Part 44 (1/2)
”Saints and martyrs and f.u.c.king Karis,” Marcus swore. ”Right. a.s.sembly for the First, and find Val, Mor, and Give-Em-h.e.l.l. I'll be out in five minutes.”
”Yessir!”
Fitz saluted and ducked out, letting the flap close behind him. Once he was gone, Jen sat up, the thin sheet falling away from her bare b.r.e.a.s.t.s. She seemed to be naked as well, although as best Marcus could recall they hadn't managed to accomplish anything the night before. His last memory was stripping off his clothes and toppling onto his bedroll, to be instantly drawn under by acc.u.mulated exhaustion.
”Stay here,” Marcus told her. ”I'll send someone back when I've figured out what the h.e.l.l's going on.”
She nodded, half-sleepy and half-alarmed. He tugged savagely at his s.h.i.+rt, fumbled with the b.u.t.tons, and then pulled his coat on over the top. As an afterthought he grabbed his sword belt, tucked it under his arm, and stepped outside.
The sun was still below the horizon, and the heat of the previous day had long since given way to a sullen, biting chill. Marcus' tent stood alone in the midst of a sea of blue-coated men, most of whom had simply dropped where they'd finished the march without bothering to erect any canvas or undo their bedrolls. The regimental drummer was beating a steady tattoo, and the whole hive was roaring into life. Weary men clambered to their feet, grabbed their weapons, and looked for their sergeants, whose calls rose above the roll of the drums.
Fitz was waiting, his uniform spotless as always. He saluted again as Marcus emerged.
”I've sent runners to captains Solwen and Kaanos,” he said. ”Captain Stokes will be here in a moment.”
”Good. Now tell me what's going on.”
”I believe Captain Roston has walked into an ambush, sir.” Fitz paused as Marcus swore again, then continued. ”Our reports are a little sketchy, but it seems as though a sizable force of Desoltai engaged our pickets on the north side of camp a little more than an hour ago. Captain Roston heard the firing and rounded up as much as he could of the Fourth to *turn the tables on them.' After that, matters were a little confused, but as best I can tell he put the Desoltai to flight and went after them.”
”Whereupon they waited for him to get far enough from camp, then swooped in and cut him off,” Marcus said. ”d.a.m.n Adrecht, he should know better. He couldn't spare anyone to tell me what he was doing?”
He'd heard the firing, or at least it had infiltrated his dreams, but that hadn't been particularly alarming. There were skirmishes every night now, and nervous sentries were always discharging their weapons at moving shadows, desert beasts, and occasionally one another.
”Apparently not, sir. In any case, Captain Stokes sent out a patrol in pursuit. They were engaged by Desoltai hors.e.m.e.n, and only three men returned, but they reported that Captain Roston and his men had taken shelter in a rocky stretch and were holding their own, but that they were pinned by heavy fire from all sides.”
”d.a.m.n, d.a.m.n, d.a.m.n.” Marcus' mind whirled. Everything depended on how many Desoltai were out there. A small force might pin a larger one at night, but day would expose the bluff and let Adrecht's troops fight their way out. On the other hand, if they were outnumbered, their resistance wouldn't last forever. No matter how good the ground they were defending, eventually they'd run short of ammunition and be forced to either surrender or be slaughtered. And G.o.d forbid the Desoltai have a cannon or two up their sleeves. ”Any more bad news?”
”Just one piece, sir. The cavalry reported that the Steel Ghost himself is leading the attack. Their sergeant claims to have seen him personally.”
”Spectacular.” If the Ghost was there in person, that meant it wasn't merely a spoiling attack. Which, in turn, meant that any effort at relief would have to go in considerable force.
He turned to find Val trotting up, with Mor close on his heels. The former looked red-faced and out of breath, while the latter, by his expression, was angry enough to spit lead.
”Have you two been apprised?” Marcus said.
”More or less,” Mor growled. ”Do you ever get sick of pulling Adrecht's chestnuts out of the fire?”
”The thought has occurred to me,” Marcus admitted. ”But there are at least six hundred men out there with him.”
”Right.” Mor blew out a long breath. ”So what do we do?”
”I'm taking the First and the Third out in support. In the meantime, Val, set up a line here at the camp with the Second and the artillery. Once we break through to Adrecht, we'll fall back on you and see how the Desoltai like the taste of canister.”
Val's expression was sour. ”Has it occurred to you that this could all be a trap?”
”It was a trap,” Mor said, ”and Adrecht walked right into it.”
”This is the Steel Ghost we're dealing with,” Val said. ”There may be more to it than that.”
Marcus raised a hand to cut off the debate. ”I've thought about it, but we haven't got any choice. We can't just leave the Fourth.”
”I know, d.a.m.n it,” Val said. He ran his fingers along his pencil mustache, smoothing the ends. ”It just feels wrong. I can't put my finger on it.”
