Stuck In Magic

by Christopher Nuttall

  Personally, I thought it was silly. Someone sidling into attack range might not have hostile intentions, but it was still dumb to let them get so close without making sure of them. I ground my teeth in bitter memory. There’d been too many times in Iraq we’d had to wait to be hit, even though we could have killed the attackers before they got close enough to hurt us. Here, at least, the rules of engagement were a little more sensible.

  The thought cheered me as we galloped through villages and hamlets, cantering past fields – some showing signs of dehydration – and over bridges that struck me as a little pointless. I could have waded though the rivers below with ease.

  The city needed to sink some boreholes quickly, to search for underground reservoirs, or start and irrigation program. I’d tried to suggest it to Rupert, as well as a dozen other ideas, but they’d gotten nowhere. Rupert was a wealthy young man, with extensive connections, yet … he didn’t have anything like enough power and influence to get things done. I wondered, idly, if what the city needed was a dictator, someone with the authority to get things moving. It would have been so much easier, during the war, if we hadn’t had to get authorisation from Washington before doing pretty much anything.

  I dismissed the old bitterness – it was unlikely I’d ever see home again – and concentrated on assessing the landscape from a military point of view. The soil was hard, barren in a number of places; I doubted we could force an advancing army to pass through a bottleneck. Hell, there was nothing stopping the

  warlords from sending their cavalry on a slash-and-burn mission through the fields. Normally, they wouldn’t be able to destroy the fields beyond repair –

  that was far harder than most people thought – but here … I wasn’t so sure. The farmers were permanently on the edge. If they were killed, or driven away from their fields, it might be enough to prevent the farm from being saved. I cursed under my breath. The city was in a deadly trap. We’d have to break out before it was too late.

  We, I thought, with a flicker of amusement. When did it become ‘we’?

  Rupert slowed his horse. “You’re being very quiet.”

  “I’m just considering how and where the war is going to be fought,” I said.

  There was no point in pretending there wasn’t going to be war. The warlord was just piling on the pressure, trying to find something the city couldn’t give him. Frankly, I wasn’t sure why he was bothering to come up with an excuse. It wasn’t as if any of the other warlords – or the king – was willing or able to stop him. “How much longer do we have?”

  “I wish I knew,” Rupert said. He glanced north, towards the warlord’s lands.

  “He has a small army under his permanent control. He could be advancing towards us tomorrow.”

  I doubted it. The warlord’s power rested on his ability to raise and deploy troops. If those troops were lost, the warlord’s power would be lost too. I’d never met any of the local warlords, but I’d met their counterparts in Afghanistan. They’d been reluctant to fight to the finish, even when the enemy was on the ropes, for fear they would be finished too. And the hell of it was that they had a point.

  “They’re demanding that we hand over more serfs,” Rupert added. “And we can’t.”

  “No,” I agreed. The warlord might be smarter if he turned a blind eye to the runaways, but … I shook my head. It wasn’t going to happen. There were just too many messages going back and forth. A successful runaway would tell his friends and family that he’d found a home and work in the city, encouraging them to flee too. “We just can’t find them.”

  “They’re getting better organised,” Rupert agreed. “They don’t want to be sent back and who can blame them?”

  I nodded. It wasn’t uncommon for immigrants and expats to put together private self-help networks, particularly those who knew the local government and population were either hostile or likely to become so, and once those networks got established they were extremely difficult to take down. The immigrants were often unwilling to cooperate, while excluding anyone who wasn’t an immigrant themselves. The former serfs could hide themselves in the big city, burrowing deep into the slums. The City Guard didn’t have the manpower to root them out.

  Not unless they show themselves too obviously, I thought. And even then, it’s just a drop in the bucket.

  I allowed myself to consider, briefly, recruiting some of the former serfs.

  They’d make good soldiers. They were already used to hard physical labour –

  they’d grown up on farms – and they didn’t dare let themselves be captured.

  Recaptured. And yet … I shook my head. It would be considered a provocation.

  The idea would have to wait until the local government conceded it was in a fight to the death.

  Provoking the war to happen at a time and place of our choosing might work, I considered, but the longer we can put it off the better.

  We chatted happily as we wheeled about and started to ride back to the fort.

  Rupert talked about tactics – he’d been studying the old books – and I was happy

  to discuss them with him. Some lessons were timeless – I intended to write down all I remembered from Sun Tzu and his fellows – while others were pointless.

  The cavalry, king of the battlefield, was going to be dethroned soon. Once machine guns were developed, they’d be slaughtered as easily as the French at Agincourt.

  “Harris is planning to retire soon,” Rupert said. “And then I’ll be the general.”

  “You need to keep studying,” I said. Sir Joseph Porter had been better qualified, although not by much. His position had been purely administrative and everyone knew it. “And we need to build up a staff.”

  I smiled as Damansara came into view, twinkling lights shining on the walls as the sun slipped below the horizon. It was easy to believe, from a distance, that the city was a wonderland of peace and prosperity, a civilised oasis in a world of violence and brutality. It looked safe and tranquil and utterly timeless …

  The war started two weeks later.

