Men of War

Chapter Thirteen

Sitting atop his ironclad, Vincent Hawthorne raised his field glasses, scanning the horizon to the east, which was silhouetted by the dawning light.

“See them?” Gregory asked. “I count at least twenty-five plumes. They must have brought them up by rail during the night. And there, see it, four, make that five flyers are up as well.”

Vincent said nothing, slowly sweeping the line of the horizon. Gregory’s eyes were undoubtedly far better, and he was trained for this through a year’s hard experience.

“Fine then. They’re going to make a fight of it,” Vincent announced, lowering his glasses.

A sharp rattle of rifle fire, sounding sharp and clear in the early-morning air, ignited. Directly ahead a line of cavalry skirmishers was drawing back from the opposite ridge. Ever since the men had dug into camp just after sundown, the ridge had been a source of contention throughout the night. If the bastards were allowed to deploy artillery up there, they could fire right down into the fortified camp of 3rd Corps.

Standing up, he slowly turned. The dawning light was starting to reveal the encircling host. It was hard to tell, but he sensed that more Bantag had come up during the night. The odds were running steep, at least six to one, perhaps even seven to one, the advantage held by having thirty-eight ironclads offset by the arrival of the enemy machines.

This day would be the day, then, and for all he knew, in the greater world beyond, the war might already be over. There was no word from Hans, not a single flyer had come back from Xi’an with a report. He was beginning to suspect that it would prove to be a very bad day.

“Should we move up to meet them?” Gregory asked.

Vincent shook his head.

“Get the men digging in. We’ve got fresh water here.” He nodded to the oasis-like spring that was in the center of the camp. “Even if the water is somewhat bitter, they can’t block it off. We dig in and let them come at us. As for our ironclads, we move up onto the ridge east of here to keep their artillery back. That’s where we’ll meet their ironclads coming in.”

“They could wait us out, you know. We’re down to five days’ rations.”

“They don’t know that. No, I think their pride is hurt, us getting this far through territory they felt was theirs. No, once those ironclads come up the fight will be on.”

“Wonder if this is all futile anyhow.” Gregory sighed.

Vincent looked over at him.

“Sorry, but word is getting around with the boys. Somehow rumors are floating about a coup back in Suzdal, that the war might already be over, and we’ve surrendered, that Hans and even Andrew are dead.”

“And what do you think?”

“If we surrendered, how long do you think those hairy bastards would let someone like you or me live. We know too much.”

He laughed, shook his head, and slapped the ironclad they were sitting on.

“We’re all doomed to die anyhow; if given the choice, I want to go down fighting in one of these. I was nothing before you Yankees came. You trained me, gave me a chance to command, gave me a machine I could master and even learn to love. That’s a pretty good life, I think, and something worth dying for today.”

“I wish we had another corps though,” Vincent whispered.

“Air cover, that’s what I want. What the hell do you think the Hornets were doing last night?”

Vincent shook his head. At least twenty machines had flown directly overhead in the middle of the night. One of them had circled several times and then pressed on. He had hoped that someone would have found a dropped message streamer, but so far nothing. Perhaps they were attempting a moonlit strike on the enemy ships off-loading the ironclads. If that was their mission, the smoke just over the next hill was indicator enough that the mad scheme had been a failure.

“Anyhow, the fewer men, the greater share of honor,” Gregory continued with a smile, and the two chuckled softly.

“Well, I guess we’re the bait. We wanted a stand-up fight, and we’re going to get one. Let’s make the most of it.”

“Hans.”

The voice was gentle but insistent, waking him from a soft floating dream. It was Maine. Funny, he had actually spent very little time there, but even after all these years it still haunted his memory and dreams. Pulled from the Regulars, he’d been sent to Augusta to help form up a volunteer regiment, 1030-odd farm boys, lumbermen, clerks, students, fishermen, boat builders, craftsmen, railroad men, factory hands, and a lone history professor who would become the 35th Maine. He’d arrived early in July. By the end of August they were already heading south to join the Army of the Potomac in Maryland. Less than two months, and yet somehow it had made its stamp upon his heart. He remembered the day he and a nervous and still-young lieutenant hiked their company from the parade field below the Capitol to the village of Belgrade. The lieutenant allowed the boys to strip down for a swim in Snow Pond while the two sat on a grass-covered hill and first questions were asked. “What’s the war like … how good are the Rebs” and the startling admission … “I hope I don’t fail these boys.”

He had grown, sick of officers who only seemed concerned with rank, privilege, clawing to promotion and this shy volunteer, voice near breaking, wondering aloud if he would “fail his boys.”

He’d been dreaming of that, but it was different. His own wife, Tamira, their baby Andrew, and with them Andrew, Kathleen, and their children. It was like a dream of heaven. No fear, a soft lazy summer day in Maine where, though the sun was warm in July, there was always a cool breeze stirring off the lake.

Even in the dream he wondered if he was wandering in Andrew’s dream realm, for the colonel had told him of his feverish morphine-twisted visions of death, of lingering by a lakeshore with all the dead who had gone before.

No. This was different, and he wondered if it was a foreshadowing, a dream of heaven.

“Hans.”

It was Ketswana, hand lightly on the shoulder, shaking insistently.

Hans opened his eyes and saw the dark features, the shaved head, eyes that were so transparent, like windows into the soul, and the look of concern.

