Down to the Sea

THIRTEEN

“Well, Commander Cromwell, all this fuss and excitement simply because we fished you out of the water.”

Still standing at attention, Richard figured it was best not to reply. He stepped forward and laid the briefcase on Admiral Bullfinch’s desk.

.“Do you know what’s in here?” Bullfinch asked.

“Sir, the presidential seal is intact.”

“Damn it, man, I can see that. But you must have a sense of what the hell it is they are doing up there in Suzdal.”

“I attended several meetings, sir, if that’s what you mean.”

“Relax, Cromwell. I told you to be my eyes up there, I want to know.”

Richard took the word relax to mean that he could stand at ease, and he did so.

Bullfinch leaned back in his chair, looked appraisingly at Richard. “Hard to believe you are old Tobias’s son.” Richard stiffened slightly, and Bullfinch put out his hand and waved it in a conciliatory gesture.

“No, no, don’t take offense. It’s just, remember, I served under your father for over a year. They pushed my class out of Annapolis early because the navy was desperate for officers. I’d hoped for one of the new steam frigates; instead I got a transport ship. Damn, how your father hated that. I mean the ship, not me. He wanted action the same as I did.” Bullfinch smiled wistfully. “We both got more than we’d bargained for.”

As he spoke he popped the seal on the case and opened it, pulling out several thick folders that, in turn, had been sealed as well.

“Looks all very official and businesslike. Now tell me, Cromwell, what did you see, and what do you think about all this?”

“The president’s speech, I read it in the papers on the way down. I think he laid it out quite clearly. The Kazan are coming, so now is the time to mobilize and present a unified front.”

“I read that as well,” Bullfinch snapped. “Andrew at his best, but that’s not what I asked for. What is it that you really saw?”

Richard hesitated. He was being asked to comment on things political, a realm he wished to avoid whenever possible.

“Out with it, Cromwell.”

“Indecision and confusion, sir.”

“Ah, now we are getting down to facts.”

“No, sir, just my opinion as you asked for it.”

“They trained you well at the academy, Cromwell.”

“Sir?”

“The military and politics to be forever kept apart. Facts versus opinion. Cromwell, politics has precious little to do with facts and everything to do with opinion, so go ahead.”

“President Keane clearly understands the issue.”

“In other words, he completely believed you.”

“I wouldn’t venture an opinion on that, sir. He said that we have to believe my report, for to do otherwise is folly.” Bullfinch grunted, his one eye baleful, gaze locked on Cromwell.

“You realize, Cromwell, that if you are wrong, if it should turn out that these bastards are not attacking, then the entire navy will look like fools. Half the senate will scream we cooked the whole thing up to ram through another appropriation. I do not take kindly to being made to look like a fool. Do you get my drift, Lieutenant?”

“Yes, sir,” he said, thinking it best not to correct the admiral concerning his new rank.

“The father of Sean O’Donald is one of my closest friends, Cromwell. On the other hand, your father was one of my most bitter foes. The fact that I now have to accept the word of one son over another, an accusation that Sean O’Donald cannot even defend himself against, is an outrage to me.”

“You know about Sean, sir?” Cromwell gasped.

“The whole damn Republic knows about him.” He reached over to the table behind his desk and picked up a copy of Gates’s Daily.

“Some damn congressional assistant spilled it last night, and Gates printed it, damn his hide. Sherman was right: every damn newspaperman should be given a choice, either hang them or hand them a gun and put them on the front line. This will break old Pat’s heart. It will kill him, Lieutenant, kill him.”

Richard did not reply.

“You were in this office less than two weeks ago, still dripping wet from your alleged adventure. Why the hell didn’t you tell me about this? As you commanding officer you should have reported to me any allegations you might have against a brother officer first rather than have it spill out like this.”

As he spoke, he coiled the paper up and slammed it several times on his desk and then in disgust threw it so that it landed at Cromwell’s feet.

“Sir.” He struggled to control his voice, to not let a hint of anger show. “I kept it in confidence because I believed it proper to first inform Senator O’Donald personally.”

“You mean, you told him this to his face?” As he spoke, Bullfinch rose half out of his chair, pointing at the paper, shouting so loudly that Cromwell knew that every officer and sailor in the outer office was most likely standing stock still, soaking in every word.

“Yes, sir. He was the first to know. Him and the president. I have discussed it with no one else since, other than now with you. If some”-he paused for a second and then let it spill out, raising his voice so that the unseen audience could hear his reply-“damn loose-mouthed pencil pusher in Congress ran and told the press about it, I can assure you, sir, it did not come from me. I resolved that no one other than Lieutenant O’Donald’s father would ever know of what happened out there, and I kept that promise to myself and to him.”

Bullfinch settled back slightly. His features were still red, though, so that it looked like he was barely containing his temper.

“You better pray for war, Lieutenant,” he said, his voice low, “and pray damn hard, because if it doesn’t come, I’ll have you shoveling shit in the most godforsaken outpost I can find, and remember, sir, you owe the Republic eight years service for your education, so you can’t resign and get away from me.”

“Sir, I will pray for exactly that to happen. I’d rather shovel shit for the next eight years than see my comrades blown out of the water.”

Bullfinch, taken aback by the reply, looked at him with obvious surprise, and Richard decided to press in.

“And they will be blown out of the water, Admiral, if we go at them in a ship-of-the-line fight, trading broadsides at three thousand yards. As I told you before, the Gettysburg lasted barely ten minutes against one of their lightest ships. You asked for an opinion, sir, and that is it, and it is the opinion of the president and the Naval Design Board as well.”

There was the slightest flicker of a smile on Bullfinch’s face, but his gaze was still hard, features red.

“Damn you, Cromwell,” he said. “At least I’ll say this, unlike your father, you have some guts.”

