(Luis)
When Lemmi and I rode into Dindigul, it was a ghost town, with neither sight nor sound of humans. Even the drying racks were empty, without so much as a pair of underdrawers waving in the northerly breeze. We saw a few chickens running around, scratching, or pecking gravel, and a couple of dogs sized us up furtively around the corners of houses, as if they knew something bad was coming. From its south side we could see the stockade some three furlongs ahead. In between, the army's horses stood tethered on picket lines, wearing nosebags. A lot of Jarvi's and Frazier's troops were lying around in the grass napping or talking or thinking, their cap brims shading their eyes. Two mounted kingsmen trotted out to meet us. The one in charge, a corporal, recognized our uniforms, and saluted.
"Sirs," he said, "I must ask you to turn over your animals to Armsman Goulais here. He'll put them on the commanders' string, near the gate, so they'll be easily found. There's not room inside the fort yet."
I wondered what "yet" meant.
Lemmi and I walked the last hundred yards. The place didn't look very reassuring. It wasn't more than maybe eighty yards on a side, and part of what room there was inside would be occupied by buildings. The barony was part of the Royal Domains, where defense had been neglected for a decade, by royal decree. The walls were about twelve feet high, with three-foot archery notches, and near the ground, the poles had fungus growing out of them.
Ah well, I thought, if mollies hadn't arisen on their own (or had they? I'd never wondered), the Church would have had to create them (or had it? I'd never looked at that, either). In a universe evolving as an outgrowth of choices and their results, something like the mollies are a necessary part of the mix, if we're going to avoid another Armageddon, and have peace for an extended period of time.
If you really think about the teachings of Saint Higuchi, that's where they take you: we need the mollies.
Inside the stockade, I could see why they hadn't brought in the horses, or Jarvi's and Frazier's men. They'd have been in the way of a very important project: wetting down the roofs. There were more buildings inside than I'd expected, built of sawn lumber hauled from somewhere with a lot more forest. Except for the blockhouses, almost all the roofs were thatched—nice flammable thatch—and most buildings were built against the stockade walls. Set the roofs on fire and you had the makings of another Grove Falls massacre.
Someone, Keith or Jarvi or a local, had sent kids up on the roofs. Other civilians had formed bucket lines from the wells to the ladders, and the kids were wetting down the thatch to protect against fire arrows. It was taking a lot of water, and though there were three wells, with sweeps, there was more waiting than wetting. I hoped they'd started yesterday.
I scanned the south walkway and found Frazier and Jarvi standing near the blockhouse at the southwest corner. Lemmi had spotted them too. "Where do you suppose Freddy is?" he asked.
"Maybe in one of the buildings, where he can use his com."
Each walkway had a set of steep stairs near both ends. In between, here and there, ordinary ladders had been lashed in place. Lemmi went up one of them ahead of me, without any difficulty but slower than usual. I followed. Frazier and Jarvi stood at adjacent bowmen's notches looking southward.
"See anything?" I called as we approached them.
Our presence didn't startle them; Captain Fong had told them to expect us. Jarvi frowned as he turned to me. "You Higuchians are strange people," he said. "Freddy told us you'd be along, and I didn't believe him. Then Fong arrived—Freddy predicted that, too—and said he'd met you on the road."
He turned to Lemmi then, and offered a square hand. "You must be Master Lemmi. I've heard about you. I'm Jaako Jarvi, Eldred's general." He turned back to me. "Is it true you two just came from Hasty?"
"That's right. From Hasty, where Arvid Bonde is regent."
He looked as if I'd sandbagged him. Obviously Fong hadn't mentioned it. "Regent?" he said. "Has Eldred given up the throne?"
His concern seemed personal. I reminded myself they were cousins through the queen, and maybe friends.
"The word is, he went insane during an audience, and began ordering executions on the spot. I mean literally—executions right there, right then, in the audience chamber. Mazeppa's treachery may have had something to do with it. He still wouldn't admit the Dkota had invaded."
From Jarvi's expression and aura, he suspected a palace coup. I kept talking. "So the sergeant major of the guard took command and asked Lord Brookins to suggest someone to rule as regent. Someone needed to be in charge—someone both competent and kin to Eldred. Someone the army would support. Brookins said Colonel Bonde was the best available."
Mentioning Brookins had put a different light on it. Jarvi trusted him.
"Colonel Bonde?" he said.
"He promoted himself."
Jarvi grunted. He was adjusting. Bonde probably was the best available, and his self promotion not unreasonable. "If Eldred's incapable of ruling," Jarvi said slowly, "the throne should go to Mary on her eighteenth birthday, only weeks from now. Unless she declines it. Does she know about all this?"
"Not yet, as far as I know."
"What does Elvi think of it?"
"Elvi ran away a day or two, maybe three, before you left Hasty." From his expression, Jarvi hadn't known that either. I went on. "With a young man named Halldor Halvorsen, it turned out. They followed Kaarlo Horn's platoon, and caught up with it at Zandria. But their behavior was so erratic, they were taken under protective custody.
"Later Mazeppa's northern army bypassed the Zandria stockade and rode on to Cloud, then bypassed it, too. Only to be badly shot up by a combination of archery, riflery, and artillery in a big ambush at the Knees of the Misasip. Lost their chiefs and scattered, headed for Many Geese I hope."
The victory at the Knees was the only part of it Jarvi knew about; Fong had told him. "That was Bonde's work, I suppose," he said.
I shook my head. "No, it was a Higuchian. He set it up, then recruited a small army of axmen to fell and help man abatises, and to clear fields of fire for the artillery. A Higuchian Brother talked Bonde into sending the artillery and the 2nd Rifles. And the one who set it up talked Nonchebe and a whole lot of Soggoan militia into manning the ambush. We're very proud of Stephen. He's only a novice."
Jarvi's expression had turned sour. "It seems Higuchian plottings are deeply rooted in all this."
"There are no Higuchian 'plottings' in it. Our actions have been largely impromptu, or began that way. Norlins heard rumors of the Dkota intentions last winter, through ironmongers that trade among them for furs and buffalo hides. So Lemmi and I were sent north last spring: me to Sota, to undertake an effective defense, and Lemmi to Dkota to gather information, and act as the situation required. The belief was, we had another year, not just a few weeks."