Hans sat up, disoriented. He had sat down on the woodpile, the city was burning, the powder works had blown.

He sat up, feeling light-headed, unsure of where he was. The air was heavy with the smell of burned wood, rubbish, and the ever-present clinging smell of the camps. He looked around. He was off the train, inside a brick building, roof burned off and collapsed. There was a chill; it was all so familiar in a distorted way, the foundry where he had once slaved.

Everything was a mad scurry of confusion, men using stoking rods were cutting into the brick wall, chiseling out firing ports through the heavy wall. He was near the main doorway, dead Bantag from storming the building were dragged to one side and piled up, and had been half-con-sumed in the fire.

He stood up. “How did I get here?”

“You don’t remember?”

Hans shook his head.

Ketswana looked at him closely.

“You all right?”

“Sure. Now tell me what’s going on.”

Ketswana motioned for him to follow as he climbed up a ramp that had once been used by labor crews pushing wheelbarrows of crushed ore, coke, and flux up to the tops of the furnaces. Most of the heavy-beamed walkway had survived the fire but was badly charred.

The walkway rimmed the inside of the factory walls just below the roofline and men and women were working feverishly, clearing away rubble from the collapsed roof, and to his amazement a couple of dozen were slowly dragging a Bantag light fieldpiece, a breechloader, to the northeast corner.

“Where the hell did you get that thing?”

“At the cannon works. A dozen of them brand-spanking-new. We even found some shells. I got one posted down by the gate, the rest of the guns are in the other compounds.” A couple of Chin, a single rifle between them, looked up as they passed, one of them holding up a half-charred piece of flesh and, grinning, nodded his thanks. Directly below, on the floor of the factory compound, Hans could see the burned remains of the Bantag he had shot yesterday, baked into the frozen pool of iron.

Ketswana, knowing what he was thinking, shook his head and laughed.

“I've had crews working all night. We found a herd of horses. I ordered them slaughtered and, using the wreckage of a barracks compound, we roasted tons of the stuff.”

He grimaced.

“Well, most of it was damn near raw, but I remember a time when you and I wouldn’t have turned down raw meat, as long as we knew what it was. That was the lure, word spread, and we must of had them coming in by the tens of thousands. Anyone who could do anything we organized off with their compound leaders, village elders, even some of their princes.

“We fed them and made it clear, if they ran off, everyone would be slaughtered come dawn. Hans, they all know that. Did you hear who’s here?”

“No, who?”

“Tamuka.”

Hans said nothing.

“Word is he’s the one that fired the city. They went crazy yesterday, started murdering everyone, as word spread that we had taken Xi’an and were coming this way.”

Hans nodded, but said nothing. There was no hope of trying to turn these people into a trained cadre, that’d take weeks, months, and months of simply feeding them right as well. Though it was hard to believe he felt they actually looked worse than what he had experienced a year ago. The simple knowledge of what was coming that day would give them the courage to go down in a final mad frenzy.

“Hans, they were organizing for this day, did you know that?”

“What do you mean?”

“You think we were the only ones?” Ketswana chuckled, as he reached out and moved Hans aside as a work crew, carrying a crate of ammunition for Bantag rifles, slowly moved past, pausing by the pair consuming their meal so that they could grab several dozen cartridges before moving on.

“Hans, they had a whole network put together. Word of our breakout a year ago spread from one end of the Chin realm to the other. They say even the people up in the Nippon lands knew about it. The ‘wind words’ are that rioting is erupting in Nippon as well. The Bantag couldn’t stamp it out. Hans, you’re something of a god around here.”

“What?”

“Legends that we would return, that we wouldn’t let them be massacred. They’re right, you know.”

“Yeah.” He sadly gazed at the skeletal crew laboring to roll the fieldpiece into position so that it wouldn’t recoil right off the platform the first time it was fired.

“So they had a network, every compound linked together by the railroad crews and track laborers. Telegraphers kept the leaders informed of everything the Bantag did. With rumors that the Republic had surrendered sweeping the city, they were actually going to try and stage a mass rebellion even before we flew in to Xi’an.”

“Madness.”

“Well, what else could they do? Even if they traded lives a hundred to one, it would have stirred things up at the end. They knew just as well as we did that once the war was over they’d all be slaughtered. Some were talking about moving on the encampment areas south of here.”

“What?”

“The old ones, their women and children.”

He said nothing, the dark thought repulsive.

“They say there’s a hundred thousand yurts less than thirty miles from here.”

The way Ketswana spoke chilled Hans, and he shook his head, silencing him.

Ketswana motioned Hans forward as the last of the ammunition carriers hauling up shells for the fieldpiece passed. Gaining the corner of the foundry building, Hans stepped up onto a raised observation platform and sucked in his breath.

The enemy host was coming. They were still several miles off, but in the cool morning air they stood out sharply. These were not mounted archers, aging guards, cruel slave drivers who could whip a terrified Chin to death but might step back from one armed with a stoking rod or pick. They were coming on slowly, deliberately, open skirmish line to the fore. Somehow Ketswana still had a pair of field glasses, and Hans took them, fumbling with the focus. One of the twin barrels had been knocked out of kilter, so he closed one eye.

