by Henry Zou
Casualty percentage rates here were in the low forties. Elements of the Ninth and 16th Infantry, Seventh Light Horse and 22nd Lancers who had been deployed here were known as those who ‘drew the backend straw’ amongst comrades.
Roth stepped down into the trenches and his boots immediately settled into five centimetres of gluey scum. It was a thoroughly wretched mixture of mostly mud, precipitation, human waste and no small amount of blood. He waded through the trenches with Pradal close behind, following an escort of NCOs.
It was humid here, the moisture clinging to his sinuses like a steaming film. The temperature in the low thirties did not bode well for the corpses, some of which were stacked stiffly horizontal to the sandbags and flakboards that reinforced the trench walls.
Roth stepped carefully, resisting the temptation to bring a hand to his nose and mouth. It would not lend a good impression to the troops he would have to command. The inquisitor moved amongst them, giving them curt nods when they caught his eye. But they rarely did. Many of the Guardsmen sat blank, with the glazed stare of exhaustion and some measure of shell shock.
Altogether, they were some of the most demoralised soldiers Roth had ever encountered. They had shed their proud brown jackets, squatting about in breeches and braces. Most huddled on crates, muttering darkly and smoking. Many others still wore their rebreathers, as the threat of poison gas was constant.
It was perhaps a slight detail, but what concerned Roth the most was the way they carried their rifles. One could always discern the morale and training of a soldier by the way they carried their arms. Well-trained troops had good trigger discipline, fingers coiled loosely outside the guard ready to fire, or straight by their shoulders like spears. Others still, carried them close to their chests, cradled in their arms as if about to rear. The variations were many, but the intentions were the same – the guns were always ready to discharge at the enemy.
The men of the Magdalah defences settled on their lasguns like crutches, leaning on them with weary resignation. It seemed they had given up the thought of fighting, they just wanted the time to pass less painfully.
Roth crouched down next to a bearded soldier whittling sticks with a bayonet. He couldn’t tell what rank the man held, as his rank sash was soiled and bloodied beyond recognition. ‘Soldier, where can I find Colonel Paustus?’
The man didn’t respond. Roth repeated himself twice before he realised the man was deaf from shelling.
Captain Pradal caught the man’s attention by placing a hand on his bayonet. The man looked up and Captain Pradal signed up a deft series of field signals. Something in the order of ‘look for the colonel’.
The man spoke, his voice unconsciously loud. ‘The colonel is dead. Mortared yesterday. Major Arvust commands this section now. He should be in the comms station if he’s not dead already.’
Pradal signed his acknowledgment and Roth moved on, trying to step on the duckboard path laid over the worst of the collected filth.
They found Major Arvust in a hollowed section of the first-line trench, under an improvised command post. A vox set was mounted over a stack of ammunition pallets and a plastek groundsheet was pitched overhead to keep the rain from damaging the comms system. The major hunched over the arrays bay, staring blankly as a tabac stick melted down to grey ash in his hands.
Major Arvust was a Guard-lifer. Roth could tell by the set of his jaw and the way the index finger of his free hand was constantly flexed, as if coiled to squeeze over an invisible trigger. The man was rough-edged, his face handsome in that rugged, sun-battered way. Looking to be in his late forties, Roth knew a career in the Guard was severely ageing. Most likely the man was no more than mid-thirties.
‘Sir, Captain Pradal, military liaison of the Medina High Command, sir.’ Captain Pradal snapped a stiff salute.
The major’s eyes never left the vox array. He flung his hand up to his head in the most half-hearted salute short of being a fly swat and took a draw of his tabac.
‘Major General Cabales already voxed through your arrival. You and the inquisitor. What do you need here?’ Arvust said, not bothering to look at either of them.
‘To bolster command staff in this area. From what we’ve heard the casualties among officers have been appalling, sir,’ Pradal said.
The major shrugged. ‘Be my guest.’
Roth took one carefully placed step forwards. ‘Let’s cut to the point, major. This section is dying; I’ve never seen Guardsmen in such a state of disrepair. I don’t want to tread on your toes. Either you’ll help us reclaim this section, or you can leave.’
