“What an interesting question, sir,” Major Alva said. “As a matter of fact, I was checking on them yesterday afternoon. You never can tell about those people.”
“Well, no,” John the Lister said. “We are fighting a war with them, if you recall. What did your check show?”
“Nothing,” Alva replied. “Oh, not a great big glow-in-the-dark Nothing, the kind that can only mean somebody’s hiding a great big ugly, nasty Something behind it. But as far as I can tell, Bell’s mages are just doing the usual kinds of things mages in an army do-healing, scrying, investigating for a what-do-you-call-it…”
He didn’t explain. “A what-do-you-call-it?” John asked.
“You know, where they try to find out whether a son of a bitch really is a son of a bitch,” Alva said helpfully.
However helpful he meant to be, he wasn’t. And then, all of a sudden, a light went on inside John’s head. “A court-martial!” he exclaimed.
“Yes, one of those.” It was, plainly, all the same to Alva. The wizard went on, “Anyhow, uh, sir, they’re doing that kind of thing, but I don’t see them doing anything much else: nothing that they’re showing, anyhow.”
“Could they hide it from you?” John the Lister asked.
Alva looked indignant. No-Alva looked offended. “The bunglers Bell’s got with him? They couldn’t hide their prongs when they pull up their pantaloons… sir,” he said scornfully.
John the Lister had never heard a southron wizard talk that way about his northern opposite numbers. Most southron sorcerers viewed the northerners with fearful respect. Most of them needed to. Not Alva, and he didn’t.
The thump of drums, the skirl of horns, and the wail of pipes came from the south, from the banks of the Cumbersome. Alva peered. “Look!” he said in childish delight. “A parade!”
And so it was. Their musicians leading the way, flags flying, regiment after regiment of tough-looking southron soldiers in gray tunics and pantaloons marched from the river north toward the encampments by Doubting George’s field fortifications. For a little while, John the Lister simply watched them, as Major Alva did. Then, realizing who those soldiers had to be, he muttered, “By the gods!”
“What is it, sir?” Alva asked.
“Curse me if those aren’t the two brigades from the far side of the Great River.”
“That’s nice,” the wizard said agreeably. “What about ’em?”
“What about ’em?” John echoed. “This about ’em: they’re the men Doubting George has been waiting for the past two weeks. He’s said he couldn’t attack Bell without ’em. Now they’re here. I wonder if he really will attack now that they are.”
“Why wouldn’t he?” Alva asked. “I mean, if he did say that-”
“People can come up with all sorts of excuses for not doing what they don’t want to do,” John answered. “I don’t know whether George has done that. By the Lion God’s fangs, I hope he hasn’t. But we’re going to find out, because he hasn’t got any other excuses left.”
Lieutenant Griff looked up and down the trench. His larynx, big as an apple, bobbed up and down in his throat. He called, “Are you men ready to do all you can for good King Avram and for Detina?”
“Yes, sir!” Corporal Rollant shouted. He gripped the staff of the company standard hard enough to whiten his knuckles. His voice wasn’t the only one eagerly raised, either. He hoped Bell’s men were too far away to hear the southrons yelling. He thought they were, but he wasn’t sure. His comrades all along the line were making a lot of noise.
“We’ve waited a long time for this now,” Griff said. “Some people will tell you we’ve waited too long. There’s all sorts of stupid talk going about. You’ll have heard it. Some folks say a new commander for us is coming from the west. Some folks say Marshal Bart is on his way here. Some even say a new commander and Bart are heading this way. In a few days, maybe all that would have mattered. But it won’t now. And do you know why?”
“Why?” the men called.
Lieutenant Griff, who’d cupped a hand in back of his ear waiting for just that call, grinned at them. “I’ll tell you why. Because we’re going to lick the hells out of the gods-damned traitors before anybody can get here from the west. That’s why!”
A great cheer erupted, as if the southrons had already gone and won their battle. Rollant gripped the flagpole harder than ever. Were they all deaf over there in Bell’s lines? Well, it wouldn’t matter for long, because the southrons were going to come forth from the line of forts they’d held for the past couple of weeks. When they did, the northerners would no longer have any possible doubt about what they intended.
Rollant’s regiment, along with the rest of the wing John the Lister commanded, was stationed on the right of Doubting George’s line. John’s men were, in fact, the rightmost footsoldiers in the line. Out beyond them were only Hard-Riding Jimmy’s unicorn-riders.
Horns screamed, all along the southrons’ front. “Forward!” Colonel Nahath shouted in a great voice. “Forward for good King Avram! Forward for freedom! Forward because smashing this army of traitors into the dust at last takes a long step toward winning the war!”
“Forward!” Lieutenant Griff yelled. “Avram and victory!” His voice would never be very deep, but it didn’t crack. He was, bit by bit, growing up.
“Forward!” Sergeant Joram boomed. “We’ll whip the stinking traitors out of their boots, or I’ll know the reason why.” Like any sergeant worth his silver, he wanted his men to fear him more than the enemy.
“Forward!” Rollant yelled. He was an underofficer; he wanted to, and had the right to, make his voice heard. “Forward for freedom!” For him, no other war cry mattered. In the north, he wouldn’t have been allowed to wear a sword on his hip, let alone a corporal’s stripes on his sleeve.
Beside him, Smitty said, “I’m confused, your high and mighty Corporalship, sir. Which direction should we go in?”
Laughing, Rollant answered, “You can go to hells, Smitty-but take some traitors with you before you do. Come on!”
His breath smoked as he scrambled out of the trench. The day was clear but cold, the sun low in the northeast. He waved the company standard back and forth. More and more southrons came out of the works in front of Ramblerton. They formed their lines and advanced.
Off to the right, Hard-Riding Jimmy’s troopers swept out on what looked to be a looping path around the far left of the Army of Franklin. Rollant saw that much, and then stopped worrying about the riders. They still had to beat Ned of the Forest. He knew all about Ned-and when had southrons ever come close to matching what he’d done? Rollant knew the answer to that only too welclass="underline" never.
He looked to the left. The standard he carried was one of scores-hundreds-sweeping forward at the same time. The right was a little in front of the center, where the banners seemed a little farther apart. Off to the left, he thought the standards were tightly bunched once more. He wasn’t so sure of that, though, as the left was a long way off.
Here and there, stones and firepots arced through the air toward the oncoming southrons from behind the northerners’ lines. The first ones fell short. Then they began clawing holes in the ranks of the men in gray. Repeating crossbows clattered into action, too. Engineers were pushing the southrons’ own catapults and repeating crossbows forward as fast as they could. They soon started shooting back.
Lieutenant Griff brandished his sword. He said, “It must be true what they say about Bell’s army-they haven’t got a whole lot of engines left.”
“A good thing, too, sir, if anyone wants to know what I think,” Rollant answered. “They’d hack us to pieces if they did.”
Bell’s men had dug shooting pits in front of their first line of trenches, as John the Lister’s army had done in front of Poor Richard. Men in blue popped up out of those pits and started sending crossbow quarrels toward the advancing southrons. One hummed past Rollant’s ear. Another-thock! — punched a hole in the standard he carried. It would have punched a hole in him, too, had it happened to fly a few feet lower.