by David Weber
He paused for effect and gestured around at the temple.
“We are a great and rich city, but our strength has never rested in weapons or warlike preparations. Our strength has always been in our riches, and the love of our God, the one running from the other. Our treasury overflows with gold and silver. Certainly, this was offered to the God, but the God calls for sacrifices to serve His greater purposes, and now His temple’s walls fall while its treasury is fat. Surely, if a small portion of that treasury were offered to the Boman, they would leave us to plunder other cities. Then the Laborers of God could return to their accustomed duties, preventing the fall of the Works of God.”
“Oh, shit,” Roger said quietly.
“Yeah,” Pahner responded. “Actually, I’m surprised nobody suggested it before. Real surprised.”
“Why now?” the prince asked, thinking furiously.
“Probably somebody had a rush of inspiration. Maybe they’ve even made contact with the barbs already. Who knows?”
Gratar regarded the councilman with obvious disgust but signed official acceptance of his petition.
“Your statement is understandable and has merit,” he said, not sounding particularly as if he believed his own words. “However, what you suggest is too important to be decided in haste. It shall be considered by the full Council of the city and the temple.”
“Your Excellency,” the councilor interrupted in a terrible breach of protocol, “there’s scarcely time to consider. Surely we must quickly contact the barbarian host, lest they come upon us by surprise and the opportunity be lost.”
“You should learn your place, Grath Chain,” the priest-king retorted sharply. “Your place is to bring forward petitions and argue their merits. Mine is to choose the time and place for them to be debated. Do I make myself clear?”
“You do, Your Excellency,” the councilman agreed quickly, lowering his eyes and head in chagrin.
“The Hompag Rains are upon us,” Gratar continued, gesturing at the skies. “There is no way for the Boman host to move in the floods of the Hompag, and so we have until the rains pass and the ways dry to make our decision. We shall deal with this petition expeditiously, but without unseemly haste. Yet before that, I wonder if our visitors have anything to say upon this matter?”
The local ruler gestured at the humans standing under the sheltering portico, and the two Terrans barely managed to conceal their surprise. Gratar had obviously had at least some prior information about the petition and its content when he’d asked them to attend the ceremony, but he hadn’t shared that information with them. Or not fully, at any rate. His message had made it clear that he would want to hear their responses to any specific complaints the grain merchants raised, but it had never suggested that they might be required to respond to a formal petition to completely abandon military preparations! Certainly no one had suggested they would have to do so in an open forum before Gratar himself reached a decision, and so neither was prepared to make any public statement about it. It was a decidedly awkward situation, which the king seemed to have arranged specifically for their public humiliation.
Roger cleared his throat and stepped forward into the rain. The slight dais at the end of the temple made a satisfactory stage, and he’d been trained since birth in public speaking, but he usually had a script to work from and time to prepare his delivery. This time, he had neither, and he thought furiously for a moment about the proposal and its implications while he gave mental thanks to Eleanora O’Casey for drumming at least some history into his head. Then he looked at Chain and his supporters and smiled. Broadly.
“We have a saying in my country, Your Excellency. ‘Once you pay the Danegeld, you will never be rid of the Dane.’
“What does that mean? Like the history of your own home, beautiful, water-washed Diaspra, our history goes back for thousands of years. But unlike the peaceful history of your city, ours is a history drenched in blood. This invasion which is so unusual for you, which makes your skin dry in fear, would be no more than a single bad day in the distant history of my country. Many, many times we have had to face the depredations and devastation of barbarian invasions—so often that our priests once created special prayers for deliverance from specific barbarian tribes. Like the Danes.
“The Danes, like the Boman, were raiders from the North. But they came in lightning-fast boats along the seashore, not by land, and they swooped down upon the coastal villages, killing and enslaving the locals and despoiling their temples. They had particularly gruesome ways of butchering the priests, and mocked them as they died, for they had called upon their god and been greeted only with silence.
“So, in desperation, one of the lands they raided offered up its gold and silver objects, even the reliquaries which had been created to show its people’s love for their god, as Danegeld. As a bribe to the Danes, a desperate effort to buy immunity for their own land and people. Lords from all across their land contributed to the goods offered to the Danes in hopes that they might stay far from their shores.
“But their hopes failed. Instead, the Danes, finding that they were offered such tempting wealth without even a fight, moved in. They took lands about the area and became the permanent overlords and imposed their gods and their laws upon the people they’d conquered. All that society, that beautiful shining land of abbeys and monasteries, of towns and cities, fell into darkness and is forgotten. Of all their great works and art and beauty, only a few scattered remnants have come down to us over the years, preserved from the Danes. Preserved not by the Danegeld, but by the few lords who stood up to the Danes and defended their lands with the cold, keen steel of their swords rather than soft gold and silver and so preserved their people, their gods, and their relics.
“So if you wish to gather your own Danegeld, gather it well. But don’t expect to be rid of the Dane.”
Gratar considered the prince levelly for a moment, then turned back to the petitioners.
“This measure will be considered by the full Council in ten days. And this audience is now closed.”