These were good troops, Hans could see that, black-uniformed, rifles held at the ready. A scattering of Chin were drawing back, refugees who had wandered out into the fields northwest of the burning city. The Bantag were not even bothering to waste a shot on such prey. If their steady advance overtook one, the victim was simply bayoneted and left. There was no looting, tearing apart of bodies, just a cold dispatching and then continuing on.

Behind the double rank of skirmishers he could see the main body of troops, advancing in open order of columns, well spread out, half a dozen paces between warriors so that each regiment of a thousand occupied a front a half mile across and a hundred yards deep. Gatlings had finished the days of shoulder-to-shoulder ranks, and Jurak knew that, as he seemed to know far too many things.

Sweeping the advancing columns he could see their left flank, his right, reaching all the way to the walls of the still-burning city, while their right flank overlapped his left by at least a mile or more. Several thousand Bantag were mounted, ranging farther out into the open steppes. These troops were not black-uniformed, many wearing older style jerkits of brown leather. He caught a glimpse of a standard adorned with human skulls.

It was a Merki standard.

He lowered the field glasses, looking over at Ketswana, who nodded.

“The bastard is here, Hans. During the night he pulled to the west, organizing the survivors of yesterday’s fight.”

Hans raised the glasses again, but the standard had disappeared in a swirling cloud of dust.

There was nothing to anchor his own left flank on; it simply ended at this factory compound. It was obvious that within minutes after the start of the fight the mounted Bantag would be around his left and into the rear.

Moving with the advancing host he picked out half a dozen batteries of fieldpieces, and several dozen wagons, which were undoubtedly carrying mortars. Except for a few pathetic guns such as the one mounted next to where he stood, they had nothing to counter that. Worse yet, though, in the middle of the advancing line half a dozen land ironclads were approaching as well, while overhead several Bantag aerosteamers were climbing, passing over the infantry and coming straight for him.

As for his own aerosteamers, there was nothing left. The wreckage of his air fleet cluttered the field, bits of wicker framing, scorched canvas, and dark lumps of what had once been engines all that was left of the air corps of the Republic. He spared a quick thought for Jack, wondering if any of them had even made it back to Xi’an.

Turning his field glasses away, he scanned the position Ketswana, his few veterans, and the Chin had attempted to prepare during the night, and he struggled not to weep. The rail line, cutting straight as an arrow from west to east, heading toward the burning city, was the rally point. During the night track had been torn up, crossties and ballast piled up to form a rough palisades.

The dozen compounds that were strung along the track were the strong points; unfortunately, most of them had been severely damaged in the fighting. The powder works, several miles to his right, was still smoldering.

What made his heart freeze, though, was the humanity huddled and waiting. Along the palisades he could see the occasional glint of a rifle barrel or someone holding a precious revolver, but most were armed with nothing more than spears, clubs, pickaxes, iron poles, a few knives, or rocks. And there were hundreds of thousands of them.

Terrified children wailed, old men and women squatted on the ground, huddled in fear, their voices commingling into a mournful wail of forlorn terror. Looking to the south, he saw tens of thousands who, with the coming of dawn, were already quitting the fight, heading out across the open fields, moving through what had once been prosperous villages and hamlets but had long ago been abandoned as the Bantag drew off the populace for labor and for the pits. They were heading God knew where, for there was no place to hide, and once the mounted riders were into the rear they would be hunted down like frightened rabbits.

He knew with a sick heart that his coming had triggered the final apocalypse. After what had happened the day before, Jurak would not suffer a single person to live. They had killed Bantag, they had destroyed the factories that were the sole remaining reason for their existence. They would all have to die.

One of the Bantag aerosteamers lazily passed overhead, the pilot staying high enough to keep out of range of rifle fire. He banked over, making several tight turns. Hans looked back over the wall and saw a sea of upturned faces, hands pointing heavenward.

Now it was not the ships of the Yankees, coming like gods from the heavens, bringing a dream of freedom. It was the dreaded Horde, and as if to add emphasis, the bottom side of the machine was painted with the human-skull standard and there were cries of fear. Yet more Chin started to break away. There was a scattering of rifle shots, a few of his men posted to the rear, holding their weapons overhead, firing not at the ship but to scare the refugees back into the line. Some turned about, but he knew that once the real fighting started, there would most likely be a panic.

The machine turned one more time, nosed over, a puff of smoke ignited. A second later there was the almost lazy pop, pop, pop, of the slow-firing Bantag machine gun. Between his compound and the next one up the line the rounds hit, half a dozen Chin falling, panic beginning to break out. The machine finally leveled out and flew on toward the city.

Hans looked over at Ketswana.

“My God, this will be a massacre,” Hans whispered.

Ketswana looked at him, eyes narrowed.

“If they realize they’re all going to die anyhow, they’ll fight. They have to.”

“Fight? With what.”

“Their bare hands if need be.”

“Against rifles and artillery.”

“Hans, they only have so many bullets, so many shells. They can kill a hundred thousand and still we’ll outnumber them.”

“My God, what have we become to talk like this?” Hans sighed.

“What they have made us become in order to survive.”

A whispering flutter interrupted them. Hans crouched instinctively as the mortar round arced over head, crashed down in the middle of the foundry compound, and detonated, the explosion instantly followed by screams of pain.

Looking back over the wall he saw where several dozen mortars had been set up on a low rise, a thousand yards ahead. The advancing skirmishers were already past that position, still relentlessly advancing.