Richard sensed his control slipping. He lowered his eyes, and that triggered even more anger within, knowing that Bullfinch would see the action as a backing down.

“Sir.” He took a deep breath, struggling to maintain his composure. “The issue here is my report and the response from Suzdal. I’d prefer if any allegations you might have about my father remain outside this conversation.”

Bullfinch blinked and, if possible, his features reddened to the point that it seemed as if he would explode. He exhaled noisily and then sat back.

“I’ll be damned if a lieutenant tells me what I can and cannot discuss in my own office.”

“As a commander in the service of the Republic,” he replied, unable to contain being called lieutenant one more time, “I believe I have every right to object to a personal insult, sir, as long as that objection is done in a professional manner.”

Bullfinch reached up, rubbing the ugly scars that creased his right cheek and forehead. “I’ll be damned, sir. Now you are quoting the rules of the service to me, no less.”

Richard was tempted to add that Bullfinch had helped to write them, but he was back in control of himself again. Getting into a shouting match with an admiral at a time like this served no useful purpose, either to the navy or to himself, or to the memory of his father, a man whom he had never even known.

Bullfinch cleared his throat, opened the topmost envelope on his desk, and slowly read through the first few pages.

He finally looked back up, acting as if Cromwell had not been standing there waiting patiently for him to continue.

“Insane,” Bullfinch sighed, and he almost seemed to collapse as if all wind had been taken out of his sails. “This whole thing is insane.”

Richard remained silent.

“Do you know what they are ordering us to do?”

– “No, sir, not officially, but I had a sense of it. I attended three meetings with the president and two with the Design Board before being detailed back here.”

“And you actually saw these ships, these Kazan battleships, as they are called here?”

“Yes, sir. Eight of them were anchored in the harbor at Kazan, as was most of the rest of the emperor’s fleet.”

“I hope to God you weren’t behind the mad scheme to tear Shiloh and her sister ships apart, because if so, orders or no orders”-he tapped the papers on his desk-“you will most definitely be handed that shit shovel before you get out of this office.”

“No, sir. I was at the meeting at the dockyard when Professor Ferguson raised the subject.”

“Did you influence that woman at all?”

Richard hesitated. “Sir, she asked my opinion, sir.”

“And that was?”

“Shiloh would go to the bottom inside of ten minutes once their battleships got within range. If we had thirty, forty ships like Shiloh, maybe enough would survive to close in and make a kill, but twenty thousand men under your command would die doing it.”

Bullfinch looked back at the papers, picked them up, and riffled through them again.

“I’ll say this at least,” he announced slowly, “she has saved our asses more than once.” He looked up again at Cromwell. “You didn’t know her husband. I did. He was a damn good friend, even if he was strange. His mind always seemed to be off somewhere else even when you talked with him. But good God, when you got into things technical, he just exploded with ideas and plans that, damn me, always seemed to work. If he hadn’t disobeyed Andrew with that rocket scheme, we’d have lost the war at Hispania, and that’s a fact.” He smiled wistfully, the tension gone for a moment as he remembered things past.

“Varinnia was a real beauty, she was, tragic what happened in that fire. But maybe it was a blessing for us all. Ferguson had the strength and moral character few men have to look beyond the flesh, to see and discover a mind as brilliant as his own beneath. No, perhaps even more brilliant because she was a perfect match, a mind that could organize and bring to completion all his mad schemes.

“And when he died, Lord, how we were terrified. He’d always been our ace up the sleeve. But he had unleashed something within her. In those last months when he knew he was dying, he crammed in years of training, and after he was gone she took off like a blazing comet. She was able to find others like herself, train them, point them in the right direction, and let them loose.”

He sighed again and then seemed to be embarrassed with his mental wandering. “Still, even if it came straight from her, I’d tell her right to her face that this time she is out of control. She’s trying to do in days what should take months. Hell, that inane decking on Shiloh will raise the center of gravity a good three feet. The ship will be so top-heavy she’ll roll in the first good gale.”

“She knows that, sir, and the response is, don’t sail into a gale.”

Bullfinch laughed. “In another month the cyclones start.”

“In a cyclone even our best armored cruisers have gone under.”

The admiral slammed an open palm on the papers. “The president orders and I obey, but by heavens, Andrew Lawrence Keane was an infantry officer before he became president. He and that Design Board, and even the damned secretary of the navy, who couldn’t figure out which railing to piss over when the wind is up, don’t know what it is to fight a battle at sea, and I do.”

“Sir, that was conveyed to me quite clearly by the president just before I left. What you have in those files”- Cromwell pointed at the papers on the desk-“are undoubtedly recommendations and proposals for ship changes, transfers of command such as the air corps, and overall strategic suggestions. The president told me to inform you that you have his full confidence, and how the battle is to be fought is under your control, not his.”

“Well, thank you very much, Cromwell,” Bullfinch responded, his voice edged with sarcasm. “I was beginning to think that-all I was supposed to do is push these papers around and sit behind this desk.”

Richard did not reply, but even a blind man could have seen that there was more that he wanted to say.

“Go on, out with it,” Bullfinch growled.

“Sir, when I first came in here, you asked for my opinion.”

“And now you’re going to give it.”

“With your permission.”

“Then do it, damn you.”

He stepped closer, trying to assume a more relaxed position, eyes not fixed on Bullfinch, but instead on one of the papers scattered about the desk: a sketch of a Kazan battleship. He pointed at the drawing.

“Sir, what is coming at us is unlike anything we ever imagined in our worst nightmares. For the last fifteen years the Kazan have deceived us. The ships they assigned to patrol their outer waters were derelict wrecks from fifty years past. All the time they were watching, observing, gathering information while they fought amongst themselves to settle their own differences.”

“Wish the hell they’d slaughtered one another.”

“The paradox is that the fighting amongst themselves created the threat that exists now. Their fleet has a generation of battle experience behind it.

