Chapter 18: Going South

Freidal had been in front of his troops when they marched into the fort. He saluted Count Quillan, and then stayed on his horse until they were at the quarters area. The men took the wounded to the hospital tents and then collapsed into their own blankets.

Freidal waited until the last man was resting before he sought out Xitki. "This isn't working," he told the old man bluntly.

Xitki Quillan toyed with a mug of wine and waved him to sit. "The first thing a competent officer learns is to plan. The first thing battle teaches him is that plans don't work. In our pride and contempt for our enemies, we made not only battle plans, but war plans." He snorted in derision.

"Now we learn the bitter truth: war plans are more fragile than battle plans."

Freidal waved his hand like angry gnats were attacking him. "We must attack! We should leave a few hundred men here and attack Outpost with everyone else. If we follow the Great Plan, we'll still be sitting here, those of us alive, during the peace talks after the war. Won or lost someplace else."

Xitki looked at him hard. "You think you can do my job better than me?"

Freidal shook his head. "Of course not! It's the others. It's the so-called Great Plan!"

"The Great Plan is the result of the effort of the finest men of Zarthan, approved by your father, the king, the God-King of the Mexicotal and the priests of Styphon. I signed off on the Great Plan! I signed off on the Captain-General's plan to raid towards Outpost.

"Once again, Freidal: do you think you can do my job better than I can?"

"No! It was those other people! I've never had a problem with one of your plans. Tell me to my face you thought the Captain-General's plan was sound! Tell me to my face that you thought the Great Plan had any chance of working!"

"Give me your hand, Freidal!"

Freidal offered up his hand and Xitki led Freidal's fingers to his throat. "What do you feel, Captain?"

"Your skin. The pulse of your blood."

"I'm alive, Freidal. If I'd told your father the Great Plan wasn't worth the parchment it was written on, I'd be dead. I had to compromise. Delos was a favorite of Styphon's House. To overrule him was to place myself in great jeopardy. Tell me, Freidal, how can I help my king, my soldiers and the people of the realm, if I'm dead?"

Freidal pulled his hand back. "And I could have closed my hand and you would be dead. We must attack, Xitki. We've lost nearly two thousand men, killed or wounded, since we arrived. We haven't once fought the main body of those who oppose us."

"And that is your plan, Captain? We simply mount up the men and launch ourselves at our enemy's throats? Right now?"

Freidal laughed, breaking the tension. "Okay, that would be a pretty stupid thing to do this afternoon. Tomorrow morning."

Quillan smiled slightly. "And between now and then?"

Freidal nodded. "Make preparations and plans."

"Well then! I'm glad you've come around to my way of thinking, Captain!"

"I can't go on like this, you know I can't," Freidal said, his voice plaintive.

"And we are back again to the discussion about whether or not you can do my job better than me."

"No. I am, however, my father's son. I believe the position of Captain-General has fallen vacant."

"And you think a jumped-up captain of cavalry can do a better job than your predecessor?"

"One thing I am sure of is that I could hardly do worse! Yes!" Freidal retorted.

"Then I guess we should find out how that sits with the other Captains. One or two of them might feel that they have a better claim to the position."

"There is something else we must talk about first," Freidal told him.

"Something more important than a council of war, so that we may plan this attack you so favor? A council of war where we elevate you to Captain-General?"

"Something of direct importance to it, yes. My Lord, Count Quillan. I saw something on the field a few days ago. Something no one else seems to have remarked on. Something that you must know, before we can plan anything."

Xitki made a come-along gesture.

Freidal gestured at Lamas, Xitki Quillans's batman. "Could you fetch Sergeant Alcibidos? He's waiting outside my tent."

A few moments later a man limped in on a crutch. His leg was splinted, his arm was splinted, his face bandaged. "Sergeant, please tell Count Quillan your duties under the Captain-General."

The man looked at Xitki Quillan and bobbed his head in respect. "My Lord, I was the senior picket sergeant."

"I want you to answer carefully for the Count," Freidal told the sergeant. "I want your best, most truthful answers. I swear to you on my honor that nothing you say here today will bring you or yours hurt."

"Why would I want to hurt one of my sergeants?" Xitki asked reasonably. "I know Alcibidos, he was a sergeant when I was a lad. A loyal and trusted man."

