Unicorn Point (32 page)

Sabreclaw had to commit to doing it right, lest she be sum marily removed from the action. “But an there be no other way, then—”

“Then blood,” Phoebe agreed. “Likely once thou dost put thy claw on the flag, and before thou canst rise beyond the range o’ their weapons, there be action. But before then, thou and thine be the meekest o’ sparrows.”

“Aye, and dragons after!” They were coming to terms with it, realizing that the blood would likely be only delayed, not aborted. “But how do we get close? That flag be in plain view, and the bats be not batty enough to leave it unguarded!”

“Precisely,” Phoebe agreed. “That be exactly why the sneak-snatch be necessary. Another squad will mount the overt attack, distracting the bats, whilst thou dost lead thy squad down under cover o’ the trees and through the chap arral—“ Here she paused to scratch a diagram in the dirt below her perch. “Needs must scurry like rats, wings furled, to pass this thicket, but the bats, assured we will not be there, will leave it unguarded or lightly guarded. Take out the guard silently and ferry through single file. Here there be water, an inlet o’ the Eastern Sea. Find the old tree fallen into it, and grasp the trunk o’ it and climb down into the water—”

“What?!”

“And under the water,” Phoebe continued relentlessly. “It be a well-known fact that most creatures believe that harpies hate water—”

“We do hate water!” Sabreclaw screeched.

 
“And lack the gumption to go near it. But the truth be that though harpies may have a strong and justified aversion to water, they be not afraid o’ it, and can handle it when the dictates o’ courage demand. Dost disagree?”

There were evidently a number in the Flock who wanted to disagree, but none did, oddly.

“By going under the water, canst pass where no bat expects,” Phoebe explained. “The inlet be narrow here, and the water fresh, so no saltsea predators be there. Hold breath, set claws in sunken tree, pull along, and the farthest branch be at a clutch o’ reeds the other side, concealment for emer gence. Crawl out unobserved, seek cover o’ nearby forest arm, and continue on toward the mountain bearing their flag.
 
Take ne’er to the air, and hide whene’er a bat shows, making no disturbance. Then, when there be no chance to get closer unobserved, make a mass rush for the flag, taking out all bats in range, and snatch it and wing for the sky and bring it back to join ours.” Phoebe fixed Sabreclaw with a steely gaze.
 
“Canst do?”

Sabreclaw hesitated, but realized that this was the way it had to be. “Can do,” she agreed. It was obvious that she dreaded the crawl under water, but saw the merit of the plan, and knew she had to prove that harpies weren’t afraid of anything.

“Then pick thy squad,” Phoebe said. “When the siege starts, take thy time, go down out o’ sight when none be watching, and let none see thee advance. The success o’ this siege be in thy claws, and the glory be thine an ye succeed.”

Sabreclaw set about selecting her squad of tough hens, and Phoebe went on to more routine matters. The remaining hens were assigned to offense and defense, and there was one sui cide squad who would make a determined raid on the enemy flag at about the time Sabreclaw’s squad was passing under the water, to draw the attention of the bats. It was all intended to seem conventional enough, as if harpies lacked the wit for innovation or subtlety, and with luck the bats would under estimate the opposition.

The siege began at noon, and would continue until settle ment. The harpies knew they had to win it by day, because the bats were supreme by night. But Phoebe figured to do it in the first hour; if her sneak ploy failed, they would be in deep droppings. She had rehearsed all the squads in their tasks; in addition to the flag defense and the flag offense, there were the mock oflense and the general defense to be seen to. Phoebe herself would hover above and go where needed to buttress a problem area.

She went forward with her lieutenants Hawktooth and Sa breclaw, to meet the bat leader Vodlevile, his son Vidselud, and a female bat. When the bats assumed their manforms, Phoebe was amazed. “Suchevane!” she screeched, recognizing the loveliest of all the vamps. “How earnest thou to be here? Methought thou wedded to the Red Adept!” For the alien from Proton-frame, Agape, had exchanged bodies with the unicorn Fleta eight years prior, and come to Phoebe for help, then gone on to the Red Adept, who had finally solved her problem. In the process Suchevane had gotten to know the Adept; she was beautiful and lonely, and he was powerful and lonely, and one thing had led to another, and now they had their mixedbreed son, Al. In the old days such a union would have been impossible, but the rovot and the ‘corn had shown the way.

