Almost at once another sound came from the wall, a metallic chorus of catapult springs that had started their lives in the suspensions of heavy trucks releasing and sending paired levers slamming into their stops. Little threadlike blurs went streaking towards the trebuchet. The crew interrupted their celebrations to throw themselves flat as the four-foot darts from the springalds and scorpions came in; one struck the frame of the stone-thrower with a long tannnnnggg and flipped upward in pieces.
Nobody seemed to be hurt this time, but the artillery duel was producing a steady trickle of casualties. . presumably inside the walls too. He was only slightly less unhappy about that. He wanted those men on his side, or at least going back to their farms and workshops and helping to repair the damage. Every one killed or crippled on either side was a loss to Montival as well as to themselves and their kin.
“Hurrah!” Rudi said sourly. “We could do that for fifty years and not knock down those walls. Not to mention I’m bombarding one of my own bloody cities, technically speaking so-to-speak.”
“You could think of it as a rebellious city,” Mathilda said helpfully.
“No, for then I’d have to wonder what I’d done to make folk supposedly my subjects willing to fight me,” he said wryly. “Artos the First I may be-the Powers insist, it seems-but Artos the Tyrant I will not.”
“Pass the cider, Tyrant,” Fred said with a crooked grin; evidently he’d been watching the bombardment too. He went on:
“Both the pontoon bridges are finished, and we’ve got the east bank thoroughly invested. And the siege towers are coming along, for all the good it’ll do us. We could lose twenty thousand men trying to storm the walls. . and I’m not sure it would even work, at that. The Cutters have things sewn up tight in there, particularly the gates. What’s left of the US Army troops aren’t very enthusiastic, but. .”
Rudi grunted thoughtfully and nodded; the but was that in an all-out assault the defenders were almost certainly going to die if the attackers succeeded in taking the wall, pushed off the inner edge if nothing else. Which was a powerful motivator for well-trained troops who knew the way things worked.
“Surrender at the last moment is always. . problematic,” Rudi agreed.
Problematic, he thought, was a tactful way to put it. When warriors’ blood is up and they’re primed to kill, they tend to keep on doing it while anything alive is left before them. Turning your back is suicide, and those who’ve seen the elephant know it. So it’s kill or be killed.
They had excellent general intelligence about the state of things in the city. There was a trickle of deserters, men who let themselves down on ropes in the night, or just shed their armor and jumped into the river and swam for it. He’d interrogated some of them himself. . and caught one or two with the CUT’s taint on them. Forewarned, it was easy enough to spot.
“Then we’ll have to chance the scheme we came up with,” Rudi said. “We have the asset. . and the asset is people, who I’d rather not sacrifice unless I must. But without me. . and the Sword. . it will not work.”
Everyone looked unhappy at that; he was unhappy, though it made no difference. Mathilda looked positively mutinous. He raised his hands.
“No, my love and my Queen. There’s nobody I’d rather have by my side for a venture like this. . but it is a risk, and it would be a hard day for Órlaith if the dice came up snake eyes for both of us. Nor can we risk a long regency with her so young; and the kingdom so young itself. Though Father Ignatius would do a fine job as Regent, to be sure.”
“I would rather juggle rabid skunks,” the cleric said dryly, reaching for the next in the stack of State papers. “With respect. Your Majesty.”
“That’s one reason you would do it well, my friend, but I hope to spare you the nipping and the stench. So we’ll go with Fred’s plan.”
“Hey, don’t pin it on me! I just told you about the. . secret.”
Rudi nodded. “It needs the Sword, and only I can wield it.”
Ignatius said nothing more; he’d argued against Rudi’s scheme, then taken the High King’s decision as final and switched stride without stumbling to bend all his efforts to make it work. Fred Thurston grinned, and poured himself a glass from the jug of cider that hung in a rope sling, sweating through the coarse pottery-it was fermented just enough to make it safe to drink without boiling or chlorine.