Startled by Roth’s candour, Major Arvust ashed his tabac and turned to regard Roth with a slow, appraising eye. Roth knew immediately that the major was a solid officer, a good navigator placed into a sinking ship.
‘I’ve tried. HQ staff want us to sit tight in a static defence. My hands are tied,’ the major said with resignation.
Roth squatted down in the mud next to Arvust and studied the officer’s notes and tactical spreadsheets. ‘My hands are not tied. I have authority to command the defences here as we see fit. Provided you wish to facilitate this arrangement.’
‘We’ll see.’ A genuine smile twitched at the corners of the major’s forlorn scowl. ‘If you mean to do what you mean to do, then I hope you have some sort of plan.’
‘Let’s see what we can hammer out,’ Roth said, tracing the grid map with his finger.
The Golias Estate was a four-storey villa daubed in powder-pink pigment. It was a villa of Kholpeshi design, taller than it was wide and severely asymmetrical. It teetered above a mezzanine gallery with long winding stairs that speared fifty metres to the commercial district below. Six hundred-odd steps was no easy climb, and Madeline had to fuss about her face with a kerchief, lest her sweat dampen her cosmetics. Perched so high up on the tiers of Mantilla, the Golias Estate was decidedly impressive with its haughty, antiquated air.
‘This place is marvellous!’ shouted Celeminé as she bounded up the steps. She was dressed in a petal frock of cream linen with a hooded scarf of soft wool, an outfit Madeline had personally selected. The inquisitor spun on her heels, the long tails of her scarf dancing with her. The heights did not seem to bother her at all.
But the heights bothered Madeline. The steps were narrow and of worn, uneven stone that spiralled down into the dizzying depths below. On stiletto-heeled buckle boots, she precariously edged up, pausing ever so briefly between each step. Like Celeminé, Madeline had dressed for the occasion in a chemise.
‘This Hiam Golias, what sort of character is he?’ Celeminé called down.
‘He’s a minor game piece. See these workshops and boutiques along the commercial galleries? He owns quite a few of them.’
‘Uh huh. And you know him how?’
‘We… have history,’ Madeline concluded and left it at that. It was no fault of her own that in the two times she had dealt with Master Golias, he had exuded a blasé, dispassionate charisma that she had not been able to resist. It was better to let Celeminé find out about Golias herself.
‘And how does the network operate?’
‘Well, the relic trade is a mix of enthusiasts. Historians, investors, collectors…’
‘Cultists?’ Celeminé added.
‘I suppose, if the right item was on offer. But it’s clandestine – don’t ask, don’t tell. Everything is based on word of mouth and reputation. If your dealings aren’t clean no one will operate with you.’
‘And what would that mean?’ Celeminé asked, bounding three or four steps closer in one leap.
‘You lose your network. Your source, the smugglers, the brokers, the clients. Everyone meshes together on a need-to-know basis. It’s a fraternity to keep away the undesirables.’
‘What do you mean by undesirables?’ asked Celeminé, although she already knew.
‘The Inquisitio
n of course,’ laughed Madeline.
The celebrations had already begun by the time they had arrived. Or perhaps the previous night’s festivities just hadn’t ended. Either way, Golias’s guests lounged about the antechamber. Many had the slack, sweaty faces of surge-heads and the rest were evidently drunk. They lazed about in various stages of undress, lost in a fugue of self-indulgence.
It was a shame, since the chamber itself was breathtakingly beautiful. Hand-woven Cantican rugs and cushions were strewn about the floor. The walls were red velvet, floral detailing picked out in gold thread. Exotic stuffed beasts, off-world felines and horned, hairy herbivores were locked in a stiff pantomime in the corners of the chamber, their out-stretched paws draped with lingerie. It was a beautiful house and a shame that it had to be despoiled by those with no appreciation for it, thought Madeline.
As they trotted past the antechamber, sleepy, whispery voices called out to them, yearning for them to join the writhing limbs. Others called out the Mantillan toast of the hour – ‘They’re coming!’
‘Go frag yourself,’ Celeminé muttered under her breath.