Puffs of smoke ignited all along the low ridge.

“Here it comes,” Hans announced, his voice filled with resignation.

Seconds later the factory compound was blanketed with explosions.

Jurak, sitting uneasily astride his mount, said nothing to the subordinates around him. He could sense their blood-lust. This was no longer war; it was an act of extermination. The advance to the jump-off point had carried them across fields where the previous day pathetic bands of guards, fleeing the rioting, had been swept up and torn apart by the Chin mob. It had stirred him as well, and that thought troubled him. He had almost grown immune to the sight of the humans being slaughtered, devoured, but it was now evident that more than one of the Bantag dead had been mutilated after death, or, perhaps, while still alive. He wondered if the cattle had sunk to eating Bantag flesh, and the thought chilled him. Looking down at three aging guards who were sprawled in a ditch, he saw that the arms had been hacked off one, the limbs missing, and the sight of it set the hair on his back to bristling.

He wondered if this was indeed what the humans felt at the sight of the slaughter pits. Did it create that same visceral fear? Was that not as well, then, the reason for their fanatical resistance? He suddenly remembered how during the War of the False Pretender he had learned that the two most influential factors in a soldier’s morale had nothing to do with generals, causes, and leadership. The first one was knowledge of how well you would be tended to if wounded. Second, what would happen if you were taken prisoner. On this world there was no such thing as prisoners, and, therefore, though the humans facing him were a disorganized rabble, still each of them might very well fight with the fury of despair.

He rode forward to join the mortar batteries deployed on the low ridge, their steady coughing thumps echoing across the battlefield. The factory compound on the left flank of the human line was smothered under a steady hail of exploding shells. Far to his own right he could see mounted units swinging wide, advance elements already across the tracks moving to get into the rear.

He had sent a courier over ordering them to hold and stand in place. The humans had to believe there was an escape route so that the panic might set in. If their line was flanked too soon, it might hem them in and cause further resistance.

There was a puff of smoke from atop the compound wall and seconds later a hissing roar as an artillery shell streaked past, the round startling him and causing his mount to rear.

“Disgusting way to die, Jurak.”

He looked over his shoulder and saw Tamuka behind him, trailed by his small retinue.

Jurak said nothing. Tamuka reined in beside him, slumping forward, hand resting on the pommel of his mount.

He knew the Merki was watching, judging, figuring he could do better. Though enraged at him, now was not the time to express it.

“That is Hans over there,” Tamuka finally announced.

“What makes you think that?”

“I can sense it. It would be like him to come back. The greatest mistake I made was turning him over to your Ha’ark. I should have kept him for my own pleasures. I could have made of him a moon feast that would have lasted for days.”

“No. Your greatest folly was in losing as you did,” Jurak snapped.

Tamuka turned, eyes filled with cold fury.

“Repeat that.”

“You heard it right the first time. If you had done your job correctly as Qar Qarth, you would still have your Horde.”

“I weakened them for you.”

Another round screamed past, but they both ignored it. “Weakened them? You aroused them. You murdered the rightful Qar Qarth and seized power for yourself and used the war as an excuse. You let your hate blind you. Now it is my people who must pay for this, perhaps all those of our race.”

Tamuka reached to his side, scimitar flashing out. The gesture was met with the clicks of half a dozen rifles being raised, cocked, and pointed straight at him by Jurak’s personal guards.

“You are not of this world,” Tamuka hissed.

“Exactly! That is why I see more clearly than you. They”-and he pointed to the compound disappearing under the rain of artillery fire-“they are not of this world either. They brought change. Now I must, too. The old ways are dead forever, Tamuka. Even if we win this day, we lose. Can I rebuild all this in a month, even a year?

“No. I must slaughter every human here for their own folly of believing in freedom. With luck, back at the front their political will shall collapse and we can attack, finishing it. But if so, I fear this is nothing more than a pyre for both our races.”

Even as he spoke the advancing phalanx of infantry started to pass, breaking formation to maneuver around the wagons and caissons of the mortar batteries.

The warriors were well-trained veterans, moving with casual ease, rifles poised, bayonet-tipped, but most still carried their traditional scimitars strapped to their hips. When the real killing started that would be the weapon of choice. They seemed lighthearted, eager for the fray, unlike the weary, exhausted warriors he had watched being shoved into the inferno at Roum. This was sport to them, almost like the field exercises Ha’ark would hold when a Chin town would be singled out and stormed just to give the warriors a taste of modern combat.

The skirmishers far ahead were already engaged, firing, advancing slowly. Several of them were down, a spattering of fire opening from the Chin position. To his left the traditional. signalers of the hordes, the giant nargas trumpets and kettledrums were coming up, the deep rumble of the horns and heartbeat thump of the drums setting his hair on end.

He looked back over at Tamuka.

“If you are so eager for the kill, why not ride forward and join in?” Jurak asked.

Tamuka looked at him angrily.

“And you shall stay here?”

“I am the Qar Qarth. This is a modern battle.”

Tamuka snarled. Nodding to his renegade followers, he viciously spurred his mount and galloped off.

Jurak, glad to be rid of his presence, dismounted, tossing the reins of his horse to one of his guards. The day was already hot, made worse by the grass fires ignited by bursting shells, the pall of smoke hanging over the entire front.

