Chapter 6

I

Glaive Trennys woke early on the day of the predicted attack and went immediately to the radio room. “Send a message to the barbarians. Is the attack coming? Send it in the clear.”

The head radio operator tapped out the message. Then he listened to the reply. “Lord Viceroy, they make no sense. Their war leader is said to be in B’Lugi itself now, and she has left a deputy, another woman, behind. The new woman doesn’t speak Tengri or Builder, but has a translator ... the translator says she is Chaba, the former slave of your original second in command, Harta Nomer, and who was freed by the barbarians. The deputy war leader says the creatures do not normally fly in the dark, but they have learned to fly just before morning. She says the attack is a little less than five hours out.”

Glaive turned to his new deputy. “Make sure everyone is in one of the fortress buildings. No one is to go outside until further notice. In a few hours, we will make an inspection that all doors to the outside are closed.”

“Yes, Lord!” he was an eager Tengri, grateful for the advancement and eager to please him.

Glaive sat in his presence chamber, contemplating how hard it was to wait, to have to rely on the word of a barbarian. Only the allies of the Builders weren’t really barbarians, were they? Perhaps they really were from the Big Moon, even though they denied it. And the B’Lugi weren’t really barbarians either.

Something tugged at his brain. The captain of the B’Lugi ship that was sniffing around out here was said to have been attacked by these creatures and lost a great many of her crew. Damn women! They should stay home and bear children! What was the honor in beating a woman? Then he thought sourly, where was the honor in being beaten by a woman?

He was off track. The captain had gotten to the gun deck, rallied the survivors, and counter-attacked. He’d taken that at face value; his mind’s vision still was of massed volleys, just smaller. But he was a sea captain; the hatches to the gun deck weren’t very large and were not placed to be conducive to attack. A hatch six feet on a side was large for a man, but for one of these birds? They were reputed to be large; they would have trouble getting more than one or two at a time through a hatch -- or a door.

Granted, the doors in the fortresses were large, at least the entrances, but even so. There weren’t going to be hundreds of birds fighting through a door. He remembered that the war leader said the B’Lugi captain had only a few men fire at once, while, one could assume, others were reloading. The Tengri battle style was massed volleys from as many men as they had. The B’Lugi tried to hide from such a volley and often did. Tengri were more numerous than their enemies, and early in the history of firearms, the massed volleys had been devastating. These days, not so much, and casualties had steadily risen.

That was a plan! They would fire limited volleys ... there weren’t going to be so many targets, and empty guns would be no match for razor teeth!

A runner fetched up in front of him, breathless. “Lord Viceroy, there is a dark cloud on the western horizon.”

He was up then and ran to the roof. He saw the cloud, ordered the alert, and everyone off the roof. When he turned to go himself, he swore fulsomely. Why had he expected aerial predators to try to enter through the front door? There was a large, uncovered hole in the roof, leading down into the fortress! How could he have been so stupid!

His deputy was a few feet away, and Glaive grabbed him. “Get downstairs, pull half the men off the front gate, send them to the tower. Hurry! Our lives depend on it!”

“You think they will come through the roof?” He stopped and watched the last of the observers head down. His head snapped back, “I will obey my Lord, then I will run to the other fortress and tell them too!”

“May fortune smile on you! May it smile on all of us! I will organize the defenders here, get someone to command below.”

This fortress had the majority of the Tengri civilians, the other fortress the majority of the slaves. Slaves could be replaced, but the Tengri could not! They were the artisans who would make this base succeed and whose absence would almost certainly see it fail! He was the last man on the roof, and the cloud was still several miles out. With a start, he saw the cloud of birds fold their wings and plunge down, going faster as they neared the ground.

He dashed below and found a few men already in the tower room. “Kneel! They will attack here in moments! Fire once, but do not attempt to reload! Fire at the animals as they try to come through the door. Once you fire, retreat to the next room and reload as fast as you ever have!” He stopped more men from coming in, telling them to wait in the next room. Then he went through himself. “Form three ranks. First rank is to be prone on the floor, the second kneeling, and the last standing. You men standing fire first and retire down the steps to the next landing and reload. Kneeling, fire second. Only fire at targets trying to enter. Once you fire, retreat and reload below. Prone men, fire last then scrabble backwards. Again, only fire at living targets coming through the door.”

There was a solid volley of shots from the tower room, then men were retreating back. “Load at the back of the room!” he commanded. There was another volley, and more men retreated back through. Glaive risked a glance in the other room, but it was useless, as it was filled with smoke, and the smoke was seeping into the room where he was. “Axes, men!” he called. “Axemen give your muskets to someone going to reload, then prepare to defend yourselves!”

The last of the men came into the room, some missing arms. “We couldn’t hold them!” someone called.

Glaive saw the first view of one of the creatures as it thrust its head into the room. A half dozen shots hit it, but the smoke was blinding. Glaive retreated to the back of the room. “Men, those on the floor stay, men with axes stay! Pass your firearms to someone without an axe. Retreat, those of you with empty firearms!”

There followed hours of exhausting fighting, having to give way when the smoke grew too dense. And always, no axemen retreated. None lived. The surviving defenders threw up barricades, if nothing else, piling furniture in the way. Until, abruptly, there was silence with no more attackers pressing forward.

They had been forced out of half the fortress, but the main entrance had never been attacked, so almost all of the survivors were in rooms that had been attacked. Glaive’s voice boomed out, “Do not advance! Do not advance! Pass the word! Do not advance!”

It took hours for the smoke to clear, and then they probed forward cautiously. There were dead creatures, but the Tengri dead were gone. The other fortress had obviously not fared as well; there was no sign of a living defender, just dead creatures. All of his slaves were gone! Two-thirds of his remaining soldiers! Most of the Tengri civilians survived, but some had had military experience and had joined in the defense. There were a lot of new widows among them as well.