The tide of victory

Chapter 34

The Hindu Kush

Autumn, 533 A.D.

"How many Pathans, do you figure?" asked Kungas.

As Vasudeva pondered the question, Kungas kept studying the Malwa positions through the telescope which Belisarius had given him when he left Charax. His position, standing atop the ruins of a centuries-old Buddhist stupa destroyed by the Ye-tai when they conquered the Kushans, gave him a good view of the fortress which blocked the Khyber Pass at its narrowest point.

"Hard to say," muttered his army commander. "They're scouts and skirmishers, only, so they move around too much to get a good count."

"Not more than a few hundred?"

"If that many. With Sanga and the Rajputs a thousand miles away, the Pathan 'allegiance' to the Malwa is threadbare at best. At a guess, the only Pathans the Malwa have under their command down there are maybe two hundred tribal outcasts. The tribes themselves seem to be pulling back to their fortified villages and assuming a neutral stance."

"Let's hope Irene can keep them there," murmured Kungas. He lowered the telescope. "Which will depend, more than anything, on whether we can take that fortress and drive the Malwa out of the Khyber Pass entirely."

He began clambering down from the ruins. "With that few Pathans on the other side, we can seize the high ground. Use grenades to clear the outlying fortifications and then set up mortars and the field guns to start bombarding the big fortress across the narrows. Stupid bastards! They haven't fought in mountain country for too many years."

Now that they were on level ground, Vasudeva was able to concentrate on Kungas' plan. The way he was tugging the tip of his goatee and the furrows in his face indicated some doubts.

"Mortars, yes. Easy enough to haul up those rocks. But field artillery too? We could get them up there, sure enough. Not easily, mind you, but it can be done. But what's the point? All we have in the way of field guns are three-pounders. They're too light to break down the walls and-firing round shot, which is all we have-they won't produce many casualties."

Kungas shook his head. "I got a better look at that fortress than you did, Vasudeva, using the telescope. The outer walls are thick enough, to be sure, but everything-including all the interior walls and pits-is typical sangar construction. Nothing more than piled up fieldstone. They weren't expecting to be defending the Khyber Pass-of all places! — so that fortress was built in a hurry. Probably didn't even finish it until a few weeks ago, judging from what I could see of the outlying forts. Half of those forts are unfinished still."

Vasudeva was still frowning. Although he actually had more experience than Kungas using gunpowder weaponry, his mind was slower to adjust to the new reality than was that of his king.

Kungas helped him along. "Think what will happen when a solid ball of iron hits that loose fieldstone."

Vasudeva's face cleared, and he left off tugging the goatee. "Of course! As good as shrapnel!"

The army commander looked down at the soil between his feet and gave it a little stamp. "Solid rock, for all it matters. No way to dig rifle pits here." His eyes lifted, and he studied the distant fortress. "There neither. All their men will be above ground, using elevated sangar instead of holes in the ground. May as well have surrounded themselves with shells."

All hesitation gone, Vasudeva became as energetic and decisive as ever. "It will be done, King! We will take the high ground-clear the Malwa from every outlying hillfort with grenade and sword-bring up the mortars and artillery. and then! Place half the army further down the pass to stymie any Malwa relief column. It'll be a siege, with us holding them in a grip of iron."

Kungas smiled, in a manner of speaking. "I give them two weeks. Maybe three. And they can't even try to retreat back to the Vale of Peshawar, once we've blocked their route. We outnumber them three to one. We'd cut them to pieces on open ground, and they know it. They'll have no choice but to surrender."

He planted his hands on his hips and surveyed the mountains surrounding the Khyber Pass with approval. "After which-using them to do the scut work-we can fortify this pass the way it should be done. And we'll have plenty of time to do it, with the Malwa preoccupied with Belisarius in the plains. Before Malwa can counterattack, the Hindu Kush will be secure. The Pathans will bow to our rule-and why not, since it will be lighter than Malwa's-and next year. "

But he was speaking to himself, now. Vasudeva, being no more prone than his king to worry about formality, was already hurrying away to send the Kushan army back into motion.

Kungas remained in the ruins of the stupa for the rest of that day, and all the days which followed. He thought it was fitting that the founder of the new Kushan kingdom should make his headquarters in a holy place desecrated by those who had destroyed the old one. By the morning of the third day, Kushan shock troops had taken the outlying hillforts in two solid days of savage hand-to-hand combat, using both their traditional swords and spears as well as the Roman grenades for which all Kushan soldiers had developed a great affection. The Malwa troops were good-much better than usual-but they were not Rajputs. Nor did they have more than a few hundred Ye-tai to stiffen them.