After I win here, then what? he wondered.

The advancing column slowed, reaching the skirmish lines forward. Tearing volleys started to ripple up and down the length of the front as twenty thousand warriors, the elite of two umens, began to fire into the hundreds of thousands of Chin huddled behind the railroad embankment. The day was turning into a slaughter.

“You’ve got your mission,” Vincent shouted. “I want their ironclads kept back from this square. If they can bring us under fire, they’ll break us up.”

Gregory, sitting atop his machine, grinned and nodded.

Saluting, he raised a clenched fist, waved it over his head, and pointed due east, toward the advancing column of Bantag ironclads.

Slipping down inside the turret, he buttoned the hatch shut, machines lined up to either side of him already lurching forward. Vincent, trying to ignore the pain, mounted a horse held by an orderly and swung it around, galloped back down the sloping hill and into the fortified camp of 3rd Corps.

The battle was about to explode. After years of fighting the hordes he could sense the building tension. They were the bait, the focal point to divert Jurak. And now the bill was coming due.

The Horde completely encircled their position, but it was easy enough to see that most of their strength, at least four umens, were poised to the north, though there were more than enough of them ringing the other three sides of the square to keep his forces pinned down. The ironclads held the rise to the east, but he still had to keep troops along that side, in case their infantry or mounted units swarmed in behind Gregory and attacked.

When it finally hit there were no preliminaries, no softening-up bombardment. They knew that if the ironclad battle should go against them, any hope of exacting vengeance was lost. Even if they did win the ironclad fight, the artillery well dug in at the four comers of the square, and in reserve at the center, would chew the precious machines apart. They were going to try it in one sharp push.

From a mile out he saw them emerging out of the cloud of dust kicked up by the tens of thousands of horses. It was a solid wall of Bantag, dismounted, advancing with long-legged strides.

His heart swelled at the sight of them. It was like the old days once again, and to his own amazement he felt a surge of emotion. This is the way they looked before Suzdal, on the Potomac Front, and at Hispania. From all that the older veterans told him, it was the same at Cold Harbor, Gettysburg, Fredericksburg, and Antietam. A full frontal assault, thrown in regardless of loss.

A murmur swept through the men along the northern flank of the square. Some of them stood up, ignoring the bursting of mortar shells raining down. A ripple of excitement swept up and down the line. Young captains scurried back and forth, carrying teams hurried back to supply wagons, bringing up extra boxes of ammunition. Sergeants paced behind the firing line, a division commander, swept up by the moment, jumped his horse over the sod earthwork embankment and galloped down his line, waving his hat, men breaking into cheers at his display of foolish bravado.

“Damn if it isn’t like Pickett’s Charge!”

It was Stan, reining up beside him, his voice shrill with excitement.

Vincent said nothing, raising his field glasses, studying the enemy advance. Red umen standards were at the fore, a few of their commanders mounted. At regular intervals down the line human-skull totems for regiments of a thousand'were held aloft, surrounded by towering bulky warriors armed with rifles. The rest carried the powerful war bows of two hundred pounds pull, arrows already notched.

Batteries at the northeastern and northwestern flanks opened up on the advancing enemy, case shot burst over the lines, but that was merely an annoyance. A standard of a thousand went down, caught by a direct burst, then came up again. The range was down to less than a thousand yards, then nine hundred, then eight hundred.

Sergeants along his own lines were shouting orders, telling the men to lever their sights up to full elevation. There was a scattering of shots, the sniper company armed with Whitworths and the new long-barreled Sharps heavy rifles. Some of the men armed with lighter guns opened and were soundly cursed by their officers.

Good. Wait until four hundred yards. It was a still morning, the smoke would cling, killing visibility. Better to wait.

The range was at six hundred, and then they stopped.

There was an eerie moment of silence, and then he heard the chanting, the weird spine-chilling cries. Harsh, guttural words. He had seen it before, Horde riders who knew they were going to their deaths, and before the charge made this final gesture to their enemies and their gods … the chanting of the names of their clans, their ancestors, and their own names and battle honors.

The strange rumbling cries rolled across the steppes, joined by the nargas and war drums, a thunderous roar. Bantag stamped their feet to the rhythm of the chant, the ground shaking. The effect was hypnotic, the chant rising to a crescendo, dropping off, rising even higher.

Again men were standing up, watching, awestruck. For a brief moment all hatred died in Vincent’s heart. There was almost an admiration for such insane raw courage. Individual Bantag began to step out of the line, unsheathing scimitars, many of them drawing the razor-sharp blades across their own forearms, then holding the blood-soaked steel up again, their individual chants drowned out by the thunderous roar.

Along his own line he could hear the men mustering a response, the surreal sound of the “Battle Hymn of the Republic” sung in Rus. All this was counterpointed by the continual crump of mortar shells exploding, artillery thundering out case shot, and then, off to his right, a mile to the east of the square, the ever-increasing roar of the ironclad battle.

He looked heavenward. The air machines were up, nearly twenty of them. They were holding back, flying high, waiting most likely for the square to break apart before swooping in. He caught a glimpse of just two Hornets dropping like stooping falcons, tearing into the enemy machines. He wondered where the hell the rest of the Hornets were.

The roaring chant dropped down to a deep growling bass, and then in a matter of seconds swirled up to a high shrieking crescendo … “Bantag hus! Bantag hus! Bantag hus!”