Lemmi spoke then. "Mazeppa was no more interested in changing his mind than Eldred was. But he might if we beat him badly enough here."
"What's our strategy here, general?" I asked.
"It's Keith's strategy. He's had a lot more experience with the D'kota, so I've handed him the reins. And what he's come up with is . . . One"—he counted on his fingers—"we will not let Mazeppa know in advance the strength of our forces here. Let him think this place is easy. Two, we'll parley with him, if he's willing: waste his time, exasperate him, till he wants to punish us; make him unwilling to bypass us. Three, bloody his nose when he attacks, weakening him while angering him further, making it a matter of pride to destroy us here. Four, we won't use our rifles until the time is ripe." He grimaced. "Five, keep him engaged till there's evidence that young Maltby's at hand. Freddy insists he's on his way with a large force. Six, if the Dkota get discouraged here, start to bypass us and continue on to Hasty, we'll send a force out the sally port to attack them and get their interest back. And overall, see that the Dkota feel thoroughly defeated when it's over."
"That makes sense to me, general. Why so glum?"
Irritation flashed and passed. "It's the best we're likely to come up with, but I see little prospect of success. At Kato I suggested we ride out and disperse them, but Keith said they'd destroy us if we tried it. And when I saw them demonstrate, I decided he was right."
The general shook his head, and his voice turned soft. "I do not fear dying, young man. I'm old, almost sixty. Life owes me nothing." He wasn't looking at me when he said it though, nor at Keith. "But I'm not here to die or make gestures," he added, "nor to let this country and these people down."
He shook his large, close-cropped balding head, and his voice became a monotone. "When Eldred traveled to Kato to meet with Mazeppa, he took me with him, and one day on the road I told him I didn't trust the man. That upset Eldred so, I never mentioned it again. Yet I had more influence on him than anyone except that miserable confessor of his, god damn his soul to hell. Eldred was what he was before he'd ever heard of Michael Clonarty, but if I'd persisted, even after the treaty was signed . . ."
He shook his head, his strong jaw working, controlling his emotions, his guilt and grief.
I gripped his shoulder. "General," I said, "you read your king rightly: his mind was beyond changing. And we'll never know—not in this world—why he held to this particular stance." I paused, then went on, making it casual now. "Meanwhile I don't know any better than you do how this fight and this war will turn out. But my brethren and I will do all we can to save Sota, and we're very good at what we do."
Jarvi stared at me for what seemed like a long minute, then shook his head again. "I wish we knew Mazeppa better," he said drily.
"That's where Lemmi comes in," I told him. "For several weeks he lived among the Dkota as a spy, initiated into the tribe and adopted as Mazeppa's son."
The general didn't have a chance to answer, beyond an astonished look, because a young man called: "Captain Frazier! The pyre's been lit!"
On the walkway, everyone within hearing turned to peer southward. It took a few seconds to make it out, then there it was: a slender serpent of smoke rose from the top of a distant ridge. Within half a minute, there was no mistaking it.
"Well," Jarvi said, "we'll soon learn how well we've planned." Then he sent one of his couriers with orders to bring the troops and horses inside.
Frazier turned to the courier beside him, a man who carried the captain's oral orders to others, reciting them verbatim. "Hernando," the captain said, "did you hear what the general just told the Higuchians?"
"Yes captain."
"Tell me! Show me you know! Quickly!"
After fumbling a moment, the man repeated it, not as precisely as if he'd gotten it as instructions to himself, but all the meaning was there, and nothing more.
"Good man!" Frazier said. "Now, do exactly as I tell you. Take your horse and ride eastward." He gestured. "Eastward to avoid the Dkota. Then circle southward, keeping to cover as much as possible, and return to the road well behind the Dkota. And take no longer than you must."
The youth nodded, looking stricken.
"When you're well behind the Dkota, hide there. Before long, a large force of armsmen and militia will come up the road from the south. Lord Donald is probably in command of it. But whoever its commander is, tell him what the general said; what you repeated to me. It could mean the difference in how this fight turns out. Do you understand?"
Again Hernando nodded. "Yes, captain."
Frazier clapped the man's shoulder. "Good! Be gone now."
Hernando saluted, then turned and jumped from the walkway, keeping his feet when he landed, and sprinted from the fort to get his horse.
Jarvi looked at Frazier. "Keith," he said, "you're as good with your men as any commander I've known."
"Thank you, Jaako," Keith replied, then turned to the young man who'd spotted the signal smoke. "Gavan, did you hear what the general told the Higuchians? What I had Hernando repeat to me?"
"Yes, captain."
"Can you repeat it?"
The young man recited it.
"Good! I want you to do the same as I told Hernando. Except—except I want you to start westward instead of east."
Gavan nodded, serious but not tense. His aura told me he felt sure of himself, and glad for the challenge. Then he too leaped from the walkway, landing in a peculiar sort of half-somersault, half side-roll that brought him up and running. Despite wearing a quiver of arrows on his back, and carrying a longbow! I have no idea how he did it. He didn't even spill arrows!
This time Jarvi looked worriedly at Keith. "How can you know he won't—" he hesitated "—betray us to Mazeppa?"
"I know him," Keith answered.
I did too now. Gavan. Keith had told me about him when we'd first met. And there'd been no hint of duplicity in Gavan's eyes or aura.
The great invader dust plume settled well before it reached Maltby's column, or nearly enough settled that the eye no longer saw it. But Jean Papineau could smell it. As a boy, he'd herded cattle in the marches, and naturally alert, perceptive, curious, the herdsman's life had sharpened his senses. As an adolescent, he'd trained with the local militia. Had he been Dkota, he might have ended up a scout: a seeker of game for the hunts, a seeker of horse herds for plundering, a spy lurking unseen or unnoticed near the villages of other tribes.
But he'd wanted to experience more of the world, and through an uncle had gotten a job as post rider, carrying express mail from Austin to Hasty. Small and wiry, and a superb horseman, he'd routinely ridden the more than one-hundred-mile distance in a single day. Deep snow, lung-burning cold or extreme heat might slow him somewhat—he would not abuse a horse—but only blizzards could stop him. He had a day's layover, and a wife, at each end.
Then Eldred had installed—or ordered Jarvi to install—a puppet duke at Austin, and someone else had been given the post job. Jean had become a herdsman again, out of Tonna, with connections to the officially disbanded militia there.
