“Falls into the realm of lessons learned, Kait. Drago. Work on it when we have time. Measure the powder ahead of time. Come up with a work song with a rhythm that reminds them to follow the proper steps in proper order. Something like that. Oh. And find a way to protect their hearing. I like to went deaf and I wasn’t on top of a falcon.”
Both men eyed him like they were having trouble believing what he had said. “Boss, we’ve been doing that for two years.”
“Oh. So. Maybe I ought to pay closer attention …”
Shouts from several directions declaimed, “Here they come again!”
In an instant Hecht was alone. Men scurried in every direction. Then he was not alone. A funny-looking little man in brown was there beside him.
“What do you think of that, Piper?”
“Looks like a false alarm.”
“Not that.”
“Then what do I think of what?”
“You were having big-ass problems with enemy soldiers who didn’t see any reason not to trudge on into the teeth of your marvelous killing machines. Right? Out there? Five deep. They just kept coming, right?”
“Yes. But then they all ran away.”
“So say thank you, honored ancestor.”
“For?”
“I cribbed an idea from your sister. I took a keg of firepowder and planted it where it was likely to do some good when it went boom.”
“Say what?”
“Took me two tries but I got the Collegium asshole responsible for the sorcery. Name was Portanté. Principaté Catio Portanté.”
“I don’t know the name. Looks like it wasn’t a false alarm.” Enemy troops were on the move, though not many. “A probe.”
“I never paid attention to him before, either. He was lowlife and low-key. From one of the cities up north, related to the Benedocto by marriage. So related to Bronte Doneto, obscurely.”
“My guess is, Serenity has a lot of friends we don’t know.”
“Muno knows them. You should let me take you down to see him.”
Hecht shuddered. “Of course.” A falcon bellowed greetings to Patriarchals who had come too close. “I’ll just pop out during a battle. No one will miss me.”
“See, this is why I never let myself get roped into big responsibilities. They eat you up. They keep you from doing what you want. Like this right here. Here come some of them dicks that need you to think for them. And I can’t disappear because they’ve already seen me.”
Rhuk and Prosek had returned. The enemy probe was not developing a threat. Hecht said, “Do keep your opinions to yourself while we talk.”
Februaren snorted. Shooting your mouth off was another thing you could not do when you had responsibilities.
Prosek seemed interested only in the man in brown. He stared, let Rhuk do the talking. Rhuk said, “Boss, we might consider pulling out after this stops.”
“Why?”
“We’re worn out and beat up and the weapons are getting fatigued.”
“Kait, I’m going to take a second to make sure I have my temper under control. All right. Go. We’ve had six weapons explode. I know that. I know why.”
“True. But our casualty estimates before were way off.”
“All right. Tell me.”
Rhuk went pale. “Sorry. Sir. We have twenty-three dead or wounded on my side.”
“Forty-two for me,” Prosek said. “Those people got into several of my positions before they high-watered.”
“To which we have to add casualties suffered by Vircondelet, Consent, and Sedlakova,” Hecht grumbled. “Unless you counted them already.”
Both men shook their heads.
Prosek, still staring at Cloven Februaren like he suspected the man of being the Adversary incarnate, said, “Manpower isn’t the problem. We’re running low on munitions. Charges, especially.”
A falcon roared. Hecht looked toward the meadow. The probe was fading. The live people out there, now, were looking for wounded to take to the healing brothers. “Are our men more worn out than those people?”
Prosek shrugged. “I doubt it.”
“Position your weapons. Load them. Lay them. Vircondelet and Consent will be back soon. Draft their men as replacements. One inexperienced man to a crew. Get me a census on our munitions. We can’t possibly have used all that firepowder. It took seven ships to haul it.”
“Oh, no sir. There’s still tons of firepowder. Just not up here. We didn’t have the drayage to bring even a fraction of it. Nor would we have brought it all if we could have. Too much risk of losing it.”