Umen standards held aloft twirled about in tight circles. Mounted commanders rode out ahead of the line, urging their horses into a slow canter, drawing scimitars. As if controlled by a single hand twenty thousand bows were slung over the shoulder, then twenty thousand scimitars were drawn and held heavenward, catching the morning sun. A collective gasp went through his lines.

“My God, they’re going to charge straight in!” Stan cried.

Vincent turned to a courier.

“I want the reserve brigade in the center deployed out now!” Vincent shouted.

The boy saluted and galloped off. Vincent grabbed another messenger and sent him to the commander on the east flank of the square, telling him to get ready to shift half his men to the north and sent yet another galloping with the same order to the west side.

Even as the three couriers raced off, the red banners fluttered down, pointing straight at the center of his line. A mad, howling roar erupted. There was no stepping off at a slow steady march, no subtle maneuvering.

With a mad passionate scream twenty thousand Bantag flung themselves forward at the run, their giant strides consuming the distance between the opposing lines at a frightening pace.

“At four hundred yards volley fire present!” the cry echoed along his own line.

Men hunkered down behind the sod breastworks, hammers clicking back, fingers curling around triggers.

The charge swept across the first hundred yards in less than twenty seconds, Vincent estimated, and they were still picking up speed, the bravest and fleetest moving to the fore. Mounted commanders, carried away by the mad frenzy, were far ahead, some nearly half the distance to the line.

“Glorious!” Stan cried.

Startled, Vincent looked over at his old comrade, but something was stirring in him as well. He remembered many a night so long ago back on Earth, hearing the old veterans speak with awe, describing the rebel charges sweeping toward Seminary Ridge and across the Cornfield at Antietam. My God, this is what it must have looked like, sheer insane courage unleashed in a wild, all-consuming explosion.

“Take aim.” The cry echoed up and down the line from a hundred sergeants and officers. “Aim low, boys, aim low!”

Vincent held his breath.

“Fire!”

The volley ignited in the center of the line and within a couple of seconds swept down the flanks.

A billowing white cloud exploded, temporarily blinding Vincent. There was the collective metallic ring of thousands of breeches levering open, shell casings ejecting, fresh rounds sliding in, breeches slamming shut, officers and sergeants roaring to lever sights down to three hundred yards.

Vincent felt a swelling of pride. These were veterans. There was no panic, just a steady professional pace.

Those who were quickest waited, bracing their barrels on the embankment.

“Take aim!”

Individual companies and regiments fired, sheets of flame swirling out. Already the dry grass in front of the works was igniting, puffs of thick white flames clinging to the ground. In the brief instant before the smoke from the second volley shut down all vision forward he saw the deadly effect of the volley, scores of Bantag going down, yet it barely stilled the pace of the mad charge, as the wave leapt over the fallen and pressed in.

A jarring concussion swept the square, a caisson exploding in the center of the position, the mortar round detonating several hundred pounds of shot and shell, sending a fireball a hundred feet into the air.

He caught a glimpse of the battery anchoring the corner to his right, the crew feverishly cranking 'the elevation screw, even as their companions tore breeches open, swabbed out bores, and slammed in loads of canister.

“Independent fire at will!”

The command echoed above the cacophonous thunder, men cheering as they were released from the constraints of waiting and within seconds the measured heavy volleys were replaced by a continual rattle.

There was just enough of a breeze that the curtains of smoke lifted so that the shadowy wall of the advancing charge was visible. They were down to less than two hundred yards and still coming at a terrifying pace.

They were going to come straight in.

Stan broke away from Vincent, spurring his mount forward, drawing his revolver.

Vincent felt pulled in as well.

No, here, stay here. He looked to his left, his guidon bearer was stock-still, sitting tall in the saddle, but the boy’s jaw was actually hanging open in shocked amazement.

Suddenly from out of the smoke a lone rider emerged, blood streaming from half a dozen wounds, his face a pulp, dead but still charging, the horse in its mad frenzy actually leaping the earthen stockade before going down under a hail of bullets. Another rider shot out of the smoke, this one still alive. With his hands off the reins, both arms extended wide, a scimitar in his right hand, his horse leapt over the barricade. The rider’s wild shriek of battle frenzy sounded above the roar of battle. He seemed to hang in midair, men recoiling back as if he was a mad god.

The horse touched down, the rider coming straight for Vincent. He drew his own revolver, started to raise it, and then a volley riddled the berserker. He tumbled from his horse, sprawled faceup on the ground, the horse going down beside him.

Magnificent courage, Vincent thought.

Then he noticed it, a dark cloud rising up from beyond the pall of smoke. An arrow volley. It was the old Horde tactic of bringing up mounted fire support behind a charging line. In the smoke and confusion forward he could barely see them, towering high above the line that was still charging forward and now less than a hundred yards away.

Few of the men actually saw, so intent were they on pouring in the fire. Thousands of arrows arced down, so that in an instant it looked as if thousands of young feathered saplings had sprouted from the earth. The volley was short, but enough arrows slammed into the lines to cause a startled cry to go up as men fell, clutching pierced arms, legs, or simply collapsed.

Vincent turned to yet another messenger, shouting for him to find the commander for the four batteries of mortars and tell him to set the range at two hundred yards and pour it on.