"Sergeant, where were you when the battle commenced?"

"My Lord Captain-General ordered two pickets forward to scale the ridge line. I could not order any man forward under such circumstances unless I was at his side." The old sergeant grimaced. "I could not keep up with trooper Rodrigos; he was ahead of me. When the Hostigi opened fire, they shot him first. I took cover."

"And then Colonel Trium ordered his men up the hill," Freidal offered.

"Yes, Lord. There had only been the one shot. There was no way to tell it was a trick."

"How many shots in the next volley?" Freidal inquired.

"Perhaps ten or fifteen. The Hostigi are fell marksmen, half of those shots went home."

"Did you see where the shots were coming from?" Freidal asked.

The old sergeant bit his lip. "I had my rifle up, looking for a target. I couldn't see a target."

"Dense smoke from the fireseed, of course," Freidal said equitably.

"No, Lord. I simply couldn't see where the shots were coming from."

"Surely the fireseed smoked obscured your vision?" Freidal continued.

The sergeant frowned, obviously thinking. "I don't recall a wind, but there must have been one. There was little or no smoke, not at first."

"Did you see any muzzle flashes, sergeant?"

"The one that killed trooper Rodrigos."

"Which way did the smoke blow from that shot?"

Again the sergeant contemplated an answer. "When I saw the flash, I took cover at once, my Lord. When I looked again, there was no smoke."

"Thank you, sergeant," Freidal told the man. "I appreciate your bravery and courage."

"I too," Count Quillan said. "I hope you will mend soon."

The sergeant snorted. "Two or three moons, they tell me. I'm not as young as I once was."

He left and Xitki gestured at Freidal. "And the point of that?"

"I told my troop sergeant that we were not to be the first up the hill. I was looking upslope when the trooper was shot. I could see the muzzle flash, but I couldn't see any fireseed smoke. Later, when Trium tried the hill, I saw muzzle flashes from one point alone, firing repeatedly. And no fireseed smoke."

"Undoubtedly you have a point to make," Xitki told him, his voice tight.

"I think the High King knew about the Great Plan. I think he's here. I think it is he, personally, that opposes us. The High King had a weapon that fired without fireseed smoke and fired more than once without reloading."

Xitki looked at Freidal for a moment then shook his head. "We know the High King was in Hostigos less than a moon before the attack. There was a public dedication of his new University in the city. Unless the High King can fly like a bird, there is no way he could be here."

"Unless it was a double and he came secretly."

"If the High King had come, we'd be facing more than a few thousand summer soldiers. He'd have brought his field army at the same time."

"That we might have noticed," Freidal said, laughing, trying to take the edge off. "No, I think it was just the High King and a cadre of his better officers."

"You are young, Freidal. You have, undoubtedly, read the romantic stories of kings traveling as commoners, princesses masquerading as bar maids and princes posing as cavalry captains.

"Freidal, if you were about to plunge your entire patrimony into war, would you ride off clear across the world from all that is important in your kingdom to take part in one small, albeit vital, part in the war? It makes no sense. We have a strong contingent of our Mexicotal allies with us, but that is just the lifting of their little finger. They have more than a million men marching on Xiphlon. We have fifty men with that horde; a representative of the king and his personal guards."

"I'm telling you what I saw. The sergeant confirmed it."

"He confirmed nothing, Freidal. His companion was shot, and he went to ground quickly, so he wouldn't get shot. When Trium's men came up the hill, he saw more shooting, but some of it undoubtedly came his way as well. He took cover again. I daresay you could ask a hundred men what they did in the battle and they could only tell you about half, if that. Every last one of those men would tell you a different story. When battle scares the pee and shit out of you, you spend your time thinking about that, not whether or not the High King is firing smokeless fireseed at you."

"Xitki, I'm warning you, that's all. Think what you like. But we know the party that hit the fort numbered about thirty. Does that make any sense? They caused death and injury out of all proportion to their number. You can ask any of the scouts and soldiers from the last battle. We know there were a hundred of them. That's all. One to our ten. And they slaughtered us.

"Xitki, allow in your calculations that there is something, someone facing us that you don't understand. These aren't Hostigi tactics; these are something different. These tactics are bold, unique and deadly effective. Things like the High King has been known to do."