Now he rode beside Donald Maltby, serving as his guide, for he knew every mile of the road as well as any human did. As they topped a low rise, his sharp eyes noticed something out of the ordinarily, just visible above the Dkota dust ahead. A tiny, distant smudge low in the sky, soon dispersed by the fair breeze.
"Smoke, your lordship," he said.
Donald peered where Jean pointed. "Smoke?"
"There. You would see it, if it were not for the dust. Or if the breeze were less."
"The Dindigul stockade?"
"No sir. The stockade is piss elm. You could not make it burn. The people of Dindigul are proud of it. They built it that way on purpose."
"Huh!" Donald wondered why, if that was true, all stockades weren't made of piss elm. "How far is it to Dindigul?"
"Six mile, six and a half." Papineau sniffed the air. "We are drawing up on the Dkota. I suspect they have stopped."
If we're six miles from Dindigul, Donald thought, the Dkota are—what? Three miles at most. Mazeppa's scouts might already have spotted the fort. Or— "The smoke's probably a signal fire lit by some sentinel from Dindigul, and Mazeppa's investigating."
It was Banda who answered. "I think that's it, sir. A signal pyre."
Donald sized up what he could see ahead. From the rise where they sat their horses, the road led down into a shallow depression most of a mile wide, and unevenly, rather thinly wooded. He turned to Jean. "What's past that next rise?"
"Mostly prairie, sir, and half a mile beyond, some woods along a slope that faces northeast. Beyond that woods, half or three-quarter mile, is the stockade. The village is a furlong farther."
Donald called his unit messengers to him. "It's time to pull up on them," he said. "But not on the road. And at a walk. If the Dkota have stopped, their dust is settling, and we don't want them to see ours. Windom, ride ahead and tell the scouts to wait until I send word again. I don't want them seen. You others, tell your commanders to spread out and ride to the far side of the woods. They're to stop there, keeping to cover. When you've delivered your messages, come back to me.
"Go now!"
Mazeppa had stopped long enough for his scouts to report back. Then, followed by his army, he advanced till he could see the stockade, his hunter eyes picking out heads in the archery notches. Halting his horse again, he signalled. Within half a minute his whole army had stopped, except for his foraging parties, trailing out on the flanks.
Face grim, eyes cold and steady, he nudged his horse again, this time to a walk, accompanied by his close men and his messengers. This was the first stockade he'd seen since Kato, much smaller, and no doubt less well defended. And he had brought with him what he had not had at Kato: from farms along the way, he'd collected hay carts, wheels intact. His braves had even loaded some of them with hay. It would be good for them to capture this place and its women, and burn all its structures to the ground.
He started forward again. Pastor Morosov moved closer to him, and spoke. "Will you send someone forward to request a parley?"
Annoyance flashed. The pastor, Mazeppa realized, hoped to avoid a massacre. "Maybe," he answered, "but first we will surround them, and demonstrate. Let them see what they are up against." He fixed Morosov with severe eyes. "Do not forget, we must break this people utterly. That means no mercy to their fighting men, and perhaps to none of them at all."
He called two messengers to him. He would send them to meet the foragers, with his orders: to continue northward till they drew even with the army, then camp and wait with their herds. He would let them know later when to continue.
They'd miss out on the fighting, and the capture of women, but they'd no doubt captured women of their own.
(Luis)
After sending out Hernando and Gavan, Frazier dispatched two scouts to the next rise southward, while the armsmen and horses crowded into the stockade. The Dkota would shoot arrows into the stockade, and crowded as it was, they'd hit people and horses. It was unavoidable.
I asked about Freddy. He was on top of the blockhouse, Keith told me, in an observation post five feet square, with two-foot parapets of thick planks, where a man could lie or crouch watching. From there he could talk with Tahmm, too, more easily than with us, actually. If he wanted to talk to me, he'd either have to buzz my com, or call loudly enough that anyone nearby could hear, or climb down through the trapdoor into the upper level of the blockhouse, then down to the walkway level, where there was a landing, and a door.
I looked up and called. "Hey, Freddy!"
"That's my name. Glad you're here. Got your amulet with you?"
"Sure do."
"Rub it for good luck."
Outside the stockade, both scouts reached the top of the next rise south, and briefly stopped, tiny in the distance. Then one wheeled and raced back. The other lingered almost till the first reached the stockade, then he too returned. No one pursued him; apparently the Dkota weren't that near yet.
Jarvi called down to Fong. "Captain, have your riflemen wait in the blockhouses, on the ground floor, ready to climb when ordered. They're to load their rifles, but none—none of them!—is to cock his weapon till ordered. If anyone does, I'll behead him personally! It's essential the Dkota don't know about them." He paused, scanning till his eyes found Baron Pannu, dark and barrel-chested, beside one of the wells. Then went down to consult with him.
When the Dkota arrived, the archery notches were fully manned, locals alternating with one of Frazier's or Jarvi's men. Jarvi's A Company waited by their horses beside the south gate, ready to sally out if need be, or climb the ladders and help defend the south wall.
B Company waited, bows in hand, manning the upper and lower rooms of the blockhouses, at twenty by thirty-inch archery slots. They'd pour arrows into any Dkota who reached the stockade walls, where the men on the walkways couldn't shoot at them. I stood at a notch, watching the Dkota line up maybe two hundred yards away—most of a furlong—where they sat two and three deep, staring toward us. My spyglass showed their faces daubed with black and red; stony faces, some of them, others eager. I didn't see any looking worried. That was something we needed to change.
The flow continued, the spillover riding around to the east, west, and finally north, surrounding us. Part of the spillover included carts, some filled with hay. Keith had foreseen that, had intended to use his own fire arrows to set them ablaze at a distance. But when Pannu had assured him the stockade wouldn't burn, Jarvi suggested letting the Dkota find out the hard way: the braves would push and pull the carts into position, and we'd shoot hell out of them while they did it. Frazier agreed. Jarvi felt pretty good about his idea.
Jules Apodaca, known to his adoptive people as Makes-Things, was born in a village of mixed ethnicities some miles north of Kato. His father was a blacksmith, dray-service operator, and general artisan. From early childhood, Jules had helped his father, but whenever he could get away, he'd sneak off to the woods and fields. There, with his child's bow and arrows, he'd hunt and shoot animals as small as frogs and mice, moved up to marmots, then graduated to a youth's bow, and to coons, coyotes, deer, even a wolf. Increasingly he'd brought home welcome meat, but even so, the conflict between his desires and his father's demands sometimes earned him beatings.
