by Robert Adams
Looking up at Corbett from beneath brows still coal-black, the big-boned man asked bluntly, “Why no long- or intermediate-range transceivers, sir? Those handhelds will be useless for anything more than twenty miles away, even the new type.”
Corbett shrugged and sank onto his cot, the only other place to sit in the spartanly furnished tent. “For what purpose, Pat? We’re going to be burdened with a long enough mule train, as matters stand — the heavy weapons and their ammo, extra ammo for the rifles and the grenade launchers, rations, grain for the animals, medical supplies, those explosives and pyrotechnics, and so on. I just cannot see burdening another mule or two ponies with one of the big transceivers.”
“But what if you get into big trouble, sir?” MacBride continued. “Admittedly, your reinforced company has the firepower of a battalion, or better, but you still could run onto more than even that could handle. You’ve always told officer trainees to keep at least one ace up the sleeve. Where’s yours, sir?”
Corbett grinned wolfishly. “Throwing my own words back at me, eh, Pat? Well, never you worry, old friend, my aces are in place when needed, and you and this contingent down here are not one of them.
“Your orders, as I said back down the trail, are simple and direct to the point: retrieve every bit of material you can of those buried packloads, repack them and get them started south to Broomtown with a reasonable guard under command of a reliable officer of your choice, with Dr. Schiepficker as a supernumerary.
“You and the remainder of the troops are to stay up here with Harry Braun for a maximum time of three months, If I’m not back by then, I won’t be, ever.
“As regards Dr. Braun, he seems a changed man, but I am disinclined to accept him at face value. Watch him carefully, If he should snap back into his bad old ways, just recall that he has no authority of any description. You are the sole commander of this operation in my absence, Dr. Braun’s only function is that of explosives expert, aside from the fact that he and Dr. Schiepficker are expected to aid in evaluation of devices and parts for them that you get from under those rocks. If he causes you too much trouble, you’ll have written authority from me to either confine him or to shoot and kill him. Okay? And don’t worry about what the Council might say about it, Pat. David Sternheimer hates the doctors guts. If you have any personal qualms, just recall how Braun cold-bloodedly murdered Cabell, last year. He was a nephew of yours, wasn’t he?”
MacBride just nodded, his lips set in a grim line, a steely glint in the depths of his brown eyes.
Corbett went on, “I mentioned in passing those long, wormlike things. Well Schiepficker’s principal reason for being up here is to study them, so cooperate with him insofar as you can, without getting any men hurt or killed in the process. If he tells you he’s got to have one alive, tell him where to go and precisely what to do with himself when he gets there. There is simply no way that that could be done safely. Those creatures are strong, incredibly hard to kill, and as vicious as a rabid wolf; their jaws easily lop off fingers and toes and their bile is invariably septic. Oh, and don’t get any of that slimy mucus they’re covered with in your eyes, either; it seems akin to the secretions of poison toads.
“Well, Pat,” Corbett stood up. “You might as well have your gear brought into this tent. It’s where you’ll be living in my absence. My force will be moving fast and as lightly as is possible, all things considered, so a tent and a camp bed will be luxuries I can’t afford. There’s room enough for us both to sack in here tonight. Gumpner and the force and I’ll be off at dawn.”
* * *
More than a month before that morning when General Jay Corbett led his force out of the camp by the landslide, another, considerably larger mounted force had crossed the ill-defined border from the southernmost reaches of the Ahrmehnee stahn into the unmapped, unknown and sinister lands to the west. This column was as heterogeneous as was the condotta of Bili of Morguhn. Middle Kingdoms Freefighters rode with petty nobility of the Confederation, with fierce Ahrmehnee warriors on their bred-up mountain ponies, with Maidens of the Silver Lady in their antique-pattern armor.
The Maidens were led by a woman who had been one of the missing brahbehrnuh’s lieutenants, one Rehvkah, who bore the scars of the serious wounds she had taken during the great battle against the Muhkohee on the Tongue of Soormehlyun. The Freefighters followed two renowned officers of their own ilk, Captains Djeri Guhntuh and Pawl Raikuh, this last him who had commanded the famous Morguhn Company of Freefighters throughout the hotly fought campaigns in the duchies of Vawn and Morguhn, then into the bitter invasion of the southern portions of the Ahrmehnee stahn.