Xitki Quillan looked at Freidal, and then shrugged. "Do me a favor. This is a story you can tell me; I trust Alcibidos as well. While he didn't draw the same conclusions, there is nothing in what he said that contradicts you, but his statements don't prove your theory either. Whatever you do, don't tell your story to anyone else. Maybe if we get confirmation of who it is we face, then it would be time to talk of your suspicions. I will freely admit that you were the one who noticed first and voiced your suspicions to me.

"Right now, Freidal, morale is in the shitter. We can't afford for it to decline any further. Not unless we know for sure. This is something we can take precautions for. But if the troops were to hear a rumor that they faced the High King... we'd be marching home in a day or two, because they'd be sure he'd be going for our homes before the summer wanes."

Xitki had Freidal retire to clean up and make himself more presentable. When Freidal returned, the Council of War was already underway. A lesser man might have taken umbrage, but Freidal knew full well that Count Quillan was easily the most devious man in the kingdom.

When he entered, everyone looked to him. Freidal bobbed his head. "I'm sorry for being late, Count Quillan."

"No problem. I saved you a seat." Xitki waved at the only slightly less ornate chair than his that sat at his right hand at the head of the table. The one the Captain-General had warmed before his untimely death.

Freidal walked over and sat down next to the old man, keeping his face empty of expression.

"Prince, do you have a word for us?" Xitki asked.

Freidal bobbed his head. "My position as a Captain of Cavalry was a polite fiction. It satisfied our allies, the servants of the God-King of the Mexicotal, who has sent his eldest son, his daughter-in-law and his grandchildren to reside with my father. Officially, they are my father's guests. All know them to be hostages for the honor of the God-King. They were afforded my father's protection and I was afforded the protection of my father's army.

"Polite fiction time has come and gone. Our armies have proved to be lacking in the field. We have lost battles; we have not been able to adhere to the Great Plan.

"We currently have enough supplies to sally forth against our enemies." There was a stir in the room and Freidal grinned sardonically. "True, we have enough to ride out, but not to return. Unless we defeat the Hostigi quickly we would be in trouble. However, we're already in trouble. I would prefer to face my father and explain to him that we tried and failed to carry Outpost by assault, rather than to explain to him that we failed to take Outpost because we sat inside our wall and essayed nothing."

Gamelin was sitting with his back against a rock, using Hellfire for shade. He grimaced to himself. This was a familiar position for him here in the desert. Except most of the other times he'd had the wit to doze in the time he had. He looked around. Like the first time, Judy was nowhere to be seen. Then, though, even if he hadn't been aware of it, he'd have seen her before the day ended. This day, it wasn't to be.

Vosper whistled and pointed to the northwest. Gamelin saw the signal blinking and heaved himself up and trotted towards Vosper and his signalman. "What?" Gamelin asked.

"Not good," Vosper said, watching the light blink. "The Zarthani have attacked towards Outpost. Helmoth managed to kill himself and four hundred men."

Vosper turned to the signalman. "That is how you read it, don't you?"

The signalman nodded. "Yes, sergeant! They are repeating the message again."

"Signalman, send, 'We continue our mission, '" Gamelin told the man.

The signalman started sending, even before his lieutenant had finished speaking. After a finger-width the signalman turned to Gamelin. "Lieutenant, they acknowledge."

"Signalman," Vosper spoke. Both Gamelin and the signalman looked at the sergeant. "About now you have an urgent need to piss. The temptation to mention what you've just seen will tempt you to speak of it to others. Signalman, not just this time, but if I hear you've passed on a message meant for others to your friends, why, I'll chop you into little pieces and leave you for the ants."

The signalman grinned. "My captain told me the day I volunteered for signal duty that my job would be the easiest in camp. But also the most dangerous. That if I spoke of what I knew, it would show I was untrustworthy and I would be killed out of hand. Sergeant, I like my job! I don't have guard duty! I don't have to wake up before dawn! Once upon a time, I could sleep the entire night without worrying about being woken. I won't mess up, sergeant!"

Gamelin had stood back, watching the byplay, thinking. There were no more signals, so he walked back towards the camp. Chollo, Manistewa's man appeared. "Bad news, Lieutenant?"