“I regret having to say this, but we must assume that Lieutenant O’Donald has told them everything he knows about us, technical and political. The Kazan will come armed with that knowledge.”

“And these Shiv?” Bullfinch asked.

Cromwell visibly shuddered. “Terrifying, sir. They view us the same way a tiger would look at a kitten. They’ve been bred for two hundred years by the Order. Why the emperor tolerates the Order’s existence is beyond me, other than the fact that he must fear them and their power.

“That, sir, is part of the reason for this war. I suspect it is an excuse to divert the emperor.”

“But you told me that their leader, Hazard.

“Hazin, sir.”

“This Hazin is cunning.”

Richard nodded. “The most cunning mind I have ever met.”

Bullfinch looked at him closely. “I sense an admiration in you, Cromwell.”

Richard reluctantly nodded. “I must confess I was intrigued. I thought he would be like a leader of the Hordes. I was a slave, sir, for the first six years of my life. I remember their cruelty, their rage. Hazin was educated, with knowledge that is beyond us. He could cite ancient poets and philosophers, then ever so subtly shift, pulling out your most hidden thoughts. He is a match for the emperor. In fact, I believe that before this is done, the emperor will be dead and Hazin will control all.”

“You liked him, didn’t you?”

Richard lowered his eyes. “He is our enemy.”

“But personally?”

Richard looked Bullfinch straight in the eye. “No sir, he is our enemy.”

Long ago he had learned to read lies, to catch the ever so subtle shift in voice, the momentary flicker in the eyes and tensing of features. It came from searching the faces of his cruel childhood masters. He wondered if Bullfinch could read that now.

Yes, he did like Hazin, and in a different world he might consider him a friend, no matter how loathsome his dreams, morality, and obsession with power. He had never met a mind like his, or a personality that could be so frightfully engaging and controlling.

He knew Hazin had seduced him, had seen him as but one more pawn in a game of power. And yet it was Hazin who had granted him his life.

Bullfinch nodded. “That is all, Lieuten-Commander Cromwell.”

“Yes, sir.” He stiffened to attention.

“Your own personal orders I assume the president told you.”

“Yes, sir, he did. He said I was the most qualified to lead the section, though he preferred that I accept a staff assignment with you instead.”

“My staff?” Bullfinch laughed. “Hardly likely.”

“I assumed you would prefer it this way, sir.”

“You at least guessed right on that one, Cromwell. We have a million square miles of ocean to watch. As the air corps moves down here, you will serve as liaison to them and for training. You’ll do more flying in the next month than you did in the last four years. Try not to get yourself killed doing it, Cromwell.”

“I plan to be here for the fight, sir.”

Bullfinch shook his head. “What we have here,” he sighed, pointing at the papers and then looking back up, “scares the living hell out of me, Cromwell. I hope my threat to send you on that shit-shoveling detail comes to pass, for all our sakes.”

“I hope so, too, Admiral, but I can tell you, unless we pull off a miracle, we’ll all be in hell before you can hand that shovel to me.”

“Lieutenant Keane, over here!”

Abe urged his exhausted mount to a loping gallop, leaning forward in the saddle as they zigzagged up the face of a low butte, following an ancient mammoth trail. Sergeant Togo, the troop’s lead scout, was crouched low on the crest, horse concealed just below the lip of the rise, and Abe swung out of his saddle, slipped to the ground, and took the precaution of unslinging his carbine and bringing it along. As he scrambled up the last few feet of rocky ground, the scout extended his hand, motioning for him to keep low.

He crawled up over the edge of the rise.

“Careful, sir, don’t kick up any dust.”

The sergeant pointed over at the next butte a couple of miles to the east.

Abe raised his field glasses and within seconds spotted more than a dozen Bantags, dismounted at the base of the butte, watering their mounts along the far banks of a muddy stream. They were out in the open, clearly visible, one of them carrying a red pennant, signifying a commander of a thousand.

The low summer grass covering the open ground between the butte and the stream was burnt brown with the heat, and crisscrossed with hundreds of tracks, crushed flat in some spaces across the width of a hundred yards or more.

“We’re on a main column here,” the sergeant announced. “Hard to tell at this distance, but the mounts look dun-colored, Betalga’s clan. Damn, he is one mean bastard.”

“Wish we had a flyer,” Abe sighed. “I haven’t seen or heard one all day.”

“A million square miles and twenty-four flyers.” The sergeant shook his head.

“Look at the water and the far bank, sir.”

Abe carefully looked at the ground, which shimmered in the summer heat, not sure for a moment what he was looking for. Then he realized that the river above the crossing was still fairly clear, while for several miles below it, the water was churned a dark, muddy brown. The far bank looked wet, rutted with deep tracks.

“They’ve crossed here.”

“Thousands of them. I bet the tail end of their column of yurts isn’t a mile or more around that next butte. Remember, we crossed that same ford coming back.”

Abe wasn’t sure if he remembered and said nothing. “This group was camped north of where we were. They’re swinging in behind Jurak’s main column, covering his withdrawal.”

Abe looked back down over the side of the butte he had just climbed. Five companies of the 3rd Cavalry were strung out in columns, weaving their way up a dried ravine. In the lead troop, his unit, the men had dismounted, a few relieving themselves, others sprawling on the ground, munching on hardtack, drinking cold coffee from canteens while Togo scouted forward.

He caught a glimpse of Major Agrippa’s guidon. He was the commander of this half of the regiment and was moving up past the head of the column. The yellow banner stood straight out in the hot, southeasterly breeze that was as diy as a bone, carrying not a hint of moisture from the sea four hundred miles to the south beyond the Shintang Mountains.

If that was indeed where the Bantag were heading, once they got up into those mountains they’d be all but impossible to control. But then again, he wondered, how could a couple regiments of cavalry change their mind?

