Hawkwood's voyage

TWENTY

Ormann Dyke.

The tumbling thunder of the bombardment went on relentlessly, but they had grown used to it and no longer commented upon it.

“We are more or less blind to what goes on over the brow of the nearest hill,” Martellus told his assembled officers. “I have sent out three different scouting missions, but none has returned. The Merduks’ security is excellent. All we know therefore is what we see: a minimum of siegeworks, the deployment of the batteries to the front-”

“And a hive of activity to the rear,” old Isak finished.

“Just so. The eastern barbican has taken a pasting, and the gunnery battle is all but over. He will assault very soon.”

“How many guns do we have still firing across the river?” one man asked.

“Less than half a dozen, and those are the masked ones that Andruw has been saving for the end.”

“We cannot let the eastern side of the bridge go without a struggle,” one officer said.

“I agree.” Martellus looked round at his fellow Torunnans. The engineers have been working through the night. They have planted charges under the remaining supports. The Searil bridge can be blown in a matter of moments, but first I want to bloody their nose again. I want them to assault the barbican.”

“What’s left of it,” someone murmured.

Three days had passed since the first, headlong assault of the Merduk army. In those three days there had, contrary to Martellus’ prediction, been no direct attack on the eastern fortifications. Instead Shahr Baraz had brought up his heavy guns, emplaced them behind stout revetments and begun an artillery duel with the guns in the eastern barbican. He had lost heavily in men and material in the first deployment, but once his pieces were secure the more numerous Merduk heavy culverins had begun to pound the Torunnan fort on the eastern bank to rubble. The bombardment had continued unabated for thirty-six hours. Most of Andruw’s guns were silenced, and the eastern barbican was holed and breached in several places. Only a scratch garrison remained there. The rest had been withdrawn back over the river to the island, that long strip of land between the river and the dyke.

“The heavy charges are in place. When they occupy the eastern fort they are in for a shock, but we must make them occupy it-we must make them pay for it. And to do that we must keep troops there, to tempt them in,” Martellus said relentlessly.

“Who commands this forlorn hope?” an officer asked.

“Young Corfe, my aide, the one who was at Aekir. Andruw will have his hands full directing the remaining artillery. The rest of the skeleton garrison is under Corfe.”

“Let us hope he will not turn tail like he did at Aekir,” someone muttered.

Martellus’ eyes turned that pale, inhuman shade which always silenced his subordinates.

“He will do his duty.”

Jan Baffarin, the chief engineer, came scuttling like a crab through the low-ceilinged bomb-proof towards Corfe and Andruw.

“We’ve repaired the powder lines. There should be no problem now.”

He was shouting without realizing it, as they all had been for the past day and night. The huge tumult of the bombardment overhead had ceased to seem unusual and was now part of the accepted order of things.

The bomb-proof was large, low and massively buttressed. Five hundred men crouched within it as the shell and shot rained down on the fortress above their heads. Dust and fragments of loose stone came drifting down when there was a particularly close hit, and the air seemed to shake and shimmer in the light of the shuddering oil lamps. “The Catacombs” the troops had wryly labelled their shelter, and it seemed apt. All around the bodies of men sprawled and lolled, some asleep despite the unending noise and vibration. They looked like the aftermath of the plague, a scene from some febrile nightmare.

Corfe roused himself from the concussed stupor he had been in.

“What of the guns?”

“The casemates are intact, but Saint’s love, those are the heaviest calibre shells I’ve ever seen. The gatehouse is a pile of rubble, and the walls are in pieces. They don’t have to attack. If they keep this up they’ll reduce Ormann Dyke to powder without ever setting foot in it.”

Andruw shook his head. “They can’t have the ammunition and powder, not with their supply line as long as it is. I’ll wager a good bottle of Candelarian that they’re running low right now. This bombardment is for show as much as anything else. They want to stun us into surrender, perhaps.”

A particularly close explosion made them wince and duck instinctively. The granite ceiling seemed to groan under the assault.

“Some show,” Baffarin said dubiously.

“Your men know the drill,” Corfe said. “As soon as the rearguard is across the bridge you touch off the charges, both on the bridge itself and in the barbican. We’ll send the whole damn lot of them flying into the Thurians. There’s a show for you.”

The engineer chuckled.

The bombardment stopped.

