The Order War

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  “If they drop rocks, doesn’t that block the way for them later?”

  “They just blow up the rocks. It takes a while and slows them down, but they can do it. We can’t.”

  Justen nodded. He hadn’t fully considered all the things that a Chaos Wizard could do in mountain warfare.

  Two riders galloped across the valley, raising thick dust that hung behind them like a red fog. Justen squinted to make out what was happening as the scouts reined in near the middle of the Sarronnese forces, two parallel lines of foot levies in roughly parallel lines perpendicular to the road, reinforced in the center by the horse troopers. On each flank were additional cavalry, carefully positioned behind copses of scraggly trees.

  “Over there!” Firbek stretched in his stirrups and pointed toward a taller hillock in the midst of the Sarronnese forces. “We need to set up there. Get that cart moving!”

  The marine ranker on the cart snapped the traces, and the cart groaned past the inn and toward the hillock pointed out by Firbek.

  A thin, bearded man-broom in hand-and a gray-haired woman watched silently from the doorway of the inn.

  “Why don’t they leave? There’s going to be a fight here.” Justen looked back toward the center of the Sarronnese troops, where Gunnar, Dyessa, and the bulk of the reinforcements had joined up.

  “I don’t know. Everyone was told to leave. Where there’s a battle, the Whites bum everything to ashes.”

  The battle ensign dipped twice, and three short blasts from a trumpet followed.

  “Strike two! Strike two!” Yonada stood in the stirrups and gestured. “Form up.” She lowered her voice and turned to Justen, pointing to the hillock where Firbek stood amid the brush and red rocks. “I’ll see you there later.”

  Justen watched as Yonada’s squads peeled away. He rode alone toward the marines, feeling almost useless… and somehow vaguely regretful that the friendly Yonada was gone. And he wondered why he was riding into a battle for no really good reason-just to observe? His fingers brushed the black staff, and he smiled faintly at the warmth of the order residing there.

  What was he supposed to discover? A new weapon, as if he were some second Dorrin? And who knew whether any of the stories about the great Dorrin were really true? Justen hardly felt comparable to the venerated ancient smith. At least Gunnar could ride the breezes and tell the Sarronnese leaders where the enemy forces were.

  Justen tried to send his perceptions out beyond the valley, but he could sense nothing past a few hundred cubits. He nudged the gray, who did not move until he knocked his booted heels into her flanks. Then she ambled toward the hillock where Firbek wrestled the rocket launching rack off the cart. Justen dug his heels into her flanks again, and she lurched into a trot, forcing him to grab the edge of the saddle and hope his staff didn’t bounce out of the lance holder.

  Great engineers didn’t have to hold onto saddles, did they? Justen hung on until the gray slowed down to a walk at the beginning of the hill’s upslope. He reined in near the top and looked eastward.

  What seemed like a stream of white-coated figures issued from the defile at the far end of Middlevale and poured into the flat plain.

  The Sarronnese trumpet sounded again, and the foot soldiers dropped to a kneeling position behind hastily heaped piles of earth and sand, holding long pikes ready to lift.

  The blue cavalry dropped blindfolds over their mounts’ eyes.

  The White forces marched forward several hundred kays, then halted-out of bow range.

  Hssttt!

  A firebolt flared from amid the white banners waving behind a cluster of head-high, pink-gray boulders to the right of the east entrance to Middlevale.

  The gray under Justen whimpered and sidestepped, and the engineer urged her partly back down the hillock, where he dismounted and tied her to the same scrub oak as Firbek’s mount. Then he scrambled back up the rocket emplacement.

  Another firebolt flashed from the area of the white banners, dropping just short of the front line of the Sarronnese. Even before it had hissed into a blackened spot on the sandy earth, another fireball arced into the Sarronnese lines.

  A scream echoed across Middlevale.

  A heavy roll of drums thundered from the east end of the valley, and the White foot and lancers began to move forward as another fireball smashed into the left side of the thin Sarronnese line.