“Keep an eye on them, Sergeant, see if you spot anything else.” Abe pointed at the ravines and low, bare hills that flanked the valley ahead.

“It’s.crawling with them. I can smell their stink,” the sergeant grumbled. “Tell the major it doesn’t look good up ahead. It’s a natural spot for an ambush. I suggest we stop here and then probe forward real careful like.”

Togo pointed at the buttes that flanked the approach to the ford. “They could have a full umen hidden behind those buttes, and we’d be none the wiser. I think we should send scouts out to circle them first. For good measure, send a courier back to the rest of the regiment to come up before we go venturing any farther.”

“The other half of the regiment is fifteen miles or more off,” Abe replied.

“Just the opinion of a lowly enlisted man, Lieutenant,” Togo replied, looking up balefully at him.

“I’ll tell him,” Abe replied.

He slipped off the top of the rise, remounted, and endured a nervous, gut-churning slide back down the face of the butte. Major Agrippa arrived at its base to meet him.

Abe reported the sighting along with Togo’s recommendations.

Agrippa grinned. “Good work, Lieutenant.” He turned and ordered a sergeant to ride back down the line and to urge the men up, forming into companies by line.

Agrippa turned and looked back at Abe.

“So you think they’re just ahead, Lieutenant?”

“Sir. I’m new at this, but I trust Sergeant Togo’s judgment. He grew up in the northern plains. It looks like we’re crossing into the track of Betalga’s clan. They can field well over an umen.”

“Their males will be spread out across a hundred square miles of ground, Lieutenant. They’ve got to hunt to survive, and this is damn poor ground.”

The lead company came up out of the ravine behind them, and Agrippa pointed for them to deploy to his left, calling for them to form a skirmish line.

“Sir, maybe you should go up and take a look with Sergeant Togo. The ground around the other side of this butte is flat and open like a bowl, two miles across, the stream at the far end. In the flanks, though, there’s a lot of ravines, washouts. It’s impossible to see what’s in them.”

“They crossed through here. We’ve been picking up signs all day, Lieutenant. I’m not looking for a fight. We’ll just advance, get into the rear of their column, and make it real clear they are to stop in place.”

“You could have ten thousand of their riders on us inside an hour.”

“Lieutenant, they wouldn’t dare attack if we gain their column of yurts. We could slaughter their mates and cubs. They know that. They’ll back off, and then we turn them around.”

Abe swallowed hard, realizing that the men of his troop were watching the exchange. “You men mount up and fall in,” he snapped angrily, then looked back at Agrippa. “Sir, should I get one of my men to head north, find Colonel Yarsolav, and have him come up?”

“Yes, you do that, Keane. Let him know we are into the rear of their column and bringing them back.”

Abe hesitated.

“Keane, this isn’t the old days back when I was a lieutenant in the last war. The Bantag barely have one gun for every ten men. We’ve got two gatlings with this column. So just relax and follow your orders the way you were trained to do. You might think a lot of the Bantag, but they’re little more than beggars now, so just follow your orders.”

Abe stiffened. “Yes, sir.”

“I’ll make sure you get mentioned in the dispatch when I report how we turned these bastards around and forced them to come back.”

Abe saluted, turned, and called for his other scout, Togo’s brother.

“Listen to me carefully,” he whispered. “Your brother’s got a bad feeling about what’s ahead. Ride north like hell. You should find Colonel Yarsolav and the other half of the regiment about fifteen miles from here. Tell them to get down here at once. Suggest as well they send a dispatch back to Fort Malady before advancing. I think we’re going to have a fight here.”

“You mean, old Agrippa is riding in after them.” Abe nodded and the trooper groaned. “Damn, I never should have volunteered for this unit.”

He spurred his mount and galloped off. The rest of the column was coming up out of the ravine. The compact line kicked up plumes of dust as they deployed to left and right on either side of the butte.

Agrippa rode down the line, shouting orders, telling the men to draw their carbines, deploy around the butte, and spread into open skirmish order. He caught a glimpse of Keane and rode over, his horse already lathered with sweat.

“Your troop to the front, get a couple hundred yards ahead of the main line, beat that grass, make sure none of them devils is hiding. And remember, don’t shoot unless fired upon. If they want a war, let them be the ones to start it.”

Abe was tempted to tell him the grass was barely knee-high, dry as tinder, and a Bantag cub couldn’t hide in it, but orders from majors were orders. Calling his fifty men to form, he rode the several hundred yards to the north flanking the butte and swung out into the open plain beyond.

“Open order skirmishers, advance at the walk!” Abe shouted, and pointing straight toward the ford, he started the advance, his men spreading out in a line two hundred yards across. Togo rode up to join him, looked over bale-fully, and drew his carbine.

“Did you talk to him?” Togo asked.

Abe bristled slightly at the accusatory tone in Togo’s voice, but, remembering Hawthorne’s advice, he did not react.

“Yes, I told him exactly what you said and threw in my own opinion as well. I sent your younger brother off as a courier to the main column.”

Togo grunted and said nothing more.

He heard a bugle call from behind, and looking back, Abe felt a cold shiver at the magnificent sight.

Two companies came galloping out to the north of the butte, and a hundred yards to the south two more companies emerged, followed seconds later by the limber-drawn gatlings.

Each flank formed into a line eighty mounted men across and two ranks deep, company guidons in the middle. Carbines were drawn, barrels flashing in the sunlight. Bugles sounded, announcing the advance at a trot.

Abe picked up the pace of his own line, anxiously looking to either flank. They covered the first mile, the tension mounting. The ground ever so gradually undulated, slowly rising up, dropping down, then rising again.

