Rally Cry (27 page)

As the procession reached the bridge over the mill stream, the Namer gestured to one of his riders, who reined his mount about and stopped, while the rest of the party disappeared from view.

Andrew watched him for a moment and then, turning, started back into the fort.

"Andrew!"

Hans hit him hard, throwing the colonel to the ground. A four-foot shaft screamed past. There was a startled cry, and the bearer of the
Maine
flag, who had been standing behind Andrew, tumbled over backward, the colors dropping to the ground.

A rippling volley slashed out from the fort. Tugar and mount went crashing to the ground. Coming to his feet, Andrew ran over to the soldier who'd been hit and was now covered with the state colors. Already an ugly stain of scarlet was working its way up through the faded silk.

Andrew pulled the flag back. The boy was dead; the arrow had been driven clean through his chest and had buried itself in the earthen wall behind him.

He looked back up to where the dead Tugar lay sprawled on the ground. Several Suzdalians pulled him free from his horse and then dragged the corpse off.

"Most likely wanted to see what our rifles could do," Hans said quietly, "and take you out at the same time."

"
A good hundred and fifty yards,"
Andrew said, judging the range. "That's one hell of a shot."

Kal, Emil, and Kathleen came rushing up to Andrew's side.

"Now they will want a thousand heads for the death of one," Kal said.

Andrew turned and looked back at the body being carried back into the camp.

"The bill's
already been
paid in full," Andrew snapped in reply.

"I still can't believe it," Nahatkim whispered. "Three times before in my life I have seen the Tugars come. But
never, never have I seen one die
."

A mumbled chorus of agreements echoed around the table.

"Did you see his body?" Boris said excitedly. "I got close enough. There must have been half a hundred holes in it. He was torn to pieces—it was a beautiful sight."

"But that was only one Tugar," Ilya retorted. "They are as numberless as fish in the sea."

"Yet there are some among us who will fight," Kal said forcefully. "Have we not fought before? When the nobles squabble they drive us out of the fields to march by their sides, and so brothers kill brothers for the sport of the damned boyars.

"It is a time of choosing," Kal continued. "What allowed the Yankees to live was Ivor's hatred of Rasnar, and Rasnar's desire to manipulate Ivor and the Yankees and in the end steal their secrets. But now that the Tugars come early, Ivor is in fear. He will turn against the Yankees."

"Can he beat them?" Boris asked.

"Maybe so," Kal replied. "All they need do is surround the camp and starve them, or find some evil to strike them down first. Perhaps the Yankees, now that they know the full truth, will take their great ship and sail away. If they do, Ivor will fall, and Rasnar will become all-powerful. Then you know that the people of Suzdal will be sent to the pits while Novrod will gain exemption, because Mikhail will gain control of us, and then punish us for revenge."

Nahatkim, leaning on his cane, slowly came to his feet.

"I have seen seventy-seven snows," the old man whispered hoarsely. "Three times I have seen the pits. The first time I watched the girl that I loved dragged in for their moon feast, the second time my father and mother, and the third time—" he paused, his voice choked—"and the third time my only son, with the lame foot, whom I loved more than my life."

The old man looked about the room with rheumy eyes.

"And we allow this," he cried. "We have allowed our names as men to be changed to cattle. They, the cursed church, the fat boyars and nobles, they have used such a thing to rule us, to subjugate us, to rob us, and in the end to take away our pride as men.

"I listened to these Yankees. They know the
answer,
they know it is better to die now as men than to live as slaves. Better to stand upon a field as men, even if their heads will only be held high for that one day, than to sire children, knowing in our hearts that someday they will be led to the slaughter pits crying in terror.

"What have we become, oh Kesus, for we are no longer men," and with tears streaking his face the old man sat down.

Kal looked about the room. All were silent, their eyes

fixed
on Nahatkim, many of them with tears running down their cheeks.

"We fight," Kal said hoarsely. "There are twenty of us to each noble. We will fight the nobles first, and after them the
Tugars,
and we will make this Declaring thing that
Hawthorne spoke of."