"Yes. Outpost is attacked; we lost a lot of men and evidently didn't get much for it. How far now, to your redoubt?"

The other waved ahead of them. "We've been going slowly, Lieutenant. At this rate, five days."

"We need to be faster."

The man looked at Gamelin then nodded. "You will have to spend horses. Perhaps men. Two days, in that case."

"We cannot spend either," Gamelin told him. "The supplies have to come through."

"Tomorrow, men will come to help carry the burden. Men who will not be able to carry as much as a horse, but who will still live at the end of the journey."

Gamelin frowned. "That's horses. Two days and I will lose soldiers."

"Not the good ones," the Ruthani trader told him bluntly. "Your men... they aren't very good, Lieutenant! Not up to our standards, they aren't very tough! You can't let the weak ones slow you down."

"We will go as fast as we may," Gamelin told the man. "I will not spend men. If someone falls, we'll carry him."

"You command, Lieutenant. The choice will be yours," the trader told him. Making it clear Gamelin's choice was just plain stupid.

After that, the rest of the day was a nightmare. No more rests. No more walking the horses. Fortunately, the break had come in the afternoon, because by dark, his men were exhausted and the horses were worse.

But, come dawn, there were men, more Ruthani, who appeared from the desert. They were grim, hard men. Men, Gamelin quickly came to learn, who had one purpose: killing Mexicotal. Oh, they'd kill Zarthani if they had a chance, but the Mexicotal were their prime target.

The worst part of the next day was the High Sun halt. It was clear about thirty of his men and about fifty horses would die in the afternoon, if they kept on. The Ruthani had brought enough men to bear the burdens the horses had carried, but they weren't interested in helping the Hostigi.

Gamelin made the hardest choice of his life. "I know it's not the best thing, Vosper. I want you to stay with these men and the spent horses. Let them rest until tomorrow morning and then continue on. If need be, take another day. Go slowly. We'll keep in touch. I'll see if we can send you more water as well."

Vosper had laughed. "You have made an old man's day, Lieutenant! Duty I can appreciate! This way I will arrive well-rested and ready for anything!"

Gamelin was pretty sure that if Vosper had continued on with the main body, he'd have arrived rested and ready for whatever was next.

The rest of the day was really bad, stretching all of them to their limits. Chollo was resting as the sun was half consumed by the horizon and Gamelin crouched next to him. "How much further?" Gamelin croaked.

Manistewa's man eyed Gamelin and smiled slightly. "You did better than I would have thought. But we slowed significantly this afternoon."

"It was very hot," Gamelin said. Even wetting his throat hadn't helped and there wasn't much water.

"We know." Chollo waved at the pile of mountains ahead of them. "In that canyon there, some of the women and children have brought water. You won't see them. Tomorrow, about halfway to High Sun, we'll make the final camp. There will be shade, water and grass for the horses."

He stopped talking and shaded his eyes, looking northwards. After a heart-beat he grinned. "Manistewa's niece comes behind us, along with her friend."

Gamelin turned and looked, but couldn't see anything. After half a finger-width of being told where to look, he could see the two ants out across the desert floor. He could only shake his head in amazement. His father had trackers like that, men who could see in the distance as Tuck with his glass device. They all swore it wasn't sorcery, just very good eyes.

While they were waiting, the signals sergeant approached diffidently. "Lieutenant, would you look at this?"

He was carrying some rocks. Gamelin grimaced, suddenly sure he was going to learn something about rocks. He bobbed his head to the older man, nearly as old as Gamelin's father. "In a moment, Sergeant."

Gamelin turned back to Chollo. "And this camp tomorrow... it doesn't sound very much like the redoubt I have heard about."

"It isn't. You will never see it, Lieutenant. Tomorrow more people will come, and the remaining weapons and supplies will be taken to safety. This is no need for any Hostigi to see where."

"That isn't the understanding I was given by Count Tellan."

Chollo chuckled. "Even if Manistewa had been telling the truth, which he wasn't, the Elders of the People wouldn't have permitted it. In times of peace, very few of our people know the way. A few more know a place to go to find a guide to take them to safety. We have kept our secret safe for more than a thousand years, Lieutenant, and we plan on keeping it safe for another thousand."