They were following the tracks of the clan column, dried grass mashed flat, ruts from the heavy wheels cut into the dry soil, horse droppings everywhere, the droppings still damp. He tried to act composed, remembering his father’s story about going into action for the first time in Antietam. But this wasn’t Antietam. He didn’t know if this was the start of a fight, a war, or just an exercise to please Major Agrippa’s vanity.

“Ahead, sir.”

One of his troopers was pointing. The ford was less than a mile away. A lone Bantag rider had come up out of the streambed, red standard held aloft. Several more joined him, one turning to gallop away.

“The left, sir!”

He looked where another trooper was pointing. A flash of light up on one of the flanking buttes, gone, then flashing again. Sunlight on a sword blade, a signal, he couldn’t tell, but it gave him a queasy feeling, as if he were sticking his neck into a noose.

The range was down to less than half a mile. Heat shimmers made the Bantags look like ghostly figures, elongating, flattening out, shifting, changing shape. They continued to close.

He looked back again. The sight was still inspiring, battle line now joined across a continuous front nearly a quarter mile wide, guidons standing straight out in the hot wind, gatlings following several hundred yards farther back. Looking forward, the range was down to less than six hundred yards.

“Smoke!”

Several men cried out at the same time, pointing to the left oblique, just forward of the streambed. For a second he wondered if it was a rifle shot, waiting for the zing of the bullet. He had never actually heard a bullet fired at him, but the veterans had always talked about the beelike hum, the flicker of air as a round brushed past.

More smoke, now in front, then to the right, puffs igniting, small white plumes. Several of the men cocked their carbines, reined in, took aim even though the range was absurdly long. He shouted for them to hold fire.

More smoke, white plumes curling up, then laying flat out in the wind. All across the front curls of smoke were igniting, flaring. He saw a flicker of fire, and within seconds it was a wall of flame rising up, spreading out, leaping before the wind.

“Halt!”

The first whiff of smoke was already upon them, the sweet scent of dried grass burning, strangely triggering a memory of autumn days at the country home, burning leaves.

The crackling roar of the spreading inferno could be clearly heard. His mount shied, snickering with fright, ears lying back.

For several long seconds he sat there, dumbfounded, not sure what the hell to do next. He looked back over his shoulder. The line was still advancing, the men lower down in the hollow, but surely they had seen. He caught a glimpse of dust to his left, sliding down the butte-a wave of riders several hundred strong.

He looked forward again. Beyond the rising wall of flames he saw the standard bearer, up in his stirrups, red pennant held high, waving back and forth.

“Back!” Abe swung around, pointing to the rear. “Back to the hill at a gallop!”

As he spurred his mount, it reared up, nearly throwing him. It turned around, and for a mad second he thought it would race off straight at the wall of fire, which was now leaping before the wind, flames dancing high, a front of fire half a mile wide raging across the plains as fast as the wind.

He viciously sawed his mount around, leaned forward, and dug in his spurs. The horse shied again, then fell in with the rest of Abe’s troopers, who were off at a gallop, racing straight back toward the rest of the line.

The other four companies were coming up out of the hollow, but the line was slowing. Some of the men were standing in their stirrups to see what was ahead. Those on the left flank were pointing toward the butte to the north, where the expanding line of riders were storming down.

He headed straight for Agrippa.

“Lieutenant, what the hell?” Agrippa screamed, and then he looked past Abe, eyes wide. “Bugler, sound retreat!”

Men were already turning, not even waiting for the call. Abe screamed for his troop to stay with him, but everyone was jumbling together, forward companies falling back into the second line, men turning about, several losing their saddles. A trooper in front of Abe, riding flat out, suddenly tumbled as his mount stepped into a hole, snapping its leg. The man crashed down, his screaming horse rolling over on top of him, crushing him.

He looked back. The fire was leaping with the wind, actually gaining. Hot embers were swirling around them, smoke blanketing the ground like a fog, blinding him.

Coughing, eyes stinging, he focused all his attention forward. He weaved around another pileup where two horses had collided, throwing their riders. One of the men was obviously dead.

In all the confusion, he suddenly felt a bizarre sense of detachment, wondering what he was doing, why this was happening, what was he supposed to do next.

The unfurling wall of smoke made everything look dreamlike, surreal, with shadows moving to either side. Then he heard a strange fluttering sound, the air hissing. Directly ahead he saw a man jerk, half rising out of his saddle, then slump over, ever so slowly falling, left foot catching in the stirrup, his face a bloody pulp.

They’re shooting at us?

Is this what it is like? he wondered. Strange, he felt no fear, just a curious surprise that someone was shooting, trying to kill him. Did Jurak order this? Ten days ago I was in their camp, I sat with them, talked, and now this.

He saw another man go down, horse screaming, rearing up in mid stride, twisting in agony, rolling. The rider tried to kick free of his stirrups, then disappeared beneath the writhing mass. The sickening crunch of their hitting the ground snapped him out of his dreamlike state.

All command was broken down. Everything was mad panic and chaos.

He caught a glimpse of a larger shadow to his left. A team of four horses raced past, one of the precious gatlings. The limber wagon and piece were bouncing and careening, gun crew atop the limber desperately hanging on.

He edged over toward them. “To the butte!” he screamed. “Follow me!”

He weaved in front of them, looking up, catching a glimpse of the pale, red sun visible through the smoke, nearly directly overhead and slightly to his left.

Keep the wind directly on your back, he realized. We were riding straight into it before.

As he rode straight on, time seemed to stretch out. He could feel his mount beginning to slow after a hard morning’s ride and now this mad gallop.

“Come on, damn it, come on!” He raked his spurs in again.

A shadow emerged from his right, hard to distinguish for a second. It was bigger, far bigger than a trooper.

A Bantag rider burst out of the smoke, scimitar raised, grinning, roaring a wild battle cry, coming straight at him. Wide-eyed, Abe saw him coming, his fingers still tightly clutching the reins, carbine dangling from his shoulder sling, slamming uselessly against his hip.