Another volley rose up and then another, this one longer. The bastards were sweeping high, sending the deadly shafts into the center of the square. At nearly the same instant the charge emerged out of the billowing smoke, a solid wall of Bantag, running straight in.

Wild cries went up, commanders urging their men to stand. Directly in front of Vincent, a regimental commander holding the flag of the 15th Suzdal and showing remarkable poise, had firm control of his unit, having ordered his men to cease fire and wait. With the wall of Bantag less than thirty yards away the command was given to present and take aim.

The Bantag charge barely hesitated. At ten yards the volley of four hundred rifles erupted. It struck with such force that the front ranks of the Bantag seemed to have run into a wall, collapsing, thrashing, some picked up bodily and flung backwards into those behind them.

He could actually hear the volley hit, bullets smacking into bodies, swords, accoutrements, helmets, bows … equipment, parts of bodies, and blood actually showered up and backwards. As one the regiment slammed open breeches, slapping cartridges in. A few Bantag struggled through the confusion and flung themselves up and over the battlement, swords flashing. Vincent saw a human head tumbling into the air. Another soldier was lifted into the air, scimitar driven through his body to the hilt, the Bantag shrieking in triumph. A lieutenant leapt forward, driving his own blade up into the throat of the warrior.

More Bantag surged forward, the next volley cutting them down at ten paces. The flanks of the 15th started to cave in as the regiments to either side were pushed back from the embankment, curving inward like a drawn bow. A dark wall of Bantag surged over the top of the battlement, swords flashing. Men still down behind the embankment slashed upward with their bayonets, stabbing their towering opponents in the legs, groin, and stomach. Scimitars rose and fell, blood splashing.

A reserve regiment to Vincent’s left stormed forward, dozens of men falling as hundreds of arrows soared down from straight overhead.

The batteries in the corners and dug in at the middle of the line were anchor points, the gunners all having gone over to double canister, each gun discharging a hundred iron balls at waist-high level every twenty seconds.

To the left of the 15th and the center battery the entire line started to peel back, men stumbling out of the fight, the insane charge pushing in.

Vincent caught a glimpse of Stan in the middle of the fray, still mounted, revolver out, firing into the host as reserves from the west flank stormed in, counterattacking. Toward the center of the square, men were upending empty supply wagons to form a barricade while the battery in the center, now unlimbered, wheeled about in preparation to fire, but so thick was the tangled press of Bantag and humans that they didn’t dare shoot.

A tearing volley erupted behind Vincent, and, looking over his shoulder, he saw that they were charging against the south side of the square as well, this one a combined mounted and dismounted assault. An orderly to Vincent’s right was lifted out of his saddle and collapsed, caught in the back by a rifle ball. Vincent could see puffs of smoke from the south … so that’s where they are committing their rifle-armed troops.

Bantag skirmishers by the hundreds were pressing in on the south side, and though his own men had the advantage of earthworks, they advanced relentlessly, falling down into the knee-high grass, popping up to shoot, then disappearing again.

Then the final blow came in. Overhead the first of the Bantag air machines started into a steep dive, the slowfiring machine gun thumping, bullets stitching into the center of the encampment.

It was now time to unleash his one reserve for this, and the two specially equipped ironclads parked in the center of the square went into action. The canvas tops of the converted machines were pulled back, revealing the open center and the twin Gatling guns positioned to fire straight up. The gunners inside the two machines waited, letting the Bantag machines get well in range, then opened up.

Tracer rounds soared heavenward from the center of the beleaguered square. Within seconds both gunners had the range, rounds tearing into the first of the machines, which instantly ignited. The gunners shifted targets to the second machine, then the third and fourth in line.

One after another Bantag airships exploded, the pilots of the other airships breaking off the attack in sharp, banking turns. One of them banked over so sharply that the machine hung vertical on its side, seemed to hover, then slowly rolled over on its back and went straight in.

Wreckage rained down on the square, parts of burning ships, wings, howling engines, causing dozens of casualties, but the sight of the feared Bantag air fleet shattered so completely in a matter of seconds heartened the beleaguered defenders, a ragged cheer erupting from the square.

But the position was starting to collapse in spite of the victory overhead. The 15th Suzdal was all but surrounded, forming its own small square, men backing up, rear ranks firing, front ranks standing with poised bayonets to impale any who broke through. Hundreds of Bantag were swarming in on Vincent’s right, a wild confused melee swirling about not fifty yards away. Arrows by the thousands continued to rain down, now catching as many Bantag as humans, sowing confusion on both sides.

As for the ironclad battle to the east, it was impossible to see anything because of the confusion and smoke.

Vincent heard a shouted warning. It was his guidon bearer, arrow buried in his leg, but still astride his horse, screaming, pointing, with his free hand.

Around the edge of the 15th Suzdal several score of Bantag, led by what he assumed to be a umen commander, who miraculously was still mounted, were coming straight at them.

Vincent leveled his revolver and deliberately fired. Still they came on.

He turned his mount; the charge pressed in. A Bantag, scimitar held high overhead with both hands, charged straight at him. He caught the warrior in the face with his next to last round. Letting go of the blade it tumbled end over head, flashing past Vincent’s face. Another Bantag, this one on foot, came in low, aiming to hamstring Vincent’s horse. He dropped that one, raised his revolver to fire at the umen commander, and clicked on an empty cylinder.

