Herzer knocked on the door and entered at a female voice: "Clear."
He looked around the room and grinned at the startled faces.
"Doing a little cross-pollination?" he asked and avoided grimacing at the unintended double entendre.
"Our engineering assignment is permissible as a group project, sir," Ensign Van Krief answered after a moment. "And there are only two extant copies of Defeat Into Victory and American Caesar available, sir. We managed to snag both."
"American Caesar?" Herzer asked.
"The biography of General MacArthur, sir," Tao answered, getting dagger looks from the other two. "It covers the Inchon landing in some depth."
"Interesting," Herzer replied. "We'll have to see if the library will let us borrow them on long-term loan."
"Sir?" Destrang said.
"You've all been detailed to be General Talbot's messengers," Herzer replied. "I've got homework assignments from all of your instructors. It's a headquarters assignment, but you'll be riding, so pack dress and undress uniforms; we're leaving in the -morning."
"We, sir?" Van Krief said, her voice rising an octave to a near squeak.
"I've been detailed as his aide, for my sins." Herzer grinned. "Not that I'm unfamiliar with the position. But bring your armor, as well. As I said, I've been on this sort of assignment before."
The five of them, and their equipment, made a heavy load for the stage coach. But they all managed to pack it in by the time the scheduled departure arrived.
Duke Edmund gave his wife a hug before he boarded, then picked up the tow-haired child at her side.
"I'll be back soon," he said, giving the boy a squeeze.
The boy just looked at him from big, blue eyes and then gave him a hug back that was hard and swift. The child was beautiful, even by the standards of the time, with ears that were faintly pointed. He dropped to the ground lightly and grabbed his mother's hand, working his face and clearly trying not to cry.
"Headquarters assignment," Daneh said, pointing at Edmund. "That means you stay safe. Understood?"
"Understood, milady," Edmund grinned.
"Herzer, too," she said.
"Herzer, too," the duke answered.
"We've got to board, boss," Herzer said, stepping up and getting a hug from Daneh as well. "I'll take care of him," he said.
"Like you did the last time?" Daneh chuckled.
"He didn't get a scratch," Herzer replied, defiantly, then smiled. "Really, we're going to be in Newfell Base. I won't say 'what can happen?' but we're not planning on going on an island vacation so how bad can it be?" He tousled the hair of the boy at her side and grinned. "Seeya brat."
"Seeya, Herzer," the boy replied. "Kill some bad guys."
"I'll try," the captain replied, trying not to wince. "Gotta run."
The five of them boarded the coach, which had barely room for six, and took their seats, the three ensigns squeezing in the forward, and therefore less comfortable, seats, with the captain and the general in the rear bench. As soon as they were on board the coachman called to his horses and with a wave from Daneh they were off.
"Okay," Edmund said, looking across at the three ensigns, "let me get a few things straight. I'd tell you to call me Edmund, but that would just worry you and you'd probably slip up around the Navy, which has gotten really protocol ridden in a very short period of time. So it's 'Duke Edmund' or 'General Talbot.' I brought you along for two reasons. The first is that I'm going to need messengers. The Navy has a good communications center but the nearest Army commo center is up at Gemtown Barracks. There's going to be messages that I don't want the Navy seeing, so you're going to be carrying them to Gemtown, which is one hell of a ride. The other thing I want is eyes and ears. I want you to watch what the Navy's doing and how they are doing it and, drawing upon your vast experience, finding things that you like or don't like about what they do. I'll probably ask for input from time to time but if something really springs out at you, bring it to me. Especially if you run across things that you think the Navy doesn't want me to know. But what I don't want is mouths. The admirals are some starchy sons of bitches. Herzer I'll cover if he puts his foot in his mouth and I've got a reputation to maintain as an aggressive SOB. But you guys stand around with your eyes and ears open and your mouths shut. If you have anything for me, wait until we're alone. Is all of that clear?"
"Yes, sir," the three responded.
"Questions?"
"No, sir," Van Krief responded after a moment. "I don't know what to ask, sir."
"Knowing that there are questions, but not what they are, is the beginning of wisdom, young lady," Edmund said, aware that he was being pompous. "And in any case, we're both in the same boat. I know that there are questions to be asked, but until I get the information I need to evaluate the situation, I don't know what they are. And, yes, that bothers me as much as it does you. More."