  “Rockets ready!” snapped Firbek. Justen frowned. The Whites were well beyond the normal range of the ship-to-ship rockets. He edged up to Firbek. “The rockets aren’t accurate at that distance.”

  “Strike the first!” ordered Firbek, not even looking at Justen.

  Whhstt! After heading straight from the small launcher, the rocket neared the White lines, then curved to the right, past the soldier in gray, and exploded in a gout of flame against a boulder.

  “Another one!” snapped Firbek.

  The two marines lifted another rocket into the black iron tube.

  “It’s too far,” Justen said.

  . “We can’t get any closer.” Firbek turned toward the woman marine with the striker. “Strike it.” Whhssttt!

  The second rocket flared straight toward the Iron Guard, then twisted upward, exploding in a shower of iron fragments and flame.

  The White lancers rode forward at an even pace, carrying white-bronze lances with tips that glistened with fire. Justen scanned the lines, noting that the Whites outnumbered the Sarronnese almost two to one.

  Another roll of drums, and the White lancers charged. A staccato trumpet command warbled from the Sarronnese side, and the pikes came up, except at the far left flank. The lancers peeled away from the pikes, all but those directly in front of the marine position, where nearly a full squad angled through and began cutting the pike-holders down from behind. The left flank began to crumple.

  “There. Lower the launcher!” Firbek jabbed toward the White lancers,

  Hhhsttt! The firebolt exploded in front of the launcher, and one of the marines flared into a charred pillar, toppling forward on the crest of the hill.

  Ignoring the sickly odor of burnt meat, Justen grabbed the left-hand wheel on the launcher and began to crank while the woman marine slipped another rocket into place. “Strike it!”

  Justen released his hold on the wheel and concentrated, trying to sense the air around the rocket, but the missile curved into the stony ground and cartwheeled into a fir, turning the tree into an instant torch.

  Hhhssttt! A firebolt flared from the higher stretch of road on the far side of the valley and washed across the leading row of the Sarronnese to the left of the gap in the line so quickly that none of the four even screamed as they turned into dark ash.

  “Do something, Engineer!” bellowed Firbek. “Cover!” ordered Dyessa.

  The Sarronnese scattered for boulders, for low, rocky rises in the uneven valley floor, even for the few tree trunks. The Iron Guard horse formed up into strike squads at the far end of the canyon.

  Justen glanced around, searching for Gunnar, but his brother was nowhere to be seen.

  “Another rocket!” demanded Firbek. Justen and the remaining marine adjusted the launching frame, then dropped behind it as a firebolt washed harmlessly over the black iron.

  As soon as the flame subsided, Justen lowered the launcher until it was pointing directly at the nearest lancers, then forced himself into a semblance of detached calmness. This time, he concentrated on the rocket itself, trying to add a touch more order to the casing, a sense of smoothness, a sense of direction. He continued to pour order into the metal even as the marine touched off the fuse.

  Crrrummpp! The fourth rocket exploded where it had been aimed-right in the midst of the lead squad of the White lancers-casting black iron shards into dozens of bodies. The White lancers, even those barely touched by the shrapnel, flared into points of flame.

  A wave of whiteness flowed back from the destruction and swept around Justen. He staggered and put a hand out to the launcher frame to steady
himself.

  “You all right?” the marine asked. Justen forced a nod against the internal chaos and straightened up.

  Of the entire White lancer squad, only a single figure remained, and it wheeled its mount and galloped back toward the swelling lines of soldiers in dark gray: the Iron Guard, waiting like a storm on the horizon of the Eastern Ocean. Even on the left flank, the White lancers had peeled away, although Justen had not seen why.

  For a long moment, the battlefield seemed frozen, motionless.

  Then another set of drum-rolls rumbled from the east, and the white-clad foot began to march forward, away from the Iron Guard, almost like breakers preceding a wave,

  “Another rocket!” ordered Firbek.

  Justen again smoothed the flows and forces around the rocket and then watched as a whole section of White forces flashed into flame with the missile’s explosion. But the white-clad wave continued onward, rolling toward them even as Justen struggled to remain upright against the white backlash.

  “Strike!”

