Firemask: Book Two of the Last Legion Series (5 page)

Jasith hesitated for a bare instant, then said, “It’s better than the alternatives. And I could use a drink.”

“Who said it’s better?” Lonrod said. “I don’t plan on hitching to anyone ‘til I’m an old maid, maybe twenty-five, no matter what Daddy wants or what rich prick he tries to shove down my throat.”

She giggled. “I didn’t mean what I said to come out like that.”

Jasith managed a smile, looked around, saw no one was in earshot.

“Karo, can I ask you something?”

“Surely. Perhaps I’ll even give you an answer.”

“You went out with Loy.”

“I did.” There was sudden caution in the other woman’s voice.

“What’s he like in bed?”

Karo blinked at Jasith.

“You mean you don’t know?”

“No,” Jasith said, not looking at her friend. “I wanted to, but he said he wouldn’t, not with the woman he was going to marry.”

“Oh boy.”

“What does that mean?”

“I don’t know what it means,” Lonrod said. “But I didn’t know there was anybody in our group that won’t screw anything that comes in range. Did he say why?”

“No. He just said it was real important to him.”

“That’s weiiiird,” Karo said. “But ‘kay, if that’s the way he thinks. He’s ‘kay in the rack. Isn’t as creative as some, but he stays there ‘til you go off, at least.

“But he isn’t one of those go-all-night wonders like a couple you and I could remember.”

Jasith’s serious expression dissolved, and she giggled.

“As long as you asked me,” Lonrod said. “What was that soldier boy you were going out with like? And why’d you dump him?”

Jasith’s laughter stopped suddenly.

“I don’t really want to talk about him,” she said. “But I’ll tell you why I couldn’t stay with Garvin. Just thinking about him reminded me of all that blood, and the shooting, and what happened to Daddy.”

“I don’t track,” Karo said. “He didn’t start the war.”

“I don’t know,” said Jasith. “But I couldn’t think of going to bed with him after that. I don’t know why. Maybe …” she let her voice trail off.

Lonrod looked at Jasith closely.

“Are you sure this whole thing is that good an idea?” Her hand swept the temple, the twenty people waiting for the rehearsal to resume.

“I’ve got to get married sometime, don’t I? And Loy’s surely the kind of man my father’d want me to marry, isn’t he?”

“Oh, no question about that,” Lonrod said hastily. She was about to say more, caught herself.

“It’s too hot to be serious,” she said. “Let’s go see if anybody’s got anything cold in their lims.”

• • •

Three days out, the patrol reached the steep slopes that led to the Highlands. Already it was cooler than it had been in the lowlands, a chill wind blowing down from the heights.

So far, no one had quit, even though Garvin had been pushing them hard, giving them only three hours of sleep, and running regular night exercises.

He pointed up and stepped out of the line, then motioned to that day’s patrol leader, Abana Calafo, a small cheerful teenager who let nothing bother her, who — Garvin knew — would make it through the training. She came close.

“Straight up,” he whispered. “Rope up.” A standing joke was you could tell an I&R troop because she’d follow SOP of no sound in the field, and whisper at her own wedding.

She nodded, went to the point man and whispered the procedure. Garvin waited, looking impatient, secretly glad for the chance to wheeze a little before further exertion, while the patrol unrolled the climbing rope each wore around his or her waist, tied in, and started the ascent, which was just steep enough to be interesting if the climber slipped.

Darod Montagna, next to last in line, moved past him, exhausted eyes sunk deeper in her gray face, but still determined, took a deep breath, and began climbing.

The last man was Baku al Sharif, a solid block of a ‘Raum. Garvin saw him watching Montagna’s buttocks with a mildly interested expression.

The combat knife flashed from Garvin’s sheath, cut the rope linking al Sharif and Montagna.

“You’ve got too much energy, troop,” he whispered. “It’s too slick, and the rope broke. You get to solo on up … that way.”

“That way” was a steep, brush-choked ravine.

Al Sharif’s lips pursed, and he glared at Jaansma.

“A little hard?” Garvin suggested. “It gets to you. Yahweh knows I understand. You know, you don’t have to put up with this crap. I could hit the com right now, get a Grierson inbound, and an hour from now you’d be in a nice hot shower back at Mahan, getting a real meal instead of this dried crud.