A porter in servant’s robes led them into the dining area. Divans were set around a marble table so that the guests could recline as they ate. On the table were platters of raw shellfish, aquatic delicacies and gelatinous desserts. Without a doubt, these were not the rations decreed by governing mandate.
‘I appreciate the hospitality, but we have already eaten. Would you be able to lead me to Master Golias?’ Madeline asked.
‘Master Golias is occupied at the moment. If you will help yourself to refreshments, he will attend to your needs as soon as he is able,’ the porter recited.
Tell him if he doesn’t drag Golias out here, this little birdie will start blasting a heavy-cal pistol into the ceiling,+ Celeminé whispered into her mind.
‘My client has an appointment with Master Golias and she is in a terrible hurry,’ Madeline interpreted smoothly.
‘Is my presence required?’
They all turned to see Hiam Golias stride out of an adjacent chamber, his house robes unashamedly open. Two females, aristocrats judging by their pouty cos-implant lips and heavy eye make-up, followed him guiltily, clad in boned corsets.
‘Master Golias. It is I, Professor de Medici, and this is Lady Felyce Celeminé.’
‘Of course, how could I forget such a delicious face!’ laughed Golias, stepping under the light of the chandeliers.
He was a distinguished gentleman in his late seventies who had aged immensely well, on account of his pampered lifestyle and no small amount of juvenat treatments. He was tall and broad, with chem-nourished muscles and a long mane of silver hair. His face was greasily confident if not handsome, with a tall, prominent forehead and a sternly set jaw. Although he was not a fighter, he had an aristocrat’s fascination with adventure and had tattooed the emblem of an obscure Guard regiment onto his abdominal muscles. Of course, Golias had never served, a man of his status did not, but it certainly sparked conversation with females.
‘I’m surprised you remember me, Master Golias,’ said Madeline. She found herself hating him yet flushed in the cheeks at the same time.
‘I’m surprised you believed I’d forget. And this, this is Felyce? She has a wonderful curve in the small of her back. If only all my prospective buyers were so athletic,’ Golias said. He appraised the girls as he would a fine piece of antiquity, or perhaps stock in an auction yard.
Revolting. Absolutely revolting.+
Madeline started, subconsciously putting a hand to her florid cheeks in embarrassment. She hadn’t intended her surface thoughts to be so obvious. Such transparent behaviour was quite beyond the bounds of etiquette.
It’s fine. I can see what you mean. If only I didn’t hate him for his confidence, his wealth, his tastes, his fine mane of hair…+
With a single clap of his hands, Golias dismissed his guests from the dining chamber. They drew away sheepishly to seek other vices.
‘Shall we find more private arrangements to conduct business?’ Celeminé said coyly, playing every bit into the persona that Golias wanted her to be.
‘That all depends, my lady, on what sort of business you would like to conduct,’ Golias laughed with an unsettling silkiness.
Roth and his officers worked long into the days and nights. There was much to be done. Battle plans were drawn and scrapped, timings were coordinated and many tabac stubs were collected in the ashtray. Roth had never realised the minute details that contributed to a strategy, even down to the order in which his men would march.
The triple suns never set on Kholpesh and their time was marked by the regularity of gas attacks.
Almost on the hour, the tin whistles would relay down the trenches. Men would tug goggled rebreathers out of musette bags, pressing cumbersome masks over their faces. Rolling banks of ochre and creeping tendrils of mustard would wash over the trench systems, billowing in a slight easterly. The gas was a dense respiratory irritant, and movement only worsened its effects. Instead the men would stand up on the firing steps or parapets, allowing the dense fumes to sink and settle. It happened so often that the men often continued to play cards or clean weapons, almost unperturbed.
Admittedly, Roth found it difficult to plan tactical strategy and discuss battle plans through the filmed lens and filtration hoses, but he managed. Roth managed because he had known his strategy the minute he laid eyes on the men under his command. To him, they were thoroughly demoralised Guardsmen, sitting about withering under constant enemy aggression. What was needed was an offensive, an all-out push into the enemy-held Magdalah hills. Roth would give them what the overly cautious HQ staff had denied them for so long. He’d try to give them the good fight. On a personal level, it was what Roth needed to occupy his mind while the Task Group went about their networking. It gave him purpose after the events on Cantica.
