Conqueror

'Men,' he said, in a clear carrying voice. 'You are no longer probationers, but members of the 24th Valencia Foot. For two hundred and fifty years, this flag has meant men not afraid of hard work or hard fighting. May the Spirit of Man of the Stars help you be worthy of that tradition. You will now have the honor of an address by our heneralissimo supremo, Raj Whitehall.'

A brief barking cheer echoed off the surface of the fortification wall. Raj stepped forward, his hands clasped behind his back.

'Fellow soldiers,' he said; the cheer was repeated, and he waved for silence. 'I've been called the Sword of the Spirit of Man. It's true the Spirit has guided me. . but if I'm the hilt of the Spirit's sword, my troops are the blade. These veterans-' his stance stayed the same, but he directed their attention to the ranks behind him '-have marched with me from the eastern deserts to the Western Territories, and together we've broken everyone who tried to stop us. Because the Spirit was with us, and because we had training and discipline that nobody could match.'

The soldiers made no sound, but Raj could almost feel the pride they radiated. Poor bastards, he thought. Every fifth man in the 24th had died in the trenches at Sandoral. Mostly from artillery, with no chance to strike back.

'Victory doesn't come cheap,' he went on. 'But none of us has been killed running away.' Even the 5th's retreat from El Djem hadn't been a bugout. Tewfik's men had been glad enough to break contact. 'If you can become worthy comrades of these men-and it won't be easy-then you'll have something to be proud of.'

Or you'll be cripples, or bodies in a ditch, he thought, looking at the young men. Only the knowledge that he shared the danger he sent them into made it tolerable.

'One last thing. Before you enlisted, probably only your mothers loved you.' He allowed himself a slight smile.

'Now that you're wearing this-' he touched his own blue jacket '-probably not even your mothers will, any more. And that's no joke. We guard the Civil Government, but damned little gratitude we get for it. Gratitude is nice; so is plunder, when we find it-but that's not what we fight for. There's precious little faith or honor in this Fallen world; what there is, mostly wears our uniform. We fight for Holy Federation, for our oaths. . and mostly, for each other. The men around you now are your only family, your only friends. Obey your officers, stand by your comrades, and you've nothing to fear from anyone who walks this earth.'

* * *

'Put your backs into it,' Howyrd Carstens shouted.

'You put your fuckin' back into it,' the soldier growled back at him. 'I'm a free unit brother, not a goddam peon!'

The Brigade-colonel jumped down from his dog. Sweating, muddy, stripped to the waist despite the chill, the soldier backed a pace. Carstens ignored him. Instead he walked past to the head of the cable and grabbed the thick hemp rope, hitching his shoulder into it.

'Now pull, you pussies,' he roared.

Men, dogs and oxen strained. The siege gun began to inch forward, over the last steeper section of the hastily-built road. With a groaning shout the teams burst onto the surface of the bluffs. It was full dark, lit only by a few carefully shuttered lanterns. And by the flare of the occasional Civil Government shell, landing in the entrenchments at the eastern face of the hill. Everyone ducked at the wicked crack of the 75mm round going off, but the shrapnel mostly flayed the forward surface of the hill with its earthwork embankments and merlons of wickerwork and timber.

'That's how to do a man's job, boys,' Carstens said, panting and facing the others.

Most of the troops on the line had collapsed to the ground once the heavy cannon was on the level hilltop. Their bodies and breath steamed with exertion; the dogs beside them were panting, and the oxen bawled and slobbered. Men ran up to hitch new cables to the iron frame of the gun's mount and lead the animals back down the slope for the next weapon. Winches clanked, dragging the gun across the log pavement laid on the hilltop, an earthquake sound as multiple tons of iron thundered over the corrugations. The soldiers gave Carstens a tired cheer as they looped up the heavy ship's hawser they had used for haulage.

'And keep your jackets on,' Carstens called after them. A chill was always a danger when you sweated hard and then stopped in cold weather. There were too many men down sick as it was.

'Yes, mother,' a trooper shouted back over his shoulder-the same one who'd challenged his superior to get down in the dirt with them. The men were laughing as they trotted down the uneven surface, dodging around the wagons that followed the gun with loads of ammunition and shot.

His escort brought up his dog, and he took down the cloak strapped to the saddle and flung it around his shoulders. His heart was still beating fast. Not as young as I was, he thought.

The area ahead looked like a spaded garden in the dim light. Earth was flying up from it, as thousands of men worked to dig the guns into the edge of the bluff facing the city. A dozen positions faced the wall two kilometers away, each a deep narrow notch cut into the loess soil of the bluff from behind and then roofed over; other teams worked on the cliff-face itself, reinforcing it with wicker baskets of earth and thick timbers driven down vertically. Behind the guns were bunkers with beam and sandbag covers, to hold the ammunition and spare crewmen. As he watched, the latest gun was aligned with its tunnellike position and a hundred men began heaving on ropes. Those were reaved through block-and-tackle at the outer lip of the position, in turn fastened to treetrunks driven deep into the soil. The monstrous soda-bottle shape of the gun was two meters high at the breech, and nearly ten meters long. It slid into position with a jerky inevitability, iron wheels squealing on rough-hewn timber.

Carstens followed it, to where Ingreid and Teodore waited under the lip of the forward embankment. Just then an enemy shell plowed into the face beyond. Dirt showered up and fell back, pattering on the thick plank roofing overhead. He bowed to the Brigade's ruler and exchanged wrist-clasps with the younger nobleman.

'Glad to see you on your feet,' he said.

Teodore nodded, then waved a hand toward the city. 'Our oyster,' he said. 'A tough one, but we've got the forks for it.'

Carstens peered through his telescope. The white-limestone walls were brightly lit by Civvie searchlights, and he squinted against the glare. A globe of red fire bloomed, and a shell screeched through the air to burst a hundred meters to his left. Dirt filtered through between the planks overhead, and he sneezed.

'They're not making much practice against this redoubt,' he said.

'Told you,' Teodore said with pardonable smugness.

Ingreid barked laughter and thumped him on the back; the glove rang on his backplate with a dull bong.

'This time we're the ones pissing on 'em from above,' Ingreid said. He took the telescope from his subordinate and adjusted it. 'How long will it take?'

'We're at extreme range,' Teodore said. 'Wouldn't work at all without-' he stamped a heel '-a hundred meters of hill under us. With a dozen guns, and overcharging the loads-four, five days to bring down a stretch of wall.'

'And we've got their supplies cut off, too,' Ingreid said happily. His teeth showed yellow in a grin. 'Slow- motion fighting, but you two have been doing well. When the wall comes down. .'

'Don't like to put everything in one basket,' Teodore said.

The older men laughed. 'We've got another bullet in that revolver,' Carstens said. 'They'll all be looking this way-the best time to buttfuck 'em.'

CHAPTER TEN

'I'll bloody well leave, that's what I'll do,' Cabot Clerett snarled, pacing the room. It was small and delicately furnished, lit by a single lamp. The silk hangings stirred slightly as he passed, wafting a scent of jasmine.

'Cabot, you can't leave in the middle of a campaign; not when your career has begun so gloriously!' Suzette said.

'Whitehall obviously won't let me out of his sight again,' Cabot said. 'He doesn't make mistakes twice. And all he's doing is sitting here. I'll go back and tell uncle the truth about him. Then I'll collect reinforcements, ten thousand extra men, and come back here and do it right.'