There were a few tardy detonations from late-falling shells, and then a silence came down which was so profound that Corfe was alarmed, for a second believing that he had gone deaf. Someone coughed, and the noise seemed abnormally loud in the sudden stillness. The sleeping men began rousing themselves, staring around and shaking each other.

“On your feet!” Corfe shouted. “Gunners to your pieces, arquebusiers to your stations. They’re on their way, lads!”

The catacombs dissolved into a shadowy chaos of moving men. Baffarin grasped Corfe’s arm.

“See you on the other side of the river,” he said, and then was gone.

T HE devastation was awe-inspiring. The eastern barbican was like a castle of sand which had been undermined by the tide. There were yawning gaps in the walls, mounds of stone and rubble everywhere, burning timber crackling and shimmering in the dust-laden air. Corfe’s meagre command fanned out to their prearranged positions whilst Andruw’s gunners began wheeling the surviving culverins into firing positions.

Corfe clambered up the ruin of the gatehouse and surveyed the Merduk dispositions. Their batteries were smoke-shrouded, though a cold breeze from the north was shredding the powder fog moment by moment. He glimpsed great bodies of men on the move, elephants, regiments of horsemen and lumbering, heavy-laden waggons. The hills were crawling with orderly and disorderly movement.

A gun went off, as flat as a hand-clap after the thunder of the heavy-calibre cannons, and a sort of shudder went through the columns behind the smoke. They began to move, and soon it was possible to make out three armies marching towards the line of the river. One was aimed at the ruin of the barbican, the other two to the north and south, their goal apparently the Searil River itself. They were oddly burdened, and waggons rolled along in their midst, hauled by elephants.

The five hundred Torunnans who were the barbican’s last defenders spread out along the tattered battlements, their arquebuses levelled. Their orders were to make a demonstration, to draw as many of the enemy as possible into the fortifications and then withdraw slowly, finally escaping over the Searil bridge. It would be a difficult thing to control, this fighting retreat. Corfe felt no fear at the thought of the coming assault or the possibility of injury and death, but he was mortally afraid of making a hash of things. These five hundred were his command, his first since the fall of Aekir; and he knew he was still regarded by many of his fellow Torunnans as the man who had deserted John Mogen. He was coldly determined to do well today.

The warmth of the sun was bright and welcome. Men wriggled fingers in their ears to let out the ringing aftermath of the artillery, then sighted down their weapons at the advancing enemy.

“Easy!” Corfe called out. “Wait till I give the word.”

A gun barked from one of the upper casemates, and a second later a blossom of blasted earth appeared on the slope before the Merduk formations. Andruw testing the range.

They came on at a slow walk, the high-sided waggons trundling in their midst. The northern and southern hosts had more of these elephant-drawn vehicles than the one which was aimed at the barbican. Corfe strained his eyes to make out the strange loads, then whistled.

“Boats!” The waggons were loaded with shallow-hulled, puntlike craft piled one on top of the other. They were going to try and cross the Searil to north and south whilst engaging the garrison on the east bank at the same time.

“They’ll be lucky,” a nearby soldier said, and spat over the battered wall. “The Searil’s swollen after the rain. It’s running along like a bolting horse. I hope they have strong arms, or they’ll be washed all the way down to the Kardian.”

There was a spatter of brief laughter along the ramparts.

Andruw’s guns began to sing out one by one. The young gunnery officer had kept his five most accurate pieces this side of the river, and was adjusting their traverse and elevation personally. They began to lob explosive shells into the forefront of the central enemy formation, blasting them into red ruin. Corfe saw an elephant lifted half off its feet as a shell exploded squarely under it. Another hit one of the high-laden wains and sent slivers of deadly wood spraying like spears through its escort. There was confusion, men milling about, panic-stricken beasts trampling and trumpeting madly. The Torunnans watched with a high sense of glee, happy to be repaying the Merduks in kind for the relentless bombardment of the past days.

But the ranks reformed, and the Merduks came on again faster, loping along at a brisk trot, leaving the waggons behind. Corfe could see that the lead elements of these men were in shining half-armour and mail. They were the Hraibadar, the shock-troops of Shahr Baraz.

The formation splintered and spread out so that the shellbursts took a lesser toll. As they jogged ever closer Corfe rapped out orders, pitching his voice to carry over the rippling booms of the Torunnan artillery.

“Ready your pieces!”

The men fitted the smouldering slow-match into the wheel-locks of their arquebuses.

“Present your pieces!”