The Bantag closed.

Abe ducked, heard the hissing whistle of the blade slashing the air…and then the Bantag was gone, disappearing into the smoke, riding on.

The ground started to rise. Grass gave way to rocky slope, and as he gained a few precious feet of altitude, the smoke seemed to miraculously part. He was above it, at the base of the butte. He reined in hard, turning, nearly losing his seat again as his mare’s back legs nearly collapsed.

All around him was chaos. Troopers were coming up out of the boiling white ocean of smoke. Several were dismounting. Down in the confusion below he saw hundreds of men riding, most coming straight toward him, others veering off to the left and right. On both flanks a disciplined wall of riders were hemming them in, closing the ring. Rifle shots echoed, flashes of light in the swirling smoke.

Another bullet zipped past, kicking up dust on the rocky slope behind him. He could see half a dozen Bantags less than a hundred yards off. One of them armed with a rifle had just, fired, aimed straight at him.

The others had bows and were firing flaming bundles into the confusion.

A bugler came up out of the smoke, hat gone, eyes wide with panic.

Again the sense of detachment. Am I frightened? What the hell do I do?

He stood up in his stirrups. “Major Agrippa!”

Even as he shouted for his commanding officer, he realized the absurdity of the gesture. Wherever the damned fool was, screaming for him wasn’t going to help.

“Bugler!”

The man was kicking his mount, trying to urge him up the steep slope of the butte.

“Damn you, bugler! Over here!”

The bugler slowed, looking at him.

“Over here, damn you!”

He swung around, came up, and in a gesture that struck Abe as ridiculous he came to attention and saluted.

“Blow recall! Blow it and keep blowing it!”

The man looked at him as if he were speaking in an alien tongue. He wondered if he even understood English. He appeared to be Rus, but he wasn’t sure.

“Recall!”

There was a nod of recognition. The man spat, wiped his lips, and raised his instrument.

At nearly the same instant Abe’s horse reared up again, this time shrieking in pain. It turned, trying to run in panic. He regained control, felt the limping walk and saw the fathers of an arrow, the shaft plunged deep into his mare’s chest, just inches from his right leg.

The high clarion call of the bugle echoed, and Abe moved close to the man’s side. Standing in his stirrups, he pulled out the scimitar, which had been a gift of Jurak’s, and waved it back and forth over his head.

More men were coming out of the smoke, looking around in confusion. Hearing the bugle call, they spotted an officer and started toward him.

“Up the slope, men! Up the slope as far as you can ride, then dismount and set up a covering fire!”

A sergeant major, obviously an old trooper, picked up the cry, riding back and forth along the rocky slope, repeating Abe’s command, urging individual men and small clumps of riders forward, driving them up the slope.

The gatling crew came out of the smoke. The lead horse had its foreleg nearly shot off, blood spraying with every agonized step. The driver reined in, and the gun slewed around, nearly upending. It was obvious that there was no way in hell that it could go any farther. Abe rode down to them. “Unlimber that piece! Push it as far up the slope as possible.”

He spotted a half a dozen troopers, following a lieutenant and moving in some semblance of order.

“Lieutenant, have your men dismount. Get this gatling and ammunition boxes up the slope!”

Without waiting for a reply he turned away. Riderless horses came out of the smoke. A flurry of shots erupted to his right, and he saw a score of mounted Bantags were coming up around the flank of the Butte, having circled round.

God, if they are on the crest above, we’re dead.

The sergeant major, who had been detailing off men looked up and saw the threat. Abe rode toward him.

“You better get some men on top, sir!” he shouted. “I’ll feed them up to you as they come in!”

Abe nodded, and the sergeant screamed for the knot of troopers gathering around him to follow the lieutenant.

Abe started up the rocky slope, feeling a moment of anguish over the labored gasps of his dying mount, which seemed to somehow sense what still needed to be done before giving up.

He zigzagged up the rocky incline, passing several dozen men deploying on a narrow plateau. Several of them were firing and reloading, shiny brass cartridge casings scattered around them.

He looked back. A score or more troopers were following him up the slope.

He was momentarily aware, yet again, that bullets were smacking into the rocky ground, kicking up plumes of dust, exploding shards of rock. An arrow whistled past, striking sparks as it hit a boulder.

He caught a glimpse of an adder, coiled up, hideous looking, head raised, mouth opened and ready to strike. An hour ago, the sight would have filled him with terror. He ignored it, riding within half a dozen feet of it, then pushed on.

The slope seemed nearly vertical, and a narrow trail, a beaten path left by mountain goats, was the only way up. He felt naked, exposed as he looked down to his left.

The entire panorama of the madness was laid out below. The fire was sweeping past either side of the butte. The ground back across nearly two miles was blackened, hot spots still smoking. Dozens of fire-charred bodies littered the plain, a ghastly sight. Dying horses, flesh smoking, staggered about, shrieking in agony. Curled-up bodies of dead troopers lay in the smoking ashes. A rippling explosion, sounding like a string of Victory Day firecrackers, detonated, followed by a dull whooshing explosion. One of the gatling limbers was burning. An ammunition wagon was upended nearby, its four horses still trapped in their traces, down on the ground, kicking and thrashing.

The Bantags to either flank had drawn back to let the fire pass, but were now circling back in. Down at the very base of the butte a wild melee was being fought, the most daring of the attacking host having pressed right into the middle of the smoky confusion. Abe could see the flashes of scimitars rising and falling.

The trail ahead switched back yet again, and directly above he saw the crest. His poor mount, gasping for breath, blood frothing, struggled the last few feet.

He heard the click of a rifle being cocked, and looked straight up into the muzzle of a gun.

“By all my ancestors,” Togo gasped, “get up here, damn it!” He lowered his weapon and disappeared. Seconds later Abe heard the gun go off.