“It’s almost worth missing the birth to have Virginia safe away from this and not able to argue with me,” he said. “This way I get to go along without sweating blood every minute.”
“Todenangst wasn’t all that safe,” Mathilda said soberly, then laid a hand on his arm when he winced. “Sorry, Fred. I know it must have been hard, hearing that Virginia was there and in danger, her and the baby, after you thought she was so well guarded.”
He snorted. “Rudi and I had a cussing contest. He only won because the Sword lets him speak more languages. I learned how to say motherfucking son of a BITCH in eight or nine. It sounds really odd in Elvish.” Then he looked towards the city. “I hope to hell this comes off for a whole raft of reasons.”
“This Cole Salander is a good man, and has his wits about him,” Rudi observed. “And a most powerful degree of motivation.”
“Yeah, I thought so too. I’m going to bump him up a few grades. Provided we all live through this. And your cousin Alyssa is even sharper, I’d say. Between them they may be able to pull it off.”
Rudi raised his glass; the cider cut the dust very satisfactorily, just sweetly acrid enough.
“I’ll drink to that,” he said. Then, overriding someone’s throat-clearing: “And yes, there’s enough for more. That’s what you were about to say, wasn’t it?”
Mathilda jerked in startlement; Ignatius kept writing; and Fred’s head whipped around. Rudi’s hand had already been going to the pitcher.
“No fair,” two soprano voices said in a disturbing almost-chorus. “You’ve got the Sword.”
The etiquette of the High Kingdom was quite flexible in the field-Rudi and Mathilda had made sure of that, having spent enough time in the Protectorate in their youth to see how you could get sewn up in ritual like a cross between plate armor and a cotte-hardie. Certain people had access without prior notice or challenge from the guards, first and foremost his companions on the Quest.
Some of those people could move very quietly, and liked to show off about it even now.
His half sisters Mary and Ritva were among both categories. Signe Havel’s daughters weren’t Bearkillers except by birth; in their teens they’d decided to live with their Aunt Astrid and uncle-by-marriage Alleyne Loring in Mithrilwood, what had once been Silver Falls State Park. That. .
Eccentric lady, Rudi thought charitably as he waved them to the table.
. . eccentric lady Astrid and Rudi’s elder half sister Eilir Mackenzie had founded the Dúnedain Rangers a few years after the Change, inspired by a series of books that Astrid had insisted on calling The Histories and which she’d been obsessed with even before the Change. She was dead now, in the spectacularly successful rescue of Fred’s mother and sisters and sister-in-law from Boise last year. The folk she’d founded were even more devoted to her martyred memory than they’d been to her charismatic person.
The Dúnedain specialized in what the ancient world had called special operations, well taught by experts in the early years. In peacetime they hunted bandits and man-killing beasts and escorted caravans and led expeditions to the dead cities. In time of war they were even more valuable, the more so as the High Kingdom fitted so neatly into their founding myths.
“Mae govannen, maethyr,” he said: Well-met, warriors.
“Mae govannen, Aran Raud, i ’wanur vîn,” they replied, putting their right palms on their hearts and bowing before they sat: Well-met, High King, our kinsman.
Among the Dúnedain eccentricities was using a language from the books. .
Pardon me, from The Histories, he thought.
. . though that had its pr
actical benefits since very few outside that fellowship could understand it. One of the many minor disturbing things about carrying the Sword was that it had made him fluent in that tongue as well. . including immense amounts of grammar and vocabulary, which the long-dead Englishman hadn’t invented but which fitted perfectly with the rest and included all the elements you’d expect in a living speech. In fact, he spoke two varieties of it, one of which felt more formal than the other; Ranger scribes had been pestering him for details ever since he got home.
Mary had been identical to her twin Ritva until she lost an eye and acquired an eye patch during the Quest. The two tall fair young women still looked very much alike in their mottled sage-green-brown Dúnedain field gear, with three blue eyes between them and the white Tree, seven stars and crown on the breasts of jerkins that had light mesh-mail riveted between two layers of soft leather.