“Then sleep. Nice white sheets, quiet, and maybe a three-day pass on the beach to recover from this stupid shit.”

Al Sharif looked at Garvin coldly.

“Screw you. Boss.”

He pushed his way into the brush, started clambering up the face.

Jaansma laughed.

That’d be at least two that’d make it.

He grunted, and started up the slope. He looked up, saw Montagna climbing just above him, thought,
She does have sort of a cute butt, pity you can’t socialize with anybody you’re in charge of.
Then he realized he hadn’t thought of Jasith at all that day.

• • •

“Y’see what you’re gonna be missing?” the man shouted at Loy Kouro over the band’s blare, waving at the three strippers onstage, who were down to scarves and smiles.

Kouro owled at them, picked up his glass, and upended it in the general area of his mouth, half of the contents making its way down his throat.

“Nup, nup, Jermy,” he said, weaving a bit in his seat. “Th’ time for that’s pissed … passed … gone.”

“Not yet it isn’t,” his friend said. “Tomorrow, you stand up, take th’ vows, an’ you’ve got to become a good boy … or anyway not get caught bein’ bad. Bad, bad, bad. Won’t be able to do what we used to do with the girlies. Wouldn’t want Jasith pissed at me, I wouldn’t.”

He winked elaborately, sloppily refilled Kouro’s glass with a mixture from three of the bottles on the table. Somebody wove past, grabbed the glass, disappeared with it. Jermy cursed, found another glass, dumped its contents out on the rug, and began rebuilding a drink.

“Look around, m’friend. Nothin’ but your Mends here.”

The club was, indeed, packed with young Rentiers: some actually Kouro’s friends, the others wise enough to want to stay on the good side of the planet’s biggest publisher.

“Th’ girls finish up, an’ they’ll be over d’rectly,” Jermy promised. “An’ there’s a room upstairs, an’ you can go on up with any of ‘em you want. Hell, all of ‘em if you want. There’s more ordered up, arrivin’ in a bit.

“Better make it a night to remember.”

“Nup, nup, nup,” Kouro said. “That’d be dishonest, bein’ untrue. I’d sure be pissed off if Jasith was runnin’ around on me.

“Time I grew up, anyway. Got to be like Hank Sank.”

“Huh?”

“An old Earth play. By somebody or other. Couple plays, actually. Henry Vee, which stands for five in some old-timey language. This guy’s a prince … that’s next to a king … and he’s a wild hair until he gets the throne, and then he becomes a great … greaaaat … warrior. Wins the Battle of Hastings or some-such. Long time since my father made me read it.

“He’s gone, now, and I’ve got to do what he’d want me to do. Marry good, think about havin’ kids, keep the dynasty going.”

“Gods, man, you’re not gonna turn into a dreek, are you?”

“Got to grow up sometime.”

“Who says?”

Kouro didn’t answer, but reached for the drink. He overbalanced, fell facefirst into a pool of liquor. After a moment, he began snoring loudly.

Jermy stared at him.

“Poops out at his own party. Hafta come up with some stories about what really happened for tomorrow morning, when he’s real hungover and needs some shame.” He stood, waved at the stage.

“Hey, girls! Hey. The party boy’s out, but there’s somebody over here still able to show you a good time!”

• • •

A foot tapped Garvin’s boot, and he forced himself awake, ignored groaning muscles, and tried to look alert and eager. The patrol lay in a large star formation, legs almost touching.

This was the day they’d “make contact,” or, in reality, reach the abandoned Musth base.

Garvin tried to decide if the mist was coming down hard enough to qualify as rain, decided it was, and that he hadn’t been this wet since the last time he went to the field.

He was incredibly dirty — they’d been out … and he had to count on his fingers … ten days now, and other than streams or when the near-constant mist became a drencher, nobody had bathed, and everybody wore the same combat fatigues they had on when they came off the Grierson. At least Jaansma had three pair of socks, one pair on his feet, another pair tied to his backpack being “washed” by the rain, the third just in the top of his pack supposedly drying.

This was the I&R way, and again he wondered why the company never seemed to lack for volunteers, had an even greater wonderment about why he remained in the unit.

Darod Montagna was again patrol leader, and made the mission briefing. Garvin had given her the data on where the patrol was and the situation posited by the exercise the night before, and now listened to her break it down.

