you find big enough for them. Wait one second, no longer. And then throw in a grenade."
She signed and spoke the words. She could almost hear now. She wondered how long that would last. If she were right about the bombs she was making, things would get worse before they got better.
"The instant you throw the grenade, you'd better duck."
She took the third bomb herself.
* * * *
The guards in the tower she'd unsuccessfully attacked with the gunpowder barrel had gotten a swivel gun shifted.
As she lugged her three-gallon bomb toward them, one of the ninja stood to fire a crossbow—and caught a plum-sized shot directly on her chest.
The round cannon shot went through her without even being slowed and smashed into one of the towers that the ninja controlled, spreading its gory load against the stone walls.
The gun's crew went to work reloading and Ellie rushed the tower.
Three gallons of alcohol weigh a fair amount. She had to get close to be able to throw it.
One of the guards saw her coming and picked up a musket.
He was aiming it when her bomb hit the floor.
Released from the cracked wooden cask, the superheated alcohol vaporized instantly, surrounding everyone inside with an almost transparent haze of scalding alcohol steam.
Even from outside the tower, Ellie could feel the heat and smell the alcohol.
The guard inhaled two lungs full of superheated steam and screamed.
But not for long. She tossed in her last grenade and hit the stone floor.
The result wasn't a sharp bang like the gunpowder barrel. Instead, it made a woshing sound, but at a much lower pitch.
The burning alcohol sucked all of the oxygen from the air, instantly killed the guardsmen who were already in the tower and those who had gathered on the stairs leading up to the tower to attempt a dawn assault on the rooftop ninja.
Ellie followed the explosion inside and found nothing but death.
Chapter 20
Free Lubica went from a few bandits huddling in the mountains to a vibrant reality.
The remnants of the fortress garrison held out for three days before surrendering, but after the massacre in the towers, there had never been much doubt about the final outcome. More than two hundred guards had been killed in the bomb blasts. Another hundred men were badly burned.
Mark's soldiers had suffered heavy casualties, but they had managed to secure the city and, with the surrender of the citadel, the last holdouts were gradually surrounded and captured.
On Ellie's orders, Mark agreed to let the disarmed garrison march away, to Sergius. They promised not to take up arms against the Free Lubica Army, but Ellie knew how much that promise was worth. She also knew that they needed to get them out of the city. Outside, with Sergius, they were simply more soldiers to defeat. Inside, they could constitute a fifth column.
"What about you, Arnold?” she demanded after the last of the garrison troops, given only enough wagons to transport their wounded, left the city.
The baronet stood with her on the wall nearest the city gate. Beneath them, on one side, the defeated soldiers marched away. On the other side, inside the city walls, people were getting on with their lives. Farmers had brought harvest produce to markets. Merchants, who had huddled in locked shops for two days after the fall of the city, were coming out now, surveying the damage, and celebrating the fact that Mark had held the army in control and minimized looting.
They weren't there to loot the city, after all. They intended to live there, to create an example of Free Lubica that would make the rest of the country yearn to be liberated.
"What about me?” Arnold answered.
"I mean, we'll let you go too. Give us your word that you won't fight us and you can leave any time. I'll even let you keep your horse and sword."
He shook his head. “Sergius would denounce me as a traitor if I refuse to fight against you, Ellie. It's better if I stay here."
"But he'll call you a traitor if you stay as well."
Arnold's smile was way-cute. “I don't know about you, but I'd rather be a traitor where he can't reach me."
"Okay. I'm extending your parole to run of the city. Do you have any problems with that?"
"Thanks."
She heard what he didn't say. “You agree not to attempt escape?"
"Why would I want to escape this?” He gestured at the city. Not answering again, she noticed.
"I know you're honorable, Arnold, but I wasn't born yesterday. I need your word. No escapes.” Ellie didn't think he wanted to escape. She thought Kalfr's feelings accurately reflected Arnold's real sentiments about Sergius. But his honor would require him to serve the king he'd sworn his fealty to if she didn't make him promise.
"You have it.” He sounded both annoyed and relieved. “I won't try to escape."
"Good. Now let's see how a Free Lubica city works."
* * * *
"It's unfair.” The fat tradesman clenched his fist, then quickly unclenched it when he saw Ellie's eyes narrow. “Your new laws have bankrupted me."
She sighed. She'd been conducting this court for two solid days, missed her workouts, and was getting nothing but grief no matter what decision she finally reached.
"How are the new laws hurting you?"
"I borrowed against my contract for repair of the city wall to buy a crew of skilled stoneworkers. Now you've freed the slaves but you're trying to hold me to my contract. How am I supposed to pay the blood-sucking money-lender?"
"When did you buy the slaves?"
"Two weeks ago. After I won the contract. It says so right here. If you can read it."
Insulting your judge didn't strike Ellie as the most brilliant advocacy, but she wasn't used to being a judge so maybe she was wrong.
"The Lubica Free Army announced universal emancipation more than three months ago. You had adequate warning."
"Who would have thought a bunch of bandits could take a walled city? As it is, I'll be ruined. I'll be sold into slavery myself for debts that I had no intention of taking on."