Because the dehrehbeh of the Behdrozyuhn Tribe of the Ahrmehnee had been at long last persuaded to stay at home and restore order and prosperity to his twice-invaded, twice-shattered, extensively fought-over tribal lands, those of his tribesmen who rode with this column and the several hundred Ahrmehnee warriors from other tribes had chosen several of the more experienced and famous of their number to act as the Ahrmehnee lieutenants for him who was leader of the entire column.
Two knights rode in the lead, followed closely by their bannermen and attendants, who led the sumpter mules which bore their arms and armor. They jogged along side by side, the elder forking an iron-gray gelding spotted on the rump with darker gray, the younger on a big red-bay mare. They were engaged in the very same argument that had occupied them from almost the moment they and their two units had joined at the Behdrozyuhn village nearly a week agone.
“And I says horse turds, Sir Geros!” growled the elder from the deep chest of his big-boned, thick-shouldered, rolling-muscled body. “Don’t matter diddly what kinda he-cow thang thet Pitzburker hung awn me, I’m jest whut I allus was: Big Djim Bohluh, the meanest, drinkin’est, cussin’est, fightin’est, fuckin’est soljuh the Army of the Confederation evuh had an —”
“Yes, you see, Sir Djim,” the younger, slenderer, flat-muscled man put in eagerly, “that’s just what I mean. You are an experienced soldier, a veteran of many years with the army. You know what orders to give and just when and how to give them. Me, I needs must be watched over and prompted by Pawl Raikuh, else I often would be lost in matters of a military nature; but you, now, you would know it all. That’s why I think you should be the paramount leader of this force, not I. Why can’t you agree?”
“And I’ll say ’er one more time, Sir Geros, suh,” Sir Djim said tiredly, a touch of exasperation in his voice. “I wuz a damn good sergeant . . . when I won’t drunk, I means. But I won’t never no of’ser, dint never wawnt to be one, won’t be one, now, neethuh. You say you younger nor me? Wal, the las’ ten, fifteen years I’s in the Reg’lars, ever dang of’ser I had ovah me was younger nor me, so you won’t be gettin’ no cherry, see.
“As for not knowin’ whatall to say or whin to say ’er, shitfire, man, you got all you need in thet Raikuh. Of’sers don’t give orders, mostly, Sir Geros, they tells they sergeants whatall they wawnts done and the sergeants gives the troops the friggin’ orders, thet’s SOP in eny dang army. If they good of’sers, they watches and listens and learns from they sergeants, that’s the way it allus been.
“You wants me to be one your sergeants. I’ll do er, Sir Geros, and happy as a hawg in shit, but I ain’t gonna take ovuh runnin’ thishere hashup, and you wastin’ Sacred Wind tryin’ to tawk me into it.
Farther back in the column, two other men rode side by side. These two were about of an age — a bit younger than Sir Djim, but considerably older than Sir Geros. They were alike too in other ways, some easily visible, others far less so. Both were Middle Kingdoms-born — though one was base and one of noble antecedents. Both had begun their soldiering as common troopers and clawed their way to command positions in the best tradition of their violent calling. Both had had the experience of fighting through the rebellion which had begun in Morguhn and ended in Vawn, then had served in the campaign against the Ahrmehnee which had followed hard on the heels of that rebellion.
> The words of old Sir Djim, often nearly shouted, had drifted back to where Raikuh and Guhntuh rode, Guhntuh shook his head, saying, “Pawl, if you have the influence you seem to have over Sir Geros, for love of Steel, ask him to lay off Sir Djim and resume his command. That old man has stated nothing less than the unadorned truth, by his lights, and no argument by Sir Geros is going to change his mind.
“Archduke Hahfos of Djohnz privily informed me that Sir Djim is at least sixty years old, possibly half a score more than that — no one save him really knows, it seems.”
Raikuh grinned. “Yes, I remember that story. Whilst Bohluh was a staff NCO with the Confederation Army headquarters at Goohm, he so ‘doctored’ the records as to slice fifteen to twenty years off his official age. Had he not been a Golden Cat man and thus easily remembered by the Undying High Lord Milo, he’d most likely have gotten clean away with it, too, and died in the ranks of old age.”