Until, confiding in no one (remarkable at thirteen years), he'd left home on a stolen horse and ridden west to live with the Dkota. There he'd been adopted into the tipi of a hunter, and become a notable hunter himself. Like most of Mazeppa's braves, he had not chosen the way of the warrior, but like most Dkota men, he had the basic skills, and served now as a fighting man, willing if not enthusiastic.
He had a strong artisan muse, and as a boy working with his father, had learned much. Large and muscular, and willing to fight despite his good nature, he had numerous admirers and friends among his Dkota peers. And always he'd gone his own way, an acceptable trait among the Dkota.
When Mazeppa's army reached Dindigul, Jules's adoptive band, the Badgers, moved into a position north of the stockade. But Jules, instead of situating himself in the circle to await orders, sneaked into the village.
He knew how to read, and on one of the buildings saw a bilingual sign announcing Livery Stable and Dray Service. Horses shod. And in the weeds out back found the dismantled remains of a wagon, its tongue broken and with two wheels missing. But the rear carriage, with its two wheels, was intact.
At the sight, a vision came to him. And in the stable were tools, rope, harness . . . everything he needed, including of all things a grapple. Meanwhile, grazing the field behind the stable were two draft horses, not animals that would ordinarily attract a buffalo tribesman, except perhaps for meat, but . . . And of course there was an oat bin in the stable. Filling its scoop with oats, he approached one of the draft horses and coaxed it inside, where he tied, then harnessed it.
That done, he trotted off to get some friends. What he needed now was a heavy roof-beam, thick for strength, and long, for added weight and momentum.
(Luis)
We were as ready as we could get, the stockade our shelter and our trap. And a trap for the Dkota, with us as bait. Meanwhile Dkota scavenged the village for wood, setting aside doors as shields. Some of the wood they threw atop the hay carts.
After a while, braves began running their horses in a long loop inside the circle, yelling, yipping, displaying their horsemanship, hanging off the offside, showing us only a moccasined foot and part of a leg, then popping back up. I was impressed. They slanted in as close as fifty or sixty yards, sending arrows at us when they popped up. From the walkways, longbows were twanging. The Dkota made poor targets, but they were losing horses, so after a minute they stopped. I wondered if perhaps, in tribal conflicts, it was taboo to deliberately shoot horses. On our side of the fort only one rider was still down, thrown when his horse fell, and hit twice himself before he could be helped away. One of his rescuers had also been hit, and one of his, but all in all, it hadn't cost Mazeppa much or accomplished much
Meanwhile the Dkota were building a circle of small fires outside effective archery range. And hay carts were being drawn up. But Mazeppa sent something else first. Horsemen were poised with bows. Now they rode in lines past the fires, and leaning, lit and nocked long arrows, fire arrows. Abruptly they darted toward us, not so close as the earlier riders, and launched flaming arrows over the walls. Now we'd learn how well-watered the roof thatch was. For at least a minute the fire arrows flew, and from the bailey we heard screams, shouts, sounds of stricken animals.
I allowed myself a backward glance. Boys with rakes and pitchforks were busy on roofs, digging out burning arrows and throwing them down. So far as possible, people had taken shelter inside buildings or close to their walls, but the arrows came from all four sides.
More than fire arrows flew toward us. Other warriors sent arrows toward our archery notches. Good targets. Men fell wounded or dead to the walkways. And now came the hay carts, with firewood, broken-up furniture, window shutters piled on top, pulled and pushed by braves, while others trotted alongside carrying doors to shield them.
It cost them men despite the shield bearers, but as necessary, others dashed out to take over. Every cart left casualties in its tracks, but one after another reached the stockade, to be jammed sideways against the walls. Then their remaining pullers, pushers, shield bearers, raced to safety or fell to arrows. And when a cart was in place, other warriors ran out to throw more wood on it, each act earning honor.
The Dkota had learned at Kato that blockhouses were major sources of casualties, so here, every blockhouse was targeted by a hay cart. One by one the carts were set afire, and burned fiercely. Smoke arose, obscuring targets, and the Dkota archery stopped, the circle of warriors drawing back, waiting for the stockade to burn down. Then they'd have us. On the walkways, the intense heat made many of the archery notches untenable, but the hay didn't last long, and when the fires had consumed it, the heat became less intense. In the bailey, a few roofs had been ignited beyond saving, and burned out of control. One by one, more quickly than you might think, the burning roofs collapsed, sending flame and sparks swirling upward. Boys and men crouched on every fire-free roof, to cast off falling embers.
The stockade itself did not take fire. Its timbers were scorched, even superficially charred, but refused to burn on their own. When the fuel on the carts burned up, that was it; no more fire. Meanwhile we had every notch manned again. Some two hundred yards distant, the Dkota still sat their horses, but they no longer trilled. They'd suffered numerous casualties, and their principal strategy had been defeated.
Our attention now was mainly on Mazeppa and the cluster of men who surrounded him: Lemmi referred to them as his "close men." Most were distinguishable by the number of eagle feathers in their headbands, or occasionally in the band of a wide-brimmed straw hat. Mazeppa's headband carried the most; to accommodate them required loose ends that hung down his back to his waist. Most of the men, though, had only a few, often one or two. Lemmi said the number indicated honors, but he knew only in a general way how they were earned.
I'd kept half an eye out for some sign of Donald Maltby and his militia, but had seen nothing. I kept expecting Freddy to call something down to us, but so far he hadn't, so I stepped inside the blockhouse landing and commed him. He was still up there, but hadn't heard anything new from Tahmm.
After a few minutes, a Dkota left the circle, riding toward the stockade with a hand raised, as if wanting to parley. My spyglass told me the object he held was a tobacco pipe. Frazier gave an order to Jarvi's trumpeter, who blew the command to hold fire. I hoped the militias knew what it meant.
"That's not Mazeppa," Frazier said. "He's not tall enough. But I've seen him before. At the treaty conference." "It's Pastor Morosov," Lemmi told us. "Among the Dkota, he amounts to a bishop."
"Do you want to talk with him?" Frazier asked. "I have no idea what to say."
"Let me," I said. "Let's keep Lemmi a secret for now."