There was a nervous tension in the packed room. Kal looked about at the men. Here were representatives from nearly every major farmholding of Suzdal, and the great households of the city. These were the men who could rally the peasants to the cause. Kal knew what had been in the hearts of all of them, the hundreds of thousands of Rus who as the days drew closer lay awake in terror, even as the nobles laughed and the church counted its silver for the selling of indulgences. It was at the breaking point.

He looked about the room, sensing that all of them wanted to believe, but none would dare try.

From the back of the packed room, Tanya pushed her way forward.

She looked at her father and tried to force a smile.

"I have a life in me here," she said softly, placing her hand over her stomach, and turning, she looked back at the assembly. "I'll fight and die rather than let a noble or
priest take
that from me to be fed into the pit, and if you are men you'll fight with me!"

There was a moment of stunned silence, which changed in an instant to wild shouts of rage that had been pent up all their lives. Daggers came from belts, slamming into the table.

"We fight!"

Dancing and screaming, the men erupted into wild pandemonium.

Kal spun his daughter around, while the group, howling and shouting, let loose a lifetime of frustration and rage.

"How?" he asked, trying to be heard.

"In the usual way," she said, suddenly nervous. "I wanted to tell you, but. . ."

"
Hawthorne?" Kal asked disbelievingly.

Smiling weakly, she nodded in reply.

He was tempted to explode with rage, but the look in her eyes and the pride he felt for what she had just helped to create overwhelmed him.

He pulled her close.

"We're going to have
find
that boy and have a very long talk."

Then, releasing the girl, he climbed atop the table and shouted for attention.

He looked around at the men. When the excitement wore off, he realized, the full terror of what they had just started would sink in. In his heart he feared that before this was done, together or separately, they would all be hung on the wall or led into the pits, but for the moment he did not care.

"We are not pleased with either of you," the Namer growled.

In spite of each other's presence, Rasnar and Ivor could not conceal their terror.

"The Yankees are your responsibility," the Namer continued, pointing straight at Ivor, "and yours," his gaze shifting to Rasnar.

"But we did not bid them to come here," Ivor protested.

"Yet you suffered them to live among you. Their infection of defiance might spread, and it would be a pity to flatten your cities if they should resist us."

His left hand ran over the wound to his arm. Such a thing had never before been done. He had actually been frightened by them, though he dared not show it or admit it to anyone.

The chant singers had told about cattle who had appeared fifteen or more circlings back. Their face hair was pointed, beneath shining caps of armor. A hundred Tugars had died from their smoke makers before they had been stamped out.

Best to let the cattle settle it now, and if any were left of the Yankees, Qubata would finish them. It was not that he feared their numbers—he had counted not half a thousand of them. It was their defiance which could never be tolerated. Breaking them would keep the Rus cattle in line as well. But they must not be allowed to go elsewhere, to hide and breed.

"I leave now with your own problem to settle by my command. But remember this as well. I want their skulls laid out for me, and all of their devices as well when we return. Let them not escape. I want as well for you to save for me the two leaders who showed defiance. I have a promise to keep with them."

He started from the door, and then paused and looked back. "You boyars and churchmen have lived well under our rule, but such things could be changed. It has happened in other lands to those who keep not their lowest ones respectful of our rule."

Lowering his head to clear the door, the Namer strode out into the nave of the cathedral. He looked at the altar, and laughed at the image of the weak gods of cattle who in the afterworlds must offer their own flesh to Bulgatana, father god of the Chosen Race.

Peering anxiously from the window, Ivor and Rasnar watched as the Namer mounted his high platform. The nargas and drums sounded and the procession passed up across the empty square. A knot of peasants stood off to one side, shrieking in sorrow as fifty of their loved ones, hooked to chains, staggered off behind the column, food for the march back westward.

"Now you must be with me," Rasnar said coldly, looking back at Ivor.

The boyar sat down heavily, and adjusting his glasses he looked at his hated foe.

"If all the Rus were united," he said quietly, "peasant, noble, church, we could fight them."

