“I was going to ask you the same question, sir,” his wing commander replied. “I understand we can’t hope to hold our position with so many southrons coming after us, but where do we go from here?”
“Someplace with good foraging, from which we can strike a blow at the glideway up from Rising Rock, or at a detachment of southrons if they give us the chance,” Bell answered. There had been a time when the Army of Franklin could have stood up to the whole southron host-before it lost four expensive battles in a row outside Marthasville. Bell tried not to dwell on that.
“Sooner or later, the whole southron army will come after us,” William said.
“Later,” Bell told him, and explained what the mages were doing.
Roast-Beef William’s big head bobbed up and down. “That’s good, sir, but it won’t last forever. And the southrons are hard to fool the same way twice.”
“We’ve bought some time now.” Bell had never been a man to look to the far future. It would take care of itself. The problem right at hand always seemed more important. Without solving it, he couldn’t get to the far future, anyhow.
“Do you think the southrons are after us with their whole force?” William asked.
“Seemed that way, gods damn them,” Bell said. “Let them come. They aren’t going to accomplish anything that way.”
“Not unless they crush us,” Roast-Beef William said. But then, almost reluctantly, he nodded again. “We’re lighter and quicker than they are, no doubt.”
“Even so,” Bell said. “Any man who knows me knows I hate retreat to the very marrow of my bones-but there are times when it is needful, and this is one of those times.”
“Yes, sir,” Roast-Beef William said, and then muttered something under his breath.
“What was that?” Lieutenant General Bell asked sharply.
“Nothing, sir,” his wing commander answered. Bell glared at him. William looked back, stolid and innocent. Bell couldn’t press any more. What he thought he’d heard was, That’s what Joseph the Gamecock kept saying.
It wasn’t quite insubordination, but it came close. As far as Bell could see, the two cases were as different as chalk and cheese. Retreat seemed Joseph’s natural state. He fell back because he dared not face the foe, or so Bell was convinced. He himself, on the other hand, moved away from the southrons only because they so dreadfully outnumbered him. They hadn’t outnumbered Joseph to anywhere near the same extent.
Why the southrons now outnumbered the Army of Franklin so much more than they had when Joseph the Gamecock commanded it was something Bell stubbornly refused to contemplate.
As Bell and the Army of Franklin moved south and east, the general commanding had no trouble telling where General Hesmucet’s army had gone earlier in the summer and where the land had not seen the red-hot rake of war. Earthworks and field fortifications scarred the ground where Hesmucet’s men had moved. One wheatfield had entrenchments in three sides of a square dug through the middle of it. What the farmer would be able to do about that, Bell couldn’t imagine.
Farmhouses were burnt, barns and serfs’ huts razed. Of livestock and blonds in the region where Hesmucet’s men had gone, Bell saw next to none. Half a mile away from the southrons’ path, cows and sheep and unicorns grazed, though he still noted hardly any blonds. “Bastards,” he muttered, not knowing himself whether he meant Hesmucet’s men or the serfs who fled to them.
A little before noon, one of his wizards came up to him and said, “I’m sorry, sir, but their sorcerers just penetrated our spell of deception.”
“Well, gods damn them to the seven hells,” Bell said. But it scarcely counted as an outburst; he’d expected that news for a couple of hours. He gave the mage a grudging nod. “You did the best you could.”
“Why, thank you, sir!” The man sounded not only relieved but astonished. He must have looked for a firepot to come down on his head.
Bell condescended to explain: “You bought us more time that I thought you would. We’ve got away clean now.”
“Ah.” The mage nodded, with luck in wisdom. He gave Bell a salute that would have disgusted any sergeant ever born. “Happy to be of service, sir.” He saluted again, even more disreputably than before, and went off to rejoin his comrades in wizardry.
I take it back, Bell thought. I do know one mage who rides a unicorn-Thraxton the Braggart. The lines furrowing his brow, for once, had nothing to do with pain. Thraxton was a mighty sorcerer, no doubt about it-and the Army of Franklin would have ended up better off if he’d never cast a single spell, no doubt about that, either. If a man is an ass, who cares whether he rides a unicorn?
What would Thraxton have done with the Army of Franklin, had King Geoffrey given it back to him instead of to Bell? Something unfortunate-Bell was sure of that. Again, what he’d done to the Army of Franklin himself never crossed his mind. The men let me down. He was sure of it.
We’ll smash up the glideway line. We’ll cut Hesmucet off from all his supplies, Bell thought. We’ll see how much the soft southrons like living off the land. We’ll see how well they fight when they’re hungry and short of everything, the way we always are.
He had visions of Hesmucet’s men stumbling across the plains of Peachtree Province with hollow eyes and bony fingers, moaning for a crust of bread. On the other side of the Western Ocean, Great King Kermit’s army had all but come to pieces when it had to retreat from Pahzbull in the middle of a hellsish winter. That was more than fifty years ago now, but people still told stories about it.
Liking the vision in his own mind, Bell offered it to his aide-de-camp. Major Zibeon chewed it over, then said, “That would be very nice, sir-now which gods are going to supply the Sorbian winter here in Peachtree Province?”
Bell’s ears heated. Zibeon had been polite in calling him a fool, but he’d called him a fool nonetheless. “We can still whip them,” Bell growled.
“I hope you’re right. I even think you’re right, sir,” Zibeon said. “But I don’t see southron soldiers starving in the snow, not hereabouts.”
“What precisely do you see, Major?” Bell’s tone was certainly cold enough for a Sorbian winter.
“Right now, I see that we’ve stolen a march on the enemy,” Zibeon replied. “I see that we’d better take advantage of it, too.” And not even Lieutenant General Bell could argue with him there.
Rollant sprawled down by a campfire with a groan. “I’m sick of marching,” he said. “I don’t like it even when we’re going where we’re supposed to. When it turns out we spent the first half of the day going in the wrong gods-damned direction… I don’t fancy that a bit.”
Smitty was every bit as worn as he was, but managed a weary grin. “You go tell that to General Hesmucet, Rollant,” he said. “He’s bound to listen to you, right? After all, you’re not just anybody. You’re a corporal.”
“And you’re an idiot,” Rollant said. Smitty gave an extravagant wave of the hand, as if accepting praise far beyond his deserts.
Sergeant Joram tramped past. “Get water, Rollant,” he said.
Before Rollant had been promoted, that would have meant his going down to the closest creek with the squad’s water bottles. But, now that he was an underofficer, he got to tell other soldiers to go instead. But picked a couple who hadn’t had the duty for a little while: “Gleb, you and Josh take care of it.”
Josh groaned as he got to his feet, but didn’t argue. Gleb said, “I don’t want to do it. You had me do it a few days ago.”
“Yes, and it’s your turn again,” Rollant said. “We’ve been through everybody else in the squad since then. Go on. Get moving.”
Gleb shook his head. “Hells of a note when a blond thinks he can tell a real Detinan what to do.”
Ice and fire ran through Rollant. He hadn’t had much of that trouble-less than he’d expected-till now. Maybe he could head it off here. Tapping the stripes on his sleeve, he said, “It isn’t a blond telling you what to do, Gleb. It’s a corporal telling you. Now go fill our water bottles.”