"Sir," Destrang said. "We have standard intelligence briefings, just like everyone else. According to them, we have five dragon-carriers to the enemy's five. And our dragons have trained in bombing techniques, whereas the enemy has not. I'm not sure that there is any question that we can take out the enemy fleet. But you seem concerned." He paused, and frowned. "Is there any intelligence that you have that suggests the enemy may be more formidable than he appears?"
"I can't answer that question, Ensign," the general sighed. "But . . . do you think that you should depend upon the enemy's stupidity? They have known about our capability for nearly a year and a half. They have built dragon-carriers in that time. I find it unlikely that they have not developed the capacity for bombing, whether there is intel or not. And if they have, I think that moving to intercept them when they are clearly courting battle is unwise. Does that answer the question?"
"Yes, sir," Destrang nodded. "Can I ask what you would do, sir?"
Edmund frowned and shrugged. "I tend to keep my plans close to my vest, Ensign, but in this case, since it's hypothetical . . . I would probably retreat the main fleet and break off a small task force. Use the mer and delphinos to keep the position of their main fleet fixed and move for sea-room. At some point, they are going to need fleet replenishment. The Briton Isles are still a basket caseÑthere are still elements holding out in the northern and western hillsÑso they are going to have to replenish at some point and get that replenishment from Ropasa. When they move to replenish, have the task force, task forces if there are enough detachable light units, attack the convoys. At some point, they are going to have to head back to base. When they have turned, moreover, it's likely that they are on low rations. Unfed wyvern are dangerous wyvern. They cannot fly as far, are harder to handle in the air, and if it goes on long enough they start attacking the crew. It is when they turn for home that I'd pounce. Especially since I had light units at their back. It might even make sense to have a carrier out there, lying doggo and hopefully unnoticed by their orca scouts. It would be demoralizing in the extreme to be hit by a full dragon-strike just as they thought they were safe."
"Indirect approach, sir," Van Krief said, nodding. Then she looked at the captain quizzically.
"But, sir, we have the steam hammer," she pointed out. "Why not crush them while we can?"
"No," Herzer replied, "we think we have the steam hammer. There is a whole world of difference between the two, Ensign. Piling on when you think you're grabbing a house cat and finding out you've got your hands on a house lion, is a recipe for hurt."
Herzer was uncomfortably aware of the ensign sitting opposite him. The countryside outside the coach was boring in the extreme, a patchwork of plowed fields and uncleared timber with very occasional small towns. And the coach lurched as it moved down the Via Apallia. The pre-Fall road had been constructed and maintained by reenactors and in keeping with the continued social distaste for "real" roads was constructed in the Roman manner with paving stones. It was incredibly smooth compared to most of the burgeoning post-Fall road network. And the coach was well sprung, on good metal leaf springs, with the new vulcanized rubber tires. But it still rocked and occasionally lurched uncomfortably. Looking sideways in it was painful after a time. And the landscape across from him was a hell of a lot better than the landscape outside. The ensign had the tip of her tongue sticking out ever so slightly as she reread Slim's autobiography of the Myanmar campaign. And she set off her undress blues quite fetchingly. Herzer had just started to fantasize about uses that the tongue could be put to when he realized he needed to think about something else and closed his eyes.
Unfortunately the future held too many uncertainties to think about clearly. With the New Destiny combat fleet at sea, the invasion fleet it was meant to protect could not be far behind. Paul Bowman, the leader of New Destiny, the man who had planned the coup against the Council of Key-holders that had started the civil war, considered himself to be the good guy. Since it was clear that the Freedom Alliance resistance to his plans was evil, any action taken by him was clearly on the side of the angels. Which was why he had announced that if the UFS could not see the light, it would be forced to by a reign of terror.
Celine Reinshafen, another of the council members who had sided with Paul, was not nearly so high-minded. When Duke Edmund had been living the life of a feudal baron and crafting swords and armor, she had been creating genetic monsters that pushed the envelope of the pre-Fall biological protocols. Since the start of the war, she had apparently gone into overdrive and they had already faced several of her monstrosities. The Changed humans that made up the backbone of the New Destiny hordes were but one example; brutal, strong and remarkably durable, they made fearsome soldiers in the assault. When they had first been faced by Blood Lords, they were named "orcs" on sight. Not so disciplined at holding a shield-wall, especially in the face of a flight of arrows from UFS longbowmen or assaulting Blood Lords, they were still a damned tough enemy.
But she was rumored to have created others. The ixchitl, pre-Fall, had not had poisonous nematocysts, so that was probably one of her little "tweaks." And she had managed to infiltrate a few others into the UFS. One of them, a horrible giant humanoid beast that was inhumanly strong, quick and deadly, had woven a web of terror through Washan until it was run to ground and destroyed by a group of citizens. It had chosen to immolate itself when the manor it was using as a base was burned to the ground. They still weren't clear on what it had been or how she had created it. And there had been others. Would be more.
