The boy messenger glanced from the ferenghi to Smidha to Jahanara, unsure what to do.
Smidha and Jahanara both nodded at the youth.
He addressed the princess but answered Isla’s query: “Lahore Gate is intact, but with what seems heavy losses. It is too soon to know who is alive and who is dead.”
Both Ilsa’s and Monique’s eyes closed and their lips moved. Smidha thought it the first time she’d seen either ferenghi pray.
“Go, obtain the latest reports and return to us with fresh news,” Jahanara said firmly, eyes on her friends.
Another messenger appeared as the first made ready to leave, this one from the interior of the pavilion.
“Yes?” Begum Sahib said.
This messenger, far senior to the first, began his report even as he bowed. “Priscilla begs leave to send in the stretcher-bearers and medics held in reserve.”
Smidha had forgotten they were to send them in where the battle dictated a need.
From Jahanara’s frown, she had forgotten as well. “Go directly to them and command them to go first to Lahore Gate and thence to wherever there are the most wounded in need. Then return to Priscilla and extend my personal thanks for her foresight and memory.”
“Your will, Begum Sahib,” the man said as he bowed.
Redoubt west of Lahore Gate
“Jesus Christ,” Bertram said, turning John’s fall into a slide. A heave rolled the heavier man sideways and onto his front.
“Medic!” he yelled again. When one did not immediately appear in answer to his desperate summons, Bertram took a breath and tried to remember his first aid training. Kneeling over the up-timer, he started the assessment.
John was breathing normally, a good sign. He was pale. Not a good sign. There were a number of scrapes and bruises visible on his face, hands, and lower arms. But all of them seemed superficial. Ignoring the big wound he could see, Bertram felt for others. Finding none, he examined the wound in John’s back. It was perhaps the length of a hand and gaped a few fingers wide while the rent in the armor was far bigger, and the padded silk undergarment was stained red with blood. He shook off idle questions of exactly how and when the cut had been made. He couldn’t pull the armor off, so he had to do his best to check beneath the belt and around John’s waist by feel alone. Lots of blood in the fabric, but he didn’t find another wound.
“Medic!” he shouted again. Standing, he opened the pouch at his side and promptly stuck himself in the hand with the tip of the pre-threaded needle as he rummaged for it.
Cursing softly, Bertram bent, the needle ready to punch yet another hole in his friend’s back.
Chapter 49
Battlefield outside Red Fort
Watching the milling mob of his reserves begin to retreat, Aurangzeb knew the day was, at best, a draw. He still had perhaps four times as many men as his brother, but Aurangzeb’s losses had been greatest amongst the most aggressive of his warriors. It was, perhaps, the natural outcome of any attempt to storm prepared defenses, but it was still one he could ill-afford. Unlike a regular siege, his best artillerists had died almost to a man while at their guns, felled by the infernal up-timer weapons with little to no gain.
Sternly, Aurangzeb repressed the fury he felt toward Nur Jahan and his sister Roshanara, whose supposed intelligence had proven so faulty. He would deal with them later, but for now he forced himself to accept that the fault was ultimately his and no one else’s. He’d tried to be clever and forced the matter too quickly.
He considered ordering the most powerful of his remaining umara to rally their men and make another attempt, but wisdom learned from Father stayed his tongue. A true leader did not issue an order when he knew that order would not be obeyed. Doing so led those who heard it to question not only your orders but also your authority to give them. No, the men would not—could not—be organized for another attack. Not today. And to ensure the men would fight tomorrow, he would have to arrange a truce to collect the dead and wounded who fell today.
Dara had won the day—and perhaps many days still to come. Despite all Aurangzeb’s prayers. Despite his every effort to live and plan according to his understanding of God’s will.
Aurangzeb glanced about his greatly thinned command group and sighed. None of his more powerful umara would be returning soon. Even if the battle had left them unwounded and not facing a challenge to their right to lead, none among them would wish to face their Sultan Al’Azam after failing to secure the victory, even though it had been Aurangzeb, not they, who had promised the win.
No, they would not serve, and none among those remaining with him was of suitable rank to treat with Dara or his representatives.
Briefly, he considered using Nur, but dismissed the thought almost as soon as it came to him. She had proven herself untrustworthy, whether from error or treachery.
His eye fell on President Methwold. Dimly he remembered the man joining the command group sometime after dawn. Now the Englishman was gray-faced with worry as he watched Sidi Khan’s retreat from the guns, concern for Carvalho writ large on his pale features. He wore ferenghi garb today, making him stand out among Aurangzeb’s silk-and-jewel-studded courtiers. Such garb would also mark him out on the battlefield.
“President Methwold,” he said.
There was no response.
“President Methwold,” he repeated, louder.
The Englishman started in alarm, but controlled his mount’s reaction without conscious thought. “Sultan Al’Azam!”
“Approach,” Aurangzeb said, deciding the Englishman would serve.
Methwold did as he was told, ignoring the stares of Aurangzeb’s kokas and umara.
“I require a service from you,” Aurangzeb said.
Methwold nodded and said, with admirable calm, “Then I am at your service, Sultan Al’Azam.”
Aurangzeb looked again at the battlefield. “Ride to the pretender’s commander and offer a truce to recover the
