Warlord (73 page)

"Oh, the evil, evil bastard," Raj breathed. Behind the engaged Squadron units still more men were dismounting and running forward into the smoke, into the artillery and massed rifle fire. Admiral Auburn was sending in the last Battle. The bulk of the Squadron troops were slowing; exactly the wrong thing to do, but inevitable as terror balanced and fought against courage. The rifle-fire beat on, under the steady roaring of the guns; more and more of the enemy were falling flat and trying to crawl forward, or taking shelter behind bodies.

400 meters. 
 

A new sound from the artillery, long
PAAAMMM
reports as they switched to case-shot. No bursting charge, just a giant shotgun shell with hundreds of half-ounce lead balls ahead of the powder . . . they whistled through the air with a malignant hum, like giant wasps, and where they struck they carved pathways through the packed Squadron fighters, as clean as wedges cut by a giant invisible knife. Raj walked Horace forward between two companies of Poplanich's Own, coughing with the powder-smoke and peering out. The Squadron attack had stalled . . . or rather, it was acting like a stick of butter thrust slowly onto a hot frying pan, melting away at the front despite the pressure thrusting it forward from behind.

A last knot of men ran out of the smoke, grouped around a banner. The Captain to Raj's left barked a command—probably unheard in this racket—and swung his sword. Muzzles turned; the next volley ripped half the men around the flag off their feet. They came on, feet pumping; more fell, until there was only one to scoop the banner out of the dirt and continue with bullets kicking clods out of the dirt all around him. He staggered, red spots blossoming on his chest, came on again, sank to his knees and thrust the iron spike of the flag into the ground and slid down it, arterial blood pouring out of his mouth. Raj sat watching as bullets snapped the flagstaff and the folds dropped over the last man to hold it.

The steel of his saber tapped against Horace's stirrup-iron.
Three hundred meters,
he thought.
I doubt any of them got closer than that.
 

Behind, through the gaps in the smoke, he could see the Squadron forces disintegrating. They had been locked for a moment as the last ranks trapped those in front when they turned to flee, but shell fire had knocked holes in that wall. Now the last Battle were fleeing as well, some still mounted, individuals and blocks scattering away. Panic spread faster than ripples in water, and in moments scarcely a hundred Squadrones were facing the Civil Government line. Hundreds more died as bullets and shrapnel took them in the back, as they ran sobbing with exhaustion and fear over the bodies of the dead.

"Sound
rifles cease fire,
" Raj called.

It spread down the line, faster than the sea breeze pulled away the dirty cotton blanket of smoke. The guns cracked on, hammering the fleeing enemy.

"Sound
prepare for general pursuit,
" he said; that rolled out too, a complex of drums and bugles.

Down the line of infantry orders barked. Men stood, and there was a ten-thousand-fold glitter as the long bayonets snapped onto the bars and cleaning-rod fasteners beneath the barrels. Banners swayed to the front and drums beat; in a long waving front like sea-surf the infantry advanced at the walk. A staccato rattle of aimed individual fire swept out ahead of it, marksmen and NCOs shooting and reloading as they advanced. Around Raj the cavalry line dissolved as men raced back for their dogs and slid their rifles into the scabbards before the right stirrup: There was a scent of scorched hide over the sulfur stink, as the glowing metal burned the liners; then a massive jingling as twenty-five hundred riders formed by battalions behind him: He heeled Horace forward as the banner of Poplanich's Own moved up to one side.

"Sound the charge!"

At both ends of the Civil Government line sabers slithered free by the thousand, a blinding mirror-brightness.

His sword swept up and then down, pointing to the dispersing mass of the enemy.

"Charge!"

"Coward! Whelp! You fled, you fled!" the women screamed at the defeated Squadron warriors.

Many of the Squadron levy had brought their households along with them to share the victory, leaving them in the wagon-fort a few kilometers behind the line. Now the women stood on the wagon-beds with their black shawls fluttering, striking clumsily at the fugitives who had made it this far, at their husbands and brothers and sons; they had swords and clubbed muskets in their hands, or stock-whips.

"Coward, coward!"