He wondered what changes she might have made to the dragons on the New Destiny side. Firebreath came to mind. It had been impermissible under Council rules prior to the Fall but many of the rules had been struck down when the Council split. Not the prohibitions against explosives, which prevented them from using guns or internal combustion engines, or even high-pressure steam engines for that matter, nor the uniform protocols against self-replicating microorganisms or nannites. Both had been implemented with near unanimity by previous Councils and only a unanimous Council, impossible in these days, could waive them.
But firebreath she could do, with enough power. She might be able to draw it from the bodies of the dragons themselves; that was how the orcs were created. But the best material for firebreath would be jellied gasoline, and while it was producible by biological organisms, the Change was complicated and dangerous. Not to mention learning to use it.
He opened his eyes and looked into eyes of china blue, at which the ensign across from him flushed.
"Penny for your thoughts, Ensign," Herzer said with a faint smile.
She flushed again and looked away for a moment, then looked back with a slight frown creasing her brow.
"I . . . I was wondering, sir. Where did you lose your hand?" she asked.
Herzer looked over at the general who looked back with a faint quirked eyebrow and shrugged.
"If we were still at the Academy, I'd tell you to do a research paper," Herzer said with a faint smile. "Since we're not, and it's a long drive to the coast . . ." He frowned and looked at the ceiling for a moment, then grimaced.
"Raven's Mill was attacked in the autumn of the year of the Fall," Herzer said. "At that time there were only fifty-seven Blood Lords and forty fully trained archers. I was in the first Blood Lord class." He pulled back his left sleeve and turned up his forearm, to reveal the brand on the underside. It was a wing-spread eagle, mouth wide in a scream of challenge, with the words "Semper Fi" under it. There was a puckered wound right across it, with others lacing the arm.
"Thirty-eight," Destrang said, nodding and pulling back his own sleeve. The brand was the same but with a "38" above it. The other two ensigns nodded and turned their own up. None of them had other scars, however.
"We didn't have a class number," Herzer said dryly. "And most of the roads you march on, we built. Anyone eat the lemon?"
"No, sir," Van Krief replied. "The last couple of classes had had such a scuffle for it that they've outlawed it."
"Pity," Herzer said with a grin. "My suggestion was that they simply fall the class out, oh, about ten klicks out from the clearing and let them race for it. Anyway, at the time no one in the class, including Gunny Rutherford, knew what the lemon represented or who was buried there. I trust you all know?"
"Yes, sir!" they responded.
"Anyway, there was this big army, mostly Changed, on the way, led by a consummate motherfisker named Dionys McCanoc, pardon my language, Ensign."
"Not a problem, sir," she said, coloring and smiling.
"Dionys . . ." He paused and looked at the general again. "Dionys had a personal grudge attached to the attack, but that's not important."
"And the opposite," Edmund interjected. "You saw the young boy with my wife?"
"Yes, sir," Tao said. "Your son?"
"Dionys'." The general smiled, thinly. "The act was nonconsensual." He raised a hand to forestall the terrified ensign's apology. "I don't mind having Charles called my son; he's a fine young man. But he is not the son of my body. So, you can safely say that I was not particularly pleased with McCanoc. We had a history from before the Fall as well. Nothing particularly important to the story. Go on, Herzer."
Herzer paused and then shrugged. "There's more to the story. I was present at the rape of Mistress Daneh. Rather, I was unable to prevent it so I ran away." He looked at the ensign across from him whose eyes widened as she paled. "It's not always the best course to be stupidly heroic. It would be nice if the world was that simple and since then it has been, by and large. But we are not all that we seem and it's worth keeping in mind.
"As I was saying," he continued, looking out the window. "Dionys was coming with blood in his eye. We were outnumbered ten to one. What would you do in that instance, Ensign Destrang?"
"Leave enough of a force in the town to possibly hold and then maneuver a force so that he could not attack the town without it sallying at his rear."
"The problem being that he could hit the town and overrun it before the force outside could have done anything," Herzer said. "The general went for the deep hook, instead, moving out of the town, leaving it defended only by the militia, and dangling the Blood Lords and the archers out as bait." He remembered those fights like they were yesterday, almost his first introduction to battle. Friends dying around him, the feel of life being let out by his sword. "We . . . attrited the force with small damage to ourselves by luring it, repeatedly, into defensive positions."