By that time the rider had pulled up about a hundred yards away, waiting. Frazier nodded. "Go ahead."
I climbed into an archery notch and waved my arms overhead. "You're not Mazeppa!" I shouted. "We will speak with Mazeppa."
Morosov backed his horse a few steps, then it pirouetted, and carried him back to the cluster of men around his chief. I wondered how many bishops of the Church could ride horseback like that. After a minute of conferring, a different rider trotted out.
"That's Mazeppa," Lemmi said.
"Shall we shoot him?" Jarvi asked. "Fong's men could finish him off here and now, and I doubt his people would stay, with him gone."
"We want him alive," I said. "For the peace treaty. A real peace treaty."
Mazeppa too stopped about a hundred yards out. In his right hand, resting on his forearm, was a pipe. Lemmi held his own spyglass to his eye. "That's not his ceremonial pipe," he told me, "but it'll do for discussion."
Jarvi started to ask what I was going to say to the chief, but my muse took over, interrupting him. There wasn't much debris below me, so I handed my spyglass to Lemmi, stepped into the notch again, flexed my knees and jumped. Landing in a Higuchian fighting roll—in this case for show—that brought me back onto my feet. Gavan Feeny would approve, and so would the Dkota. Then, my eyes on Mazeppa, I walked halfway to where he sat his horse, then stopped, arms folded across my chest. Mazeppa nudged his horse forward, cutting the distance to a dozen yards. I cut that to five. I could see his aura, even in the sunshine, and realized why Lemmi described him as charismatic.
"I am Master Luis," I told him, "of the Order of Saint Higuchi. I have come to hear what Chief Mazeppa of the Dkota and Ulster has to say to the peaceful people he has attacked."
His horse, like himself, was tall, and he remained in the saddle, taking advantage of the elevation. His voice was cold, deadly. "If the people inside come out and lay down their weapons," he said, "I will let them ride away unmolested. But they must take nothing away with them except the clothes on their bodies. My warriors can have whatever goods they find here. You are not to destroy or remove any of it."
"There are women and children inside. Will they also ride away unmolested?"
"I have said it. All may walk away unmolested."
His aura suggested he'd keep his word, but there was an ambivalence. "What about food?" I asked. "And horses?"
"They must take no food; they can survive a few days without eating. As for horses—you have killed many of ours. We will take yours in payment."
He was no more interested in a deal than I was. He'd come out here to satisfy Morosov and perhaps other chiefs, and get us out of the fort. Then he'd have us searched, and find something to use as an excuse for butchery.
So far our voices had been no louder than necessary, for two men standing five yards apart. Now I raised mine, not quite shouting, but loud enough to be heard on the walkway. "Mazeppa Tall Man," I said, "known in your youth as He-Who-Must-Win, your ambition and arrogance have led you on a false path. Now I have an offer for you. You have found us dirt-eaters better fighters than you'd expected. You were driven away from Kato, and even at this unimportant place we have stopped you. What do you suppose will happen when you reach Hasty, if you live to reach it? Hasty, where our main army is waiting for you.
"You sent another army from the north, to Zandria and Cloud. Up the river from Hasty, it was met in open battle, and destroyed. Its survivors have scattered, bleeding and broken, many without horses, to find their way back to buffalo country by threes and fours, running by night and hiding by day.
"Why should we put our lives in your hands here? You made a great mistake, invading our country. We are many, and brave, and dangerous—and among us are wizards. Now the Dkota find themselves like the dog who attacks the porcupine. If he backs away soon enough, he may live a long life. Otherwise he ends up with his mouth and nose full of quills, perhaps with his eyes put out. Then there is nothing for him but regret and death, no matter how great his pride had been."
Mazeppa's sun-browned face had darkened; now his aura flared with anger. He'd have ridden me down, or tried, but he was within ready killing range of the stockade, and his ambition gripped him. He wasn't ready to die yet. Meanwhile I wasn't done. I raised my hand, indicating more to be said, and he did not turn to leave. I lowered my voice again.
"It is not too late for Mazeppa to turn back to Many Geese, there perhaps to take his revenge on Sky Chief, who tricked him, played with him, at the cost of many Dkota lives."
Mentioning Sky Chief and the Dkota dead had bitten deeply. Mazeppa's flushed face paled, his hand frozen halfway to his hatchet. Wheeling his horse, he rode stiff-backed toward his warriors. I turned too, and stalked to the sally port. It opened, and they let me back in. Its narrow gate had hardly closed when I heard arrows thud into it.
Almost at once, a single war whoop rose from the south, echoed a moment later by hundreds more from every point of the compass, and from the walkway, a trumpet. Seconds later hooves rumbled, and almost as quickly a new storm of arrows passed overhead, at first from the south, then from every direction.
Shouts and screams rang through the fort again, of people and animals hit. Others roared anger or bloodlust. I climbed the nearest ladder onto the walkway. In front of me, a local militiaman fell backward from his notch, his hands moving to his walnut-colored face where an arrow shaft stuck out of one cheek, the feathers showing from the other. I paused long enough to draw my knife and cut the shaft behind the head, then jerked out the now-headless shaft by the feathers. Crimson flowed from cheeks and mouth, and choking, the man rolled onto hand and knees vomiting swallowed blood.
Crouching, I moved to join Lemmi and the others. Some of our bowmen cowered behind merlons, in shock at the arrow storm. Others used the merlons as shelter in which to draw their bows, then pivot into their notch to send an arrow at the enemy; a drilled action. I stepped over a body with an arrow in its throat, and slipped in its blood, nearly falling. Just ahead of me, Jarvi stood squarely in a notch, not sheltering at all. From somewhere, probably a dead man, he'd gotten a bow and quiver, and was drawing and shooting as rapidly as possible, a living example of aimed, rapid-fire archery. For an instant I thought to pull him back; I'd want him at Hasty to help straighten things out. But my muse stopped me. The general was working out an issue of his own.
As before, Keith was doing his shoot and take cover drill. Beside him, now under his orders, crouched Jarvi's wide-eyed trumpeter. White-knuckled, the boy waited, gripping his instrument. I spoke to Keith, and he turned. "Are you all right?" he asked.
I was bloody from the man shot through the face. "Yeah," I said, "I'm fine."