So began, on the morning of the fourth day, the bombardment of the Malwa fortress which was the key to control of the Khyber pass. The Kushan troops were able to place many mortars within a thousand yards of the fortress. The devices were crude, true. They had been patterned after what Belisarius called a "coehorn mortar," nothing more complicated than a brass tube mounted at a fixed forty-five-degree angle on a base. The only way to adjust the weapon's range was by adjusting the powder charge. But the four-inch shells they fired, with a fuse ignited by the powder, could still wreak havoc within the fortress even if they could not shatter the walls.

And, two days later, once the Kushans had wrestled the field guns into the hillforts they had taken, the mortar fire was augmented by solid shot. Which, in the days which followed, began slowly pulverizing the inner fortifications and-more slowly still-crumbling the outer. Fieldstone being returned to fieldstone, with blood and flesh lubricating the way.

And each morning, as he arose, Kungas completed the thought. Speaking aloud, to the mountains which would shelter a kingdom being reborn.

"Next year-Peshawar!"

* * *

The oldest and most prestigious of the Pathan chiefs stroked his beard, frowning fiercely. Part of the frown was due to his ruminations. Most of it was because, being the grand patriarch of a patriarchal folk, he did not approve of the woman sitting on the chair across from him. Outrageous, really, for this self-proclaimed new king to have left his wife in charge of his capital!

Still-

Different folk, different customs. So long as the Kushans did not meddle with his own-which the scandalous woman had assured him they would not-the chief did not much care, in the end, what silly and effeminate customs the dwellers of the towns maintained.

Too, there was this: effeminate they might be, in some ways, but there was no doubt at all that the Kushans were not to be taken lightly on the battlefield. And the fact that-judging from reports which Pathan scouts had brought from the siege in the Khyber Pass-they seemed as much at home fighting in the mountains as in the plains, was added reason for caution.

As a rule, the Pathans did not much fear the armies of civilization. Plains armies. Dangerous enough on flat ground, but ill-prepared to challenge the Pathans in their own mountains. But the chief had not lived to such an age, nor risen to such prominence, by being an arrogant fool. Civilized kingdoms, with their wealth and rich soils, could field much larger armies than the Pathans. And whenever those armies proved capable of adapting to mountain warfare.

It had happened once before, after all. The old chief barely managed to repress a shudder, remembering the savage punitive expeditions of the Rajputs.

"Done," he said firmly, bowing his head-slightly, and a bit reluctantly-to the woman seated before him. Then, rising from his own chair, he cast an imperious gaze over the eight other Pathan chiefs seated alongside him. As he expected, none of them seemed prepared to challenge his decision.

"Done," he repeated. "So long as you do not meddle with us-nor interfere with our caravans-we will respect the peace. Send annual tribute to the King of the Kushans."

Three of the other chiefs seemed to stir a bit. The oldest, snorting, added the final condition for Pathan allegiance to the new realm:

"This all presumes, you understand, that the King of the Kushans can take the Khyber. And hold it, once Malwa strikes the counterblow. We will not face Rana Sanga again!"

The Kushan queen nodded her head. The old chief could not tell, but he suspected that the damned woman was smiling at him. Impossible to tell, for sure, because of the heavy veil she was wearing. But he did not like the hint of humor and wit which seemed to lurk in her eyes.

Damned Kushans! He had been told that the Kushan queen had only donned the veil when the Pathans arrived. He could well believe it. She was reputed to be a sly creature, tricky and devious.

Still-

Customs were customs. And they depended, in the end, on survival. So, controlling his bile in the way such a wise old patriarch had learned how to do over the decades, he kept his face from showing his distaste.

"I am not concerned about Rana Sanga," said the woman, speaking as softly and demurely as she had since the Pathan chiefs first entered her audience chamber. "I have been led to believe, for reasons I cannot divulge, that he will remain preoccupied elsewhere. For years, probably his lifetime."

The old Pathan chief stared down at her. The idle chatter of a silly woman? Perhaps.

Still-

Perhaps not, also. The woman was reputed to be very cunning, and so well-informed that some were already whispering about witchcraft. That possibility, oddly enough, brought the fierce old patriarch a certain relief. Customs were customs, survival was survival. And so he allowed that it was perhaps just as well-since the effeminate Kushans seemed determined to be ruled by a woman-that they had at least had the good sense to choose a sorceress.