Ranger

by William Stacey

  "Something's happening," Lee said.

  Even without his binocular mode, Alex saw the blond man mount a kelpie. Another man on another animal joined him, this one holding a white flag. Both men rode toward the path up the gorge.

  "Well," said Alex, "maybe we're finally going to get some answers."

  The two Russians approached, their white flag hanging limp. Alex and Martinez stood waiting fifty meters from the top of the mesa so that the Russians couldn't spy upon their defensive positions.

  The two men halted their mounts, watching Alex and Martinez. The blond man raised both hands, showing they were empty. Up close, Alex now noted their uniforms were falling apart, patched together multiple times, often with whatever they could find. Neither man wore body armor, but both carried rifles slung over their backs—very strange rifles. Even stranger, both men wore swords on their belts, the same curved cavalry sabers the dark elves carried.

  The blond man, tall and rugged-looking with bright-blue eyes and a weathered visage, climbed down from his saddle. The second man, thinner, with long dark hair and a beard, also dismounted and took both reins. He watched Alex and Martinez as if expecting treachery. Both men moved with the confidence of seasoned warriors.

  "That's close enough," Alex said in English.

  The blond man considered Alex. "I'm… My English is not… strong," he said with a pronounced Russian accent.

  "Better than my Russian," Alex answered in Empire Common.

  The blond man smiled, exposing white teeth. "You speak excellent Fae Seelie," he said, switching to the other language. "I'm impressed. How? You've been here for what… days? How is this possible?"

  "Doesn't matter. Who are you?"

  The man nodded, his gaze cool and calculating. He glanced at Martinez, sizing him up, then peered past them to the lip of the gorge, where the others watched from behind cover. Everything about this man screamed professional soldier.

  "Asked you a question," Alex said, bringing his attention back on himself.

  The man smiled. His gaze now resting on Alex, he hesitated when he saw Witch-Bane on his hip. "Valentin Michaelovitch Volkov," he said. "Formerly a major in the Russian Federation Ground forces. Call me Valentin."

  "Valentin," Alex repeated. "Valentin Volkov. I don't speak Russian, but that means Wolf, doesn't it? You're the queen's new warlord."

  "Hardly. My men and I are more like the Janissaries of the Turkish Empire, slave mercenaries, but yes, I am Wolf. My friend is Senior Sergeant Dimitri Gosporov. You are American?"

  "Canadian, but my friend is American."

  The sound that came from Martinez's throat was more growl than greeting.

  "I'm Major Benoit. Call me Alex. This is First Sergeant Santiago Martinez. Call him First Sergeant Martinez."

  Valentin nodded. "Welcome to Faerum, Alex. Tell me. Is there still a Canada and America?"

  "We represent the North American Council, the largest group of organized survivors."

  A glimmer of loss flashed through Valentin's blue eyes. "I don't know what that is. Is… is there a Russian Federation, a Russia? Russian people?"

  Alex watched him in confusion. He's serious. "How long have you been here?"

  "Six years. Please… if you don't mind. Our families, our friends."

  "I'm sorry. I'm not aware of any Russian survivors in Boulder City. First Sergeant?"

  "No, sir," Martinez said. "We'd know. The council sent teams all over the world to bring survivors back. Most heard our nonstop high-frequency radio message, voice and Morse code, and contacted us. I've never heard of Russian survivors, but there was a dark-elf incursion in Russia, before the elves activated their genocide machine."

  "Kamchatka," said Valentin, his voice filled with sorrow. "Us. Our battalion was tasked by Main Directorate to set up the UN's quarantine zone. We had… prayed others survived, but even before we came here, there had been no radio communications with anyone." He glanced at the other man, Dimitri. The look of loss that passed between them was sincere. Alex was certain of that.

  "I'm sorry. You have my sympathies."

  "Thank you."

  "Valentin, what are you doing here? Why are you helping the same race that murdered most of humanity?"

  "I do what is necessary to keep those I love safe. We came here six years ago, the remnants of our battalion and those Russian civilians we could save."

  "How?"

  "Through a vast hole in the air, a rift. The same way you arrived."

  "Why?"