He pushed the last few feet, came over the crest, and saw Togo leaning over the other side of the butte, which at its crest was less than thirty yards across.

“They’re coming up from behind!” Togo shouted, even as he levered in a fresh round, leaned over, and fired again.

Abe swung off his mount. Uncasing his carbine, he grabbed a bandolier of ammunition secured behind the saddle.

The next trooper in line came up behind him, and before he was even dismounted he had his revolver out, leveled it, and fired, dropping a Bantag who was trying to ride up onto the crest.

Abe looked back down the trail. More than a dozen men were still following.

“Come on!” he screamed.

He loaded his weapon, turned, and started toward Togo. The sergeant screamed something incoherent in Japanese. Abe wanted to ask Togo how the hell he had gotten up to the top of the butte ahead of everyone else, but kept silent.

He gained the edge on the other side and looked down. Several hundred Bantag had circled in behind the butte, which acted like a wall, blocking the fire that was sweeping along with the wind to either flank. Some of the Bantag were trying to ride up, but their horses were simply too big and cumbersome to mount the slope; that was the only thing that had saved the troopers on top from already being overrun.

Most of them were dismounting, starting up through the rocky ground, climbing hand over hand.

Togo fired again, and Abe clearly saw the bullet smash into the upraised forehead of his target, blood exploding, Togo grunting with delight.

Abe lowered his weapon, took aim, and then, amazingly, he found he simply could not squeeze the trigger. He had his target clearly in sight, a young one, frame not yet filled out, bow slung over his shoulder, face down as he climbed, not even aware that death was closing in.

“Lieutenant?”

He gladly turned away, looking back. A corporal had gained the crest. “Where the hell do you want us?”

“Over here. Drive those riders back.” He turned away from the crest. “Sergeant Togo, deploy the men out on this line as I feed them in!”

He ran back to the other side. For a second he felt a wave of horror.

Two hundred feet below was pure chaos, no sense of command. The smoke from the fire around the base of the hill was beginning to clear, replaced by yellow-gray puffs from carbine fire.

Intermingled, swarming in around them, were scores, a hundred or more Bantags, most using scimitars, some armed with bows, a few carrying old bolt-action rifles from the war.

A war, he thought. Damn it, this is war.

Several dozen troopers broke from the flank of the butte, trying to ride around it to the west, instinctively heading back the way they had come. From around that side a score of Bantag charged. In seconds it was over, blades flashing, bodies tumbling, all the troopers dead.

Amazingly, the bugler he had ordered to blow the recall was still at it. But no one else was left out on the burnt plain except for the dead and dying.

As more troopers rode up the slope, the sergeant below grabbed men, pushing them up.

“Who’s in command here?”

It was Agrippa, gaining the crest on foot, face puffy and scorched, breathing hard, eyes dilated.

For a second Abe looked around, caught off guard, waiting for someone else to answer. Then he looked back. “I am.”

“I’ll take over, then. Get these men mounted and ready to follow me. I’ve lost my mount, so find one for me as well.”

The bugle below fell silent. He looked back over. The man was falling out of his saddle, a Bantag rider withdrawing his scimitar from the trooper’s back.

“Lieutenant, do you hear me, mount up.”

“Where did you say we’re going, sir?”

“We’ll go down the other side and break through. Now follow orders!

The sergeant major down below was heading up the slope, pushing the last of the survivors before him.

“Did you hear me, Lieutenant?”

“Yes, sir, I heard you.”

“Then do it.”

Abe stared at him. “Why?”

“What did you say, Lieutenant?”

“Why, sir? What the hell are you going to do once we get down there?” He pointed down at the prairie. Clusters of Bantags were riding over the smoldering ground they had just retreated across, casually dispatching the last of the wounded, while to the flanks and rear a circle of skirmishers were closing the net in tight. A knot of troopers had gained a small ravine, but were quickly being annihilated as scores of Bantags swarmed in on them, heedless of loss.

“We’re going to get the hell out of here, Lieutenant. We’ll go down that slope.” He pointed to the west.

“Sir, there’s hundreds of Bantags down there, and we don’t have more than sixty up here.” As he spoke he indicated the skirmish line deploying along the rim of the butte. One of the men was already dead, head blow off by a well-aimed shot, but the rest were pouring out a steady rate of fire.

A corporal, every inch the professional, was pacing the line, crouched low, offering encouragement, pointing out targets, cautioning the men to make every shot count. He paused in his work, looking straight at Abe. His gaze spoke volumes. The corporal had heard every word. He simply shook his head, nodded down to the plain below, then drew a finger across his throat.

Abe took a deep breath, turned, and faced the major. “May I suggest, sir, that we stay here. Most of the battalion is dead, sir. We go down there, and we won’t get half a mile before they finish us off.”

“What? What the hell did you just say. Lieutenant?”

“With all due respect, sir. We are on the high ground. Up here we can secure the flanks for the men still down below. Ride back down and we’re all dead, and the gatling position down on the east slope will be wiped out as well.”

“We’re dead if we stay here,” Agrippa cried and pointed back to the east.

The distant riverbank that they had been riding toward was swarming with hundreds of Bantags.

“They’re coming!” Agrippa cried, shifting his gaze to the troopers, who had slowed in their firing and were watching the confrontation. “Mount up and let’s get moving before it’s too late.”

“They’ll slaughter us if we go off this hill.”

“Mount, damn you, get mounted!”

Abe looked back down at the base of the slope. Not a single guidon was in sight. Out on the plain he saw a Bantag galloping off, triumphantly holding the yellow flag with the crossed sabers of the battalion, flame-scorched, waving it over his head as he raced toward the ford.

“Mount, Lieutenant, and that is a direct order. I don’t give a good damn who your father is. Now get these men moving!”

Abe turned back. “No, sir.”