"Free Lubica does not allow debtors to be sold into slavery. Read the laws on bankruptcy. You may need them. Next case."
Freeing the slaves had seemed like such an obvious decision. Fortunately, although slavery had been legal in Lubica, it wasn't widely practiced. There had been less than five hundred slaves in Harrison proper, and a couple hundred more working on the farms outside of town. Most of them were skilled workers who simply continued in their existing jobs, but working for a wage rather than subsistence.
Freedom of the press had appeared to backfire when an obvious Rissel agent arrived and set up a single sheet weekly broadsheet whose headlines universally decried the Free Lubica government as traitors and heretics who denied the holy role of the King as regent of god. They let him publish, but paid close attention to whom he met and where he got his money.
Still, trading ships arrived, farmers sold their harvests, and miners hauled in the products of their efforts.
In a series of raids, Ellie and Mark captured the remaining cities of Harrison province and expanded into both Rissel-occupied Lubica and southward, toward Sergius's heartland.
Better yet, royal lands combined with personal holdings by the Duke of Harrison added up to almost a third of the farmland. Another fifth had been tied up in monastery properties. Expropriation and a combination of land reform and judicious sales filled their coffers and created a strong base of peasants with a stake in the outcome of the war. Not that peasants had ever won a war in this dimension.
By ones and in small clumps, young men and women arrived, looking to join the Lubica Free Army, to protect their family's new properties, or si
mply to take a chance with an army that had accomplished the impossible and that didn't reserve all of the senior officer positions to those born into the nobility.
* * * *
"It isn't enough,” Mark announced after a detailed review of the troops and their training schedule.
The winter solstice had only recently passed and there were months of winter ahead of them, but already the snow lay thick and sooty on the city.
Their army had replaced its losses and now stood at about fifteen hundred soldiers. About half were veterans of their bandit days and the conquest of Harrison while the remainder were recruits with at least minimal training. They looked pretty good marching with muskets, something approximating a uniform, and a positive attitude. Ellie suspected a few of them could actually fight. But they needed more training, more experience if they were going to face the combined armies of the Rissel and Sergius in the spring.
After the review, Ellie and Mark had headed for the training fields themselves. Ellie had spent weeks just teaching Mark the first sword Kata. The man might be a tactical genius, but he had been almost worthless with a sword. After three months of practice, he wasn't worthless any more. He wouldn't cause any problems for a Dafed or a Sergius, but he wasn't likely to stab himself either.
"We need to do something,” Mark insisted.
She lowered her sword and leaned on it. Everyone knew that Sergius would march against them in the spring. But what else could they do in the meantime?
They'd already sent agents throughout the kingdom, to territories occupied by Sergius and those controlled by the Rissel. Those agents were both recruiting soldiers for their army and urging city leaders to declare their allegiance to Free Lubica.
Some of those agents had survived. But none of them had persuaded a single city to throw their support behind the rebellion. Lubica had seen peasant rebellions before. All had failed.
"We've got some money,” she reminded Mark, her breath gusting white steam in the cold air. “We can hire some mercenaries."
He shook his head. “We're outnumbered five to one, at least. What mercenary would want to put their head into that trap?"
"All right. But it doesn't matter how many troops they have. We've got enough to hold Harrison. And our ninja can stay outside the city and wage guerilla war on them. We could make it uncomfortable for them to hold the territory and spread the war behind their lines in territory they think is secure."
He nodded, clearly unconvinced. Still, he raised his sword—a copy of Ellie's katana—and started his way through the Kata.
She knocked the sword from his hand. “Don't even try a Kata if you aren't going to focus on it."
He squatted down to pick up his weapon but kept his eyes on her. Good. He was learning.
"I think we're reaching too far, Ellie. The people don't really understand the concept of a democracy. The closest thing they know are a few trading city-states. And they're more like renaissance Venice was in our dimension. You know, a plutocracy rather than a real democracy."
"We've been setting up schools."
Mark hoisted his sword, then sheathed it. “I know. But we don't have enough teachers. And most of those who know how to read are either priests or aristocrats and we can't really trust either of those."
Ellie drew and attacked the target dummy with the shomen overhead strike. Between being a judge, doing her share of the protective magics the mages cast to protect the city and warn it of any attack, and the raids she had led deep into Sergius-controlled Lubica, she hadn't had enough time to refine her martial arts. And she'd need every bit of that skill if they were going to have a chance.
"We need to attract more soldiers to our army. But for that, we need to be a little less abstract. We need a concrete alternative to Sergius,” Mark said. “There's an old cliché about how you can't beat something with nothing. We're against Sergius because he's an oathbreaker who doesn't care about the people, but nobody sees us putting forward a better candidate."
All of a sudden, Ellie realized where this was heading. “So you want to be king?"
Her first reaction was horror. But that was wrong. Mark had a good way with people and his military skills would come in handy. Coming from America, he wouldn't have the crazy ideas about kingship the locals seemed stuck with. Still, she hadn't known he was so ambitious.
She brought her sword down to her hip and looked at him.
He stared at her, reflecting her initial horror right back at her. “Me? King? You've got to be kidding. I'm already in this thing way over my head."