  "Not by choice. We were fleeing an active volcano, and the rift offered our only escape. So God wanted us to come here."

  "And you think God wants you to serve the dark elves?"

  Valentin shrugged. "I don’t presume to guess the will of the Almighty, but Queen Tuatha didn't offer us an alternative." The look in his blue eyes was one of profound sadness. "We do as we must."

  "What you've done is murder our friends," said Alex, his pity replaced now by the anger building within him. "An unprovoked attack."

  "No, what I did was the same thing soldiers have done since the dawn of time, followed orders and killed enemies. No different from you, Yankees."

  Alex tensed. "Told you once already," he said through bared teeth. "I'm Canadian. And you and I are very different."

  Dimitri must have seen something in Alex's face because he stepped forward. Martinez tensed. Valentin, his eyes never leaving Alex's, stopped his friend, placing a hand across his chest, and spoke to him in Russian. Dimitri calmed, although he still glared at Alex and Martinez. Martinez, standing at Alex's elbow, smiled, sending a shiver down Alex's spine. Dimitri's hand reached into his shirt pocket, and Martinez's hand drifted to the handle of the bayonet hanging upside down from his load-bearing vest.

  "Calm," Alex whispered in English.

  Martinez remained ramrod stiff, but he didn’t draw his weapon.

  Dimitri pulled a piece of paper from his pocket and held it out to Alex.

  "What is that?" Alex stared at the paper in Dimitri's hand.

  "Consider it a gesture of our good will," said Valentin. "It's the names of your soldiers, the men and women, including the injured, we saved at the redcap village. They are safe and in good health."

  Alex took the paper, opened it, and saw a list of names, dozens, written in English. He handed the list to Martinez. "What do you mean, 'saved at the redcap village'? What did you assholes do there?"

  "Only what was necessary and far less than the fae seelie would have done had we not been there. We did not slaughter the redcaps, although the princess wanted to. Your wounded are alive as well—at considerable risk to my people, I must add. Please do nothing that might draw attention to the fact we hold them. My fae masters are… less than kind."

  "You expect me to thank you?"

  "I don't expect you to do anything, but you could thank me."

  "I'll think about it. What do you mean, your 'fae masters'? Who's in charge?"

  "Not me. I serve the queen, but her daughter Crown Princess Kaladania commands this army. She permits me to arrange terms of your surrender."

  Martinez snorted in derision.

  "That isn't going to happen," Alex said. "Look around you, Valentin. You really want to risk an attack up that path?"

  "Not even a little bit, my Canadian friend. But there are less than a hundred of you. Nor do you have your marvelous battle suits. You hold the terrain, but we control the skies, magical wyvern-mounted air superiority—don't underestimate the elves."

  "Trust me. I don't."

  "You've wandered across a desert to reach this rock, for reasons I can't guess. But you can go no further. We don't have to attack you. We can wait you out. In a day or two, you'll run out of water, but we can send patrols for more. When your water is gone, you must accept terms. Why put your people through such suffering? I promise if you surrender, no harm will come to any of you. The queen needs warriors to fight for her."

  Alex's bark of laughter echoed through the
gorge. He shook his head, a mocking smile on his lips. "Valentin, you've sold out and now serve the queen who slaughtered your families, everyone you've ever known. Why should I trust anything you'd say?"

  Valentin's face went hard, and Alex saw the anger in his blue eyes. "Because you're now faced with the same hopeless choice I had. You can't stay. We won't let you go. Surrender before the evil bitch of a princess I serve orders us to slaughter you for her amusement—and don't think she won't."

  "Get back on your ugly-ass demon-horses and get off my mesa."

  Valentin sighed. "A pity, Alex. There are so few of us left, and we fight one another."

  "C'est la vie, comrade."

  Martinez snorted happily. Dimitri scowled.

  Valentin and his aide mounted their kelpies, facing down the steep gorge.

  Valentin looked over his shoulder. "You know where we'll be, my friend. Don't wait too long to change your mind."

  "Don’t break your neck on the way down," Alex called out.

  The Russians rode away. Once they were well out of earshot, Martinez said, "What do you think, sir?"

