Destiny's shield

first thing Kujulo himself had noticed.

No tents.

The flat, empty ground which formed most of the fortress' interior should have been covered with tents. There was not enough room in the brick buildings for more than a small garrison. Kujulo thought his squad member's estimate of two hundred was overgenerous. The garrison's officers, for one thing, would have undoubtedly taken the largest rooms for themselves. For another, Kujulo could see no sign of any cookfires on the open ground. That meant a kitchen, taking up even more of the brick buildings' space.

'A hundred and fifty, tops,' he pronounced. He studied the Malwa soldiers advancing toward them from the west-if the term 'advancing' can be used to describe a mode of progress that was as skittish as a kitten's. Studied the soldiers, and, more closely, their leather armor.

'Shit.' He spit on the ground. 'Those aren't soldiers. Not proper ones. Those are nothing but fucking gunners. Cannon handlers.'

His squad was now ranged on both sides of him. Behind, he could hear the thirty men from the next three squads moving up.

All of his men grinned. Like wolves eyeing a herd of caribou.

'I do believe you're right,' said one.

Another laughed. 'Think we can hold this gate against them? For the minute it'll take Kungas to get here.'

Again, Kujulo spit on the ground.

'Fuck that,' he snarled. 'I intend to defeat those bastards. Follow me.'

He stalked toward the Malwa gunners. By now, all four squads had taken position in a line stretching a third of the way across the inner grounds. Forty Kushans, wearing good scale armor, hefting their swords and spears with practiced ease, began marching on the Malwa.

The gunners stopped. Stared.

Kujulo broke into an easy trot. Forty Kushans matched his pace.

The gunners stared. Edged back.

Kujulo raised his sword and bellowed the order to charge. Shrieking like madmen, forty Kushans charged the hundred or so Malwa some thirty yards away.

The gunners turned and raced for the brick buildings. Half of them dropped their weapons along the way.

By the time Kungas arrived, a minute or so later, Kujulo was already organizing a siege. And complaining, bitterly, that he would have to go into the fucking forest and cut down a fucking tree since the fucking Malwa didn't have any fucking timber big enough to ram through the fucking doors.

Cutting down a tree proved unnecessary. The 'siege' was perhaps the shortest in history. As soon as the Malwa gunners forted up in the brick buildings saw Kungas' five hundred men storming into the fortress, they immediately began negotiating a surrender.

The biggest obstacle in those negotiations were the five Mahaveda priests holed up with the gunners. The priests, bound by holy oaths to safeguard the secret of the Veda weapons, demanded a fight to the death. They denounced all talk of surrender as impious treason.

Kungas, hearing the priests' shouting voices, called out his own offer to the Malwa gunners.

Cut the priests' throats. Pitch their bodies out. You'll be given good treatment.

The first corpse sailed through one of the doors not fifteen seconds later. Within a minute, the lifeless bodies of all five priests were sprawled in the dirt of the fortress grounds.

Kungas cocked his head at Kujulo. 'What's your opinion? Think those gunners'll spill their secrets?'

Kujulo spit on the ground. 'Imagine so. Especially after I reason with them.'

'We're family men,' complained the garrison commander. He was squatting in the middle of the fortress' gun platform, where Kungas had chosen to interrogate him. Kungas himself was standing by one of the great siege guns, five feet away. Near him, Kujulo sat on a pile of stone cannonballs.

'They told us this was just garrison work,' whined the captured officer. 'A formality, sort of.'

Kungas studied the man quivering with fear in front of him. It was obvious that the garrison was not one of the Malwa's elite kshatriya units. Technically, true, many of the gunners were kshatriya. But, just as there are dogs and dogs-poodles and pit bulls-so also are there kshatriya and kshatriya.

Kungas realized that Rao's savage guerrilla war had stretched Venandakatra's resources badly. The Goptri of the Deccan didn't have enough front-line troops to detail for every task. So he had assigned one of his sorriest units to garrison Suppara's fortress.

And why not? he mused. Suppara's on the coast side of the Western Ghats. Too far away for Venandakatra to worry about. Too far away for Rao to strike at, even if he wanted to.

But none of his good cheer showed on his face. Kungas eyed the captive stonily.

The garrison commander flinched from that pitiless gaze.

'We're fathers and husbands,' he wailed. 'Way too old for this kind of thing. You won't hurt our families, will you? We brought them with us to Suppara.'

Kujulo sat erect, his eyes widening. With a little sideways lurch, he slid off the pile of cannonballs and strode over to the Malwa commander. Then, leaning over the frightened officer, he barked, 'Brought your families, did you? Women, too? Wives and daughters?'

The garrison commander stared up at Kujulo's leering countenance. The Kushan's expression was venery and lust personified. Gleaming eyes, loose lips-even a hint of slobber.

Now completely terrified, the officer looked appealingly toward the Kushan commander.

'Depends,' growled Kungas. Face like an iron mask.

'On what?' squeaked the officer.

Kungas made a little gesture, ordering the man to rise. The Malwa sprang to his feet.

Another gesture. Follow me.

Kungas walked over to the edge of the gun platform. A low stone wall, two feet high, was all that stood between him and a vertical drop of about a hundred feet. The western wall of the fortress, atop which the gun platform was situated, rose straight up from a stone escarpment. To the northwest, the town and harbor of Suppara were completely within view. View-and cannon range.

Gingerly, the Malwa officer joined Kungas at the wall. Kungas pointed at the harbor below. To the three war galleys moored in that harbor, more precisely.

'It depends on whether-'

He broke off, seeing that the Malwa officer was not listening to him. Instead, the garrison commander was staring to the southwest.

Kungas followed his eyes. On the horizon, barely visible, were the sails of a fleet. A vast fleet, judging from their number.

'Ah,' he grunted. 'Just in time.'

He bestowed his crack-in-the-iron version of a smile on the Malwa officer. 'Such a pleasure, you know, when things happen when they're supposed to. Don't you think?'

The garrison commander transferred his stare from the distant fleet to Kungas. Again, Kungas pointed to the three galleys in the harbor below.

'Depends,' he growled. The Malwa's eyes bulged.

'You can't be serious!' he exclaimed.

Kungas flicked his eyes toward Kujulo. The Malwa's eyes followed. Kujulo, standing fifteen feet away, grinned savagely and grabbed his crotch.

The Malwa recoiled, pallid-faced.

'Depends,' growled Kungas. 'Depends-on whether you and your men destroy those three ships for us. Depends-also-on whether you show us how to use the cannons.'

Silence followed, for a minute. The garrison commander stared at the galleys below. At Kujulo.