"Operationally offensive, tactically defensive, sir," Van Krief said. She had apparently gotten over her shock.
"Precisely," Herzer said. "Then we outmarched the army back to the town and met it at the Bellevue grade, with a clear line of retreat to secondary positions if we needed them. We held them, though." He paused again, flexing his jaw. "We held them and beat them into a bloody pulp. No matter how many attacked, they couldn't break the Line. Finally, they broke. Then Dionys attacked, alone."
"Alone, sir?" Tao said. "Wasn't that suicide?"
"Not if you're protected by powered and field-protected plate armor," Edmund replied, dryly. "Normally it's a recipe for a massacre. And suicide to attack the person."
"So . . . I committed suicide," Herzer said, with a faint smile. He was still looking out the window. "And his power-sword went right through my shield like it was paper and took off my hand."
"Dionys was also protected by a nannite cloud that drew its energy from the humans around it," Edmund said, looking at his protŽgŽ with a querying expression. "Herzer still kept attacking, with a knife, trying to get something into the armor, until he was overcome by the field."
"I wasn't the only one," Herzer smiled. "Bast, hell even Azure, Rachel's house lion, got into the act."
"I assume that someone killed him, sir," Destrang said when Herzer was clearly done.
"Oh, yes," Herzer smiled, looking at the young man. "Duke Edmund. Well, not killed, paralyzed."
"You, sir?" Van Krief asked. "How?"
"Young lady, before the Fall I was, in all modesty, the finest medieval armor and weapons replica maker on earth," Edmund said, smiling at her. "It would have been silly indeed for me not to have weapons and armor that could overcome anything Dionys, or that ham-handed hack Fukyama, could come up with. I made better stuff than that when I was your age." He chuckled and shook his head, looking out the window.
"So that's the story of how I lost my hand," Herzer said, holding the prosthetic up and flexing it. "And afterwards, Duke Edmund, who as he has so humbly noted is something of a smith, made this for me. It slices, dices and makes julienne fries. Also useful for properly marking papers." He made a shredding motion, exposing the sharpened hooks within the prosthetic. "Practically invulnerable to corrosion as well. Thanks so much."
"You're welcome," Edmund replied.
"Not particularly heroic," Herzer continued, "all I did was slow the bastard down for a half a minute or so. Bast slowed him down even longer."
"And who is Bast?" Destrang said. "Other than an Egyptian cat-goddess."
"I'd almost forgotten that." Herzer laughed.
"Bast is Herzer's girlfriend," Edmund said. "One of them, anyway."
"Excuse me," Herzer replied, miffed. "With all due respect, General, sir, she was your girlfriend long before she was mine."
"Your girlfriend is the duke's age?" Ensign Van Krief blurted.
"Oh, much older," the duke replied. "We old folk can get pretty spry, young lady."
"Sir, I didn't mean . . ." the ensign replied, flustered.
"I know you didn't," Edmund grinned. "That's the problem with being a boss, you have to be careful what you joke about. That was a joke."
"Yes, sir," Van Krief said, smiling. "Sorry."
"Bast is an elf," Herzer said. "Actually, what she calls a wood elf. She was created during the AI wars. And, yes, we sometimes share a bed."
"Or a patch of moss," Edmund said. "Or a rock. Or standing up. Or in the water. . . ."
"Milord Duke," Herzer said, sweetly. "You recall what you just said about being the boss? And at the moment, you're not wearing your magic armor so if you'd like to make it to the fleet base in one piece . . ."
"I don't care how big you are," Edmund replied, smiling and looking out the window. "Age and treachery beats youth and innocence all the time."
"Sure, boss, but you've been training me in treachery for the last four years," Herzer pointed out, reasonably. "So as I was saying about Bast. Bast is Bast. She's incredibly beautiful, incredibly uncaring about appearances, irreverent, funny and the most deadly individual I know. I've seen her gut orcs, ixchitl and orcas with equal ease. She's the best bowman I know, as well, and the best dancer. She flies a dragon as if she was born on one and flies them bareback, which is no joke let me tell you. She's a couple of thousand years old and looks, and sometimes acts, fourteen. I'm honored to occasionally share her bed. Or, as Duke Edmund put it, a patch of moss, a beach, a rock, whatever."
"Oh," Van Krief said, looking thoughtful.
