"Heneralissimo," he said. "Ah. . I thought you'd want to know about Osterville."
"Osterville?" Raj asked. It was an effort to remember the man; he hadn't thought of him since Ain el-Hilwa. And good riddance. "It's enough that he isn't here, making trouble."
"No, he won't be doing that," Menyez said. "It was unpleasant, but as you said, it was necessary."
Raj looked at him. Menyez flushed. "All right, mi heneral. I destroyed the letter and your seal, and he went into the Drangosh with a sixty-kilo roundshot tied to his ankles. . but I still don't like it."
Raj nodded. "Of course, Jorg." Only Suzette has my seal. "I understand."
He shivered slightly, despite the heat of the day.
* * *
A dot of red light arched over the wall, trailing fire through the darkness. Thud. It exploded among the vacant houses-hopefully vacant houses-and a column of fire rose into the night. Another spark. Thud.
"That makes six the past hour," Raj murmured to himself.
in the past fifty-five minutes thirty seconds, Center added. harassing fire.
"Ali's obviously decided to starve us out," Raj agreed.
An image drifted across his eyes: his own emaciated body, still living, naked and covered with weals and burns. Pairs of dogs were hitched to chains attached to each ankle and wrist. The drivers urged the dogs forward slowly, gradually taking up the slack. Ali ibn'Jamal sat watching, pounding his fist on the arm of his portable throne and laughing with pleasure, licking his full lips. Tewfik stood to one side, arms crossed and a look of faint disgust on his face, echoed by most of the noblemen and officers around him. Behind him a gallows stood skeletal against the sky, with the bodies of the Companions dangling from it-by meathooks through their ribs. Several of them were still writhing. .
Raj made a grimace of distaste. "Even by the standards of Mihwel the Terrible, Ali is a prime case."
a subjective judgment, but accurate. child-rearing practices among the colonial royal family are conducive to severely dysfunctional personalities.
A step sounded on the tiles behind him. There had been no challenge and response from the sentries on the stair below, so it could be only one person.
Suzette leaned on the railing beside him, looking out over the city and the glistening water. "Full circle, my love," she said. "Sandoral, and a battle to come."
"And men dying unexpectedly," he said.
She turned her face towards him, drawn and pale beneath the moons. "Osterville couldn't lead and wouldn't follow and wouldn't get out of the way and let you work, either. Can you imagine the sort of havoc he'd have created back here, with everything depending on Jorg keeping things running smoothly? We'd have ended up swimming across, while Osterville tried to make everyone do things his way."
"Jorg-"
"Jorg is good man and a good officer, but he doesn't have your talent for facing men down-especially not men higher on the chain of command. You know that." A little anger crept into her voice: "How many better men have been killed on this campaign so far?"
Raj smiled ruefully and shook his head. "You always could out-argue me," he said. A shrug. "I just don't like having a fellow officer killed like that. It's the sort of thing Tzetzas does."
Suzette sighed. "I don't like it either," she said quietly. "But it had to be done."
Raj nodded. They watched another Colonial shell come over the walls.
"It's cold," Suzette said in a small voice.
Raj extended his arm and the long military cloak he wore. Suzette came under it and laid her cheek against his chest.
"We can't afford any mistakes this time, can we?" she said after a moment.
"No," Raj replied. He looked up at the moons. They'd be rising late, tomorrow evening. Victory or death, he thought. All men die, but this has to be done. "Let's turn in."
* * *
"Precisely this bearing," Raj said.
He drew a line in the dust with the stick. Behind him the artillerymen staked down their frame-two sets of rigid beams at right angles, with a slanted piece across the arms. They aligned it with the mark in the dust; once it was firmly in place, they pushed the gun up the slanted fronting of the frame and tied off the wheels at a chalk mark on the wood.
"Range is exactly 3,525 meters," Raj said. "Load contact, two-second delay."
"Sir," the gunner said, giving him a glance.
How could you know? Raj read in his face. And a trace of awe; men knew he didn't make empty boasts.
Raj walked on to the next gun's position as the iron clang of the breechblock sounded behind him. All fifty-eight surviving field guns were lined up just inside the north wall of Sandoral, all up on the frames; all aligned along the precise vector he'd drawn in the dirt for them. Every single one, as far as Center could judge, was now aiming at the exact midpoint of earth above Ali's command bunker, behind the Colonial outworks-where he invariably retired after the sunset prayer. All the fortress guns in the fixed positions on the wall were aligned as well, those of them that would bear on the target.
Irregularities-wear on the rifling of guns, slight differentials in shell loading and drag, whatever-would spread the projectiles. It ought to be an unpleasant surprise, nonetheless.
Dinnalsyn looked back at the long row of guns. "Think we'll get him, mi heneral?"
"No," Raj said. "That's a very secure bunker. The last thing I want to do is put Tewfik in full command. But it'll certainly get his attention, and Ali's got a short temper. If I know my man, he'll do something stupid."
The limbers stood in a row five meters behind the guns, the dog teams in traces and lying down.
"Are the rafts ready?" Raj said.
"Ready and waiting, sir," Dinnalsyn said. "The planking and decking from the pontoon bridge was exactly as much as we needed. . I suppose that's no coincidence?"
"You might say that," Raj replied. He clapped him on the shoulder. "Stay ready for it."
The last of the cavalry battalions on special duty were sitting by the wall, finishing their evening meaclass="underline" beans and pigmeat and onions, dished out from kettles over camp fires and scooped up with tortillas. It was the 5th Descott. They were professionals enough to concentrate on eating, but he could feel the tension crackling off them. He walked over and made a beckoning gesture. They crowded around him and crouched or sat at his hand signal; only about three hundred fifty left-and the battalion had been at double strength when he took it west to fight the Brigade.
"All right, dog-brothers," he said quietly. That forced them to listen carefully and lean closer; it also made each man feel as if he was talking to that one alone, as an individual. "You've guessed that something's up. Two hours after sundown-"
The sun was just touching the western horizon.
"— the guns are going to cut loose with a five-round stonk. The second the last gun fires-but not before-you give the wogs five rounds rapid. Then you come back down from the wall, ride your dogs to the docks, get on the rafts and off we go."
He paused a moment. "You're all fighting men and all Descotters," he went on. "My father and grandfather and great-grandfather fought the wogs, and so did yours."
Nods; Descotter rancheros held their land on military tenure, paying their tax in men rather than money. Fathers and sons and brothers followed each other into the same battalions time out of mind; comrades were neighbors at home, officers the squire's sons.
"There's a lot of Descotter blood and bone buried around here. Now we have a chance to end it." That caused a rustle, men coming forward in their crouch and leaning on their rifles. "If we win this one, we break them-not just push them back, but wreck them for all time. If we lose. ." He grinned. "Well, we haven't done much losing while we've been together, you and I, have we?"