Lemmi grinned at me from the next notch. "Nice work," he called. "You really kicked the hornets' nest." Then, with his head, he gestured upward toward where Freddy was lying, or had lain, on the blockhouse roof. "Maltby's militias are drawing up a mile or so south."
So Tahmm had buzzed him. I knew Donald's warrior muse was a strong one; the question was how well he listened to it. In his position, a wrong move could be disastrous, for him and for Sota.
The archery exchange continued for several minutes, and I wondered how many packhorses of arrows Mazeppa had brought with him. Then, abruptly, the Dkota arrows stopped. Jarvi's trumpeter blew the order to draw sabers. Even as I drew mine, the Dkota charged. Within seconds their lariats were snaking upward, settling over merlons, and the fight became bloody chop and thrust.
During the archery exchange, enough armsmen and militiamen had fallen that numerous notches were undefended. Agile braves were on the walkways, hatchets in hand, and the din of shouting, shrieking, crying out, was deafening. A section of the decaying east walkway collapsed, dumping struggling men onto a roof just below, from which they slid or rolled or jumped into the bailey. Meanwhile the archery from the blockhouses was furious and deadly, sweeping the ground outside the walls, finding horses and men. The fighting on the walkways was intense, most of the combatants heedless now of danger.
Briefly it seemed the Dkota might prevail, but not enough made it over the walls. The assault had struck and piled up, and after brief savage minutes, those who hadn't found their chance at a merlon, rode or ran back to the circle. While those who'd made it over, died. Then a ragged cheer broke out on the walkways, growing into a full-throated cry of victory that was taken up by the folk in the bailey.
It seemed to me the Dkota would not charge again. Leaning through my notch, I scanned the ground outside and was impressed by the carnage. Our folks began to throw out the Dkota bodies lying on the walkways.
Jarvi and Keith too had looked over the killing ground. Now they were scanning the walkways, getting an idea of our own losses. We'd lost a lot fewer than Mazeppa had, but percentage-wise? Now Captain Fong stepped out onto the walkway, his face and voice stiff with upset. "General," he reminded his uncle, "you did not call on my riflemen."
"I'm aware of that, Captain," Jarvi answered. Pointedly; the young commander was imposing on their familial relationship. "I'll let you know when the time is right." He said the last dismissively. Fong, knowing he'd overstepped, saluted sharply and reentered the blockhouse. Jarvi turned to me unhappily. "What about that?" he asked. "How do we know when the time is right?"
They'd been waiting, a squad in the lower level of the blockhouses, having to keep out of the archers' way. "It's time to order them upstairs now," I said, "so they'll be in position when Maltby's militia is ready. Meanwhile they need to be reminded not to fire till ordered."
He frowned, digesting that. "When Maltby's militia is ready. Why didn't you say so earlier?"
I liked and respected the old man. He'd been more agreeable than I'd had any right to expect, and more importantly, I depended on his good will. "Earlier I wasn't sure enough," I answered mildly. "Higuchians, especially masters, live and act in the moment. We plan so far as we reasonably can, so far as circumstances permit, but we act according to the situation, and trust our judgement."
He wasn't ready to give up being irritated yet. "As a negotiator," he said, "you almost got us all killed. I can't imagine an enemy more aroused than the Dkota were."
"Credit Mazeppa for that, general. Mazeppa and the Dkota's warrior tradition. As for negotiating? It's not time yet. I was goading him. We have the advantage here. The fort is ours, and it allows us to kill more of them than they do of us. I was operating on points two and three of your strategy: exasperate the enemy, make him unwilling to bypass us. And weaken him; we certainly did that."
Keith was taking in all of this, his eyes intrigued. Jarvi snuffed his resentment and nodded, impressing me again. "So," he said, "what next?"
"That depends on what Maltby does. And Mazeppa, of course. I'll call for your riflemen when it seems to me they'll make the difference between the war ending here, or the Dkota rampaging through the rest of Sota."
The general frowned, but his voice was not hostile. "When it seems . . ." he echoed, stressing "seems."
"That's the best we can do," I told him.
He settled for that. Then Freddy buzzed me from the roof, and I put my amulet to my ear, keeping it on low. "Someone just rode out of that strip of woods behind the Dkota. Two of them, shirtless, and too far away to recognize faces. I think they're ours; I think they're wearing boots, but the grass is up to their horses' bellies. One of them may be Maltby. It's hard to be sure."
"Lemmi," I said, "get on your horse and be ready to meet Mazeppa. Maybe we can entice him to pick up his casualties; that'll stall him for a bit." Freddy would hear via his com, and understand.
Lemmi nodded and headed for a ladder. I didn't suggest anything more. He'd know what to say. After he left the walkway, I stripped off my shirt, tied the sleeves to a borrowed bow and waved it overhead.
While other braves launched arrows at the stockade and its occupants, Jules Apodaca and several friends had assaulted an elderly, forty-foot-long hay barn next door to Dindigul's livery stable. With axes found in the woodshed, two of them attacked its strong corner posts, while Jules himself coaxed up and harnessed the other draft horse. Then, with the corner posts seriously compromised, he cast the grapple over a tie beam, and with the horses, pulled the structure down.
Their labor had just begun. Working rapidily with smith's hammers and crowbars, they freed the ridgepole of rafters and roofing, then looped strong ropes around one end and pulled it out of the hay and debris. All against a background of yelling and screaming—and cheering—half a mile away.
With horses, ropes, pry poles, strong backs, a heavy smith's bench, and trial and error, they lifted and lashed the roof beam securely onto the available wagon carriage, balanced so the center of gravity was slightly to the rear of the axle. Four men could easily raise the trailing end, push with it, and use it to steer.
Donald Maltby had left his militia in thin young forest, in the hands of Lieutenant Banda, taking with him Frazier's two messengers, Gavan and Hernando, and two of his own. He was riding shirtless, a form of long-distance disguise. He'd promised Banda to return within an hour. Neither man had a timepiece, but as a ducal guardsman, Banda was experienced with clocks, and had a fair sense of how long an hour was.
The five of them had crossed a stretch of prairie grass deeper than their stirrups, then reached a slender band of woods where the downslope leveled out. From the fringe of the woods they'd watched from the saddle, the young trees obscuring their outlines. Most of a mile ahead he could see the south side of the Dkota ring, and the blockhouses.
