“Well, thank you very much, Cromwell,” Bullfinch responded, his voice edged with sarcasm. “I was beginning to think that-all I was supposed to do is push these papers around and sit behind this desk.”
Richard did not reply, but even a blind man could have seen that there was more that he wanted to say.
“Go on, out with it,” Bullfinch growled.
“Sir, when I first came in here, you asked for my opinion.”
“And now you’re going to give it.”
“With your permission.”
“Then do it, damn you.”
He stepped closer, trying to assume a more relaxed position, eyes not fixed on Bullfinch, but instead on one of the papers scattered about the desk: a sketch of a Kazan battleship. He pointed at the drawing.
“Sir, what is coming at us is unlike anything we ever imagined in our worst nightmares. For the last fifteen years the Kazan have deceived us. The ships they assigned to patrol their outer waters were derelict wrecks from fifty years past. All the time they were watching, observing, gathering information while they fought amongst themselves to settle their own differences.”
“Wish the hell they’d slaughtered one another.”
“The paradox is that the fighting amongst themselves created the threat that exists now. Their fleet has a generation of battle experience behind it.
“I regret having to say this, but we must assume that Lieutenant O’Donald has told them everything he knows about us, technical and political. The Kazan will come armed with that knowledge.”
“And these Shiv?” Bullfinch asked.
Cromwell visibly shuddered. “Terrifying, sir. They view us the same way a tiger would look at a kitten. They’ve been bred for two hundred years by the Order. Why the emperor tolerates the Order’s existence is beyond me, other than the fact that he must fear them and their power.
“That, sir, is part of the reason for this war. I suspect it is an excuse to divert the emperor.”
“But you told me that their leader, Hazard.
“Hazin, sir.”
“This Hazin is cunning.”
Richard nodded. “The most cunning mind I have ever met.”
Bullfinch looked at him closely. “I sense an admiration in you, Cromwell.”
Richard reluctantly nodded. “I must confess I was intrigued. I thought he would be like a leader of the Hordes. I was a slave, sir, for the first six years of my life. I remember their cruelty, their rage. Hazin was educated, with knowledge that is beyond us. He could cite ancient poets and philosophers, then ever so subtly shift, pulling out your most hidden thoughts. He is a match for the emperor. In fact, I believe that before this is done, the emperor will be dead and Hazin will control all.”
“You liked him, didn’t you?”
Richard lowered his eyes. “He is our enemy.”
“But personally?”
Richard looked Bullfinch straight in the eye. “No sir, he is our enemy.”
Long ago he had learned to read lies, to catch the ever so subtle shift in voice, the momentary flicker in the eyes and tensing of features. It came from searching the faces of his cruel childhood masters. He wondered if Bullfinch could read that now.
Yes, he did like Hazin, and in a different world he might consider him a friend, no matter how loathsome his dreams, morality, and obsession with power. He had never met a mind like his, or a personality that could be so frightfully engaging and controlling.
He knew Hazin had seduced him, had seen him as but one more pawn in a game of power. And yet it was Hazin who had granted him his life.
Bullfinch nodded. “That is all, Lieuten-Commander Cromwell.”
“Yes, sir.” He stiffened to attention.
“Your own personal orders I assume the president told you.”
“Yes, sir, he did. He said I was the most qualified to lead the section, though he preferred that I accept a staff assignment with you instead.”
“My staff?” Bullfinch laughed. “Hardly likely.”
“I assumed you would prefer it this way, sir.”
“You at least guessed right on that one, Cromwell. We have a million square miles of ocean to watch. As the air corps moves down here, you will serve as liaison to them and for training. You’ll do more flying in the next month than you did in the last four years. Try not to get yourself killed doing it, Cromwell.”
“I plan to be here for the fight, sir.”
Bullfinch shook his head. “What we have here,” he sighed, pointing at the papers and then looking back up, “scares the living hell out of me, Cromwell. I hope my threat to send you on that shit-shoveling detail comes to pass, for all our sakes.”
“I hope so, too, Admiral, but I can tell you, unless we pull off a miracle, we’ll all be in hell before you can hand that shovel to me.”
“Lieutenant Keane, over here!”
Abe urged his exhausted mount to a loping gallop, leaning forward in the saddle as they zigzagged up the face of a low butte, following an ancient mammoth trail. Sergeant Togo, the troop’s lead scout, was crouched low on the crest, horse concealed just below the lip of the rise, and Abe swung out of his saddle, slipped to the ground, and took the precaution of unslinging his carbine and bringing it along. As he scrambled up the last few feet of rocky ground, the scout extended his hand, motioning for him to keep low.
He crawled up over the edge of the rise.
“Careful, sir, don’t kick up any dust.”
The sergeant pointed over at the next butte a couple of miles to the east.
Abe raised his field glasses and within seconds spotted more than a dozen Bantags, dismounted at the base of the butte, watering their mounts along the far banks of a muddy stream. They were out in the open, clearly visible, one of them carrying a red pennant, signifying a commander of a thousand.
The low summer grass covering the open ground between the butte and the stream was burnt brown with the heat, and crisscrossed with hundreds of tracks, crushed flat in some spaces across the width of a hundred yards or more.
“We’re on a main column here,” the sergeant announced. “Hard to tell at this distance, but the mounts look dun-colored, Betalga’s clan. Damn, he is one mean bastard.”
“Wish we had a flyer,” Abe sighed. “I haven’t seen or heard one all day.”
“A million square miles and twenty-four flyers.” The sergeant shook his head.
“Look at the water and the far bank, sir.”
Abe carefully looked at the ground, which shimmered in the summer heat, not sure for a moment what he was looking for. Then he realized that the river above the crossing was still fairly clear, while for several miles below it, the water was churned a dark, muddy brown. The far bank looked wet, rutted with deep tracks.
“They’ve crossed here.”
“Thousands of them. I bet the tail end of their column of yurts isn’t a mile or more around that next butte. Remember, we crossed that same ford coming back.”
Abe wasn’t sure if he remembered and said nothing. “This group was camped north of where we were. They’re swinging in behind Jurak’s main column, covering his withdrawal.”
Abe looked back down over the side of the butte he had just climbed. Five companies of the 3rd Cavalry were strung out in columns, weaving their way up a dried ravine. In the lead troop, his unit, the men had dismounted, a few relieving themselves, others sprawling on the ground, munching on hardtack, drinking cold coffee from canteens while Togo scouted forward.
He caught a glimpse of Major Agrippa’s guidon. He was the commander of this half of the regiment and was moving up past the head of the column. The yellow banner stood straight out in the hot, southeasterly breeze that was as diy as a bone, carrying not a hint of moisture from the sea four hundred miles to the south beyond the Shintang Mountains.
If that was indeed where the Bantag were heading, once they got up into those mountains they’d be all but impossible to control. But then again, he wondered, how could a couple regiments of cavalry change their mind?