He raised his sabre. He could see individual faces in the ranks of the approaching enemy, horsehair plumes, panting mouths underneath the tall helms.

He swept his sabre down. “Give fire!”

The walls erupted in a line of smoke and flame as nigh on five hundred arquebuses went off in a single volley. The enemy, scarcely a hundred yards away, were thrown back as if by a sudden gale of wind. The front ranks dissolved into a mass of wriggling, crawling men, and those behind faltered a moment, then came on again.

“Reload!” Corfe shouted. It was Andruw’s turn now.

The five guns of the remaining Torunnan battery waited until the Merduks were within fifty yards, and then fired as one. They were loaded with deadly canister: hollow cans of thin metal containing thousands of arquebus bullets. Five jets of smoke spurted out, and the Merduks were flattened once more in a dreadful slaughter.

The smoke was too thick for aiming. Corfe shouted at the top of his voice, waving his sabre: “Back off the walls! Second position, lads! Back on me!”

The Torunnans ran down from the ruined battlements and formed a swift two-deep line below. Their sergeants and ensigns pushed them into position and then stood ready.

The gunners were leaving their pieces, having spiked the touch-holes. Corfe saw Andruw there, laughing as he ran. When the last artillerymen were behind the line of arquebusiers he gave the order.

“Ready your pieces!”

A line of figures pouring through the gaps in the walls now, hundreds of them, screaming as they came.

“Front rank, present your pieces!”

Thirty yards away. Could they be stopped? It seemed impossible.

“Give fire!”

A shattering volley that hid the enemy in clouds of dark smoke.

“First rank, fall back. Second rank, give fire!”

The first rank were running back through the fortress to the bridge, where Baffarin and his engineers waited. It would be very close.

The second volley staggered the smoke, flattened more of the oncoming enemy, but Corfe’s men were falling now for the Merduks had arquebusiers up on the battlements firing blindly into the Torunnan ranks.

A shrieking line of figures issued out of the powder cloud like friends catapulted out of hell.

A few weapons were fired, a ragged volley. And then it was hand-to-hand down the line. The arquebusiers dropped their weapons and drew their sabres, if they had time. Others flailed about them with the butts of their firearms.

Corfe gutted a howling Merduk, swept the heavy sabre across the face of another, punched the spiked hilt into the jaw of a third.

“Fall back! Fall back to the bridge!”

They were being overwhelmed. The enemy was pouring in-thousands of them, perhaps. All across the rubble-strewn and pitted drill square Corfe saw his line dissolve into knots and groups of isolated men as the Merduks punched into it. Those who could were retreating; others went down under the flashing scimitars still swinging their weapons.

He clanged aside a scimitar, elbowed the man off-balance, thrust at another, then spun round at the first man and slashed open his arm. They were all around him. He whirled and hacked and thrust without conscious volition. The knot broke apart. There was space again, a moving turmoil of figures running past, shouting; there was flashing murder every instant and so much blood it seemed some other element spilling everywhere.

Someone was pulling frantically at his arm. He swung round and almost decapitated Andruw. The gunner officer had a slash across his face which had left a flap of flesh hanging over one eye.

“Time to go, Corfe. We can’t hold them any longer.”

“How many at the bridge?”

“Enough. You’ve done your duty, so come. They’re preparing to blow the charges.”

Corfe allowed himself to be tugged away and followed Andruw’s lead out of the fortress, calling the last of his men with him as he went.

The bridge was standing on a few stone supports. The rest had been chiselled and blasted away. Baffarin was there, grinning. “Glad to see you, Haptman. We thought you had got lost. You’re among the last.”

Corfe and Andruw ran across the long, empty bridge. The lead elements of the enemy were a scant fifty yards behind, and arquebus balls were kicking up splinters of stone around their feet as they made the western bank. The survivors of Corfe’s command were crouched there among the revetments of the island. Those who still possessed their firearms were firing methodically into the press of the advancing enemy. As they saw Corfe and Andruw a hoarse cheer went up.

Baffarin’s engineers were touching off ribbons of bound rags with slow-match. A culverin was firing canister across the bridge, stalling the Merduk advance. Corfe sank to his knees in the shelter of the earthworks behind the bridge, chest heaving. He felt as though someone had lit a fire inside his armour and the black metal seemed insufferably heavy, though when running he had not even noticed its weight.