And rising above the stockade, smoke! It made his stomach knot. A moment later they heard what might have been a cheer. "That doesn't sound like Dkota," Gavan said. Donald hoped the other youth was right. Though his stomach was knotted, his hands were steady. He took his spyglass from its case, certain his plan couldn't possibly work, and at the same time determined to make it work. A look through the glass told him he was too far away to distinguish faces in the archery notches.
He spoke to his couriers, "Gavan and I are going to where I can see more. You others stay here, but watch me. If I turn my horse and look back, and raise my arm overhead, Hernando will ride to Lieutenant Banda and tell him to bring the troops up to where we are now. That's if I turn and raise my arm overhead. But if I don't turn—if I don't turn, and I wave my arm overhead"—he demonstrated—"that means I'm signaling the people in the fort, so they'll know we're here." He tested Hernando's recall, and received the message back verbatim, including emphases.
Then Donald and Gavan rode into the open at an easy trot, eyes on the Dkota in the near distance. Three furlongs ahead stood a solitary burr oak, its trunk thick and rugged, its crown broad. When they reached it, they stopped in its shade, and Donald realized that his tension, his edginess, had passed, replaced by calm. It seemed to him he was inside himself looking out, and at the same time outside looking at himself. An electric chill ran over him.
He raised his spyglass again. On the stockade wall, a man stood up in one of the archery notches. After a moment he either jumped or fell, perhaps hit by an arrow. Donald couldn't see him hit the ground; the Dkota were in the way.
Staying where he was, he scanned, watching, waiting for some indication of what was going on. Time passed; tension returned. Then someone waved what looked like a shirt, tied to a staff by its sleeves. A surrender?
He needed to get closer. From where he was, he could miss the critical point, the time to strike. The thought triggered a pang of anxiety, but he brushed it away. After telling Gavan to stay where he was, to relay any signals, he rode forward another furlong, and paused to scan again. This time he saw an irregularity in a blockhouse roof: the upper part of a head.
And Donald knew! The man was looking through a spyglass! At him! At once he waved his left arm overhead, widely. The face disappeared, was replaced a moment later by something round and gray, held motionless. A hat, broad brimmed with an oval crown—a Higuchian hat! It disappeared, replaced again by the forehead and spyglass.
A grin split Donald's face. Once more he waved his arm.
Then he examined the backs of the Dkota ahead. There was no sign that any had noticed anything remarkable. Something else held their attention, he decided. Something compelling.
Turning in his saddle, he signalled Gavan.
When Mazeppa saw the shirt-flag waving, he decided. The dirt-eaters in this place had shown less respect to the dead than those at Kato had, but perhaps they had Dkota wounded inside they were willing to give back. And he was willing to trade—one dirt-eater woman or child could be let go for each of his own wounded returned.
He told his close men what he had in mind, then rode into the no-man's land between his circle and the fort. This time no one leaped from the wall. Instead a narrow gate opened, and a man rode out, tall, lean, and dark. For a moment he didn't recognize him. When he did, he stopped, not in rejection but in consternation, staring.
Lemmi didn't stop till he was only ten feet away.
"Hello, my father."
"You!" The word was little more than breathed. Mazeppa rallied. "Truly, Helverti Chief has played me false."
"Helverti Chief is done for," Lemmi said. "He has powerful enemies among his own people, the Sky People. I told you, before: there are players in this you know nothing about. Players who seek no one's destruction, who prefer to be no one's enemy. Players who have much influence with the Sotans, and follow the teachings of the Christ."
Lemmi's words registered, but Mazeppa did not heed them, his mind held by mystery: Helverti Chief had stolen him, then healed him and given him to the dirt-eaters. For what purpose, this? What purpose any of it?
"I do not hate my father-of-choice," Lemmi went on, "he who took me into his tipi. I was sent to you to undo, if I could, the evil done by Helverti Chief, that master deceiver, a servant of Skunk Bear. And to prevent this war that now threatens the Dkota with destruction."
He paused, examining Mazeppa's aura. "Perhaps you are remembering the voice that whispered to you on your vision quest. Such whispers can come from others than Jesus. Skunk Bear also whispers into the minds of men, as is well known."
This comment truly shook Mazeppa. Had he ever told that story to anyone besides Pastor Ipatiev? In particular, had he told his son-of-choice? Surely not. He'd confided his mission, yes; his life goal, yes. But anything more? Perhaps Elder Ipatiev, before he died, told Morosov, and Morosov had . . .
Reading Mazeppa's inattention, Lemmi backed his horse a few steps, as if about to leave, the movement recapturing the chief's focus. "Jorval treats people as he'd treat a mullein leaf," Lemmi said. "He wipes his anus with it and throws it away. If you take your braves back to Many Geese now, he will know, and gnash his teeth, tear his hair, for you will have wrecked his larger plan. But if you stay here, using up your people in his service, he will shake with mirth. And for the rest of his life tell the story of his victim Mazeppa, and the destruction of the Dkota."
The words froze Mazeppa. Briefly, the young Dinneh examined him, then turned his horse and trotted back to the sally port. When he reached the walkway, it was Frazier who asked what success he'd had.
"He's not able to back down," Lemmi answered. "He's obsessed with his dream now: to rule the Misasip, and save the buffalo peoples from a threat that doesn't exist.
"But he's no longer the man he was when he left Many Geese. Not even the man he was a few hours ago. He's losing his grip."
When Mazeppa returned to his close men, he almost didn't see them. Things Lemmi Dark Skin had said, and before that the one called Luis, had seriously confused him. He could no longer see clearly the world around him.
A familiar voice snapped him out of it, one of his close men, Utkur War Spear of the Badger Band. A young man was with Utkur, nearly as tall as Mazeppa, and strongly built. Like Utkur, he wore the Badger totem painted on his breast. He'd been sweating heavily, the sweat full of dirt.
"Mazeppa," Utkur said, "this young man has brought you a new weapon, one to break down the gates of the fort."
This wakened Mazeppa. His eyes sharpened. "Tell me about this weapon," he said.
(Luis)
Despite what Lemmi had said about Mazeppa losing his grip, there was no sign now of withdrawal or indecision. The tribesmen were waiting for something—some signal, some order—and none of us had a notion of what it might be. But every one of us was concerned, because for whatever reason, when Mazeppa returned to his close men, everything around them seemed to pause. Followed by a sense of intention and expectancy, of something brewing, and I wondered if it was connected to what Freddy had forwarded to Tahmm awhile earlier: that in the village, a building had been pulled down by men with horses.