The signal sergeant spoke up. "Then Ruthani, you need to kill us all." He tossed one of the rocks in his hand, and then gave it to Gamelin. It was incredible! The rock was the heaviest he'd ever lifted!

"My father, Lieutenant, was a scholar who traveled the lands of the High King. It was his duty to look for minerals. That rock, Lieutenant, is called leadstone. It contains a lot of lead, plus silver and other minerals. If there is very much of this, then the High King will claim the land."

Gamelin's first instinct was to shoot the sergeant. It was clear Chollo was thinking the same thing.

"The High King has not claimed this land and we will not let him," Chollo said evenly. "You will see things like leadstone and other odd rocks in our lands. Forget them. They belong to our people, not yours."

The sergeant bristled. "We have already given a great deal of lead to the Mexicotal and Zarthani. We are here to send them more. And you would begrudge the High King the wherewithal to do it?"

"Sergeant," Gamelin interrupted the other's tirade. The sergeant looked at him. "Shut your mouth. Take samples; take notes of where you found them. This is none of our business, but affairs of state that are the concern of Count Tellan and the High King. Like your messages, you aren't to go talking about this to anyone except me."

The sergeant stood, furious and contemptuous. "As you command, Lieutenant." He stalked away, rigid with anger.

Chollo regarded Gamelin coldly. "You will not take that which belongs to our people."

"Me?" Gamelin laughed as best he could. "I have a hundred men and less than half of them here. I couldn't take a latrine pit unless my enemies withdrew first. As I told the sergeant: this is a matter for my superiors. And your elders."

"All know how the elders feel," Chollo said.

Gamelin glanced out over the desert. Tanda Havra and Tazi were much closer, running like ghosts over the desert. Gamelin couldn't help but feel his heart lift, knowing that somewhere behind them was Tuck... and Lady Judy.

Chollo laughed at him. "I don't have to worry about you. You are so love-smitten that you will not pay attention in your first battle."

Gamelin turned to face the much older man. "I paid attention in my first battle. And my second and my third. She's not so much a distraction as a motivation."

The other laughed and in what Gamelin guessed was supposed to be a friendly gesture, punched Gamelin hard in the arm. It was going to leave a bruise, Gamelin thought, but he resisted the temptation to rub it... or to return the blow, which had been his first thought.

Tanda Havra and Tazi slowed to a walk a few hundred paces away and came up to them. They were, Gamelin saw, breathing no differently than he was. They were sweaty and dusty, both needed a bath, but Gamelin was sure that was all they needed. And probably wouldn't mind going without for a while longer.

"Lieutenant, Chollo," Tanda said, bowing slightly to Gamelin, but not to her uncle's man.

"Tanda! Did you see Vosper?"

"Aye, they'll be here tomorrow before sunset."

"We have another quarter day's journey before we make final camp," Gamelin told her.

Tanda Havra shrugged. "Then, day after tomorrow. They will lose some horses; there isn't sufficient water. In another moon, you will not be able to come this way at all."

"And Captain Tuck?" Gamelin asked.

She grinned. "Tuck and the others, two more days for sure. He is more careful, staying further east than you did. It isn't as short a trip, but there's more water."

"This moon," Chollo opined.

Tanda grinned and bobbed her head. "This moon, indeed so!"

Later Gamelin stood off to one side of the camp, contemplating the mass of mountains to the south. There was only the slightest trace of light left. It rankled that he'd had to rely on Chollo and his men to bring the water; Gamelin's men were too spent.

Still, they were okay now and tomorrow would see them delivering the remainder of the weapons and supplies they carried with them. From out of the gathering darkness, Tanda Havra appeared to stand next to him. She too contemplated the mountains.

"You are upset that they won't show you the redoubt," she told him.

"It doesn't seem very trusting. But a thousand years... that is a long time to keep a secret."

"Will it help if I told you that until I started south I did not have any idea of where it was? The general direction. South and east, from Mogdai. Not how far, not which direction. As you may have noticed, there are a lot of mountains down here."

"I noticed," Gamelin said, slightly amused. Trygath wasn't like this at all! There a man could ride for days and the greatest eminence he might pass would be little taller than he was.