“Only a few seconds now,” Baffarin said. He was still grinning, but there was no humour on his face; it was like a rictus. Sweat carved runnels down his black temples.

Then the charges went off.

Not a noise, just a flash, an immense. . impression. A sense of a huge happening that the brain could not quite grasp. Corfe felt the air sucked out of his lungs. He shut his eyes and buried his face in his arms, but he heard the secondary explosions distantly, as though he were separated from them by thick glass. Then there was the rain of rubble and wood and more terrible things falling all around him. Something heavy clanged off his backplate. Something else hit his hand as it gripped the back of his head, hard enough to numb. Rolling concussions, a swift-moving thunder. Water raining, men moaning. The echoes of the detonations reverberated off the face of the hills, faceted thunder, at last dwindling.

Corfe looked up. The bridge was gone, and the very earth seemed changed. Of the eastern barbican, that great, high-walled fortress, there was little left. Only stumps and mounds of smoking stone amid a huge series of craters. The catacombs laid bare to the sky. Fire flickering-the smell of powder and blood and broken soil, a reek heavier and more solid than any he had ever experienced before, even at Aekir.

“Holy God!” Andruw said beside him.

The slopes leading down to the site of the barbican were black with men, some alive and cowering, others turned into corpses. It was as if they had simultaneously experienced a vision, witnessed an apparition of their prophet, perhaps. The carcasses of elephants lay like outcrops of grey rock, except where they had been mutilated into something else. The entire battlefield seemed frozen in shock.

“I’ll bet they heard that in Torunn,” Baffarin said, the end of the slow-match still gripped in an ivory-knuckled hand.

“I’ll bet they heard it in fucking Hebrion,” a nearby trooper said, and there were automatic chuckles, empty humour. They were too shocked.

The air clicked in Corfe’s throat. He found his voice, and surprised himself with its steadiness.

“Who have we got here? Tove, Marsen, good. Get the men spread out along the earthworks. I want weapons primed. Ridal, get you to the citadel and report to Martellus. Tell him-tell him the eastern barbican and bridge are blown-”

“In case he hadn’t noticed,” someone put in.

“-And tell him I have some. .” He glanced around. Sweet Saints in heaven! So few? “I have some tenscore men at my disposal.”

The survivors of Corfe’s first command busied themselves carrying out his orders.

“They’re fighting along the river,” someone said, standing and peering to the north. The boom of artillery and crackle of arquebus fire had shattered the momentary silence.

“That’s their fight. We’ve a job to do here,” Corfe said harshly. Then he sat down quickly with his back to a revetment, lest his rubber legs turn traitor and buckle under him.

Martellus watched the climax of the battle from his usual vantage point on the heights of the citadel. Not for him the hurly-burly of trying to command his men from the thick of things. John Mogen had been the man for that. No, he liked to stand back and study the layout of the developing conflict, base his decisions on logic and the dispatches that he received minute by minute, borne by grimed and bloody couriers. A general could direct things best from afar, distanced from the shouting turmoil of his battle. Some men, it was true, could command an army whilst fighting almost in the front rank, but they were rare geniuses. Inevitably Mogen came to mind again.

The roar of the explosion was a distant echo of thunder rolling back and forth between hills ever further away. A huge plume of smoke rose up from the centre of the battlefield where the eastern barbican had once been. The assault had been blunted there, perhaps even crippled. Young Corfe had done a good job. He was someone to watch, despite the cloud hanging over his past.

But to north and south of the smoke two fresh Merduk formations, each perhaps twenty-five thousand strong, had closed on the river. The artillery on the Long Walls and the island had peppered their ranks unceasingly with shells, but they came on regardless. Now they were unloading the flat puntlike boats from the elephant wains and preparing to brave the foaming current of the swollen Searil River.

Once they cross the river in force, Martellus thought, it is only a matter of time. We may destroy them in their thousands as they cross the dyke, but cross it they will. The river is our best defence, at least while it is running this full.

He turned to an aide.

“Is Ranafast standing ready with the sortie force?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then go to him. Give him my compliments and tell him he is to take his command out to the island at once. He can also strip the walls of every fourth man except for gunners, and all are to be arquebus-armed. He is to contest the crossing of the river. Is that clear?”

“Yes, sir.”

A scribe nearby had been scrawling furiously. The written order was entrusted to the aide after Martellus had flashed his signature across it, and then the aide was gone, running down to the Long Walls.