"Who else? I don't think the people are ready to follow Lart."
Mark drew his sword and pointed it at her chest. “We have one perfect candidate. You're the returned Witch Princess. You're the true heir to Mucius, last of the legitimate kings before the usurpers from Rissel forced themselves on Lubica. You've always been our real leader. You're the one who turned Lart and his gang from bandit thugs to an army. You're the one who stood against Sergius and demanded rights for the people. This is why your parents hid you away on our Earth. You've got to declare yourself the legitimate ruler. The true queen."
Ellie knocked away Mark's sword. She didn't think she was ambitious, but she'd been making waves ever since she'd arrived here. Could he be right? But reality saved her. No way.
"It would never work. First of all, I don't want to be Queen. Second, I'm a woman. This isn't America, you know. People here still think women are good for making babies and sewing up wounds.” And sex, but she didn't feel comfortable mentioning that to Mark.
He shrugged. “Tough. This isn't about what any of us want. It's about what Lubica needs from us. And so what if you're a woman? You're still the best fighter in our army."
Ellie couldn't help laughing. Of all the people she knew, only Mark would have such a blasé attitude toward her sex. This dimension wasn't very liberated but even on Earth, even in her father's dojo, she'd been aware of the subtle put-downs, the minor snubs—many of them probably unconscious on the part of the men or even women who tossed them out. Even in America, how many female Presidents had there been?
"Fencing skills aren't the most critical part of being a good king, Mark. I think what you have, the knowledge of history, understanding of people, sympathy for those less fortunate, those are more important."
Mark yanked off his helmet and resheathed his sword. “I'm an outsider, a foreigner. We need someone who can rally the people, not someone who's going to scare them away. Besides, I don't want it. I won't take it."
She removed her own helmet, and then stripped off the heavy armor she used for training.
Mark tried to look away, but she caught him staring at the relatively modest curves of her body. Which was unusual, unfamiliar. By the standards of Lubica, she was more man than woman. Even Arnold hadn't tried to kiss her again after that one moment.
But remembering Arnold gave her an idea. “Okay, so neither of us want to be King. What about Arnold?"
Mark looked startled. “As King?"
"He's honorable. Unlike Sergius, if he agreed to a parliament, he'd deliver. And the royal family and nobility are so inbred we could probably come up with some reason why he's the legitimate king."
"You're forgetting something, Ellie. He's still loyal to Sergius. Even if we made him king, his honor would require that his first official act be to abdicate."
Mark was right, but Ellie wasn't about to give up on her idea. She strode toward the two-story house that she'd transformed into her home, letting Mark tag along. “He'll come around. Sergius is going to declare him traitor. In this culture, fealty is a two-way street. When Sergius turns on Arnold, Arnold will be freed of his vows."
"Maybe.” Mark opened the door to her house and followed her inside. “But no matter what happens, Arnold won't be king. He has a living father, you know. Ranolf would be the legitimate heir."
Ellie ignored him. “And if you married Shalla or Jeneen, you'd be a prince. Not a bad deal."
"Shalla? You're kidding."
His reaction surprised her. She'd been certain he had a crush on one of those girls. He almost looked horrified.
He managed to gasp, “watch out,” but by then it was too late.
* * * *
She'd gotten too involved in listening to Mark, caring about his reactions. She had gotten careless.
They didn't catch her completely off-guard. Mark's look and gasp warned her.
She dropped her armor and helmet and reached for her katana. But she knew she was being too slow.
The two assassins sprang at her simultaneously, their swords already drawn.
She caught one with a kick to the gut, shoving him back and giving her space to draw her sword. She was going to die, but with luck, she could take one of these killers with her.
Her back crawled as it waited for the impact of the second assassin's sword. She forced down her reaction. When it happened, it would happen.
The assassin she'd kicked straightened, waved his sword in her direction, and charged.
She sidestepped, blocked, and caught him with the flat of her sword on the side of his head as he ran by.
He stumbled into the still body of his colleague and collapsed.
Ellie shifted her sword into high guard and looked around.
The killer she'd hit lay unconscious. Blood gushed from his partner where he'd been stabbed in the gut.
"What the—"
"You didn't think I'd just let them kill you, did you, Ellie?” Mark asked. He held his sword away from his body in a guard. Blood dripped from his sword and from a gash in his cheek.
"But—"
"I know. You're used to thinking of me as a nerd who might know something about tactics because I used to read a bunch of history books but who's worthless in a real fight. Hate to spoil those preconceptions.” He turned and headed for the door. “Oh, by the way, bring the one you knocked out by headquarters. I don't suppose we'll learn anything but we might as well question him."
"But Mark—"
But Mark was gone.
Ellie stared down at the corpse and the still breathing but unconscious body of the second assassin but her mind was on Mark. What had gotten him so steamed up? It took a lot longer than a couple of months to make a swordsman. Her father claimed it took twenty years and that she wasn't nearly there yet. So of course Mark was still a beginner. Not that he was completely incompetent, as he'd just proven, but nobody was going to mistake him for a really top-notch fencer.
