He said, “I’ve seen regular officers who didn’t do their jobs as well as you do, Colonel.” He spoke the truth; Nahath was everything anyone could want as a regimental commander, though he might have been out of his depth trying to lead a brigade or a division.
Nahath touched the brim of his gray felt hat now. “I thank you very much, sir. I’ve done my best, but this isn’t my proper trade.” He looked north, toward what was left of the Army of Franklin. “What will we do tomorrow?”
“I don’t know, not for a fact. I spoke with Doubting George a little while ago, but he didn’t say,” John the Lister replied. “Still, my guess would be that we’ll go on driving them as hard as we can. I don’t think the general commanding will be content to let the traitors’ remnant get away. If we can take that army off the board altogether…”
“Yes, sir. That would be a heavy blow to whatever hopes the north has left.” Nahath nodded. “Good. I hoped you’d say something along those lines.” Saluting, he did a smart about-face and marched off.
Whatever he does back in New Eborac, I’ll bet he’s a success at it, John thought. Then he started to laugh. It wasn’t necessarily so. Marshal Bart, the one southron officer who’d won victory after victory even in the dark days when few others did, had failed at everything he tried away from the army. Only after he redonned his gray tunic and pantaloons did he show what he could do.
Shouts and cheers rang out not far away. John hurried over to find out what was going on. Picking his way past the campfires came Hard-Riding Jimmy. Every man who saw the young commander of unicorn-riders tried to clasp his hand or pound his back or give him a flask. By the way he swayed, he’d already swigged from quite a few flasks.
John came forward to congratulate Jimmy, too. “Well done!” he said. “Without you, we couldn’t have broken them the way we did.”
Jimmy’s answering grin was wide and foolish; yes, he’d done some celebrating before he got this far. “Thank you kindly, sir,” he said. “You didn’t do too bad yourself, by the Lion God’s holy fangs.”
“Every day another step,” John said. On a night where Hard-Riding Jimmy and even Doubting George were sounding like the great Detinan conquerors of days gone by, the men who’d subjected the blonds, he could afford to be, or at least to sound like, the voice of reason. He added, “We took a big step today.”
“None bigger,” Hard-Riding Jimmy said. “No, sir, none bigger. I’ve never seen the traitors go to pieces like this before.” He flashed that grin again. “I hope I see it some more.”
“Do you expect anything different from now on?” John asked.
Jimmy shook his head. “Not me. They’re ruined. It’d take a miracle-no, by the Thunderer’s balls, it’d take a miracle and a half — for them to rally after this. Bell’s got to be fit to be tied from what we did to him.”
“He’s still got Ned of the Forest,” John remarked, curious to see what the mention of one leading commander of unicorn-riders would do to the other.
“Ned’s a fine officer,” Hard-Riding Jimmy said with the owlish sincerity of a man who’d had a little too much to drink. “A fine officer, don’t get me wrong. But we whipped his men, and we’ll whip ’em again next time we bump into ’em, too. They’re plenty brave. Never braver-don’t get me wrong.” If he hadn’t had too much to drink, he wouldn’t have repeated the phrase. “But he hasn’t got enough troopers and he hasn’t got enough proper weapons to give us a real fight.”
“Those quick-shooting crossbows make that much difference?” John asked.
“Hells, yes! I should say so!” Hard-Riding Jimmy exclaimed. “Sir, inside of five years the ordinary crossbow will be gone from the Detinan army. Gone, I tell you! It makes a decent hunting weapon, but that’s all. With quick-shooters, we’ll sweep the blond savages off the eastern steppe like that.” He snapped his fingers, but without a sound. He tried again. This time, it worked. “That, gods damn it.”
“Well, after what you’ve done the past two days, I can’t very well tell you you don’t know your business,” John the Lister said. He clapped Hard-Riding Jimmy on the back again. Grinning still, the commander of unicorn-riders lurched off.
“Brigadier John!” a runner called. John turned and waved to show he’d heard. The messenger hurried over to him. “I’m glad I caught up with you, sir. Doubting George’s compliments, and the orders for the morning for your wing are hard pursuit. You are to take an eastern route, as best you can, and try to get ahead of the traitors. That way, with luck, we can surround them and wipe them out.”
“Hard pursuit by an eastern route,” John repeated. “I’m to get out in front of the Army of Franklin if I can. My compliments to the commanding general in return. I understand the orders, and I’ll obey them.” With another salute, the runner trotted away.
George had brought engineers forward to put more bridges across the stream that had slowed pursuit the evening before. As soon as they got near the far bank, northern snipers started shooting at them. The southrons pushed repeating crossbows up to the edge of the stream and hosed down the brush on the north bank of the stream with quarrels. They sent men in gray in there after the northerners, too. All that slowed but did not stop the sniping. Slowing it let the bridges reach the north bank and let the southrons cross with ease. After that, the snipers fell back.
Riding at the front of his column of footsoldiers, John the Lister pushed ahead as hard as the tired men would go. Every once in a while, off to the west, he got a glimpse of the remnants of the Army of Franklin, which was also moving north at something close to double time. The traitors had to be even more weary than his own men. How long could they continue that headlong withdrawal? John grinned. Not long enough, or so he hoped.
He was about to order his men to swing in on the fleeing northerners when a crossbow quarrel zipped past his head. If he could see Bell’s men, they could see him, too. And even Bell, no great general-as he’d proved again and again-could see what the southrons had in mind.
Bell’s rear guard came from Ned of the Forest’s troopers. They were, as every southron who’d ever met them had reason to know, a stubborn bunch. Here they were fighting mostly dismounted from a stand of trees that gave them good cover.
John the Lister wanted to roll over them even so. He wanted to, but discovered he couldn’t. They knocked his first attack back on its heels. Cursing, he shouted, “Deploy! We’ll flank them out, by the Lion God’s mane!”
And his men did exactly that, with some help from Hard-Riding Jimmy’s unicorn-riders. They did it, yes, but doing it took them an hour and a half. They didn’t damage Ned’s force very much, either. Instead of waiting to be surrounded and slaughtered, the northern troopers went back to their unicorns and rode off when their position grew difficult. They wouldn’t have any trouble catching up with Bell’s retreating column of footsoldiers.
They wouldn’t-but John the Lister’s men would. While the southrons were fighting that rear-guard action, the main body of their foes marched several miles. John did some more cursing. “Step it up, boys!” he called.
The soldiers tried. He’d feared he was asking more of them than flesh and blood could give. Toward evening, they came close to catching up with the northerners again. Again, though, a detachment of Ned’s troopers, this time backed up by footsoldiers in blue, delayed them long enough to let Bell’s main force get away.
“We’ll keep after them,” John declared. He wondered if they would be able to make the traitors stand and fight, though.
Ned of the Forest supposed he might have been more disgusted, but he had trouble seeing how. One thing that might have let him show more disgust would have been less to worry about. He was as busy as a one-armed juggler with the itch. The southrons knew they had the Army of Franklin on the run. For once, that didn’t satisfy them. They wanted the army dead-no, not just dead; extinct.