Scepters (49 page)

“Sand.
I didn’t see any just to the north.”

“We
don’t know of any. Now… there are three knolls where they would have a clear
line of fire at the fort and the defenses…”

Despite
his tiredness and his doubts about the Matrites being obliging enough to attack
where the Southern Guard forces were, Alucius forced himself to follow every
word Omaryk spoke, and to relate mentally each position to the map.

On
Quinti, Alucius was up before dawn, riding along the ring road on the far side
of the coast road gap and fortifications. He rode alone because he wanted a
better feeling for the land, the emplacements, and even for any sense of
Talent. He also rode by himself because he had felt so hemmed in by everything,
by so many lancers and officers all around, by the situation, and by the
feeling that he was being pushed toward something whether he wanted to go or
not. He laughed softly. He’d chosen to be pushed, even if he’d had little real
choice. Perhaps that was what upset him—the feeling that even his choices were
constricted so tightly that they weren’t really choices, but a matter of
picking the lesser evil.

The
first thing he felt as he rode out was a sense of deadness underneath the land.
The land he saw, the grasses, the animals—their lifeforces were much the same
as anywhere, but somewhere, around two to three yards beneath the surface,
there was little life, as if it had once been wiped away. Whatever had happened
had taken place a long time ago, certainly at least at the time of the Cataclysm,
if not before.

He
rode slowly looking toward the north and the northwest, but he saw little
except for the land and what lay upon it and the Lanachronan patrols and
sentries. Someone must have passed some word about the Northern Guards, because
while guards scrutinized him, not a one challenged him. Nowhere did he sense
any form of Talent, nor the lifethreads of large numbers of lancers—except
where the Lanachronan forces were posted along the ring road. The ring road
itself remained stone-paved as it slowly arced to the southwest, but less than
two vingts to the west-southwest of where it intersected the coastal high road,
it narrowed from roughly eight yards to slightly less than six.

Alucius
continued to worry about the unspoken Lanachronan assumption that the Matrites
would attack the fortified points on the ring road. In some ways, that made
sense—if the Matrite goal was to reduce the fortifications and destroy the
Lanachronan forces. If Alucius had been designing the attack, he would have
simply bypassed the fortifications, taken the city, then attacked from inside
the ring road. The crystal spear-throwers were only marginally useful against
heavy stone, but highly effective against everything else.

On
the other hand, he reflected, the spear-throwers were so heavy that they had to
be moved on solid surfaces, and he doubted that they could be pulled up any
steep incline. That meant that they would either use the high road or find a
good side road that would allow them to move to a position where the ring road
was low in comparison to the surrounding land.

Four
vingts to the east of the coast road intersection he found a likely
possibility. The ring road had been cut across a long ridge that angled
northwest, descending on a gradual angle from the ring road. There were steep
gullies on either side of the ridge until it was more than a vingt away from
the ring road. At the road itself, those gullies had been filled in to create
both a wall and a support for the road. The base of the ridge was three vingts
to the northwest, and only a few hundred yards across a flat expanse separated
the lower end of the ridge from a narrow dirt road that looked to angle off the
coastal high road several vingts to the north.

The
whole distance could be covered at night, and by the time the Matrites were
discovered, unless sentries were posted down the ridge, they could hold the
ring road. If they used one of the spear-throwers to isolate the Lanachronan
forces, they could send forces to take Southgate bit by bit, and eventually
force either a Lanachronan pullout and retreat or the destruction of most of
the Lanachronan forces.

Alucius
spent almost half a glass studying the ridge, determining how his forces might
flank a possible assault in a way that would offer minimal exposure to the
spear-thrower.

On
the way back, he stopped on the west side of the high road from the main road
fort. For a time, he looked down at the heavy stone walls and iron-timbered
gates that felt ancient and had to have been constructed centuries before, if
not even earlier. After studying the fortifications, he doubted that the gates
and walls would see any action.