There was not much time for Ranafast to scratch together his command and get into position. Martellus cursed himself. Why had he never envisaged a mass boat crossing? They had been busy, the Merduk engineers, in the weeks they had been stalled at Aekir.

The first of the boats were already being shoved down the eastern bank and into the water. They were massive, crude affairs, propelled by the paddles of their passengers. Fourscore men at least manned each one, and Martellus counted over a hundred of them lining the eastern bank like southern river lizards basking in a tropical sun. Shellbursts were sprouting up in their midst like momentary fungi, shattering boats, sending men flying, panicking the elephants.

The Searil was three hundred yards across at the dyke, a wide brown river that was churning wild and white in many places and was thick with debris from its headwaters. No easy task to paddle across it at the best of times. To do it under shellfire, though. . These men excited Martellus’ admiration even as he plotted their destruction.

The first wave was setting out. To north and south of the ruined bridge the Searil suddenly became thick with the large, flat boats, like a stream clogged with autumn leaves near its banks.

A thunder of hooves, and Ranafast was leading his horsemen-the vanguard of his command-across the dyke bridges to the island. A column of marching men followed on after the cavalry. With luck, there would be over seven thousand on the western bank to contest the crossing, supported by artillery from the walls.

And yet when he looked at the size, the teeming numbers, of those who clogged the eastern bank, Martellus could not help but feel despair. For miles the edge of the Searil was crawling with enemy soldiers, boats, elephants, horses and waggons. And that was only the assaulting force. On the hills beyond the reserves, the cavalry, the artillery, the countless camp-followers darkened the face of the land like some vast blight. It was inconceivable that the collective will of such a multitude should be thwarted.

And yet he must do it-he would do it. He would defy the gloom-mongers and amateur generals and all the rest. He would hold this fortress to his last breath, and he would bleed the Merduk armies white upon it.

Globes of smoke, tiny with distance, appeared along the length of the walls. After a few seconds the boom of the cannon salvoes came drifting up to the citadel, and soon the guns of the citadel itself were firing. The noise was everywhere, together with the blood-quickening smell of gunpowder.

White fountains of exploding water began to burst amid the Merduk boats. Martellus could make out the men in the craft straining like maniacs at their paddles, but remaining in time. They had their heads bowed and shoulders hunched forward as though they were braving a heavy shower of rain. Martellus had seen the same position assumed by most men advancing against heavy fire; it was a kind of instinct.

One, two, then three of the boats were struck in quick succession as the Torunnan artillery began to range in on their targets. Martellus had the best gunners in the world here at the dyke, and now they were fulfilling his faith in them.

The men in the shattered boats sank out of sight at once, weighed down by armour. Even had they worn none, they had no chance in the rushing current.

Ranafast was deploying his men along the western bank whilst his own shells whistled over his head. He had a couple of galloper-guns with him also. But the men were spread perilously thin, and Martellus could see now that the central Merduk column was staging an attack on Corfe’s position, manhandling boats amid the debris of the bridge, all the time under heavy fire from Corfe’s surviving command and the other defenders who were posted there. Ranafast should see the danger, though.

Sure enough, the cavalry commander brought his two light guns down to Corfe’s position, and soon they were barking canister at close range into the Merduks trying to cross there. An ugly little fight, but the main struggle was still going on along the flanks.

The waterborne Merduks were in trouble. More boats were being struck by Torunnan shells, and when these did not sink at once they began to roar downstream like sticks caught in a millrace, crashing into their fellows and sending them down-river in their turn. Soon there were scores of boats whirling and drifting in the middle of the river, wreckage and bodies bobbing up and down, the geysers of shellbursts exploding everywhere.

Some boats reached the western bank, only to receive a hail of arquebus bullets. Their complements straggled ashore to be cut down by Ranafast’s men. A tidemark of bodies built up there on the western bank while the Torunnans reloaded methodically and fired volley after volley into the wretches floundering ashore.

The battle had quickly degenerated into a one-sided slaughter. Signal guns began to sound from the Merduk lines calling off the attack, and those on the eastern bank halted as they were about to push a fresh wave of craft into the water. The unfortunates already on the river tried to come about and retrace their course, but it was impossible in that maelstrom of shot, shell and white water. They perished almost to a man.