"Are you mad?" Rasnar hissed. "They would smash us into the ground. Do you think I like them, knowing they hold power over us? Remember your station, Ivor. We rule through them."

"We could rule without them," the boyar said coldly.

"You are mad."

"The Yankees could show us how."

"So that was your hope as well, wasn't it? That is why you did nothing for now, and let them build their infernal devices upon your land. You became tempted to defy even the Tugars. But now they come too soon for your mad dream to be possible."

Ivor was silent.

"You know what the Yankees will do. They will fight and they will die. For each death of a Tugar, a thousand must die. If the Yankees can even kill one for one, half the people of all Rus will die in retribution, and I daresay there will be no exemption for nobles this time."

"We could fight alongside them," Ivor said again, coldly.

"If you dare," Rasnar hissed, "then through me all the cities of Rus will march against you, for there is no love between you and your brother boyars. They think you fat, overproud, and desirous of being named Ivor the Great rather than Ivor Weak Eyes as you really are."

With a snarl, the boyar stood up and started for the door.

"What will it be? Defeat the Yankees and the church will not object to your becoming the Great. Defy me and it will be Mikhail instead."

Ivor turned and looked back at Rasnar. Somehow an idea had started to form over these months, but now he knew it was dead. Time had played against him. There was no alternative left, for now that the reality was before him, the mad dreams had died. He knew after all that the horde was invincible and he must live.

"I will send messengers tonight," Ivor whispered. "The nobles will gather from the cities. When the snow falls heavy again, we will attack them in the middle of the night."

Rasnar smiled.

"But if Keane is taken alive, he is mine. Perhaps I can still save
him,
and the same stands for any other Yankee."

"Of course," Rasnar replied.

"As for the Yankee weapons, they are mine as well."

Rasnar did not argue that point. There would be time enough later to change that agreement.

The boyar stalked from the room, and laughing softly, the prelate returned to his desk.

"All right, gentlemen," Andrew said, settling behind his desk. "This is an open meeting. I want all opinions."

The room was silent as the various company commanders, staff, and contingents from O'Donald's and Cromwell's units looked about, each hoping the other would say something first.

Finally it was O'Donald who stood up.

"If ever something needed killing," O'Donald said, "it's those beasties. I volunteered to fight rebs, and I did it gladly, wanting a good argument to sink my teeth into. But I didn't hate them. This is different. I'll kill Tugars and laugh while a-doin' it."

Several of the company commanders nodded grimly.

"I'm an abolitionist man,"
Houston said sharply. "I joined to fight slavery. This makes the Johnnies back home look like rock-solid Republicans. Let's smash this system to the ground, colonel, free the peasants, arm 'em, and fight!"

"I think
it's
madness," Tobias retorted from the other end of the table.

Normally any comment from the man would draw at best indifference from the infantry and artillerymen, but Andrew noticed that this time there was a difference in the room.

"Go on, Captain Cromwell," Andrew said evenly. "State your views."

"You heard that Kal fellow when we questioned him earlier. These Tugars number in the hundreds of thousands. We can fight and we'll all die. I'm not one for dying in a hopeless cause.

"Now, I've sailed the waters south of here. There's good land to be found, far away from this madhouse. I say we pull out while the pulling's good and hide out till the Tugars have passed."

"And if they hunt us down?" Andrew asked. "For I've got a feeling they can't let people like us live—it would set a precedent that could threaten their entire system."

"Then if they find us, we'll simply load up the
Ogunquit
again, pull out to sea, and move on. I don't think they've got anything to match the steam engines below her deck."

Tobias settled back into his chair and looked around. More than one man was nodding in agreement.

"So we learn to live like hunted dogs, is that it?" O'Donald snapped back.
"Always looking over our shoulders, ready to run from our shadows."

"Not always," Tobias retorted. "You heard Kal—they stay for a winter in one area, then move on by spring heading east. Twenty years later they come back out of the west. We need hide only for this one year. When they come back again, we and our sons will be ready for them."

"And leave the people of Suzdal to the sack, is that it?" Mina retorted.