“Help yourselves,” Rudi said. Raising his voice slightly. “And you two come in as well, so that I may punish you suitably for allowing these depraved Rangers to attempt a practical joke on the ineffable majesty of Artos the First, the shame and sorrow of it.”
The two women were accompanied by their husbands-though Ritva and Ian Kovalevsky hadn’t yet found time to formalize their obvious bond. Ingolf Vogeler was a big battered brown-haired and vastly experienced man in his thirties, originally from a remote part of the Midwest. Ian was younger, slighter, fair-haired, and hailed from the Peace River country of northern Drumheller, which he’d left to become a member of a red-coated band of mounted warriors who kept peace in the Dominions. That had put him in Ritva’s way as they all returned to Montival, and they’d hit it off. Or Ritva had decided she wanted him, which would amount to much the same thing.
The poor lad hadn’t a chance once Ritva set her sights on him; though to be sure he’s able and clever as well as comely, the which does not surprise me, she has high standards.
She’d told him once that she and Mary had thrown dice to see who got Ingolf, who Rudi considered one of the better all-round warriors he’d met and a good friend to boot. As well as the man who’d ridden into Sutterdown four very eventful years ago to tell Rudi that the Sword of the Lady awaited him in Nantucket. . and had done so with the Prophet’s killers on his trail.
I’m rich in real comrades, something a King can’t count on, from all I’ve heard and read. Which reminds me. .
“Ignatius, do you have that letter from Drumheller that came in with the morning courier?”
The cleric silently produced it. Ian’s ears had pricked up hopefully, and Rudi went on, sliding it over to him:
“Not from your family, Ian, but of interest still.”
He handed it to the younger man. The northerner’s pale brows went up. “Well, well! Indefinite detached duty as liaison, straight from the Deputy Commissioner Western District! That sort of. . regularizes things.”
From his looks, he’d been guilty about it too; they were a painfully law-abiding lot where he came from. Ian went on:
“I’d been worried about that. How did you manage it, Your Majesty? I wouldn’t have thought the Force, ah. .”
“Cared much what Artos the First desired? Yes, but they do care what the leaders of the Dominions want, and Drumheller may not wish to be part of the High Kingdom, but they do want good relations and they are our allies against the CUT. I merely wrote to Premier Mah politely asking a favor of her.”
“Thanks!” he and Ritva said simultaneously.
“You’re welcome. Just invite me to the handfasting. No need to inflict Rudi or Artos on any of the children. Now to business.”
He unfolded the map, and they went over it as dinner arrived. Since the army was now stationary, and newly come in a rich irrigated countryside that trusted the Montivallan forces to pay for what they ate, the food was better than usual; skewers of peppered grilled beef and onions, steamed cauliflower, fresh risen wheat bread, butter and the luxury of a green salad. After a while in the field you lusted after greenstuff the way a drunkard did for whiskey, not to mention needing the fiber to keep your guts in order.
“Mmmm,” Mary said, forking a piece of tomato. “Good thing we’ve been winning the battles-they didn’t have time to strip the countryside before we besieged the city, and we’re getting what the townies usually eat. I get so sick of trail mix and dog biscuit.”
Rudi’s fist slammed down on the table, making the plates jump. Everyone looked at him in surprise; he wasn’t much given to displays of temper.
“I’m tired of winning battles!” he said, controlling the flush of anger. “I’m tired of killing brave men whose only fault was to be born in the wrong place and to get levied from the plow! I want to win this bloody war, and get back to my proper work and my family and let everyone else do the same!”
He cleared his throat, feeling their eyes on him and feeling a bit self-conscious too.
“Sorry.”
Ingolf chuckled and spoke, a little unexpectedly-he was normally a little taciturn.
“No problem, Rudi. You’re too God-damned self-controlled for your own good, sometimes. Anyway I agree.”
Just then a snatch of marching song came through the open flap, in time to the tramp of boots:
“Dry your eyes-it’s no cause to weep
The weather is fine and the road isn’t steep
The world is still round, my compass is true
Each step is a step back to you
Each step is a step back to you.”