  Chapter Seventeen

  The summons arrived at nightfall, the messenger barely giving Rupert a chance to wake me – and for me to pass command to Horst and Fallows – before hurrying us back to the city. We had special permission to return, something that underlined just how serious matters were as we dressed in our finest uniforms –

  Rupert’s would have outshone even a dictator’s personal outfit – and joined the council of war in the city palace. It was neutral ground, apparently, which didn’t keep it from being surrounded by legions of private guards. I wondered, idly, just what could be done to defend the city if those men were under my command.

  I hadn’t had any real hopes for the council of war – the city government was such a mess that it was hard to say who was responsible for what – but it managed to be worse than I’d feared. Men were shouting at each other, trying to sort out a pecking order before they decided on a response to the crisis; servants were making their way from table to table, handing out drinks that stank of alcohol. I declined, and signalled to Rupert that he should decline too. We needed clear heads. I watched, feeling my heart sink as senior aristocrats finally managed to impose some semblance of order on the crowd. If a relatively small council was like this, it was a wonder anything got done. I supposed I should be grateful. A more efficient city government would probably have been better at hunting down the runaways and staving off the war.

  You have a chance to prove yourself, I thought. Don’t fuck it up.

  My eyes glided around the room. I recognised Lord Drache – Rupert’s father –

  sitting next to an older man who reminded me of Harbin Galley. His father?

  Harbin himself was standing on the other side of the map table, wearing a blood-red tunic covered in gold braid and medals. Stolen valour, or I was a fool.

  The British officers of old had worn red so the blood wouldn’t show and demoralise the troops, something I�
��d always thought was a little silly. It was unlikely Harbin had even considered showing so much consideration in his life.

  He probably thought it made him look good. Me? I thought it made him look like a target.

  He looked at me, just for a second. His eyes glinted. I couldn’t tell if he remembered me or not. He probably thought all guardsmen looked the same. And yet, standing next to Rupert … it was hard to tell. The look he directed at Rupert was anything, but friendly.

  “The warlord intends to send a troop of cavalry down the road to the outskirts,”

  a young man I didn’t know said. His fingers traced a line on the map. “They’ll

  occupy Pennell” – a small town on the edge of the city’s formal jurisdiction –

  “and then devastate the farms before retreating, having given us a bloody nose.”

  I frowned. “How can you be sure?”

  The room rustled. I realised I’d made a mistake, talking out of turn. Harbin sneered. His father frowned, disapprovingly. The remainder of the room seemed unsure what to say or do. I might be a commoner, but I was also one of Rupert’s liegemen … I disliked the thought of people considering me property, yet it had its advantages. Rupert and his family might have to back me up just to save face.

  “That’s what they’ve always done,” the young man said. “The warlords don’t want to lay siege to the city. They just want to remind us of our place.”

  “And they haven’t made any preparations for a long war, Tobias,” Lord Drache said. “They just want to give us a bloody nose.”

  I swallowed the urge to point out that was exactly what Tobias had said as the aristocrats started arguing again. They didn’t seem to want to fight, or do anything – really – beyond bending over and taking it. I shuddered. A long drawn-out war would be very bad for the city, but constantly surrendering would be bad too. And yet …

  “You’ll make your stand at Pennell,” Lord Galley said. He gave Rupert a cold smile. “Make the city proud, before you run.”

  Rupert stiffened. I didn’t have to look at him to know what he was thinking.

  If he ran, he’d be branded a coward and blamed for the disaster. His enemies would have all the excuse they needed to strike at him – and, through him, his father. If he stood and fought, he’d be killed along with his men, giving the warlord a cheap victory to soothe his injured feelings. I felt a flash of naked hatred for Lord Galley and his rapist son. I’d loathed some officers back home

  – and what I thought of our political masters was unprintable – but none of them had ever sent me into a fight they expected me to lose.

  Well, I thought. We’ll just have to see what we can do about it.

  I listened, matching names to faces as the chatter ran around the room. The city fathers were acting like a bunch of headless chickens, already bending over and bracing themselves for the kick up the backside they knew they were going to receive. They were already beaten, I noted sourly. I’d seen it before –

  bullied kids and communities who didn’t dare raise a hand to their tormentors in the certain knowledge that resistance would only prolong the agony – but this was worse. They expected Rupert and his men, the men I’d trained, to die. They didn’t think we could make a stand.

  It felt like hours before the room came to a decision everyone knew was inevitable – that had already been made – right from the start. Rupert’s father spoke briefly to him, then departed with the rest of the city fathers. I hoped he’d said something encouraging. Harbin paced around the map table, swinging his arm as if he were pushing his way through an admiring crowd. I rolled my eyes. I understood the value of making a show, but not when there were so few witnesses. There was nothing he could do that could change our opinion of him.

  “Well,” Harbin said. He sneered, openly. “I trust you have a plan?”

  “We have our orders to make our stand at Pennell.” Rupert sounded stunned, as if he couldn’t quite believe what had happened. “We have to meet them there.”