Then
he rode down the connecting ring road segment, across the high road, and up the
eastern traverse to the main road fort, where he tied the gray outside and made
his way inside and up the stairs to the marshaling hall and to the door to
Marshal Alyniat’s small study.

“Majer
Alucius, reporting to Marshal Alyniat, as ordered personally by the marshal.”

“Sir,
let me see if he’s ready to see you.” The guard turned and relayed Alucius’s
statement word for word.

“Have
him wait.”

The
words were muffled, but clear in intent.

Although
he could sense no one inside the chamber with the marshal, Alucius ended up
waiting more than half a glass. After his acts of the day before, he had half
expected something like that, foolish as it seemed to him.

At
the sound of a single rap on the inside of the door, the guard turned to
Alucius. “He’s ready to see you, sir.”

“Thank
you.”

Alucius
opened the door and stepped inside, closing the door behind him.

The
marshal looked up from the table desk and the maps spread across it. “I’d have
preferred to see you immediately,” Alyniat said with an open smile, and a sense
of amusement, “but this is Lanachrona, and if I did not make you wait some,
under the circumstances, every officer would be trying your techniques, Majer.”

“They
might have some difficulty with that, sir. They’re not herders.”

Alyniat
laughed. “That would not stop them from trying. And this morning was a good
morning for games, because the reports from the scouts show that the Matrites
will not reach the area within several vingts of the ring road before late
afternoon.”

“Yes,
sir. Have they seen the heavy wagons and the sand wagons that follow them?”

“I
asked for that information. There are two such wagons. One is coming down the
Fola road. The other is on the road from Zalt. They must have used another road
to bypass our forces. The weapon on the Zalt road was used to take out half a
company whose captain thought that he was attacking a Matrite supply caravan. I
would have reprimanded him for not understanding the instructions, but since he’s
dead, I’ll merely be passing on the information at officer’s call this morning.
You will be here, and, for now, you’re a brevet majer-colonel.” Alyniat turned
to his writing table and picked up the two collar insignia—a four-pointed star
crossed with a single sabre. “Those are Southern Guard insignia, but I can only
brevet you in the Southern Guard. The sabre point is to the outside.”

“Thank
you, sir.”

“You’ll
perform to the rank, I’m certain.” Alyniat’s wry smile dropped away. “I don’t
need details, but I’m presuming that, as with all your other accomplishments,
you’ll need your force to get you to the point where you and some of your
Northern Guards can actually do what needs to be done.”

“Effectively…
yes, sir.”

“That’s
one aspect of your demeanor you should keep, Colonel. There’s nothing saved by
indirection, except confusion. Do you need any special supplies?”

“No,
sir. We could use some extra grain for the mounts, if it can be spared. They’ve
ridden a long ways in a short time. But… sir, I’ve done some scouting, and I
have some concerns that the Matrites may not attack directly from the high
roads.”

“That’s
possible. Where do you think they might attack?”

“I
don’t know all the possibilities, sir, but there’s a ridge some four vingts to
the southwest on the ring road. The slope is flat enough, and the ground looks
hard enough that they could attack from there.”

“Four
vingts? I know the place. I have my doubts that they would move that far from
the forts. They don’t just want the city. They want to smash us.”

“Yes,
sir.”

“You
have that doubting agreement, Colonel. I’ll make you a wager. You post a watch
there, and I’ll wager that they’ll see nothing.”

“If
I have your approval, sir, I’ll take that wager.”

Alyniat
laughed. “I’ll tell the other colonels that you’ll be watching special areas
for unusual activities. But… if we get attacked elsewhere, I want your forces
ready to support or do what you need to do to take out the crystal
spear-throwers.”

“Yes,
sir. Except that we can only attack one at a time, and I can’t break off
dealing with one crystal spear-thrower to deal with another.”

Alyniat
frowned, then nodded, his fingers drumming on the table for several moments
before he spoke. “I can’t gainsay that. I just hope we don’t need you in two
places at once.”