Rhuk said, “We’re low on firepowder, boss, but even lower on charges. We started out with twenty to twenty-five for every weapon.” An almost unimaginably immense number, Hecht understood. Tons upon tons. Wagon after wagon. “But the stuff goes fast. None of the crews have used up all they started with but some are down to their last two or three. There isn’t anything around here that we can substitute. We’re having what’s left redistributed. It won’t last long if there’s another big attack. Oh. Each team had one charge of godshot. In case. But we don’t want to use that.”
Hecht stepped on a flash of anger. This was not their fault. This was his. They had done what he had told them to do. In truth, they had done more.
He had not expected this to last. He had counted on massed fire to panic the enemy. But he should have considered the possibility that they might be manipulated by a maniac sorcerer willing to spend them to the last man.
Hecht said, “Things didn’t go the way I expected. But there have been dramatic changes over there. I’m told.” Slight gesture toward the man in brown. “So, for now, we hold on, every weapon loaded. Instead of spreading your munitions around, though, concentrate them with the weapons that will keep firing after the first salvo.”
Hecht looked to Cloven Februaren, hoping to hear something about the improbability of another serious attack.
The old man understood but could promise nothing.
“Don’t kill people trying to clean up down there.”
Prosek said, “We might have a problem with theft. I’m missing several kegs of firepowder.”
A ghost of a smirk shadowed the lips of the Ninth Unknown.
Hecht understood. “They didn’t go to waste, Drago.”
The respite stretched for hours. The enemy removed his dead and wounded amid gathering carrion birds and insects. The Righteous took care of their own.
Cloven Februaren contrived to vanish without being noticed.
The Patriarchal force did not move again till late afternoon, when Hecht had begun thinking about standing down for dinner, then slipping away.
There must be a castle somewhere big enough to hole up in till the weight of the Empire made itself felt elsewhere.
But he did not want to abandon his falcons.
He would have to if he ran.
So standing his ground was his only real choice.
He worried about Clej Sedlakova. There had been no word.
The day’s costs haunted him already.
Some key veterans had fallen, men who had been with him since the City Regiment days.
And Titus had suffered his first serious wound.
“Here they come!” went up across the slope. And this was no false alarm. The enemy entered the meadow and crept forward on the flanking hills. Hecht said, “Titus, I didn’t look at it close enough before I decided to do this. If this goes bad …”
“Never mind, boss. I put myself here. It’s all right.” Boldly said but it was not all right.
Hecht knew he needed to have a face-to-face with his soul if he survived. He was not sure if hubris, arrogance, overconfidence, or a combination of those was his trouble, but there was something.
A smile tickled his lips as he recalled feeling like this in every tight situation where his enemies gave him time to brood. He began to have irrelevant thoughts, too. As usual.
He should have studied the Construct more diligently. He would h
ave a way out of here, now. Though he might be at less immediate risk than his men. Serenity might want him taken for special attention later. He seemed the sort.
Fire discipline held. The falcon crews waited.
The advance slowed as it approached a suspected kill line. Most of those men had seen what had happened to those who had gone before them.
Officers safely farther back cursed and threatened.
The advance stopped dead.
A tremendous explosion took place out of sight, down the road. Gray smoke rolled up into the late-afternoon light, accompanied by shouts and screams. Everyone out front jumped, surged, surprised.
Hecht ordered, “Fire the full salvo.”
The falcons roared. Reddening sunlight tinted the smoke a fierce orange-red.
That smoke, for a short while, drifted upslope, pushed by marginally warmer air from down the mountain. Soon, though, the air cooled. The smoke drifted downhill again. No one and nothing emerged from it.
The smoke concealed the sources of a lot of noise. Something was going on in there. To Hecht it sounded like every man turning on his neighbor. Partly true. Each man had become desperate to get away. But sorcery that messed with men’s minds added to their desperation.
Hecht gave orders that there be no firing unless the attack developed.
