"You know," he said, getting out his pipe and tobacco, "we didn't have a very big army to start with. What do we have now?"
"Five hundred, and four hundred along the river," Phrames said. "We lost about five hundred, killed and wounded. The rest are guarding prisoners all the way back to Fitra." He looked up at the sun. "Back almost to Hostigos Town, by now."
"Well, we can help Ptosphes and Chartiphon from here," he said. "That gang Hestophes let through Narza Gap will be in Nostor Town by now, panting their story out, and the way they'll tell it, it will be five times worse than it really was." He looked at his watch. "By this time, Gormoth should be getting ready to fight the Battle of Nostor." He turned to Phrames. "You're in charge of this stuff here. How many men do you really need to guard it? Two hundred?"
Phrames looked up and down the road, and then at the prisoners, and then, out of the comer of his eye, at the boxes under the improvised table. They hadn't gotten around to weighing that silver yet, but there was too much of it to be careless with.
"I ought to have twice that many."
"The prisoners are mercenaries, and have agreed to take Prince Ptosphes's colors," the priest of Galzar said. "Of course, they may not bear arms against Prince Gormoth or any in his service until released from their oaths to him. In the sight of the war god, helping guard these wagons would be the same, for it would release men of yours to fight. But I will speak to them, and I will answer that they will not break their surrender. You will need some to keep the peasants from stealing, though."
"Two hundred:' Phrames agreed. "We have some walking wounded who can help."
"All right. Take two hundred; men with the worst beat up horses and those men who are riding double, and mind the store. Harmakros, you take three hundred and two of the four-pounders, and cross at the next ford down. I'll take the other four hundred and three guns and work north and east. You might split into two columns, a hundred men and one gun, but no smaller. There'll be companies and parts of companies over there, trying to re-form. Break them up. And burn the whole country out-everything that'll catch fire and make a smoke by daylight or a blaze at night. Any refugees, head them up the river, give them a good scare and let them go. We want Gormoth to think we're across the river with three or four thousand men. By Dralm, that'll take some pressure off Ptosphes and Chartiphon!"
He rose, and Phrames took his seat. Horses were brought, and he and Harmakros mounted. The messenger from Sevenhills Valley sat down, stretching his legs in front of him. He rode slowly along the line of wagons, full of food the Nostori wouldn't eat this winter, and would curse Gormoth for it, and fireseed the Styphon temple-farm slaves would have to toil to replace. Then he came to the guns, and saw one that caught his eye. It was a long brass eighteen-pounder, on a two-wheel cart, with the long tail of the heavy timber stock supported by a four-wheel cart. There were two more behind it, and an officer with a ginger-brown beard sat morosely smoking a pipe on the limber-cart of the middle one. He pulled up.
"Your guns, Captain?"
"They were. They're Prince Ptosphes's guns now, I suppose."
"They're still yours, if you take our colors, and good pay for the use of them. We have other enemies besides Gormoth, you know."
The captain grinned. "So I've heard. Well, I'll take Ptosphes's colors. You're the Lord Kalvan? Is it true that you people make your own fireseed?"
"What do you think we were shooting at you, sawdust? You know what the Styphon stuff's like. Try ours and see the difference."
"Well, Down Styphon, then!" They chatted for a little. The mercenary artilleryman's name was Alkides; his home, to the extent that any free-captain had one, was in Agrys City, on Manhattan Island. His guns, of which he was inordinately proud, and almost tearfully happy at being able to keep, had been cast in Zygros City. They were very good; if Verkan could collect a few men capable of casting guns like that, with trunnions…
"Well, go back there by that burned house, by those big trees. You'll find one of my officers, Count Phrames, and our Uncle Wolf there. You'll find a keg of something, too. Where are your men?"
"Well, some were killed before we cried quits. The rest are back with the other prisoners."
"Gather them up. Tell Count Phrames you're to have oxen-we have no horses to spare-and get your company and guns on the road for Hostigos Town as soon as you can. I'll talk to you later. Good luck, Captain Alkides
Or Colonel Alkides; if he was as good as he seemed to be, maybe Brigadier-General Alkides.
There were dead infantry all along the road, mostly killed from behind. Another case of cowardice carrying its own penalty; infantry who stood against cavalry had a chance, often a good one, but infantry who turned tail and ran had none. He didn't pity them a bit.
It grew progressively worse as he neared the river, where the crews of the four-pounders and the two eight-pounders were swabbing and polishing their pieces, and dark birds rose cawing and croaking and squawking when disturbed. Must be every crow and raven and buzzard in Hos-Harphax; he even saw eagles.
The river, horse-knee deep at the ford, was tricky; his mount continually stumbled on armor-weighted corpses. That had been case-shot, mostly, he thought.
SO your boy did it, all by himself," the lady history professor was saying. Verkan Vall grinned. They were in a seminar room at the University, their chairs facing a big map of Fourth Level Aryan-Transpacific Hostigos, Nostor, northeastern Sask and northern Beshta. The pin-points of light he had been shifting back and forth on it were out, now.
"Didn't I tell you he was a genius?"
"Just how much genius did it take to lick a bunch of klunks like that?" said Taigan Dreth, the outtime studies director. "The way I heard it, they licked themselves."
"Well, considerable, to predict their errors accurately and plan to exploit them," argued old Professor Shalgro, the paratemporal probability theorist. To him, it was a brilliant theoretical achievement, and the battle was merely the experiment which had vindicated it. "I agree with Chief's Assistant Verkan; the man is a genius, and the fact that he was only able to become a minor police officer on his own time-line shows how these low-order cultures allow genius to go to waste."
"He knew the military history of his own time-line, and he knew how to apply it on Aryan-Transpacific." The historian wasn't letting her own subject be slighted. "Actually, I think Gormoth planned an excellent campaign against people like Ptosphes and Chartiphon. If it hadn't been for Kalvan, he'd have won."
"Well, Chartiphon and Ptosphes fought a battle of their own and won it, didn't they?"
"More or less." He began punching buttons on the arm of his chair and throwing on red and blue lights. "Netzigon was supposed to wait here, at Listra-Mouth, till Klestreus got up to here. Chartiphon began cannonading him-ordnance engineering by Lord Kalvan-and Netzigon couldn't take it. He attacked prematurely."
"Why didn't he just pull back? He had that river in front of him. Chartiphon couldn't have gotten his guns across that, could he?" Talgan Dreth asked.