Some of the wagons were burning, and women threw themselves into the flames. Others cut their children's throats before stabbing themselves, or hanged themselves from the tall wagon-poles with their children at their heels. Raj passed a family strung up thus like obscene fruit; beyond them, inside the great circle of wagons, men who had thrown away their weapons were rolling under the feet of the milling frantic oxen to die. Their bawling covered the screams, an undertone to the roar of flames and the occasional crackle of shots. A field-gun went bouncing by, on its way to some pocket of holdouts.

WHUMP.
A powder-wagon blew up a thousand meters across the fort, and a globe of orange fire strobed for seconds across retinas in counterpoint to the ringing in ears stunned by the blast.

"Let's get some order here, Spirit-dammit!" he shouted hoarsely, waving the revolver at a clump of cavalry. "Get these people under control!"

They cantered over and began prying two wagons apart, slashing at the hide bindings with their sabers; one trooper looked up as dead feet brushed his head, swore and cut twice to sever the rope. His comrades shouted curses as they heaved and bodies rained down on their heads. Infantry were already at work inside, rounding up the survivors, stunning and binding; when the wagons were heaved apart a column of prisoners came through at a stumbling run, kicked, prodded with bayonets, and whacked along with rifle butts. A blond girl fell almost at Raj's feet; she would have been very pretty, except for the swelling purple bruise across one side of her face. She spat at his feet and stumbled off with the rest, holding a torn blouse across her breasts as a shoulder pushed her.

"You, Captain," Raj said. The officer saluted. "Get more of these wagons dragged apart or we'll lose them all to the fire. Move the oxen out but keep them bunched. And for the merciful Saints' sake, keep the men in hand!"

Ludwig Bellamy was looking white, even in the ruddy light of the fires and the dust-shrouded afternoon sun.

"Your father made the right decision," Raj said, sweeping his pistol in a circle over the scene. His voice was a little louder than need be, even with the level of background noise. "He knew the Squadron was going to lose. This is what defeat is, Messer Bellamy. Avoid it."

Raj heeled Horace into a canter, and the command-group and the Scouts followed, past growing roped-off squares where Squadron prisoners sat under guard with their hands behind their heads. The fires were dying as the soldiers pulled the wagons away; other men were spreading the tilts as groundsheets and piling loot in a rough-sort, separate heaps for fabrics and weapons and whatnot. Many of M'lewis's men were casting longing glances at the wagons—a sack was one of the rare pleasures of a soldier's life—but their Lieutenant was there . . . and Messer Raj had a name for seeing his men right.

He halted as Muzzaf Kerpatik rode up with a platoon of the Slashers: The men dropped back as they halted their mounts nose-to-tail, and Raj leaned forward to listen. The little southerner was not formally a fighting man, but his face was black with powder smoke under his cap and puggaree, and the Komar-made pepperpot pistol stuck through his sash had seen use this day.

"I have the Admiral's wagons under close guard," he said. Leaning closer and speaking in a whisper: "I estimate the value of what we found at two hundred twenty thousand gold FedCreds, Messer Raj—and he escaped with the best of it. Many of his private papers were left, as well."

Even then Raj shaped a silent whistle. Enough to equip and mount the entire Expeditionary Force, and pay it for a year; that was making war support war with a vengeance! So
much for Tzetzas,
he thought; the Governor would be very well pleased indeed.

"Also, I have these men," he said. Raj looked at the column of prisoners behind the Slashers, roped neck and neck. Ordinary-enough Squadron warriors, from their looks; a few had the rich equipage of high nobles. Then the Slasher Captain rode up; it was Pehdro Belagez, the new commander. He carried a Squadron banner over his shoulder, and swung it down for Raj to see.

"These
Ihorantes
dogs are the ones who killed our commander under a flag of truce,
mi Heneral,
" he said in a gentle voice, with an almost kittenish tone. "Messer Kerpatik brought us to them as they tried to escape with their sows and spawn, for which the Spirit of Man of the Stars will shine upon him. What is your will concerning them, my General?"

"The families? Slave market."

"And the men?" Belagez asked. The troopers leaned forward in their saddles: Mekkle Thiddo had been a popular commander.

Raj looked at the big burly figures who stood with downcast eyes in their bonds.