Darkness came. The smoke went away. Indifferent stars came out. Rivademar Vircondelet reported that the Patriarchals had withdrawn from the meadow, around a sheltering knee of mountain. The meadow was carpeted in a fresh human harvest. The enemy was removing their wounded. Night scavengers were moving in.
At some point, unnoticed till he spoke, Cloven Februaren had rejoined the Commander of the Righteous. Hecht’s people paid him no heed. They stepped around him but did not speak to him or ask about him.
Februaren observed, “It’s over, Piper. They’ve given up. You might still hear from the Night, though. It wouldn’t hurt to have a few of your toys charged up with godshot, just in case. Take care of that, then I want you to take a walk with me.”
“Why? Where to?”
“Down there. To talk to people from the other side.”
“Should I ask you questions?”
“You can if you like. You may not get the answers you want to hear.”
“What I figured. Titus!”
“Sir?”
“How are you feeling? How’s the arm?”
“They say I’m going to live. Only fourteen stitches but it aches like hell.”
“Good to hear. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
Februaren grumbled, “I don’t want to intrude on a budding romance, but …”
“Just making sure Titus is fit to join us. Titus, you can carry a truce flag, can’t you?”
“If you insist.”
“Good. It’s a sure thing that there’ll be people we know down there, one way or another.” Hecht shook a finger at the Ninth Unknown. “My way, old-timer.”
Februaren scowled but did not argue.
Hecht asked, “Is this likely to take long? I haven’t eaten all day.”
“You should take better care of yourself. Grab a loaf, cheese, and sausage and let’s go. You can nibble along the way. It’ll be slow going.”
“That’s all right. I can wait.” The scenery would not be appetizing.
The old man snickered.
Hecht thought the Ninth Unknown was on his way to becoming something more than human. Was there such a thing as an apprentice ascendant? Like an accidental ascendant? Unaware of his status?
Asgrimmur Grimmsson could be presented in evidence.
Frowning, Titus went to work rounding up lanterns and lifeguards.
***
Titus said, “Our new weapons do terrible things.”
Terens Ernest, swollen proud to be accompanying his commander, said, “Not worse than swords and axes. Praise God, they didn’t come at us on horseback. I couldn’t stand it if we had to kill a couple thousand horses.”
Cloven Februaren snorted but did not otherwise express an opinion.
Hecht said, “The real horror is how fast and impersonally we can kill. Some of those men firing falcons never saw the enemy up close. And guys like Prosek and Rhuk will keep finding ways to reach out farther, faster, and more accurately. They love the challenge. They never think about it in human terms.”
This was the bloodiest battlefield of his acquaintance. There were many bloodier encounters on record, a few quite recent: Los Naves de los Fantas and what had taken place outside Khaurene. But there was an industrial feel to what had happened here that he found disquieting.
Titus asked, “What will Serenity do when he hears about this?”
“He’ll spew Writs of Anathema. Of Excommunication. Bulls of all sorts, blustering. Blaming everyone but himself. He’s turning into his cousin.”
The Ninth Unknown would not remain silent. “And no one will take him seriously anymore because he’s showing such a great talent for looking as goofy as Sublime. He’s not that blind and dishonest but we’ve had some straight-arrow Patriarchs for contrast. He looks like a throwback. What’s happened here could finish him with the Brothen mob.”
Hecht did not believe that. Bronte Doneto was much too crafty. “How about we concentrate on the moment?”
He was nervous. The darkness seemed unnaturally deep. The lanterns did not push it back to a comfortable distance. The killing field stank of spilled bowels and coagulated blood and flesh already corrupting. He kept tripping over dead people. The nasty water got inside his boots. He was hungry and his head had begun to hurt. Though the altitude was high and the air was chilling the sounds of insect wings seemed like the hum of primitive death gods at their after-the-fighting chores, like those old devils he had finished off in the Connec.
His amulet declared the night free of all but the most trivial Instrumentalities.