After a little, Freddy commed from his post on the roof. "Donald's moved closer," he said, then followed that with a broken series of observations. "The man with him is Gavan, I think . . . He's looking us over with a spyglass . . . I think he saw me! Yes! He just waved! That took guts."
"Does he know you saw him?" I murmured.
He didn't answer right away. Then, "I'm sure of it," he said. "I held my hat just above the parapet, and he waved again, this time standing in his stirrups . . . Now he's moving back toward the woods. I think he signalled someone there, too."
That was reading a lot into a little, but knowing Freddy, I'd bet on it. "Any indication the Dkota know he's there?" My impression was, they didn't miss much that went on around them.
"No sign of it."
"Any sign of what he has in mind?"
"None," he said, then, "let's talk about that later."
I stepped back out on the walkway to a puzzled glance from Keith. Meanwhile our riflemen were in the blockhouses now, in the upper level at the firing ports. Jarvi, through Fong, had ordered them to target men with the most feathers, and to sort out the targets in advance with the others in their blockhouse. They were to target individual chiefs, or failing that, their horses.
The principal exception to that rule was Mazeppa, who was NOT to be shot. His horse, yes, but we wanted its rider alive, in our hands. He was easy to recognize, by his height and his headdress. The best marksman in the 2nd Rifles had been assigned to him. A second exception was Morosov, easily recognized by the slender, short-armed, six-foot crucifix he carried. The third we assumed was the chief of the Wolves. His headdress rivaled Mazeppa's, and his spirit chief carried a staff with a wolf's head on it. He sat his horse only a few yards from Mazeppa, listening but not saying much. From time to time he sent what seemed to be messages to the braves on the east, or maybe the north side of the circle.
Now something unexpected began. Mazeppa, the Wolf Chief, and their close men left their command area, riding to the southwest corner of the box they had us in, then north out of my sight.
Where's he going? I wondered. Freddy commented as if he'd heard me: "Mazeppa's either making a circuit, or . . ." He paused. "Something's going on in the village." His next pause was longer, ending with "Mazeppa's stopped opposite the northside gate. It appears he's going to stay there."
Jarvi was staring at me, so on an impulse I kissed my "amulet." Then I told the others what Freddy had told me, without saying how I knew. Keith knew, and of course Lemmi. Jarvi accepted it, sending orders to the southwest and northwest blockhouses, moving riflemen to keep them with their known targets, rather than orienting on new. We moved to the north walkway too, to keep Mazeppa in front of us. We didn't have a notion of what was going on.
Soon the commanders on the other walkways sent word that the warriors facing them were acting as if readying to attack again. Then Freddy, who'd remained on the southwest blockhouse, had an update: Donald's militias were moving out of the forest. He could see them now.
Meanwhile something was coming out of the village, too, and I realized why the Dkota had pulled down a building: for its ridgepole. They'd made a battering ram out of it. "They're going to try knocking down the north gate," I said, pointing. A slope led down from the village. Nothing much—a drop of a couple feet per hundred horizontal; enough to help build momentum on the dry, hard-packed road. I wondered who among the Dkota knew about singletrees and eveners, or recognized the potential in a roof beam and a pair of wheels. The men bringing it stopped about two hundred yards off. Two of them unhitched the horses; others led them away.
Two hundred yards. According to Jarvi, that was a long rifle shot for a human target, even with the uniform batches of gunpowder he boasted of. Accuracy was the problem, he said. The balls, if they hit their targets, would do their job well, even beyond two hundred yards.
Mazeppa and his chiefs had gathered around, examining it. Mazeppa had dismounted, to study the wheel and axle assembly, kneeling, bending, moving around. "Stand still," I muttered, "stand still." Twenty warriors had lined up along the ram, ten on each side, a shield bearer by each of them. Then Mazeppa and the others who'd dismounted went to their horses and mounted again. Distantly I heard him shout, an order to be passed around the circle. It was time.
"Fire," I told Jarvi. "Fire!" he told his trumpeter. The youth blew a brief phrase, even as the ram crew raised the trailing end and pushed, setting the ram in motion. It took little time to pick up speed, no longer than it took the riflemen to lay their sights on their targets. Already arrows were being launched from the Dkota circle, to be answered by bowmen on the walkways. Then a ragged salvo of gunshots boomed from the blockhouses, and from the middle section of the north wall. I saw chiefs fall from their horses, saw horses shot down under chiefs. Saw the ram picking up speed as if it had life of its own, its crew running alongside as if there'd been no thunderous salvo. Saw arrows stuck in shields, and in several fallen men. Saw Mazeppa reel in his saddle—struck by an arrow! Heard another boom, too soon to be a reload, and his horse collapsed under him, falling to one side on its rider, raising dust.
Saw Jarvi fall to the walkway; he'd been standing at a notch again, fast-firing. I liked and admired the old soldier, and needed him in Hasty, so I shouted for an aid-man, then dropped to my knees to see what I could do for him. He'd been gut-shot, and the arrow hadn't gone all the way through. Drawing my belt knife, I cut the feathered end off and pushed hard, forcing the pointed, sharp-edged head out of his back, then pulled it the rest of the way by the head.
Heard and felt the ram strike. There were war cries at the gate, and roars of Sotan anger. The impact had broken the heavy bar and partly dislodged one gate, making a gap wide enough that Dkota warriors fought their way through with spears and hatchets.
Rifle fire hadn't ended with that first salvo. Behind each rifleman at a firing notch was another. When one had fired, he stepped back to reload, and another stepped up to replace him. Thus a second, less selective salvo followed quickly. After that the marksmen fired at will, favoring warriors with multiple feathers.
On the walkways we had worries of our own, for the whole first rank of braves had charged the walls. Again lariats snaked upward, and again we were busy hacking. Where the east walkway had collapsed earlier, its defenders stood in the bailey, their bows sending arrows point blank at the warriors clambering through unmanned notches. By then, of course, the Dkota arrow flights had stopped, and the war cries and bellows of rage had been largely replaced by grunts of effort, cries of pain.
Then war cries swelled again—an exuberant unified roar from outside the south wall. I knew at once whose shouts they were. Donald Maltby's force had arrived.