The fight itself would be an uphill battle. According to the readouts provided by Major Arvust, the geography, enemy disposition and their own resources did not leave them with many choices. The Archenemy were dug in amongst the foothills, roughly four hundred metres across no-man’s-land.
From his magnoculars Roth could spot the Ironclad’s large number of static armour: light tanks, tankettes, bombards and Basilisks, mostly hulled down in static firing pits. The silvery glint of their turrets buried under camo-netting resembled studs riveted into the soil. They would be hard to dislodge and the Ironclad would not expect the besieged Imperial forces to mount any form of counter-attack. It was an assumption that Roth intended to exploit to its fullest.
These vehicles had been devastatingly effective from their high vantage points but Arvust and Pradal firmly believed they would be vulnerable to a well organised infantry advance. Roth was inclined to agree if only by dint of their sheer confidence.
To this end, Roth had rallied the combined companies of the Seventh Light Horse and 22nd Lancers, leaving the Ninth and 16th infantry in reserve to hold the trenches. Numerically, with less than four hundred Guardsmen for the offensive, the numbers did not favour them. Yet these Guardsmen were the elite Cantican Horse Cavalry. The lancers especially were fighting men of no small repute. The Cantican Colonials lacked the heavy armour prevalent amongst other Guard formations, and the lancers bridged the gap between infantry and vehicle. While the primary role of the light horse was to escort the few precious tanks in the Cantican arsenal as mounted infantry, the lancers were the shock troops.
In particular, the lancers wore chest bandoleers clustered with fuse bombs. Mounted on nine-hundred kilogram destriers, the lancers would even charge headlong into enemy formations, leaving a trail of fuse bombs in their wake.
Unfortunately, having been relegated to trench warfare, the Cantican cavalry had parted with their steeds in Mantilla. Roth commandeered what horses he could. He voxed for the reacquisition of their steeds but was infor
med that of the several thousand well-trained horses left inside the city of Mantilla, hundreds had been slaughtered for food in order to fuel the aristocratic celebrations. Roth met this news with a series of choice expletives and very real threats to the well-being of the entire Mantillan upper class.
After his temper had simmered down, they re-adapted. The Magdalah offensive would become a mixed mounted infantry advance. Under the cover of rain, the Seventh and 22nd would storm the Magdalah foothills, each man loaded with as many explosive charges as he could carry. Their targets would be the ponderous beasts of static armour, the very same engines that had rained down tonnes of ammunition onto their lines for the past months. Lacking the proper supplies, many Guardsmen even resorted to creating their own improvised trench-fighting devices with what equipment they had at hand.
Given two days to prepare, the Canticans proved the inventiveness of Guardsmen in the art of dealing death. Stick grenades were defused and studded with nails to make hand clubs, knotted balls of rope were embedded with .68 calibre rounds to make studded flails. The simplest weapon Roth noticed during his final inspection was the sharpened entrenching tool. Even the thin metal plates supplied to reinforce firing steps in the trenches were hammered roughly into tin sheet breastplates. The process of industry and the preparation of war infused the Canticans with a vigour they had not felt since the beginning of the conflict.
The charge would be straightforward. It was a simple plan but was by no means flawless. But for the Guardsmen, it was better than waiting in the trenches for the unseen shell with their name on it.
Chapter Eighteen
The atrium ceiling captured a shaft of sunlight in a single slanting pillar of gold. Motes of light, soft and dancing, coalesced across the surface of the impluvium pond below it.
The indoor atrium garden of the Golias Estate was by no means large, but what it lacked in grandiose scale it far exceeded with Neo-Medinian design. The atrium was three times taller than it was wide, the soaring heights allowing for a cradling canopy of imported trees, mostly tall finger palms and fern-tailed fronds. Trellises of carnivorous flower vines and potted succulents in poisonous colours jostled for attention in a vivid display of off-world flora. To complete the interior, a stone bench and upright harp were arranged at an angle from the central pond, a pocket of ambience beneath the subtropical surroundings.