“And so do the troops,” he said.
Mary grinned and cocked her one eye at him with good-natured skepticism. “And what will you do, lover, when the reign of peace arrives?”
He shrugged. “Sleep a couple of years, and then try not to see anything more exciting than a field full of sheep eating grass and crapping where they please, ever again. You youngsters-”
“Hey, you’re only eight years older than I am!”
“Nine, but it feels longer. You youngsters don’t. . look, guys, you take the dipper to the bucket long enough, the bucket’s going to run dry. And you only get one bucketful per life. I’ve drunk a lot of dippers on a lot of hot days.”
Most of the people around the table looked blank; Rudi suddenly realized he was the third-oldest there, which was a bit of a shock. He was used to thinking of himself when the word “youngster” was thrown about.
I’m still a young man, he thought. But I’m not a heedless overgrown boy leaping into the blue anymore, that’s true. Ingolf is sounding less and less cynical and more and more wise when he says something like that.
He’d had warnings from the Powers, direct and blunt, that he wouldn’t make old bones, too. Every year spent warmaking was a waste he couldn’t afford.
I’ve been that boy, but now I’m a husband and a father. . and a King, to be sure.
Ignatius nodded slightly over his spare dinner of salad and bread, catching his monarch’s eyes and inclining his head towards Ingolf in silent agreement.
Rudi made a gesture of acknowledgment. “With luck, this will speed things up considerably. Now, here’s how we’re going to handle the timing. First the Rangers will-”
CHAPTER TEN
City of Boise
(formerly southern Idaho)
High Kingdom of Montival
(Formerly western North America)
June 25th, Change Year 26/2024 AD
The streets of Boise were dark. Cole Salander was used to that where he grew up-night simply was dark, unless there was a full moon-but normally the capital of the United States had gaslights along the main avenues, burning the by-product of the sewage plant. The incandescent mantles had seemed almost painfully bright to Cole the last time he’d been here, about a year ago. Now they were closed down, the iron posts just another hazard along the streets. Here and there a glimmer of lamp or candlelight showed, usually from behind shutters. The air was still and smelled of the smoke confined by the walls, and somehow of fear. In the distance, off to the east, a fla
re of light showed as a ball of napalm came over the wall, and there was a faint clanging as the fire-wagons headed towards the spot.
“I am completely insane,” Cole Salander said, sotto voce, striking along briskly with his right hand on the hilt of his short sword. “I volunteered for this. I rest my case.”
“Absolutely no dispute,” Alyssa answered in the same low tone, walking with a suitable humility, the (jiggered, non-locking) handcuffs on her wrists. “And I’m twice as absolutely insane as you are.”
He could sympathize. He certainly wouldn’t want to be a prisoner, particularly a woman, in this Cutter-controlled city. How thoroughly controlled had come as a bit of a shock to him-and, he thought, to Captain Wellman. Theoretically the Captain had come in to report to a general who was part of the Emergency Steering Committee about a possible intelligence asset; developing those was one of the things the Special Forces were for, after all. In point of fact there had been a red-robed High Seeker standing in the same room, arms crossed across his chest and shaven head gleaming. The general had slid his eyes in the man’s direction every few seconds, and there had been sweat on his forehead even though the building was cool. And a rayed sun pendant on the breast of his uniform.
Wellman had been silent for a long time when they came out of that; not that you expected an officer to be chatty with the enlisted men, but the Special Forces were a lot less stiff than the Regulars. He hadn’t doubted Cole’s cover story of prolonged flight and hiding; why should he? It was exactly what could have happened if they hadn’t run into that Mackenzie patrol, and he’d gotten a commendation and field-promotion to corporal out of it. Alyssa, complete with an excellent set of false papers prepared by her own side, had been his ticket into Boise; their story was that she’d talk to him and nobody else-it had produced a lot of embarrassing kidding. But the thought of how many things could have gone wrong along the way made him sweat even now.
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