“Well,” stated Guhntuh, “I’ll say this truth to anyone who wants to know it: For a man of such advanced age, he is without question the strongest, most active and supple, most personally pugnacious oldster I’ve ever run across. He can fence my top weapons master into the ground with almost any weapon you care to name, and can and will drink you, me or anybody else under the table. He knows curses I’ve never heard and can curse for a good hour without repeating himself once. While I’ve never seen him really fight —”
“I have,” remarked Raikuh, nodding. “He was seconded to my Morguhn Company just before we stormed those undermined salients outside Vawnpolis, and for want of time to think of another posting for him, I assigned him to help to guard the then-bannennan, Sir Geros, at that time a sergeant. I recall only bits and snatches of that action, of course. After all, I was fighting, too, But my recollections of him were of cool, almost detached precision of a near-mechanical nature in his strokes and parries and thrusts with that broad, heavy shortsword, even while he used that big, wide shield to protect not himself but Sir Geros. He sustained some near-fatal hurts that day, and when he was wagoned back into the Duchy of Morguhn, I assumed I’d seen the last of him. Steel, but he must be tough, all whipcord and boiled leather!”
The other captain briefly showed an expanse of gapped, yellowed teeth. “He is that, right enough, colleague; belike the tens of thousands of gallons of spirits and ale and beer and wine he’s imbibed over the years have pickled him to the consistency of campaign pork, and it takes a good man to cut a chunk of that stuff with a razor-edged poleaxe. Moreover, for a gentleman of later years, Sir Djim has got a better nose for scenting out easy women than far many a younger man. He found at least one in every Ahrmehnee village we rode through on our way down here; swived them all right and proper, too, or so I’m told. The old boar even got into one of the three Moon Maidens what rode down with us. if you can credit trooper rumors, and the way their captain, that Rehvkah, looks at him sometimes, when she figgers nobody be watching her . . . ? Well, it leads a man to wonder why is all.”
“I’d keep a locked jaw on that, were I you,” warned Raikuh. “I’ve seen Moon Maidens fight, too, and every one of them is much younger and much faster than either you or me, friend.”
Guhntuh shrugged. “If that should ever come to pass, I’ll take my chances. I fear no mannish woman, no matter how fast or young. But the rumor I mentioned is none of my business, either, true enough. But I’ve had damnall success with the few convalescing Maidens who were at the Taishyuhn village over the last year or so; I’d come to the conclusion that they all welt man-hating lesbians.”
Raikuh’s head bobbed once in the affirmative. “Most seem of that peculiar persuasion, Djeri, but a few seem more normal. There is one of whom I can think that I know would tumble with Sir Geros did he but slightly crook one finger . . . but he hasn’t, to date. Nor do I think he’s bedded any of those hot-blooded Ahrmehnee girls who’ve been panting after him for so long. You know, sometimes I wonder and worry about him.”
Guhntuh grinned slyly. “Lahvoheetos? That’s Ehleen, ain’t it, Pawl? You know what lotsa them Ehleenees is like. Mebbe he’s just pining for a little boy’s bottom?”
“I think not,” said Raikuh in a tone that brooked no demur. “Before he was ennobled, Sir Geros and I were as close as two brothers. Were he bent in that direction, I would’ve known it long ago.”
“Mayhap his passion is war, fighting, killing,” suggested Guhntuh. “I’ve known men who would rather kill, see lifeblood flow out than eat drink, sleep or screw,”
Again Raikuh shook his head. “Not our Sir Geros. He’s at the base a very gentle man. He only turned to Steel when it became obvious to him that he’d die otherwise. He was heartsick for over a week after the Ahrmehnee and the rest of us executed all those captured cannibals in that village business of which I spoke yesterday; he knew it had to be done, but he could never have done it or ordered it done.
“No, I’ve come to the conclusion that he’s simply overshy, needs a really aggressive woman, probably. Given enough time, I’m sure he’ll find himself one.”
Captain Pawl Raikuh’s prescience was well known, but he rode completely unaware of just how accurate was his last sentence regarding the eventual seduction of Sir Geros Labvoheetos.