He was nervous about the possibility of imminent treachery. Titus had a bum right arm. The Ninth Unknown was older than the ground underfoot. Terens Ernest was an unknown quantity. Rivademar Vircondelet considered himself a lover, not a scrapper.
Consent, Vircondelet, and Ernest were along because they felt mistrusted and left out. So. This time they had a chance to be there when the hammer came down.
He did not introduce Cloven Februaren.
Other than Titus, who was burdened with the truce flag, everyone carried a lantern. Hecht, Ernest, and Vircondelet also carried spears and a standard array of sharpened iron. The spears proved useful in dealing with the treacherous footing.
The Ninth Unknown had armed himself with a foolish grin.
These five were not likely to give an account of themselves that would echo down the ages.
Once past the end of the meadow they spied torches and small fires behind the knee of the mountain. About twenty men awaited them, two hundred yards off, in that weak light.
More small fires at intervals marked the road to the plain. There was movement on the road.
Hecht muttered, “I should have made them come to me.”
Cloven Februaren said, “You’re much too paranoid, Piper.” And, “Learn to believe in yourself.”
***
Hecht knew many of the men awaiting him. Most were not friends of Bronte Doneto. They included representatives of four of the Five Families of Brothe, including Paludan Bruglioni of the powerful Bruglioni family. Paludan had been at death’s door when Hecht last saw him. Principaté Gervase Saluda, Paludan’s lifelong friend, was there, too. Both remained seated in the wooden frames that had been used to carry them up the mountain. The Arniena agent was Rogoz Sayag, with whom Hecht had worked while employed by that family and later, during the Calziran Crusade.
The Cologni and Madesetti were represented by strangers. Only the Benedocto, Bronte Doneto’s tribe, had no obvious agent on hand.
Someone would report back. Espionage and treachery were heart and soul of Brothen city politics. And Brothen city politics shaped the larger policie
s of the Church.
Overall, these people made an unlikely alliance. Some had been backstabbing each other for generations.
Which pointed up the depth and breadth of the developing crisis of confidence in the current Patriarch.
How had Doneto managed so swift a decline?
Hecht wondered more about how Paludan and Gervase, both badly crippled, had managed to be on scene so soon.
A man Hecht did not know stepped forward. “I’m Acton Bucce of Bricea,” he said. “Acting captain of what survived your sorcery.” Acton Bucce was a sad and angry man controlling his emotions tightly.
Bucce asked, “Would it be acceptable to add fuel to the bonfires? I’d like more light and warmth. So many ghosts will make this a cold, dark night.”
Hecht glanced at Februaren. The old man nodded. “Go ahead. I met some of those ghosts coming down here.”
The fires grew fast. Everyone on the Patriarchal side seemed cold and haunted. Hecht touched his amulet lightly. Still it offered no warnings other than the usual nascent itch.
The swollen bonfires bruised Hecht’s night vision but flung light far enough to reveal corpses laid side by side, touching, their feet at the edge of the road.
“You wanted to talk, Acton Bucce?”
“Twelve hours ago I commanded a regiment called the Free Will Swords. Short-term mercenaries from Brothe’s poorest quarters. Twenty-two hundred men, mostly experienced. Thirty-day enlistments, fifteen paid ahead. Now I have thirteen hundred men barely in shape to take care of themselves. We have so many dead we can’t take them back with us. We’ll bury them in marked graves, where there’s enough man left to identify, so their people can come get them if they want.”
Bucce paused as though inviting comment. Hecht said nothing.
Bucce continued, “All told, the Patriarch sent about seventeen thousand men. At sunup I was eighth in the chain of succession. Now I’m the senior officer surviving. These civilians are urging me to indulge my inclination to save the men who’re still alive. We’re working on that but still have bodies to recover. We’ve collected more than four thousand already. And the wounded outnumber the dead. Sepsis will claim a lot of those because the healers can’t get to them all.”