"Look on the bright side," Reskird said. "We get to loaf around on guard duty when the other guys have to dig the trenches and pitch camp."
"Bah! Some silver lining." Bragi had a broad lazy streak, but in this case did not feel that escape from the drudge work was sufficient compensation.
Birdsong watched over his shoulder, mustache wriggling. Bragi bared his teeth and growled. Birdsong laughed. "You know what they say. A bitching soldier is a happy soldier."
"Then Reskird is the happiest fool on earth," Haaken grumbled. "A hog up to his collar in slops."
Birdsong chuckled. "Every rule has its exceptions."
"Where are we going, Corporal?" Bragi asked.
"They haven't told me yet. But we're headed east. There isn't anything east of here but the border forts facing the Sahel."
"The Sahel? What's that?"
"The outer edge of Hammad al Nakir. That means the Desert of Death."
"Oh, that sounds great."
"You'll love it. Most godforsaken land you'll ever see." His eyes went vague.
"You been there?"
"I was at Wadi el Kuf with the General. We took this route then."
Bragi exchanged glances with his brother.
"Ha!" Reskird cried, suddenly enthusiastic. He started babbling cheerfully about Hawkwind's victory.
Bragi and Haaken had listened to other veterans of the battle. It hadn't been the picnic Reskird thought. Haaken suggested Kildragon attempt a difficult autoerotic feat.
They finally overhauled the other infantry company a day from the assembly point, a fortified town called Kasr el Helal. The veterans grinned a lot during night camp. They had made the overtaking intentionally difficult.
Hawkwind and the remainder of the regiment were waiting at Kasr el Helal. Also on hand were several caravans hoping to slip into Hammad al Nakir in the regiment's safety shadow, and two hundred Royalist warriors sent to guide the Guildsmen. Bragi and Haaken found the desert men incredibly odd.
Hawkwind allowed a day's rest at Kasr el Helal. Then the savage march resumed. Bragi soon understood why extra boots had been issued. Rumor said they had eight hundred miles to march, to some place called the Eastern Fortress. The actual distance was closer to five hundred miles, but it was long enough.
The pace started slowly enough, passing through the wild, barren hills of the Sahel. The desert riders ranged far afield. The column traveled ready for combat. The primitive locals were fanatic adherents of the enemy, somebody called El Murid.
The natives never offered battle. The Guildsmen never saw them. They saw almost no natives anywhere during the first twenty-seven days of the desert crossing.
Hawkwind conducted repeated exercises during the march. The heavy support train acquired at Kasr el Helal was a severe drag on speed. Yet its professional camp followers, cooks and workers made military life easier to bear. Hawkwind, though, kept those people as segregated as he dared, fearing an infection of indiscipline. Their discipline was pure chaos compared to that of the Guildsmen.
The youths from the north examined the barrens day after day. "I'll never get used to this," Bragi said.
Haaken admitted, "It scares me. Makes me feel like I'm going to fall off the world, or something."
Bragi tried to see a bright side. "Somebody wants to attack us, we'll see them coming."
He was only partly right. Twenty-seven days out of Kasr el Helal, Reskird suddenly yelled, "Pay up, Haaken."
"What?"
"The van riders are coming in." Kildragon pointed. The native outriders were rushing toward the column like leaves aflutter on a brisk March wind. "That means a fight."
Bragi looked at Haaken meaningfully. "You suckered him out of a month's pay, eh?" An hour earlier word had come back that they could expect to be within sight of their destination before nightfall. Haaken had begun crowing about how he had hornswoggled Reskird into betting they would see action before they arrived.
Haaken suggested they both attempt the sexually impossible. He grumbled, "Those Invincibles wouldn't be this close to the castle anyway."
"They're between us and the Fortress," Reskird said. "We have to break through. Pay me now, Haaken. Be hard to collect if you get taken dead."
"Don't you ever shut up? You got a mouth like a crow."
"You do have a way with words, Reskird," Bragi agreed.
Horsemen indistinguishable from the outriders crested a ridgeline ahead. They studied the column, then flew back the way they had come.
Hawkwind halted. The officers conferred, dispersed. Soon Bragi and his companions were double-timing into the selected formation, which was a broad, shallow line of heavy infantry with the native horsemen on the flanks. Bowmen scattered behind the infantry. The heavy horse, still donning armor and preparing mounts, massed behind the center. The camp followers circled wagons behind them to provide a fortress into which to retreat.
Birdsong dressed the squad. "Looking good, lads," he said. "First action. Show the Lieutenant we can handle it." Sanguinet insisted they couldn't whip their weight in old women.
"Set your shields. Stand ready with spears. Third rank. Stand by with your javelins."
Bragi watched the ridgeline and worried about his courage. This was no proper way for a man to fight...
Riders crested the hill. They swept toward the Guildsmen, hoofbeats rising into a continuous thunder. Bragi crouched behind his shield and awaited the order to set his spear. Some of his squadmates seemed to be wavering, certain they did not dare hold against the rush.
The riders sheered off toward the flanks. Arrows from short saddle bows pattered against shields, crossing paths with a flight from longer Guild bows. Horses screamed. Men cursed and wailed. Bragi could see no casualties on his side.
An arrow chunked into his shield. A quarter inch of sharp steel peeped through. A second shaft caromed off the peak of his helmet, elicited a startled curse behind him. He scrunched down another inch.
The earth shuddered continuously. Dust poured over him. The taunting riders were racing past just thirty yards away.
He could not restrain his curiosity. He popped up for a peek over the rim of his shield.
An arrow plunked him squarely, smashing the iron of his helmet against his forehead. He tumbled onto his butt, losing his shield. Another arrow streaked through the gap in the shield wall, creased the inside of his right thigh. "Damn," he muttered, before it started hurting. "An inch higher and... "
Reskird and Haaken shifted their shields, narrowing the gap till a man from the second rank could assume Bragi's place. Hands grabbed Ragnarson, dragged him backward. In a moment he was cursing at the feet of the bowmen. One shouted, "Get back to the wagons, lad."
He didn't make it halfway before the encounter ended. The enemy tried to turn the flanks. The friendly natives pushed them back. Trumpets sounded. Hawkwind led the heavy horse through aisles in the infantry, formed for a charge. The enemy flew away, vanishing over the hill as swiftly as he had come. He remembered Wadi el Kuf, and had no taste for another bout with the men in iron.
Though Bragi had perceived their undisciplined rush as an endless tide, there had been no more than five hundred of the riders. Outnumbered by a disciplined foe, they had done nothing but probe. Even so, several dozen fallen comrades were left scattered across the regiment's front. Bragi was one of only four casualties on the Guild side.
The camp followers rushed out to cut throats and loot. The Guildsmen remained standing at arms while their native auxiliaries went scouting again.
Bragi settled down with his back against a wagon wheel, cursing himself for the stupidity that had gotten him hurt. All he had had to do was keep his head down, just as he had been taught.