”This whole d.a.m.ned trek feels wrong,” Mor said. ”Where the h.e.l.l is the colonel, anyway?”
”Out doing whatever it is he does at night,” Marcus said, without trying to disguise his bitterness. ”Which reminds me. Val, find him and bring him in. He's got an escort, but we don't want the Desoltai stumbling across him.”
”Right. What about Give-Em-h.e.l.l?”
”Keep him here with you, in case they try some sort of wide swing.”
Not that the handful of cavalry troopers remaining would help much in that event. Marcus felt a pit yawning open in his gut. There were too many variables, too many things that might go wrong, and far too much he didn't know. He kept picturing Ja.n.u.s, one eyebrow slightly raised, gray eyes impa.s.sive.
”And that was your response, Captain? Interesting . . .”
f.u.c.k him. Marcus ground his teeth. He's not here when we need him.
”Well?” he said to Mor and Val. ”What are you waiting for?”
a a a The spit and crackle of musketry as they approached was comforting, since it meant that the fighting wasn't over. Marcus had fumed and sweated as the First Battalion formed up east of the camp, faster than they ever had at Fort Valor but still far too slow to suit him. They'd marched out in column as the Third mustered behind them, while the Second and the Preacher's guns started creating a defensive line at the edge of the encampment.
There was no road to follow, but it was obvious enough which way Adrecht had gone, even without the reports from the scouts Fitz had interrogated. The sandy ground was marked by the pa.s.sage of hundreds of pairs of boots, and here and there bodies had been left behind by both pursuers and pursued like a trail of bread crumbs. There were no wounded, though, which Marcus found ominous. It meant Desoltai riders had combed the area after boxing Adrecht in, as far back as the site of the initial ambush.
When the rocks came into view, Marcus could see that the story Fitz had heard from the survivors had left out a few details. He'd pictured a single hill of boulders, with the Desoltai crouched in the rolling badlands beyond it. Instead, three high promontories dominated a sprawling field of jagged, broken rock, forbidding in the shadowy half-light and shrouded by gunsmoke. The shots came in ones and twos, not coordinated volleys, and he could hear the distant shouts and screams of hand-to-hand fighting.
Saints and martyrs. Marcus' heart sank. The rock field was a commander's nightmare, with vision restricted to a few yards in any direction and no chance of maintaining control over his men. He felt a flare of anger. How the h.e.l.l did Adrecht let himself get stuck in there?
He turned to Fitz, who waited at his side as always. ”Any thoughts?”
”That's not going to be fun, sir.”
”There's an understatement.” Marcus looked over his shoulder. He could see the dust cloud raised by the Third, perhaps ten minutes behind him. ”Send someone to Mor and have him form up on the edge of this c.r.a.p to make a rally line. We're going in. Two-company front, reserve companies just behind the leaders.”
”Yessir!” Fitz saluted and hurried off.
a a a For once, things went the way the tactics manual said they ought to. It was impossible for Marcus to keep close track of the battle once his men had vanished into the rocks, but he could see the rising smoke and hear the echoing cracks of musketry. One set of flashes marked the progress of the First, while renewed activity from the central hills meant that the Fourth had seen the attackers.
Each pair of companies made a little bit of progress, order dissolving as they closed with the Desoltai among the rocks by a series of rushes. Eventually they would stall as individual soldiers ran out of stamina or courage and sought cover. Then the next pair of companies, still fresh, would rush past them and repeat the process. In the face of determined opposition it was a recipe for a bloodbath on both sides, but judging by the rate of progress, the Desoltai were falling back before the action got too hot.
Mor's Third Battalion was forming up behind Marcus as he fed the last pair of First Battalion companies into the fray. Mor himself clambered down from his big brown gelding and hurried over, eyes on the fuming mess ahead of them. Here and there muzzle flashes were visible, and soldiers in blue flitted like ghosts between the rocks and the drifting smoke.
”Nearly there,” Mor said, after a moment.
Marcus nodded. ”So far, so-”
Shouts from behind him were quickly drowned out by the boom of the battalion drums calling for square. Marcus turned in time to see Desoltai hors.e.m.e.n, not three hundred yards off, riding hard for the rear of the Vordanai formation. Where the h.e.l.l did they come from?
Surprised or not, Mor's men gave a good account of themselves. The way they formed square, if not parade-ground smooth, was fast enough to get the walls of bayonets up in plenty of time. The Desoltai saw it and sheared off well before contact, but even so a volley of musketry from the nearer face of the square sent a few of them tumbling. There were fewer of them than Marcus had thought, not more than a couple of hundred.
Something's wrong. Val had been encircled by a force big enough to keep him pinned down for hours, but Marcus' men weren't running into anything like that level of opposition.