  Whhhssttt…

  “… strike…”

  Whhssttt…

  “Strike… strike…”

  How long the marine lit off rockets and Justen smoothed their path to destruction and chaos, the engineer was unsure, only that the pattern ended.

  “Ser! We have only a handful of rockets left.”

  Justen studied the valley, noting the greasy black splotches across the entire eastern end and the seemingly endless lines of white and gray troops marshaled below the red rocks.

  The sun hung barely above the western lip of the canyon valley. Had that much time passed?

  A double drum-roll rumbled into the late afternoon, and now the gray-clad Iron Guard foot marched forward toward the concentrated knot of Sarronnese foot, backed with the remaining archers and perhaps two squads of cavalry.

  The Sarronnese held only the two central hillocks and the ground between.

  “Why don’t they go around?” Justen asked no one in particular. “We couldn’t stop them now.”

  “Once they start to fight, Engineer, they leave no survivors.”

  Justen’s stomach tightened. All he was supposed to have done was to watch and learn. Instead, he had been killing, and he was just about to be killed.

  “Might as well try the rest of the rockets.” Firbek’s voice was hoarse.

  Justen helped depress the launcher once more and waited for the woman to squeeze the striker. And Justen again smoothed the flows and forces around the rocket. The black iron missile flared into the advancing Iron Guards. A handful fell like leaden dummies or disjointed marionettes, but there were no flares and explosions-not as with the White lancers.

  And still more troops seemed to pour from the defile in the eastern end of Middlevale.

  Justen glanced to his left and right. More than half of the Sarronnese forces seemed to be down, burned to ashes, or missing.

  “Strike another one!” Firbek demanded.

  Justen concentrated once more on supplying order to the rocket. And once more another set of Iron Guards toppled as they strode toward the scattered Sarronnese forces. But the Iron Guards advanced as slowly and steadily as the tide.

  Three more firebolts flared from the line of boulders just beyond the eastern entrance to Middlevale. Two dashed themselves against stony hillocks. Screams followed the third, which had struck two mounted troopers on the edge of the command post where Dyessa and Gunnar remained, still mounted. A scraggly fir began to burn.

  “Get that light-fired rocket in the launcher!” Firbek glanced toward the white banners at the end of the valley. “Aim it toward those white banners.”

  The woman marine slipped the rocket into place and looked up, striker in hand. “You like to help us, Ser?”

  Firbek scowled, but he walked over to the remaining case of rockets.

  The marine ranker squeezed the striker.

  Justen belatedly focused his attention on the rocket, enough so that it wobbled only slightly before plowing through a line of foot soldiers under a crimson-fringed gray banner. Another wave of whiteness flowing back from the destruction swept around Justen, and he put out a hand to the launcher frame to steady himself.

  “You all right, Engineer?” The woman marine looked at him.

  “Sort of.”

  Firbek levered out another rocket.

  “Shouldn’t we save a few?” asked Justen.

  “For what? Wait, and they’ll all be at our necks. Will be anyway before long, unless the wizard pulls out a miracle.” Firbek slid the rocket into the tube.

  A heavy drum-roll sounded, and a wave of dark-gray mounted troops swept forward, riding through the foot in dark gray to take the charge.

  A woman in Sarronnese blue scrambled up the hill toward them,

  “The commander wants another barrage on the Iron Guards.” The messenger conveyed the order to Firbek calmly.

  “We’re almost out of rockets. We’ll fire until we’re done.”

  “I will so inform her.” The messenger hurried back downhill, ducking calmly as another firebolt flared past her.

  “Strike!”

  Whssttt…

  “Strike…”

  “Whsstt…”

  “That’s it, Ser. That was the last rocket.”

  Justen slumped against the hot metal of the launcher frame, not sure which was worst-the dizziness, the nausea, or the splitting headache. He straightened and staggered back down toward the gray, where he grasped for his black staff.

  “We needed more rockets, Engineer. I asked for more.”

  Justen touched the black staff before speaking. “We made what we could, Firbek. They’re darkness-hard to forge.”