"She's also been gone for a year or more," Herzer continued. "And she might turn up in another year, or a decade, expecting that we'll take up where we left off as if she had never been gone. Or she might be standing by the side of the road on the way to the conference, expecting to hitch a ride. Sometimes I expect her at any moment. Like . . . now," he ended sadly.
"God, I hope not," Edmund muttered.
"As I said," Herzer said with a grin. "She's often quite irreverent. I'm sure she would scandalize the admirals."
"I'm thinking of the admirals' wives," Edmund muttered again, looking out the window with a pained expression.
"Are you . . . monogamous, sir?" Destrang asked, clearly not looking at the ensign at his side.
"No," Herzer replied. "I don't know if Bast is when she's gone or not, I wouldn't bet one way or the other. I certainly don't expect her to be and I'm not even when she's around. Nor does she encourage me to be or even discourage other liaisons. She's . . . incredibly open about sex and as uninterested in conventions about it as she is in all the rest of the rules she breaks." He grinned and shrugged. "The term 'drunkard's dream' comes to mind."
"Sounds like it," Tao said.
"Mine," Herzer replied with a grin. "Or not. Bast is entirely Bast's. As she has said before, she will still be young when I die of old age, assuming I last that long. But if you ever meet her, don't think that you'll woo her. She walks in and points and crooks a finger. She's quite immune to charm, dislikes it in fact."
"I've met elves," Van Krief said, suddenly. "She doesn't sound like any elf I've met."
"She's not a high elf," Edmund replied. "Which is who you have met before. I'm not sure there are any other wood elves besides Bast. She might even have been a one off, rather than a production model."
"You make it sound as if she was made in a factory," Tao said. "I thought the elves were a Change race, like the mer."
"An assumption that, if you ever make it in one's hearing, will get you a very cold shoulder indeed," Duke Edmund replied, seriously. "The elves are a race of created super-warriors. They were made by the North American Union when it was facing a series of small, ugly wars, in the days leading up to Consolidation. It was discovered in the early twenty-first century that humans produce an internal sedative in response to stress. The best of the warriors of Norau had limited uptake of the sedative. Since they didn't panicÑor succumb to post-stress syndromeÑboth of which could lead to unpleasantness and atrocities in combatÑthe elves were created with enhanced production." He grinned faintly and looked out the window. "But they're not Changed. They're not even vaguely human, for all they look that way."
"If the elves ever got a case of the ass," Herzer warned, "humans would be extinct in short order. And if you ever piss one off, personally, cut your own throat. It'll be quicker and far more pleasant."
"That explains the elves I met," Van Krief said, her eyes glazing a bit at the memory. "They were so . . . calm. Delightfully calm."
"Drugged to the gills," Herzer said, chuckling. "But, yes, they are intelligent and beautiful and delightfully calm."
"Sir," Destrang said, greatly daring. "Charles . . . he had . . ."
"Pointed ears," Edmund said, nodding. "Dionys had pushed the protocols as far as he could to add elven enhancements. Further, really. He was protected and aided, although we didn't know it at the time, by Marshal Chansa, then one of Paul's faction on the Council and now the head of the Ropasan armed forces."
"The one time I saw an elf pissed was at McCanoc," Herzer said. "That was before the Fall. I don't know what happened to him after, though?"
"Had to be Gothoriel," Edmund said. "he was the Rider of the Eastern Reach, basically the guy that the Lady left out in this area of Norau to make sure we weren't getting up to too much mischief. He got cut off by the Fall when the Lady closed Elfheim. I haven't seen him, but Bast said she had."
"Elfheim, General?" Tao said. "I'm starting to get one of my headaches."
"Too much for you, Ensign?" Edmund said with a grin. "Elfheim is an artificial dimension that the elves opened when they decided that living in the world was just too dangerous all around. Humans never really took to elves very well, and vice versa. Too many differences. Things that enrage humans the elves care less about and things that enrage elves humans tend to be able to ignore. The Lady withdrew and so did the majority of the elves. There's no proscription, though, they can come and go, at least they could until the recent unpleasantness. Then the Lady turned off the portals to Elfheim and stated that there would be no transfer in either direction. This cut off her eyes among the humans, as well."
"Are they on our side, sir?" Tao asked.
"No, son, they're not," Edmund said. "But they're not on the side of New Destiny, either. I'm not really sure I want them on our side; they're too likely to do things for reasons I don't understand. But I know I don't want them fighting for New Destiny. Can't imagine they would. But if New Destiny wins, if they manage to capture all the power systems and take over the world, you can bet they'll try to take the Lady on. That will be a battle to watch. Of course, at that point we'll all be dead or Changed."