  I frowned as I studied the map. It wasn’t a very good map, but – thankfully –

  I’d ridden around the city and the surrounding regions. I silently corrected the details in my head as I assessed the situation. Tobias had a point. The warlord didn’t have to come down the road – he could send his troopers cross-

  country, if he wished – but it was a good way to show his power. Any invading force wanted to prove it had complete freedom of movement, if only to convince the locals that resistance was futile. Besides, it would also allow him to look threatening without actually trying to break the walls. His troops could break off and run if they ran into something they can’t handle.

  “They’ll scatter you, the moment you form a line,” Harbin said. He struck a ridiculous pose. “My cavalry are under your command. Where would you like us to be?”

  I looked at him. “How quickly can you get a message from an observation post to the army?”

  Harbin blinked. “What?”

  “You may have to use short words,” Rupert said, wryly. “Harbin doesn’t understand long ones.”

  “You …” Harbin clenched his fists, then carefully unclenched them. “What do you mean?”

  I sighed, inwardly. I disliked Harbin. I had the feeling he’d been behind the plan to put us out on a limb and then saw it off behind us. But, as nice as it was to hear Rupert coming back to life, it wasn’t helping. I needed Harbin to actually think about what he was doing.

  “We need a handful of cavalry troopers to monitor the approaches and bring warning of the enemy advance,” I said. I drew out lines on the map. “How quickly could you get the message to us?”

  Harbin frowned. “My men are not glorified messenger boys.”

  “They need to be, for this,” I said. I patiently repeated the question. “How quickly could you get the message to us?”

  “Quickly,” Harbin said, vaguely. He poked the map, indicating a position between Pennell and Damansara. “We will take up station here, in position to react to the engagement.”

  You mean, you want to be in position to run if things go badly, I thought. I could see the logic, as cowardly as it was. You don’t think we can win the coming engagement, do you?

  “Keep most of your troopers here,” I said. “Station four along the approaches.

  I want them to alert us when the enemy comes into view.”

  Harbin scowled. “As you wish,” he said. “We’ll be ready.”

  I eyed his back, silently measuring it for the blade as he stomped off. It looked as if he was going to be trouble. The city’s cavalry was drawn from the aristocracy, who lavished care and attention on their horses and uniforms … I made a face. A well-run cavalry unit would be very useful, but I had a feeling Harbin’s men were going to be worse than useless. They wouldn’t want to charge into danger for fear of getting their uniforms smudged. Harbin’s plan was simple enough. He’d watch the engagement from a safe distance and then, after we were scattered, gallop back to the city to report our defeat. Sir John Cope would be proud of him.

  My lips quirked. I could rewrite the song, afterwards, to make fun of Harbin.

  Rupert sagged. “I’m sorry I got you into this,” he said. “You can leave, if you want.”

  “And then what?” I supposed it spoke well of him, that he was at least offering

  me the chance to leave. “What will you do without me?”

  Rupert made a face. “What can I do?”

  I could think of several answers, but they weren’t particularly helpful. Rupert thought he was going to his death, that all he could do was die bravely … and even if he managed that, his death was going to be reported – by Harbin – as cowardly and shameful. The temptation to just pack his saddlebags with as much as he could carry and then run had to be overwhelming, but he was standing his ground. I felt a sudden rush of affection. Rupert and I weren’t friends – the difference between us was just too great – but I didn’t want to see him die. He was trying,
at least. I’d known greenie offices who’d done worse.

  “This is the map,” I said, forcing him to focus on me. “Do they always come down the road?”

  “Yes.” Rupert shook his head. “Those towns and villages are always the first to be attacked.”

  I frowned, never lifting my eyes from the map. The enemy tactic made sense.

  They could march through the cropland, burning and destroying, without ever being trapped and forced to fight. I hoped the townspeople were already on their way to the city. Local armies didn’t seem bound by any laws of war, as far as I could tell. They’d loot, rape and burn their way through the towns unless they were stopped. I grimaced. I’d done my best to drill proper standards into the soldiers I’d trained, but I knew they probably hadn’t taken them to heart. I was dreading the day I’d have to make an example of one of them …

  “We need to put out pickets ourselves,” I said. I didn’t trust Harbin to do it properly. His men might make a terrible fuss if they got scratched by a bush.

  Or something. Decorative units were rarely worth what they were paid, in my experience. “I wish …”

  I glanced at him. “Can you send messages through magic?”

  “Yeah …” Rupert looked at the map. “What do you have in mind?”

  “We need warning of their approach,” I said, patiently. I would have killed for a set of radios. Or recon drones. Or orbiting satellites. Hell, I would have killed for a tank or two. I’d have settled for one of the tanks that crackled the Hindenburg Line in 1918. It might have been a great deal more useful to me than a modern Abrams. “Once we have it, we can form a line to block them.”

  “And then what?” Rupert sighed. “We fire a shot and run?”

  “No.” I clapped his shoulder, trying to project as much confidence as possible.

  “We kick their ass.”

  I grinned. “They won’t expect us to stand and fight. They’ll come in fat and happy and impale themselves on us. We’ll smash them and then Harbin can chase the survivors all the way back home.”