“The Flock be short a member, so I returned,” Suchevane replied.

“But this be a siege!” Phoebe protested. “It be very like war. We dirty birds thrive on it, but thou dost be too delicate for aught like this.”

“Delicate? I raised the child o’ a troll!”

She had a point. “Well, the mayhem be but mock,” Phoebe said. “ ‘Twere else a shame to mangle thy pretty features.”

“Aye,” Suchevane agreed, smiling. Such was her beauty, despite her advancing age and state of motherhood, that the harpy minions were nauseated.

“Thou knowest the Adepts, human folk, and animals be watching,” Vodlevile said. “E’en as their magic nulls our weapons, it sends the image o’ this activity out. This be why none o’ us may contact other beyond the demarked region, lest they learn things illicitly.”

“Aye,” Phoebe screeched moderately. “We mean to win, an all will see how we do it. There be no rules o’ conduct here.”

“Save touching not thine own flag,” he said. “Then let us part now, and next we meet as combatants.”

“Aye,” she repeated. Then she and her minions flew back toward their flag, and he and his minions turned bat and returned to theirs.

“Easy pickings!” Sabreclaw screeched.

 
“Nay, that Vodlevile be a cunning one,” Hawktooth warned. “And that hussy, the bride o’ the troll—no good can come o’ the like o’ that.”

Phoebe was inclined to agree. Suchevane had not spent eight years with the Troll Adept without learning something about the applications of power. It would be best to take her out early, as well as Vodlevile and Vidselud, so as to render the enemy leaderless. Of course, the bats would be trying to do the same to them. “Watch thy tails,” she warned the other two. “We three be marked hens, now.”

“Aye,” they screeched in chorus.

“Ho’er through the fog and filthy air!” she screeched at the Flock as they rejoined it. It was the code for the start of hostilities. Immediately the hens launched up and out, screeching a splendid cacophony. Simultaneously the bats fountained up from their starting point; Phoebe saw the cloud of them, before it dissolved into its business formation and was hidden behind the trees.

Her squads went out as assigned. The Mock Attack Squad made a hullabaloo and flew forward toward the enemy. Be hind this noisy cover, the Flag Defense Squad went back and disappeared into the foliage of the big pine tree. The General Defense Squad faded into the brush between the other two.
 
The Sneak Attack Squad simply disappeared.
 
The bats came on without hesitation. Phoebe climbed high, out of range of arrows, and watched the unfolding engage ment. She saw the Mock Attack hens charging up and taking cover behind trees as they spied manforms; that way the spears and arrows could not catch them. The manform bats paused, naturally enough; they knew better than to charge past harpy infested trees, for the hens would spring out suddenly and claw their heads, blinding or killing them.
 
However, a number of bats were flying above the trees, getting beyond the first line of harpies. They were not landing near, to tackle the hens from the rear; they were going on toward the harpy flag. That didn’t worry Phoebe; the moment the bats approached it, the defensive harpies would fly up and snatch them. The bats could not get through in batform while there were defenders. They would have to eliminate the de fenders first.

The bats dropped to the ground part way there. Some of them became manforms, while others remained bats. What were they doing?

Soon enough, she saw. The manforms were using their weapons to cover the advancing batforms. A bat would fly forward; when a harpy napped up to snatch it, a manform would loose an arrow at the bird. That was dangerous!
 
“Messenger!” Phoebe screeched, and a hen assigned to this duty flapped up to join her. “Go tell the Defense Squad to go for the manforms instead. Three birds to a man; pounce from cover and destroy. Do not fly up into their arrows!” The messenger-hen flew down, and shortly was screeching the new orders. Phoebe watched as three charged one man form. He put an arrow through the first, but the other two came down on him and scratched his eyes out. Then they picked up a new third companion and went after the next manform. This one tried to change to batform and escape, but a hen snatched him out of the air and bit off his head. Of course these effects were more apparent than real, thanks to the magic of the Adepts, but it was evident that most of the dirty birds had forgotten that. The new defense was working!
 