“What?”

“No, sir, and I don’t have time for this. We’re staying here. This is the only defensible ground we have. The Bantag didn’t want this fight. They aren’t going to stay. We just have to hang on!”

“You are relieved, Lieutenant, and by God, I’ll have you court-martialed for direct disobedience of my commands.”

“Go ahead,” Abe shouted, “do whatever you damn well please, but these men stay here! Your mad charge got them into this mess. I’ll not see the rest of them slaughtered because you panicked.”

Several of the men on the firing line, including the corporal, were looking at them.

Abe stepped closer, trying to regain control of his emotions. “Listen, Major. We can hold this position. Now pull yourself together and help me to lead these men.”

“Be damned. Now mount up.”

Before he fully realized what he was doing, Abe swung his carbine around and pointed it at the major.

“Sir, if I hear one more word from you, I will blow your damn head off. You got us into this mess with that damn stupid ride straight into an ambush that my scout warned you about. Now stay exactly where you are and shut the hell up.”

In spite of the roar of battle Abe felt as if he were trapped in a world of silence. He could see the corporal standing upright, staring at them. Togo, with a half dozen men gathered around him, was directing fire down the north slope, securing the flank, not aware of what was going on behind.

Agrippa started to reach for his revolver.

“Don’t, sir. I am not playing a game. Touch that weapon, and you are dead.”

Agrippa looked at him, mouth gaping open like a fish that had been speared and dropped into the bottom of a boat. His eyes darted back and forth, settling at last on the corporal.

“Over here,” he gasped, and the corporal reluctantly approached.

“Remove that weapon from this man and place him under arrest,” Agrippa hissed.

The corporal looked back and forth between the two, and then his gaze shifted beyond them.

“Goddamn, what the hell are you people doing?”

It was the sergeant major Abe had grabbed at the bottom of the hill, pushing a dozen men on foot in front of him. Crouching low until clear of the edge of the butte, he stood up, slowly moving toward the two officers.

“Sergeant major, arrest this man,” Agrippa hissed.

The sergeant hesitated.

“Sergeant, we are staying on this hill,” Abe announced. “Major Agrippa wants us to charge back down and make a break to the west. It will mean abandoning our comrades still down below. I have tried to reason with him, and he refused. So either he backs down now, or I shoot him.”

The sergeant major cautiously approached the two, the entire group breaking their tableaulike poses when a high arcing arrow hissed down, striking the ground between them, and then went skidding off.

The staccato roar of the gatling ignited, and Abe shifted his gaze for a second to the sergeant.

“Deployed on the plateau just below us,” he announced. “We managed to get a couple of thousand rounds up with it. The men are digging in.”

“Sergeant! Get the men mounted.”

The sergeant, moving with steady purpose, stepped between Agrippa and Abe and faced the major. Taking the officer’s revolver out of its holster, he stuck it into his own belt.

“Sir, you’re injured, sir. I think you need to lie down.”

“Sergeant?”

“I can see you’re badly burned, sir. Corporal, get something to drink for the major here.”

“I’ll have all of you court-martialed,” Agrippa cried.

“Sir, will you look over there,” the sergeant replied, speaking softly, as if sharing a few kind words with a friend.

The major turned, looking to where the sergeant pointed.

The revolver in the sergeant’s hand flashed upward. Agrippa fell, sprawling in the dust. The sergeant stood above him, holding the pistol by the barrel.

“Damn,” he whispered, “I think a ball just grazed the major.”

He looked back at Abe and wearily shook his head.

“You were right, sir, but damn it, your ass and mine are in the fire once he wakes up.”

Abe could not help but smile. “Thank you, Sergeant.”

“Look, sir. I think most all the other officers are dead. The damn bastards tore into anyone with a guidon following. I think we got about a hundred men all mixed up down there and up here, but by God if we keep our nerve, we can hold. They’re already pulling back.”

Abe had been so preoccupied with Agrippa that he had forgotten about the battle raging around them. He looked back to the east. The Bantag along the riverbank were holding their position. He could see them moving about, clustering around a rider coming in bearing a guidon.

Looking to either flank, he could see they were pulling back. Some of them had dismounted, hiding behind dead horses, scattered boulders, keeping up a slow but steady fire. To the west, down in the ravine where they had been less than an hour before, he caught glimpses of riders dismounting. The half dozen supply wagons that had been left to the rear were being looted, drivers all dead. The back door was closed. Another bullet zipped passed, sounding like an angry bee.

I’m under fire, he realized. That one down there behind the pyramid-shaped boulder is aiming straight at me.

“We’re stuck here, sir,” the sergeant announced, “but we can put up a hell of a fight at least until we die of thirst or run out of ammunition.”

“Damn, I wish we could have gotten one of those wagons up here.”

“How old are you, Lieutenant?”

“Twenty-one, Sergeant.” He hesitated. “And you?”

“Old enough to be your father. I was in the last war.”

“I could tell that, Sergeant.”

The old man grinned. “Hell, I could have thought you were, too, the way you were down there.”

Another bullet sang past.

“Like the old days all over again,” the sergeant grumbled. He looked down at the still unconscious major.

“Remember, Lieutenant, he got nicked by a spent round. I’m heading back down to the gatling now. You just keep them back from our flanks, sir.”

The sergeant disappeared back over the rim. Abe looked around and saw a few of the men still staring at him.

“What the hell are you looking at? Get back on the firing line, and make every shot count.”

As the men turned away, he caught the eye of the corporal. “Make sure the major is all right,” Abe said, and walked off.

He was startled by the sight of his mount, still standing, eyes wide with pain, bloody froth dripping from her open mouth.

“Oh, God,” he sighed.

He leveled his carbine, which was still cocked, and aimed it at the poor beast’s forehead. Abe closed his eyes and squeezed the trigger.