  "I think our friend Valentin is full of shit about one thing—he's not Russian Ground Forces. He's Spetsnaz, Special Forces, probably Alpha Group."

  "You sure?"

  "When he turned away to leave, he had a pistol stuffed in the small of his back. I only saw the handle, but it sure looked like a Serdyukov SR-1 21mm pistol. That's a special weapon, designed to fire a special bullet that penetrates Western body armor, and his assault rifle was an AN-94, a next-generation Russian weapon, like your Tac rifles. His buddy was carrying a Vintorez suppressed sniper rifle. They don't give that gear to regular army in Russia. But the big tell is he spoke English, not well but well enough. Most Russians don't just happen to speak English. Let's not underestimate them. They've already kicked our asses once. How about that list?"

  "Looks legit. More of our people survived the ambush than I thought. There are twenty-two names on the list—including the ones we left behind with the doc."

  "Not sure I'm happy about that."

  "Alive is always good."

  "Alive can be tortured or used to leverage us to do shit we don't want to do. On the other hand, he had us cold at the bridge and stopped shooting. I wouldn't have, had it been me. Maybe he's not such a good warlord after all."

  "Well, he's right on one thing, sir—the water."

  Alex slapped Martinez on the back and smiled. "No, he's not. There's water. More than we need. The problem is we're all out of dwarves. They've abandoned their city."

  "Shit. What do you want to do now?"

  "Stall for time. We have a gateway rig. We wait a few days until Liv can make another gateway. In the meantime, we search the dwarven city and find out where the dwarves went. Once we know, we make a gateway and leave Valentin and his friends sitting in the sun. If we're lucky, it'll be days before they realize we're gone. Let's hope they don't assault. We will need every bullet if we're going to search this world for dwarves."

  "What do you think?" Dimmi asked Valentin as they maneuvered their mounts down the gorge.

  Valentin glanced back over his shoulder and scowled. "They're playing games."

  "To what end? Where can they go? They're trapped."

  "Why are they up there, Dimmi? This is the question that worries me. Why come all this way just to head into the Char? They're up to something."

  "What do you plan to do?"

  "Let them get thirsty. Might not be so insufferably arrogant in a few days." Valentin yanked on his reins too tightly, and his mount became skittish, neighing loudly and threatening to rear before he could bring the beast back under control.

  "You okay, boss?"

  "Angry. I thought Canadians were supposed to be polite."

  "What about the princess?"

  Valentin peered at the ranks of the dark-elf army, the rising sun glinting from spear points. An uneasy feeling coursed through him. "Let's hope she doesn't get ideas. This is a bad place to attack." The moment he voiced the words, he knew he was talking nonsense. Crown Princess Kaladania would never sit around for days in the heat, waiting, when she could order others to die for her.

  43

  Leela paced back and forth in front of the strange dwarven machinery while Ylra and Veraxia—the oddest of couples—examined the equipment, trying to make sense of it. The ghostly images and voices continued to haunt her, increasing now. The voices were too soft to understand, but the tone was pleading. She ran her hands through her hair, certain she was going crazy, then she realized she was still wearing the Brace. She stared at the glove then pulled it from her hand. The whispers stopped, and the shadows didn't seem to move anymore. It was as if someone had flipped an off switch.

  "Guys," she yelled. "It's the Brace. I'm not crazy. It's… focusing something."

  "The Ancient One talisman," said Veraxia. "I'm not surprised. This machine, this city, resonates with inter-dimensional energy. Powerful magic has been used here. I'm not at all surprised that an Ancient One talisman is more attuned to such arcane energies. They were said to be not only creatures of pure magic but also dimensional travelers, more at home in the Red Ether than this world—or yours. There is a mystery here."

  "Where the dwarves went?" Leela asked.

  "That may not be the correct question," Veraxia answered. "A better question to ask is, ‘Have the dwarves left?’"

  "I don't understand."

  "I'm starting to," Ylra said, looking up from her examination of a control console. "I was one of two apprentice technomancers forced by the queen to run the Culling Machine, to calibrate it to cull manlings after Kargin's father died, after Kargin set him free. Because Kargin's father built the Culling Machine, we thought only he could duplicate its genius. But this machine is very similar. In fact, I see in it Kargin's own hand."