With that, he turned away from the petitioners and the humans alike, and left the temple by a side entrance, followed by his guards.
“Captain,” Roger said as they watched the petitioners begin to file out of the temple, “you remember what I just said about intelligence and eavesdropping?”
“Julian’s pretty busy drilling the troops,” the captain replied thoughtfully as he pulled out a slice of bisti root.
“He couldn’t get in to see the councilmen, anyway,” Roger said. “But I know who can.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
“Seriously, Your Councilship,” Poertena said, leaning forward to point out the details of the design, “you can get a much better return from you ores. An’ it would be easy to do with you technology. I surprised you don’t do it already.”
The molecular circuitry fleabug slid down the armorer’s finger and across the desk to nestle into a crevice in the wood. It could hear every sound in the room, but detecting it would have required top-of-the-line modern sweeper technology. Only four more to do, Poertena thought.
“What’s in it for you?” the council member asked suspiciously.
“Well, we not goin’ to be back t’rough here. I’d t’ought about some cash up front.”
“I thought you couldn’t be bought,” the Mardukan grunted, leaning back and looking at the water-driven trip hammers in the drawing.
“Well, t’is isn’t a materials contract,” the armorer told him with a grin. “It off tee books.”
Of course, that wasn’t, unfortunately, the truth, but the thought of helping to subsidize the company’s coffers with bribes from the scummies he was bugging tickled the Pinopan’s sense of humor immensely.
“How’d you get Grath Chain bugged?” Roger asked as he watched Julian flipping through conversations. The intelligence AI searched for indexed terms, but sometimes a human could still pull a nugget it had missed out of the sand.
&n
bsp; “It wasn’t easy, Your Highness.” The intel NCO rubbed a blackened eye and winced. “He’s refusing to have anything to do with anyone associated with ‘the abominations.’ He’s not even letting most of the water priests in, but Denat finally suggested something that worked.”
“What?” Pahner asked. So far they hadn’t found anyone pulling Chain’s strings, but the puppet master was out there somewhere, and the captain wanted to find him. Badly.
“We used a woman, Sir. Or a brooder-male—whatever. One of the mahouts’ women.”
“Well, it must’ve worked,” Roger said, pointing at the conversation texts displayed on Julian’s pad. Chain was definitely discussing his antipathy for the humans. In fact, he’d discussed it in private with just about every member of the Council. But so far they’d found no meetings in which he was taking orders. Nor, for that matter, was his suggestion of bribing the Boman being well received. He was pitching it as an arrangement in which the church would pay the tribute, but all of his fellow merchants knew where the money would actually come from in the end.
“Huh,” Julian said, looking at the index list. “He’s been to solicit everyone on the Council except the priests and Gessram Kar.”
“Why not Kar?” O’Casey asked. Since the problem they faced was almost purely political, Pahner and Roger were leaning on her to untie whatever knot was threatening to strangle them. “He’s in our corner, but so is Welan Gor, and Chain visited him.”
“I’ve been thinking about that, Ma’am,” Julian said. “The only explanation I can come up with is that the communication must already have been made before our bugs came online. Either Chain got a firm no, or . . . not.”
“You mean that Kar could be conspiring against the throne?” Pahner asked.
“I submit that it’s a possibility we can’t afford to overlook, Sir,” the intel NCO replied.
“We actually seem to have two different things going on here,” the sergeant continued, pointing to the transcripts. “We have a debate taking place behind closed doors about the most effective method to deal with the Boman. Don’t get these locals wrong; they all seem to think that they’re doing the right thing. There are so many good intentions around here that you could mark a superskyway to Hell with them. Even Grath Chain is well intentioned, in his own—you should pardon the expression—scummy, self-centered, underhanded, devious, and treacherous sort of way. Oh, he’s also upset about some economic losses and his loss of privilege, but mostly he just wants things to be back to normal. That means putting him back into the catbird seat, of course, but it also means a return to a situation in which the Boman aren’t a threat to Diaspra, which isn’t exactly a ‘bad’ thing.”
“I’m perfectly willing to accept that all the parties involved have the best possible motives for everything they’re doing,” Roger told him. “Given the mess we’re in, though, what does that have to do with anything?”
“Maybe not a lot, Your Highness, but then there’s this other conversation going on in the shadows.”
“What other conversation?” O’Casey asked.
“Here’s an example. Welan Gor to Fan Pola. ‘I think Grath’s plan is an interference. We should use the humans for the Great Plan.’ The caps are mine to reflect the emphasis all of them seem to be placing on it,” Julian said.
“What’s the ‘Great Plan’?” Roger asked.
“That’s a very good question, Your Highness. There’s not much confusion about what it means among the five or six, Gessram Kar included, who apparently know about it. But if they ever get together to discuss the details of whatever it is, they haven’t done it anywhere that we have monitored.” Julian looked around the ring of puzzled and slightly worried faces. “Any ideas?”
“Have our bugs just missed it because of bad luck in their placement, or does there seem to be a particularly high level of security consciousness where this ‘Great Plan’ is involved?” O’Casey asked.