The assault ground to a bloody and fruitless halt. Some of the Merduks remained on the edge of the river to try and help those labouring in the water, but most began a sullen retreat to their camps on the hillsides above. And all the while, Torunnan artillery lobbed vindictive and jubilant shells at their retreating backs. The attack had not just failed; it had been destroyed before it could even start.

“I want another battery of gallopers detached from the walls and sent to Corfe’s position,” Martellus said crisply. “Send him another three tercios also; he is closest to the enemy. He must hold the island.”

An aide ran off with the order. Martellus’ brother officers were laughing and grinning, scarcely able to believe their eyes.

For miles along the line of the river powder smoke hung in the air in thick clouds, and strewn along both banks was the wreck of an army. Men, boats, animals, weapons. It was awesome to behold. They dotted the land like the fallen fruit in an untended orchard, and the river itself was thick with boats half awash, a few figures clinging desperately to the wreckage. They were coursing downstream out of sight, helpless.

“He’s lost ten thousand at least,” old Isak was saying. “And some of his best troops, too. Sweet Saints, I’ve never seen carnage like it. He throws away his men as though they were chaff.”

“He miscalculated,” Martellus said. “Had the river been less full, he would have been at the dyke by now. This attack was intended to see him to the very walls on which we stand. Its repulse will give him pause for thought, but let us not forget that he still has fifty thousand men on those hills who have not yet been under fire. He will try again.”

“Then the same thing will happen again,” Isak said stubbornly.

“Possibly. We have exhausted our surprises, I think. Now he knows what we have and will be searching his mind for openings, gaps in our defences.”

“He cannot mean to assault again for a while, not after that debacle.”

“Perhaps not, but do not underestimate Shahr Baraz. He was profligate with his men’s lives at Aekir because of the prize that was at stake. I had thought he would be more careful here, if only because of the natural strength of the dyke. It may be that someone in higher authority is urging him on into less well-judged assaults. But we cannot become overconfident. We must look to our flanks. After today he will be probing the upper and lower stretches of the Searil, looking for a crossing point.”

“He won’t find one. The Searil is running as fast as a riptide and apart from here, at the dyke, the banks are treacherous, mostly cliffs and gorges.”

“We know that, but he does not.” Martellus sagged suddenly. “I think we have won, for the moment. There will be no more headlong assaults. We have gained a breathing space. It is now up to the kings of the world to aid us. The Saints know we deserve some help after the defence we have made.”

“Young Corfe did well.”

“Yes, he did. I intend to give him a larger command. He is able enough for it, and he and Andruw work well together.”

A few desultory cannon shots spurted out from the Torunnan lines, but a calm was descending over the Searil valley. As though by common consent, the armies had broken off from each other. The Merduks rescued the pathetically few survivors of the river assault without further molestation and loaded them on carts to be driven back within the confines of the camps. A few abandoned boats burned merrily on the eastern bank. The guns fell silent.

The indaba of officers had broken up less than an hour before, and Shahr Baraz was alone in the darkened tent. It was as sparsely furnished as a monk’s cell. There was a low wooden cot strewn with army blankets, a folding desk piled with papers, a chair and some stands for the lamps.

And one other thing. The old general set it on the desk and drew the curtain from around it. A small cage. Something inside it chittered and flapped irritably.

“Well, Goleg,” Shahr Baraz said in a low voice. He tapped the bars of the cage and regarded its occupant with weary disgust.

“Ha! Man’s flesh is too tough for Goleg. Wants a child, a young, sweet thing just out of the cradle.”

“Summon your master. I must make my report.”

“I want sweet flesh!”

“Do as you are told, abomination, or I’ll leave you to rot in that cage.”

Two tiny dots of light blinked malevolently from the shadows behind the bars. Two minuscule clawed hands gripped them and shook the metal.

“I know you. You are too old. Soon you will be carrion for Goleg.”

“Summon your master.”

The two lights dimmed. There was a momentary quiet, broken only by the camp noises outside, the neighing of horses in the cavalry lines. Shahr Baraz sat as if graven in stone.

At last a deep voice said: “Well, General?”

“I must make my report, Orkh. Relay me to the Sultan.”

“Good tidings, I trust.”

“That is for him to judge.”

“Did the assault fail, then?”

“It failed. I would speak to my ruler. No doubt you will be able to eavesdrop.”

“Indeed. My little creatures all answer to me-but you and Aurungzeb know that, of course.” Another pause. “He is busy with one of his new concubines, the raven-haired Ramusian beauty. Ah, she is exquisite. I envy him. Here he is, my Khedive. The luck of the Prophet be with you.”