  “Hard to forge? Is it easier to die?” After glancing toward the Iron Guards headed uphill, Firbek unsheathed his sword.

  Justen gripped his staff.

  A rumble of thunder-thunder, not drums-echoed across Middlevale, and a chill sense of blackness followed. Justen scrambled back toward the launcher and stared.

  Like a black tower, Gunnar stood on a low hillock to the right of the one where Firbek, Justen, and the marines had labored with the rockets.

  A second dull rumble filled the sky, and the thin clouds overhead seemed to thicken even as Justen watched. A third, longer, rumble echoed through the skies, and darkness fell like an early twilight as cold gusts of wind whipped across the burned battle plain.

  Even the Iron Guard slowed, and the white banners at the east end of Middlevale seemed to droop, despite the wind.

  Rain began to fall, first with scattered droplets, then more heavily, like a flight of cold arrows, and finally, as the afternoon skipped abruptly to late twilight, in sheets that flayed like whips.

  Justen clutched his staff and staggered toward the gray, untying his own reins and Firbek’s. He thrust the marine officer’s reins at him, then mounted the gray and spurred her toward the other hillock, where Gunnar still stood like a short, dark tower.

  Unable to see more than a few cubits beyond the gray’s mane, Justen used his order-senses to guide him toward Gunnar’s profligate squandering of order, lowering his head against the rush of wind and water.

  Were the Whites having as much trouble as he was? Did it matter? He spurred the gray across the space between the hills and up the slope.

  “Get back!” ordered Gunnar, his voice cutting through the tumult like lightning. “Get everyone out of here!” He struggled into the saddle of the bay.

  “But they’ll drown in the gorge if you’ve called rain!” yelled Dyessa over the whistling of the wind.

  Justen eased the gray closer to where Gunnar wobbled in his saddle.

  “They won’t. But they’ll die here for certain.” Gunnar steadied himself, grasping the edge of the saddle.

  Dyessa gestured to the woman with the trumpet. Three short double blasts sounded against the storm. The ensign swirled and dipped three times.

  “Again! Keep it up!” Dyessa spurred her mount t
oward the bottom of the hill.

  Justen forced a sense of order into the black staff, then extended it to Gunnar, who shook his head.

  “Touch it!”

  Gunnar shook his head again.

  “Damn it! Don’t be so frigging proud! You need it, and we need you to get out of here! Touch it!”

  Gunnar reached toward the staff, and Justen thrust it against his brother’s palm. The Air Wizard straightened even as Justen could sense his thoughts departing. Justen eased the gray next to the bay and began guiding his brother’s mount toward the inn, toward the west end of the narrow valley, vaguely aware that the single remaining marine rode the rocket cart not more than a score of cubits ahead and that Firbek held the harness of the cart horse. He tried to ignore the shaking in his knees, not certain whether it was exhaustion or fear, or some of each.

  The thunder rolled like massive drums beating through his skull, and the rain raised welts across his unprotected face, but Justen kept both horses moving, ignoring Dyessa as she chivied her troops in their retreat.

  The wind whistled, the thunder drummed, and Justen rode slowly past the bare roof beams of the inn, its thatch torn loose by the force of the storm.

  Behind him, the trumpet wavered.

  The rain pounded through his black jacket as if he were bare-backed, and with each step, the gray slowed as red mud began to form.

  Before him, the sheer red rocks loomed like a wall. He edged the horses to his left and through the narrow gap-Once inside the canyon, the force of the wind and rain dropped, although the volume of the deluge did not abate.

  Perhaps a dozen Sarronnese foot straggled down and around the switchback, just behind Firbek and the empty rocket cart.

  The dull rumbling of the thunder echoed over Middlevale and down into the canyon. To Justen’s left, the narrow cascade had become a rushing torrent, rising to within a handful of cubits below the road. How long would it continue to rise?

  “That should do it for the storm,” Gunnar straightened in the saddle, looking over his shoulder.

  Justen followed his brother’s eyes, catching sight of the Sarronnese commander as she guided her chestnut around and through the retreating forces until she caught up with Gunnar and Justen.