Chapter VIII
Lieutenant Kahndoot slapped right palm to left side of breastplate smartly — a Freefighter cavalry salute long ago adopted by all members of Bili of Morguhn’s condotta — as he and his inspecting entourage approached the section of wall she commanded this watch.
Many of the Moon Maidens had telepathic abilities, unknown and unutilized until their exposure to eastern mindspeakers. Kahndoot was one such, which had been one reason that Bili had wanted her as a lieutenant of the condotta.
He now mindspoke her, beaming, “All is well here, little sister?”
“Little happening up here, oversized brother,” she replied silently, with a touch of equally silent humor. “But down below, the enemy are scurrying hither and you like ants on an overturned hill. Another wagon train just arrived on the plain, along with two, maybe three hundreds of pikemen. Perhaps they mean to attack again. I hope so — things are deadly dull here.”
He smiled beaming back, “Yes, if they come again, we’ll just serve them another heaping helping of what we gave them last time. We have at least as many stones as they have men for us to squash with them. This is a variety of siege warfare that I can easily live with — no fear, no hunger or thirst, no worry about mines under the walls or towers, no enemy engines that can range the city, a competent garrison, along with a loyal and uncomplaining populace. Now, if only King Byruhn were still hale and about . . .”
“He shows no improvement, then?” she beamed. “I had begun to think that Pah-Elmuh and his Kleesahks could heal anyone of any injury.”
“They explained it all to me, little sister. What it all boils down to is that they cannot breach his involuntary mindshield, and therefore they cannot order his mind to begin the self-healing process, so he well may die.”
“And if he does,” probed Kahndoot, “you will accept the crown, brother Bili?”
“Oh, no, little sister, not me; I have lands and family and dependent folk far and far to the cast. I have no designs on this cold, stony little kingdom.”
“Then who, brother? It is said he is the last member of the royal house.”
“I know not,” BiIi admitted. “I suppose it will be up to the council — what’s now left of them in the wake of that stupid battle — to choose a new king. But it won’t be easy, for all of the nobility is related to King Byruhn in one way or another, though all about equally distant in relationship. There will surely be a long period of anarchy in the land before a strong man finally seizes control, and I neither want to nor intend to be here to see it. Immediately these Skohshuns are scotched, it’s me for home.”
She sighed audibly. “Would that I might say such, brother. But we Maidens, we now have no homes, no families to which to return; for us now, one strange place
is as good as another. We had hoped that here, after what Prince Byruhn had told us . . . but what good are the assurances, the promises of a dead man, or of one soon to be dead?”
Bili the Axe had no answer to that question.
* * *
Of nights when there were no other wounded to tend, when no childbirth was imminent to occupy him, Pah-Elmuh the Kleesahk took his rest in King Byruhn’s chamber, trying in every way he could to reach the monarch’s mind through that seemingly impenetrable mindshield, so that the huge body could have the opportunity of healing its hurts before the lack of proper food weakened it enough to die.
Near the rising of the old moon on a night, he lay supine on the pallet he had devised. After over an hour of vain mental probing of the comatose king, the hirsute humanoid was teetering upon the edge of sleep when the silent call came.
“Pah-Elmuh!” Bili’s powerful mindspeak was immediately recognizable to the Kleesabk. No other pure-blood human he ever had encountered had so strong a telepathic talent. “Pah-Elmuh, it is Rahksahnah. Her waters have broken and . . . it’s too early, isn’t it?”
“I come, Lord Champion,” Pah-Elmuh beamed. Sighing gustily, he arose from his pallet, once more examined the unconscious king, then strode toward the chamber door. He now was of a mind to regret that he had helped the Lady Rahksahnah to delude Bili as to just how far along her pregnancy was or had been at the time she insisted upon riding out to war, for this Lord Champion just now had more than enough worries cluttering his mind and this new one was pointless, needless. As he paced down the corridors in the direction of the suite of the Lord Champion, the massive Kleesahk mindcalled his two assistants.
Behind him, the soft beams of the risen moon bathed over the recumbent form of Byruhn, King of New Kuhmbuhluhn, lying like one of the carven images of his ancestors in the crypt buried in the bowels of King’s Rest Mountain, only the movements of his chest as he shallowly breathed showing that a spark of life still glowed within his body.