He turned to face her as the last of the light faded. "Tanda Havra, you were with Tuck. We hurried south, once we heard that Outpost had been invested. We haven't heard anything since."

"Well, as of two days ago, it still held," she told him.

"And Tuck? What are his intentions?"

"As Count Tellan said: to take the war into the lands of the Mexicotal."

"Everyone says the desert south of here is worse than what we've seen so far."

"It is. I am not sure of my uncle, Lieutenant. The morning after we learned of Captain Helmoth's attack, he produced an order from Duke Skranga, saying he wasn't to go into the field because of his knowledge of the High King's secrets. So he turned around and returned to Outpost. That makes no sense to me."

Gamelin grimaced. "I don't understand it either. Count Tellan might not give him the welcome he expects. It might be colder than the one we got here."

"Come," she said, lightly tugging on his sleeve. They walked back towards the fires, stopping outside the circle of light, but where they could see each other.

"I told you, Tuck has gone slower, he has stayed closer to water. His men are in much better shape than yours."

"I should have gone slower," Gamelin mused.

"No, you were told to come with all speed and that's what you did. That, Gamelin, is what people like you and I do, when commanded by the likes of Count Tellan... and Tuck."

"You sound like an old sergeant."

"I am of the Northern Ruthani. I left them because my mother disgraced her family. I came here, where my uncle lived, because it was the best choice I had. I didn't care for his attentions, so I moved on to Mogdai. I was a stranger for a very long time. They trusted me, this much." She held up her fingers a very short distance apart. "They trust my uncle only a little more. The elders here have allowed him to speak for them, because it is something they need."

"The world is a very complicated place," Gamelin said sadly.

"The world," Tanda Havra said quietly, "is the sum of our actions. It is what we make of it."

"Now you sound like a philosopher," Gamelin told her.

That reduced Tanda Havra to doubled-over laughter. "What I am, Lieutenant, is a solitary person who has spent too much time thinking."

"Tuck is a good man," Gamelin said stoutly.

She laughed again. "Lieutenant, Tuck fights his own battles. As do I. But that isn't to say you're wrong, either."

There was a sound behind Gamelin and he turned and saw nothing. When he turned back, Tanda Havra was gone. He chuckled to himself. Was it that simple? If a guard heard a small sound at night, he would turn and look, would he not? And since it was a small sound and if the guard saw nothing amiss, he'd finally turn back to his duty, content.

Tanda Havra sat down near the fire and Tazi promptly joined her. "Rest, Tazi. Tomorrow will be easy, the day after easier still."

"I helped fetch water," the younger girl said.

"That is good," Tanda told her.

"He was one of the ones who helped."

Tanda grinned, quite sure who "he" was. "Captain Tuck fought next to him twice. I don't think just anyone could do that... or having done so, be asked to do it again unless he was a good man."

Tazi bobbed her head. "He wanted me to walk with him tonight."

"This is not a good time," Tanda told her. "But it might not be a good time for several years to come. This is a choice you and he have to make."

"I said no. I told him I would rather run next to you, than walk with him."

"I am even less suitable than he is," Tanda said with a laugh.

Tazi sputtered in mock outrage. "You know what I mean."

"I know what you mean, sister. I have lived longer than you, Tazi. I've seen spring come, the sere summer, the relief of fall, the slowness of winter. Many times have I seen it. Many times have I seen sisters who, determined not to choose too soon, chose anyway. Do not regret choices made, Tazi."

"Do you think Tuck will truly go south? Into the lands of the Mexicotal?"

Tanda nodded. "Truly he will. I will help him, as much as I can. It will be a noble deed, even though we all will die."

"As long as we can kill one Mexicotal, it will have been a noble deed. Freeing one such as Smiling Fox's woman -- or my own mother -- that will be a deed of legend!"

Tanda smiled to herself. "I don't think Tuck plans on stopping at one dead Mexicotal, or freeing just one of them."

"And that is why I will wait as I must. I want to be part of this!"

"The Zarthani we have fought so far have been fools. It is clear that the Mexicotal are oath-bound to them -- which is why we don't meet many of their scouts. South of here, Tazi, those are Mexicotal lands. They will not be oath-bound there. It will be a thousand times more dangerous."