Everyone listened intently, fingers moving from point to point on their maps. No one wrote anything down — a lost or captured map could doom them all if this were real.

“When we reach the target area,” Montagna went on, “Alpha Element goes on line, and I’ll indicate which way Bravo goes, left or right. Bravo will sweep the area, Alpha giving support fire. When the area’s secured, Alpha moves across the area, and both elements reassemble.

“If there is contact, each of you fires one unit of ammo. If the enemy’s stronger than we are, I’ll give the order, and we break contact, go for the RP …”

She gave the map coordinates of the rendezvous point, went on, “… commo … support … chain of command.” She finished, looked at Garvin.

“ ‘Kay,” he said briskly. “We eat, then move out. Now lemme give you the reality of what we’re coming on. It’s the old Musth headquarters, which’ll most likely be boarded up.

“You’re carrying live ammo, but pick a god to pray to if anybody rolls a ball out the muzzle for real and makes a hole in somebody else’s real estate. We’re not at war with the Musth, and it’d be real goddamned dumb for somebody to start it over a busted window when and if they come back.

“Same thing goes for souveniring, looting, or casual vandalism. The words are RTU if you do.”

RTU — Returned to Unit, the threat all of the trainees had been facing since they volunteered for Intelligence and Reconnaissance from their parent companies.

“Reality is we’ll sweep around the buildings, as Montagna said, then form up on the other side, call for pickup, and go home to a nice, hot bath.”

He hid a grin, wondering what the reaction would be when he told them sorrowfully that the Grierson had been driven off by enemy fire, and aw, hell, they’d just have to walk back, and how many trainees would just go flat and say “Screw it,” throwing away the last two E-months of sweat, strain, and not a little blood, not realizing they hadn’t come close to touching their last reserves, which was really what all the harassment and pressure of I&R training was supposed to teach.

Garvin reached in his pack, took out a block of something, put it in his mess tin, poured water from a canteen over it, and refilled the canteen from the rain trap he’d made with a small waterproof cloth. The block squiggled and became something moderately resembling a chunk of protein with something that might have been button fungi around it.

He doused the mixture with the hot sauce every experienced soldier carried, ate mechanically, scrubbed the small plate and his spoon with grass, and restowed everything in his pack.

“Any time you’re ready,” and the patrol moved off, feet squidging through the ankle-high waterlogged mosses, past the trees that rose like sentinels from the mist, through the marshland of the Highlands.

• • •

Music swept through the great temple, swirling around the packed benches, then died, and the orchestra lowered its instruments.

The Leader rose, walked to the podium, and his voice rolled forth:

“Brethren, this is a day of joy and happiness, for on this day, we celebrate, with our own bodies, the mystical union between the Creator and Ourselves, a day of wedding, an estate to be entered into soberly and with considered judgment.

“If there is any among you who knows of a reason these two should not come together in holy matrimony, let him speak now …”

• • •

The Musth building rose out of the mist, strange polygons apparently made of glass and onyx. They showed few signs of abandonment, nor any measures by the Musth to prevent damage. Here a panel was shattered from some Cumbrian animal’s curiosity, there a few moss-vines had begun twining up the walls.

Montagna signaled, and Alpha flattened in firing positions, weapons ready, even though the magazines were still tucked into their pouches.

Bravo came up, on command, moved forward, slowly, quietly.

Then one man went flat, flailed at the air with one hand, palm down, and the others obediently dropped, wondering what the hell was going on, if the goddamned
alt
was pulling some crappy game. The man signaled again, fist clenched, thumb pointing down.

Enemy in sight?

Garvin was about to start snarling, then a small box spun through the air toward them, and Jaansma saw a tawny paw disappear behind a building. The grenade hit, and small insectlike creatures swarmed out and flashed toward the nearest man. He screamed, clawed at himself, and died.

“Musth!” Garvin shouted, fumbled a magazine from his pouch, loaded his blaster.

“Load ‘em up!” was his command. “For real!”

A
devourer-weapon
chattered, and finger-sized bullets thudded into the peat, close to a trooper.

“Stop shooting, you Musth!” Garvin shouted. “We’re not attacking!”

Another blast came from another direction.

“Cease firing, goddamit! We’re not your enemies,” Garvin called again, even as his fingers found a blast grenade. His thumb reflexively clicked its timer four times, and he straight-armed it at the building.