Meanwhile the forward line of hens was making progress.
 
They were flitting from tree to tree, forcing the manforms to stay well clear of the trees, because within the region en closed by branches the smaller henforms were more deadly.
 
But then they came to a wide clearing, and here the weapons of the manforms dominated.

Phoebe realized that someone was liable to do something brave and stupid at this stage, so she sent another message:

“Cross that clearing not! Go round it! Worry not about the time it takes, just protect your tailfeathers!” For time was hardly of the essence; this was a mock attack, and the longer it distracted the enemy, the better. The detour around the clearing was actually an advantage.

She hoped that Sabreclaw’s genuine attack squad was mak ing progress. If it proceeded too slowly, it might be success ful—after the bats had won the siege. But she could not check on them; they did not exist, as far as the others were con cerned, until they struck by surprise.

The bats, having taken some losses, had regrouped, and now were advancing in a leapfrogging wedge formation. Sev eral bats would fly forward together, covered by several man forms with bows, and several other manforms protected the bowmen with spears. When the hens attacked, the bowmen got some at a distance, and the spearmen got some close, so the hens were taking heavy losses.

The Mock Offense was working its way around the clearing, as directed. But Phoebe realized that this was now working to the advantage of the bats, because their flag was not really threatened yet. They could deploy relatively few man forms to keep the hens in check, and that freed more bats for the active front nearer the harpy flag. No wonder the tide was turning!

But if she recalled the Mock Attack Squad, that would only free the remaining defensive bats, and they could fly forward faster than the harpies. That was no good. There were problems all around because they were short of personnel; the seven secret birds were sorely needed now! Soon the bats would be at the flag tree, and that was too close.
 
Phoebe realized that it was time for her to join the fray.
 
They had to hold off the bat attack until the Secret Squad could strike. If they could hold out long enough, they would win. If not—

She flew down toward the point of the bat wedge. It was a virtual phalanx; indeed, the spearmen carried small shields.
 
No wonder the hens were having the worst of it! How could she break this up? A direct charge would be ruinously costly; three or four or five hens would be dispatched for every man form they took out. But if they did not interfere with the phalanx, it would reach the tree, and then there would be overwhelming bat force surrounding the harpy flag.
 
She scratched the ground of her mind, searching for an answer—and turned up a risky but promising ploy. If the hens could hide, and let the phalanx march right into the ambush, then they could attack from within the cover of the shields, too close for arrows or spears to have effect. They could wreak horrible havoc before the bats reorganized.
 
She came to ground well ahead of the phalanx, out of its sight. Her beady eye had spied a small gully that would do for her purpose. “Hens!” she screeched with minimal vol ume, so that her voice would not carry to the sharp-eared bats. “Here to me!”

Soon she had half a dozen harpies clustered around her.
 
“That batty phalanx be destroying us,” she whisper screeched. “Needs must we get inside it. Its path be by here; this be the clearest approach to our flag-tree. Hunch down, within this gully, fill it with your bodies, and I will scratch dirt o’er you, and leaves. They will take it to be a level approach. When you feel the weight o’ their passage, burst up within their formation and scratch them to pieces fast as e’er you can! They will turn and finally wipe you out; this be a suicide mission. But remember that it be only till siege-end; then all be undone, and all be heroes. Meanwhile see how many each can take out. An it be enough, it will preserve our flag and our victory.”

She was an effective screecher, because of her fright-wig; they quickly agreed and huddled down into the gully, their gross bodies filling it from side to side. Each hen spread her wings enough to hold up some dirt. Phoebe scratched earth and leaves and twigs over them desperately, cursing every root that inhibited her, trying to get them covered before the bats arrived and saw what was going on. Then she saw that she had a scraped area of ground that could be a giveaway, so she had to go farther afield and scratch a shower of dry leaves across that. The whole thing seemed too obvious; they would catch on, and poke their spears into the ground ahead, and wipe out the lurking hens before they could get started!
 
What could she do? She couldn’t call on the hens hidden in the tree; they were the last-ditch defense of the flag. All her other hens were occupied elsewhere. She needed some kind of distraction, so the batmen wouldn’t notice the scuffled ground until too late.