The commander, roaring in wild triumph, blood streaming from wounds to the face and chest, slashed viciously, Vincent ducked low, the blade whistling past his ears. Their mounts collided, nearly unhorsing Vincent. He reeled back, throwing his revolver aside, clumsily trying to draw his own sword but barely getting it out in time to parry the next blow, which sent a numbing shock through his arm.

He caught a glimpse of his guidon bearer, sword plunged through his chest, reeling in the saddle, vainly clutching the guidon as dark eager hands reached up to grab it.

The umen commander easily recovered from the parry and started a backhanded swipe. Vincent tried to turn, awkwardly raising his numbed arm and blade to block the blow.

A staccato roar ignited, sweeping past Vincent, hot tracers stitching into the commander. There was a moment when they gazed into each other’s eyes, the Bantag suddenly looking infinitely old and weary, cheated at the last second of the prize he had so bravely and now so vainly sought. He tumbled over backwards and a loud cry rose up from those around him, a cry of anguish and of fear as one of the two land ironclads that had so completely devastated the air attack now clattered forward, twin Gatlings depressed to fire into the charge.

Tracer rounds tore across the flank of the 15th, two, three, four heavy.58 caliber bullets striking each warrior. Within seconds the breakthrough disintegrated and receded over the wall.

The machine, wheels churning up the thick sod, creaked past Vincent, still firing. He tried to block out the guttural screams of the Bantag wounded as the heavy iron wheels rolled over them, crushing their still-twitching bodies into the ground.

A long burst of fire swept along the battlement, dropping the charge that was still breaking in. A cheer went up from the 15th, and the counterattack was on as men turned and pushed forward with the bayonet. Again it was the old trade-off, the massive size and strength of the Bantag, offset by the smaller but far more nimble humans, who could dodge the heavy blows, rush in, and slash upward with the bayonet.

Gradually the embankment was regained, the ground for a hundred yards inside the square paved with the dead, wounded, and dying. As the ironclad gained the embankment it turned its fire outward, slashing into the mounted archers providing fire support, and within seconds created havoc.

Bantag were fleeing, stumbling back out of the square; knots of defiant survivors trapped inside grimly traded their lives. Those who were wounded in a final gesture of contempt struggled to cut their own throats rather than suffer the agony of death at the hands of the humans.

Vincent, still numbed from the brief sword fight, rode up to the embankment. The attack was breaking apart, broken fragments falling back like a wave shattered by a rock-bound coast.

“Did you see ’em, did you see ’em!”

It was Stan, blood streaming from a saber slash to his left cheek. He was shouting hysterically, aiming his revolver, squeezing the trigger. Its hammer fell on empty cylinders and yet he was still trying to shoot.

Rifle fire struck into the mounted units as the last of the dismounted assault fell back. Horses reared up, falling, the volume of arrow fire dwindled, then they reined about, retreating, joined by the surviving infantry.

Vincent gazed about in numbed awe. The ground was carpeted black with Bantags. The charge had been an annihilation. Yet as he surveyed his own line he saw that he had received a terrible blow as well. Well over a thousand, maybe two thousand or more of his own men were down, their bodies tangled in with the Bantag along the battlement line and far into the center of the square.

The center battery had been completely overrun, its entire crew annihilated in hand-to-hand fighting, an infantry officer was already at work, shouting for his men to stack their rifles and clear the guns. Walking wounded were heading back into the center of the square, stretcher-bearers were already at work, and the cries and shrieks from the hospital area could be heard throughout the square.

“Damn. We beat ’em, we beat ’em,” Stan cried in English. “Like Fredericksburg, except it was us behind the wall this time.”

Vincent said nothing, his gaze turning back to the east, where the roar of the ironclad battle rumbled. A machine, one of Gregory’s, ignited in a fireball, turret blowing off and rising straight up as the kerosene and ammunition inside blew.

Burning machines, both human and Bantag, littered the next ridge as both sides fought for possession of the high ground. Hundreds of Bantag infantry were filtering into the flanks of the battle outside the square. He saw several Bantag rocket teams maneuvering, running through the grass, trying to get close enough for a kill.

“We got ’em by the tail and really twisted it,” Stan gasped.

Vincent wearily shook his head. Raising his field glasses, he looked straight ahead. The broken charge was falling back to get out of range, but there were still thousands of them. If they had sent three umens instead of two into the infantry assault, he suspected they most likely would have broken clean through.

Looking to the west and around to the south, he could see signal pennants flying, dust swirling up, mounted warriors by the thousands moving. They could harass from the south, but the steep bluff along that side was too good a position to take by storm. No, they were shifting around.

“Stan,” Vincent snapped, “get your division commanders here now. They’re coming back, and we don’t have much time.”

Stan, calming at last from his battle frenzy, looked around at the wreckage of his corps and finally nodded toward the west.

“That way, the ground is still clear.”

“We don’t have much time.”

Time. He looked back to the east at the ironclad fight. It was slowly dragging out. The Bantag not closing for the kill, Gregory wisely not going too far in for fear of being overwhelmed by the infantry. If this kept up, the infantry would be annihilated and then the ironclad battle would no longer matter.

He gazed at the sun, which was now bloodred from the battle smoke. It seemed as if it hung motionless in the morning sky.