So
did Alucius.

“I’ll
make sure that the majer of quartermasters takes care of the feed. You were out
riding this morning. Did you find anything else that I should know? “

“Not
yet, sir.”

“Report
to me every morning until we move into actual fighting. Is there anything else?”

“No,
sir.”

“You
may go. Until officers’ call.”

“Yes,
sir.”

Less
than half a glass later, Alucius stood at the north end of the marshaling hall,
in the front rank with two older majer-colonels, neither of whom he had met.

Alyniat
stood in front of the close to fifty officers. He began speaking without
preambles. “First… the Matrite forces were still more than fifteen vingts to
the north as of midafternoon yesterday, and the latest reports show that they
have moved less than five vingts southward… appears that both crystal
spear-throwers are being moved… Colonel Alucius has joined our forces with three
companies trained to deal with them… His force has ridden from Hyalt… defeated
the prophet there and put down the revolt… only group so equipped, and can only
deal with one at a time… will need to step up scouting as the Matrites
approach…

“That’s
all for the moment. Colonel Cyrosyr and Colonel Korynst—I’ll brief you each
individually immediately after dismissal. I’ve already briefed Colonel Alucius.”

Just
like that, Alyniat had announced that Alucius was one of the top three colonels
in the force, without even directly saying so. The faintest smile crossed
Alucius’s lips. Alyniat’s actions reminded Alucius that he had much to learn
about the politics of lancer operations, but he wouldn’t worry about those
aspects greatly—not until he’d dealt with the Matrites’ spear-throwers. If he
didn’t find a way to destroy the two supremely lethal weapons, he certainly
wouldn’t have to worry about the political aspects of anything.

Sexdi
was much the same as Quinti had been, with no sign of the Matrites from the
ring road. Alucius checked his maps and sent Waris, Elbard, Rakalt, and Bakka
to check the ring road for other possible Matrite attack points. None found
others as promising as the one Alucius located, but they did not go farther
east than the intersection with the road to Zalt. While a second major attack
might well take place farther east, he could cover only so much of the ring
road from where they were stationed. He could only hope that any obvious
movement of even more Matrite lancers and the spear-throwers would precede such
an attack. The reports that Alyniat provided indicated that the bulk of the
Matrite forces remained near the two main high roads.

That
could and would change, Alucius was convinced, but until it did, he saw no
point in moving his own forces blindly. They could use a day of not riding, and
so could their mounts. In the meantime, he also established a scouting pattern
and rotation for the ridge area, then worked out a rough pattern of attack—if
the Matrites did as he thought they might.

As
Alyniat had wagered, the main Matrite force moved slowly down the high roads
toward Southgate, so slowly that, by sunset on Sexdi, the main body was still
on the coastal high road, a good seven vingts north of the ring road. A
slightly smaller Matrite force was on the southwest high road six vingts
northeast. Had Alucius been planning an attack of the sort he had envisioned,
the Matrites were close to where he would have been. So far as Alucius could
determine, there was no absolute proof that the Matrites would attack either as
he had expected or as Alyniat had, but Alucius was wagering that the Matrites
would not begin with a direct assault.

While
the two other senior colonels had small rooms in the road fort, Alucius had
decided to sleep in the field, where he could rouse and move his forces
quickly.

His
plan was based on what he had seen and learned years before. The spear-thrower
had felt totally dead until it was put into operation, and that meant that
Alucius couldn’t count on using his Talent against it until the Matrites
powered up the weapon. He didn’t know when that might be, but it was likely
that wouldn’t happen until the weapon was close to the ring road. He hoped his
guesses were correct. He’d planned his attack that way, although the details of
what he intended were not something he was sharing, beyond telling his officers
and squad leaders that there was a special attack force. He wasn’t saying that
he was the attack force.

On
Sexdi evening, he’d gone over the contingent battle plans with his officers
until he was certain they understood. He hoped they did, but he was uncertain
about Deotyr.