  "Kargin built another Culling Machine?" Leela asked in horror. "Why would he build another genocide machine?"

  "He'd never do that," insisted Ylra. "Nor did he build the first. His father did. Trust me. Kargin lives with the shame of his father's machine. But this machine is too like his father's Culling Machine. Similar but different. It's been… modified to do something other than cull life forces. I'm just… I'm not sure."

  "Yes, you are," said Veraxia with conviction. "I hear it in your voice. What do you fear?"

  Ylra sighed and pulled on her ponytail, as she did sometimes when emotional. "Fine. I think this machine is supposed to amplify the anti-magic effect of the red-star stone. If I'm right, it's engineered to cast its effect over the entire Char Desert."

  "Such a thing," said Veraxia in a deadly serious tone, "would alter the dynamics of magic in a most dangerous manner. All magical beings would be at risk, even those that only flew over the desert. It might even kill them. This is irresponsible even for dwarves. Are you certain?"

  "No," Ylra admitted. "I'm not certain of anything, but that's how it looks." She slammed her palms on the control console. "Grandmother's hairy tits, I wish Kargin were here. He'd know."

  "Your friend is not here. You are," said Veraxia.

  Ylra glared at her, her eyes tight with anger.

  "She's right," said Leela. "You may not be a full technomancer like Kargin, but you're more than capable. You helped Kargin build the Shatkur crystals and the gateway rigs. You can do this."

  Ylra moved from one control console to another, running her fingers over each dial and gauge. She nodded. "I think I have it right. This is a power coupler, and this is a nexus node." She pointed out different machines. "But that over there"—she indicated a brass construct the size of a car near the far end of the arena, where intermittent sparks popped between two antennae atop it—"is an open power node. No technomancer—certainly not Kargin—would design a machine with an open power node. It would contribute to feedback resonance and create instabilities, maybe with side effects."

  "What are you saying?" Leela asked.

  Now, Ylra's eyes shone wit
h excitement. "I'm saying someone else built this machine. Maybe they had access to Kargin and his father's blueprints, maybe even another apprentice technomancer. Whoever it was, they tried to create an anti-magic amplifier with the red-star stone—which they must have found after Kargin and Tlathia visited this city. But they made mistakes. When they activated the machine, instead of an anti-magic field—"

  "It shifted the innately anti-magic dwarven population somewhere… else," finished Veraxia. "Another dimension."

  Ylra nodded. "I think so. And they must still be alive. When you wear the Brace, they must… sense you or something. That's why they're trying to contact you, Leela. They're asking for help."

  Alex observed the dark-elf army. He had been correct earlier—they weren't preparing to attack but establishing a camp. The dark elves placed a blocking force in front of the gorge and patrolled around the mesa with their cavalry while the rest of the army set up tents. Valentin and his dark-elf masters had besieged them. Alex didn't blame them. He wouldn't have wanted to assault up the narrow gorge, either.

  That's fine, he mused. Besiege us, Valentin. In a few days, we'll be gone, and you can explain things to your dark-elf bosses, traitor. If we can find out where the dwarves went. Alex had sent teams scouring the dwarven city, looking for clues. So far, they had found nothing.

  Martinez joined him. The other man reached his hand up to the side of his helmet and activated his binocular vision then swore. "Shit. Another 82mm mortar? That makes three."

  "Four, actually. Pan right, thirty meters past the big green-and-orange tent. They've dug in another. I also saw at least one AGS-30 automatic grenade launcher. It's out of range, but if they can bring it forward…"

  Martinez groaned, swinging his arm in its socket to loosen his shoulder muscles. "I wish we had just one war rig right now."

  "If wishes were horses, even beggars would ride. At any rate, we've more than enough ammunition for one or two fights. They must know they'd lose half their army coming up here."

  "This Russian, Valentin, if he's telling the truth and they've been here six years, fighting for the dark elves, they can't have much ammo left—if any. Maybe those mortars are just for show, to spook us into surrendering."