Connor looked back over his shoulder. "Good," he grunted.
Raupasha looked there, too, a single quick glance; yes, those men were following their orders. Hard, hard, to miss the thundering glory of this moment.
Most of the escort were Ringapi, the wild men Walker had seduced. A brace of chariots came out to meet hers, six-she had to admit they had courage, lashing their horses on and bellowing their war cries. Their foot soldiers followed, forming a ragged line to protect their charges. To one side were a half score of men in Walker's uniform, who'd been overseeing the roadwork. They went fanning out in more orderly wise, then fell to their stomachs. The dark-gray of their clothing nearly disappeared against the ground, and their rifles began to speak in puffs of off-white smoke.
She judged distance. "Now!" she shouted to Iridmi. "Wartanna!" Turn!
He leaned back and hauled on the reins. The horses turned, and the war-car followed. Connor and she jumped for the outside rail, their weight keeping the chariot from overturning. Despite practice, one or two of those behind did-or perhaps the bullets began to strike home, and they tumbled in disaster, broken men and horses and yoke-poles.
The chariot settled down again with a thump that resounded from her feet up her spine and clicked her teeth together. Now the Mitannian line was moving parallel to the wagon train, and only fifty yards away. She leveled the rocket launcher.
"Clear!" she shouted, and pulled the trigger.
SSSSSRAAAA WA CK!
A tongue of pale fire lanced out, over the heads of the warriors, and behind her into the air behind the right rear of the chariot. Exultation rose beneath her breastbone as she saw that the curved white smoke trail would come down-yes!
The rocket landed under the front wheel of a large wagon. There was a flash- BAD AMP.
"Ammo wagon!" Connor whooped, yelling into her deafened ear.
Raupasha blinked, shook her head, blinked seared eyes. Where the wagon had been was only a smoking hole and some fragments. Bits and pieces of wagon and ox and man rained down from the sky for scores of yards all about, and the line of Ringapi foot soldiers were panicked. The galloping bar of Mitannian chariots had all opened fire-some of them were galloping very quickly indeed, as if the horses had bolted at the blast. Her men fired shotguns and rifles, pulled the pins and threw the little bombs called grenades. Arrows, slingstones, and a few bullets came back at them, and then she was past the end of the enemy position.
Iridmi pulled the team to the right, back up the slope, then around across it. The rest of the chariots followed, forming a Circle of Yama, keeping up a continuous fire on the foe. Two more chariots fired rockets; one headed over the stream to burst harmlessly, and the second struck turf near Walker's men. The noise and fire and smoke still added to the terror she wanted…
"They run!" Tekhip-tilla shouted to her, his chariot pulling up level with hers. "They flee!"
"Good," Raupasha said. "But-
A bullet went kerwackkk through the space between them.
"-remember the plan!"
Iridmi pulled the horses to a halt. The others did likewise, and from each car two men with firearms leaped down. Outnumbered ten to one, Walker's men died hard but swiftly. Whooping, the Mitannians descended on the supply caravan.
"Only what you can take quickly!" Raupasha reminded them, in a firm, carrying voice.
Gold ornaments were ripped free from bodies and transferred to the victors, along with the occasional silver-hilled dagger or good-looking pair of shoes. The fire-weapons were collected quickly; the Achaeans had been armed with Westley-Richards breechloaders. All others were thrown into a quickly kindled fire, to spoil them. Jugs of olive oil were smashed over boxes of biscuit, sacks of grain, sides of bacon, and soon another pillar of dirty smoke rose to the sky. Jars of flour were shattered and scattered in the rutted mud of the road. Wagons they hacked to pieces, and fed the flames that consumed bandages and medicines, cloth and leather. Most of the wine was spilt as well, although she did not begrudge the men a swallow or two.
Raupasha looked on, her joy tinged with sadness. She had spent all her life until the Nantukhtar came in a little tumble-down manor. Every family of the peasants there had been known to her, the playmates of her youth. Sweat and pain were the price of this food, as well she knew; waste meant somewhere hearths would be cold and children would hunger. With an effort, she shook off the thought.
They would hunger anyway; this was already stolen from them.
"Kill the cattle," she said when the supply convoy was wreckage or a few choice bits lashed to the sides of chariots.
"My Queen?" one man asked, aghast.
"Kill the oxen," she said. "This is true war, not a cattle raid. We cannot take them with us or leave them to work for the enemy, or to feed him."
A great silence fell, men looking at her round-eyed. Was not the ancient word for "war" the same as "to seek cattle"? And these men's families had been impoverished by the Assyrians. There was no wealth so handy as good oxen broken to the yoke…
She drew her pistol. A man made a halfhearted attempt to block her way, then fell back from a gray-eyed glare. Raupasha put the weapon to the beast's ear, steeling herself against the mild expression of its great brown eyes.
Crack. The animal gave a strangled bellow, tossed its head, then went to its knees and fell with a limp thud to the muddy ground.
"Butcher one," she said. "But quickly! The rest, hack them apart, slash the flesh, rub filth in the cuts. Now! Obey!"
While the grisly work went on she saw to the dead and wounded. There were only six dead; a few broken bones from the wrecked cars, to be set and splinted by the Nantucktar-trained Babylonian orderly, a flesh wound or two. It was as Kat'ryn and Kenn'et had said; surprise and speed mattered more than numbers. When they had been loaded and sent off, the destruction was near complete.
"Princess!" Tekhip-tilla said.
He pointed. Raupasha unshipped her binoculars and looked. Yes, Walker's men, several score of them. Mounted riflemen, in the English tongue. The reports said that several battalions were deployed to guard against just such raids as hers. Not very many men, for so huge a land.
"Be ready!" she called to her squadron commanders. Kat'ryn had taught her; if you sounded as if disobedience was impossible, it was. "Remember the plan-every man must act his part."
They did, doing their best to look like heedless plunderers. Walker's men were taught to despise those who fought from chariots… dumb wogs, that was the phrase they used.
The gray-uniformed men came on, deploying into line as they came. "Remember their doctrine," Gunnery Sergeant Connor murmured from close behind her. "They'll dismount at four hundred yards."
She waited, tense. Yes: now they pulled up their mounts, began to swing down. Two could play this game.
"To your chariots," she called.
The Mitannians poured back to their vehicles, slapped leather on rumps, got their mounts moving back over the ridge they'd hidden behind before the attack. They were careful to drive in a disorderly mob, careful to give no hint of stopping as they fled over the brow of the rise. Sabala was the last over the ridge, a heavy ox shank in his jaws.