And with that mild blasphemy, Orkh’s voice died. Aurungzeb’s impatient tones echoed through the tent in its place.

“Shahr Baraz, my Khedive! General of generals! I am afire. Tell me quickly. What happened?”

“The assault failed, Majesty.”

“What? How? How did this happen?”

The old soldier seemed to stiffen in his chair, as though anticipating a blow.

“The attack was hasty, ill-judged and ill-prepared. We took the eastern barbican of the fortress, but it was mined and I lost two thousand men when the Ramusians touched it off. The river, also, was flowing too fast for our boats to make a swift crossing. They were cut to pieces whilst still in the water. Those who made it to the western bank died under the muzzles of Torunnan guns.”

“How many?”

“We lost some six thousand of the Hraibadar-half of those who remained-and another five thousand of the levy.”

“And the-the enemy?”

“I doubt he lost more than a thousand.”

The Sultan’s voice, when it came again, had changed; the shock had gone and it was as hard as Thurian granite.

“You said the attack was ill-judged. Explain yourself.”

“Majesty, if you will remember, I did not want to make this assault. I asked you for more time, time to throw up siegeworks, to look over our options more thoroughly-”

“Time! You have had time. You dawdled in Aekir for weeks. You would have done the same here had I not enjoined you to hasten. This is a paltry place. You said yourself the garrison is less than twenty thousand strong. This is not Aekir, Shahr Baraz. The army should be able to roll over it like an elephant stepping on a frog.”

“It is the strongest fortification I have ever seen, including the walls of Aekir,” Shahr Baraz said. “I cannot throw my army at it as if it were the log hut of some bandit chieftain. This campaign could prove as difficult as the last-”

“It could if the famed Khedive of my army-my army, General-has lost his zest for campaigning.”

Baraz’s face hardened. “I attacked on your orders, and against my own judgement. That mistake has cost us eleven thousand men dead or too maimed ever to fight again. I will not repeat that mistake.”

“How dare you speak to me thus? I am your Sultan, old man. You will obey me or I will find someone else who will.”

“So be it, my Sultan. But I will be a party to no more amateur strategy. You can either replace me or leave me to conduct this campaign unhindered. Yours is the choice, and the responsibility.”

A long silence. The homunculus’ eyes blinked in the shadow of its cage. Shahr Baraz was impassive. I am too old for diplomacy, he thought. I will end what I have always been-a soldier. But I will not see my men slaughtered in my name. Let them know who ordered the attack. Let them see how their Sultan values their lives.

“My friend,” Aurungzeb said finally, and his voice was as smooth as melted chocolate. “We have both spoken hastily. Our concern for the men and our country does us credit, but it leads us into passionate utterances which might later be re-gretted.”

“I agree, Majesty.”

“So I will give you another opportunity to prove your loyalty to my house, a loyalty which has never faltered since the days of my grandsire. You will renew the attack on Ormann Dyke at once, and with all the forces at your disposal. You will overwhelm the dyke and then push on south to the Torunnan capital.”

“I regret that I cannot comply with your wishes, Majesty.”

“Wishes? Who is talking about wishes? You will obey my orders, old man.”

“I regret that I cannot.”

“And why not?”

“Because to do so would wreck this army from top to bottom, and I will not permit that.”

“Eyes of the Prophet! Will you defy me?”

“Yes, Majesty.”

“Consider yourself my Khedive no longer, then. As the Lord of Victories rules in Paradise, I have suffered your ancient insolence for the last time! Hand over your command to Mughal. He can expect orders from me in writing-and a new Khedive!”

“And I, Majesty?”

“You? Consider yourself under arrest, Shahr Baraz. You will await the arrival of my officers from Orkhan.”

“Is that all?”

“By the Lord of Battles, yes-that is all!”

“Fare thee well then, Majesty,” Shahr Baraz said calmly. He stood, lifted the cage with its monstrous occupant, and then dashed it to the ground. The homunculus screamed, and in its scream Shahr Baraz heard the agony of Orkh, its sorcerous master. Smiling grimly, he stamped his booted foot on the structure, crunching metal and bone in a morass of ichor and foul-stinking flesh. Then he clapped his hands for his attendants.

“Take this abomination away and burn it,” he said, and they flinched from the fire in his eyes.