"Crucify them," he said.

"Thank you, no," Raj said firmly.

The delegation under the high arched gate looked downcast and astonished. It was fairly impressive for something cobbled together on short notice: the heads of the merchant guilds in long robes of a cut that had been fashionable in East Residence fifty years ago; a scattering of old aristocracy families who had hung on under Squadron rule; the underground Arch-Syssup of Port Murchison, understandably overjoyed to be representative of the State church once more; with a chorus of hymn-singing girls in garlands and white dresses and a flock of priests. . . .

"Messers, Messas," he went on, in careful Spanjol, "my troops have just won a major battle and their blood is up. The war isn't over, and it wouldn't do discipline any good to let them scatter in a rich city at night—nor, to be blunt, would it do your city much good, at all. We'll enter the city tomorrow, and I'll call you together then to settle billeting and other arrangements."

"But . . . but, there are still Squadrones inside the walls, thousands of them!" the head of the delegation said. Even now he was visibly afraid of the overlords. All to the good, or else the mobs would have torn them all limb from limb.

Former overlords,
Raj thought. "Are they under arms?"

"No—no, most of the fighting men marched out with Conner Auburn." And died, many under the walls when the gates were shut against them. "They crowd into the Earth Spirit temples, and into our Star churches, even, seeking sanctuary."

"Then give it to them. Post guards. Tomorrow, Messers, if you please."

Raj stretched and sighed, looking upward. The stars were very bright, with only a three-quarter Miniluna to dispute the heavens; it was mildly warm as they rode away from the torchlit bulk of Port Murchison's walls. Those were the old-fashioned curtain type, twenty meters high and ten thick with a rubble core in none too good condition, but they bulked huge in the darkness. The cookfires of the Expeditionary Force were a glowing constellation of their own, through the groves and gardens outside the city; it was rich land, well tended with noblemen's country-seats. Wagons and handcarts were creaking out of the city with food
and cooked delicacies, although the guards were supposed to be turning back anything too blatant in the way of liquor or whores. Mostly the men seemed too tired to be restless and too excited to sleep.

"You sure about the war not being over?" Gerrin Staenbridge said, as he and Foley fell in beside their commander. "What happened today . . . that was about as decisive as anything I've seen or heard of."

Foley nodded. "We must have killed, oh, eight or ten thousand," he said with a slight shiver. "Toward the end they couldn't fight and wouldn't give up . . ." Gerrin reached over and squeezed his shoulder.

Raj nodded absently. "It was no more trouble than slaughtering pigs in a pen, Spirit strike me blind for a Christo if I lie," he said.
Except to poor Thiddo and a hundred or so others, every one of them as dead as they'd be if the barbs had won.
"I doubt if five thousand of their main force got away: we took twenty thousand fighting men prisoners, and twice that number of civilians. They must have lost nearly thirty thousand dead—over forty thousand counting the ones here and the two thousand the Skinners slaughtered. We'll have plague unless we get them underground fast, in this weather."

That meant half of all the Squadron males of fighting age were dead or captured, if the Ministry of Barbarians' figures were anything like accurate. Of course, the Squadron could mobilize every non-cripple; they didn't have the vast peon mass the Civil Government did.

"But the Admiral got away, worse luck, and the evil, senile old bastard will probably do his best to get
all
his people killed. He can still raise another forty or fifty thousand men from the western counties, if they answer the call, and the ten thousand Curtis Auburn has out on Sadler's Island are their best anyway."

"Gah," Gerrin said. "I didn't join the Army to work in an abattoir."

"Well, we can't
count
on their being as obliging next time," Raj pointed out. "See you in the morning," he said, as they came up to the villa that was his billet.

He walked Horace into the courtyard, then halted him with a silent touch of the rein. Suzette was sitting on the veranda in a pool of lantern-light, playing her long-necked
gittar,
and two-score men were crouched motionless on the flagstones at the base of the stairs; roughneck Scouts as quiet as the officers and Ludwig Bellamy, who was looking at her with the expression of a man who has just been struck hard on the head.

"
For we are all one way riders—
Riders on that one way street,
That runs across a golden valley
Where the rivers of joy and hope run deep.
"