“Security consciousness is definitely high on this one,” the sergeant said promptly. “At one point, a council member wanted to discuss something peripheral to it with Gessram Kar, and Kar got very upset. He said that not only was the conversation finished, but that such discussions could only take place ‘at the times and places so designated.’ Security’s very tight on whatever it is. About the only thing I can tell you for sure is that whoever is orchestrating the ‘Great Plan’ is always called the ‘Creator’.”
“‘Creator’?” Roger repeated, then chuckled sourly. “Well, that certainly has a fine godlike ring to it, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, it does, and that means it’s probably something targeted at the hierarchy,” O’Casey said with a nod. “I’ll need to look at all the relevant conversations. Maybe I can pick something out.”
“What do we do about Chain?” Roger asked. “That was the original point of this meeting, if I remember correctly.”
“So far, he doesn’t appear to be a viable threat, Your Highness,” Pahner said. “Until he reaches the level of a viable threat, let’s not do anything which would foreclose any of our options.”
“Agreed,” Roger said. “I think we ought to talk to Gratar again, though. Get a feel for what he thinks.”
“About Grath Chain, or about the ‘Great Plan’?” O’Casey wondered.
“About Chain . . . and whether or not he realizes there’s anything else going on,” Pahner replied grimly.
Honal waved his hand, and the hornsman trumpeted the call which brought the unit of civan to a stop.
“Damn it, Sol Ta! You were supposed to open out!”
“We’re trying!” the infantry commander shouted back. “It’s not as easy as it looks!”
“Yeah? Well, you ought to try pulling a thousand civan to an unexpected stop before they stomp all over your infantry allies!”
“Enough!” Bogess shook his head as he trotted his own civan over to where the two leaders were arguing. “Enough,” he repeated more calmly. “It’s the timing, Honal. And training. That’s why we’re out here, in case you didn’t notice.”
“Oh, I’ve noticed, all right,” Honal said sharply, then drew a deep breath and waved over his shoulder at his troopers. “But my cavalry doesn’t need training in basic movement orders. So we’re going to cut back to just the minimum—myself and a company of about a hundred. Something that can stop unexpectedly if it has to without turning into this sort of confused mess . . . or walking on our allies.”
“Fine.” Bogess gave a handclap of agreement. “But this is important. I can see the humans’ point about a charge at the end, rather than the beginning, but can you keep your cavalry under control? Wait for the order?”
“Easily,” Honal grunted. “The ones who weren’t with us on the trek down from the mountains might have been a problem before we got hold of them, but not now. Those humans know what they’re talking about, and their tactics have never failed. As long as we can hold up our end, everything will be fine.”
“Good,” Sol Ta said. “But for that to happen, we have to get this maneuver right. And that means—”
“Back to training,” Bogess finished for him. “In the meantime, I’m going to see how it’s going with the recruit forces. If we’re having this much fun, you can just imagine what training them must be like!”
“On the square!”
Krindi Fain groaned and stumbled wearily to his feet. For three endless weeks from hell, they had assembled on this accursed square at the edge of the city and practiced the simple drills of how to stand and march as squads and platoons. Then they’d been issued their sticks in lieu of pikes and taught to march and stand with their sticks and shields. And then they’d learned more complex countermarches, company and battalion formations, and how to form and break. How to move at a trot with pike and shield in hand. How to do the approved Mardukan pikeman squats. How to live, eat, sleep, and defecate while carrying a pike and shield.
For every endless hour of each long Mardukan day, they’d trained for fifty m
inutes with a single ten-minute break. Then, at night, they’d been mercilessly hounded by the human demons into cleaning their encampment and gear. Finally, in the middle of the night, they’d been permitted to get some rest . . . only to be awakened before dawn and chivvied back onto the square.
He gave Bail Crom a hand to his feet.
“Don’t worry, Bail,” the squad leader said with mock cheerfulness. “Just think—a couple more weeks of live pike training, and then, when it’s all over, we get to fight the Boman.”
“Good,” the former tinker grumped. “At least I’ll get to kill something.”
“We’re going to kill something anyway,” Erkum Pol said nervously.
“What do you mean?” Fain asked as he led them to their places. If you didn’t make it to your mark before the humans, there was punishment drill: trotting around the square with lead weights on your pike and shield while chanting “I am a slow-ass! I want to kill my buddies!”
“Somebody told me we gotta kill something to graduate,” Pol said sadly.
“What?” Bail Crom asked. “A civan? A turom?”
“No,” the simpleminded private said with an expression of great woe. “We have to kill a member of our family.”
“What?” Fain stared at him. “Who told you that?”
“Somebody,” the private said. “One of the other squad leaders.”
“From our platoon? Who?”
“No,” Pol said. “Just . . . somebody.”
The squad leader looked around the mass of troops on the square and shook his head in a gesture he’d picked up from their human instructors.
“Well, I don’t care if it was another squad leader, or Sergeant Julian, or Colonel MacClintock himself. We are not going to have to kill a member of our own family.”
He reached his position just as Corporal Beckley came up to take over the formation.
“Are you sure?” the private asked, his confused face still a mask of woe.
