Out of the Darkness

They both spoke Algarvian. It was the only tongue they shared. Sudaku was no Forthwegian. He and a good many others like him had attached themselves to Plegmund’s Brigade in the grim fighting during the breakout from the Mandelsloh pocket in the eastern Duchy of Grelz. No one had bothered to detach them since; the Algarvians had more important things to worry about. By now, some of the men from the Phalanx of Valmiera could curse fluently in Forthwegian.

And, by now, Sidroc had stopped worrying about the obvious fact that Sudaku and his countrymen were tall and blond and blue-eyed--were, in fact, every bit as Kaunian as the blonds from Forthweg whom Mezentio’s men massacred whenever they needed to. He did sometimes wonder why the Valmierans fought for Algarve. The reasons they’d given didn’t seem good enough to him-- but then, his own probably looked flimsy to them, too. All he really worried about was whether he could count on them in a tight place. He’d seen, again and again, that he could.

Sudaku asked, “Do we hear right? Are you promoted?”

“Oh. That.” Thinking about assailing the Unkerlanter bridgehead, Sidroc had almost forgotten about his new rank. “Aye, it’s true.”

“Good for you,” the Valmieran said. Sidroc shrugged. He didn’t know whether it was good or not, not really. Then Sudaku smiled a sly smile and added, “Now you will be able to tell Ceorl what to do.”

“Ah,” Sidroc said, and smiled. He hadn’t thought of that. He and the ruffian had been giving each other a hard time for a couple of years. Now, at last, he had the upper hand. Of course, if he rode Ceorl too hard, he was liable to end up dead in the attack on the bridgehead regardless of whether the Unkerlanters blazed him. Neither the Phalanx of Valmiera nor Plegmund’s Brigade worried overmuch about keeping hard cases from their ranks.

When Sidroc got back to his squad--his squad indeed, now--Ceorl greeted him with, “Well, here’s a fine outfit ruined.”

“Plegmund’s Brigade’s been in trouble ever since it took you in,” Sidroc retorted. But he went on, “We may be ruined, if we really do have to try and smash the Unkerlanter bridgehead. It won’t be easy. That job never is.”

Lieutenant Puliano hadn’t been joking. Sidroc wished it were otherwise. He didn’t get so much as the chance to sew his new insignia of rank to his tunic before he and the men with him got ordered forward. Some behemoths came with them. The beasts wore snowshoes to help them get over and through the drifts: an Unkerlanter notion that had dreadfully embarrassed the Algarvians the first winter of the war, and that Mezentio’s men had since stolen. Seeing behemoths with Algarvians aboard them raised Sidroc’s spirits. It proved the redheads were serious about this attack.

They also brought up egg-tossers to pound the Unkerlanter positions on the east side of the Skamandros. The pounding didn’t last long. All too soon, officers’ whistles shrilled. “Forward!” Puliano shouted, along with his fellow commanders. To his credit, he went forward, too. Algarvian officers led from the front, one reason Mezentio’s men needed so many replacements.

Sidroc ran past a few dead and dying Unkerlanters whose blood stained the snow. For a heady moment, he thought the attack might have surprised Swemmel’s soldiers. Then they struck back. Dragons--some of them painted Yaninan red and white--streaked over from the west side of the river. The Algarvians didn’t have nearly enough beasts in the air to hold them off. Despite the Algarvian behemoths stiffening the attack, far more Unkerlanter animals trudged forward to oppose them. As always, the Unkerlanters turned a bridgehead into a spiky hedgehog as fast as they could.

This time, they didn’t wait for the Algarvians to start killing Kaunians or Yaninans before striking back in kind. The ground shuddered beneath Sidroc’s feet. Violet flames shot up from it. Men shrieked. Behemoths bellowed in mortal agony. And, when the Algarvian mages did resort to their own murderous magic, it was to defend against what Swemmel’s sorcerers were doing, not to aid in the attack.

Crouching behind a great gray stone, Sidroc called out to Puliano: “We cannot do this.”

“We have to,” the Algarvian lieutenant answered. “If we don’t, they’ll futter us later.”

“If we do, they will futter us now,” Sidroc retorted.

He hoped Puliano would tell him he was full of nonsense, but the redheaded veteran only grimaced. Another attack did go in. The Unkerlanters held it off and beat it back. After that, sullenly, the Algarvians--and the Forthwegians and Valmierans and Grelzers and the handful of Yaninans who couldn’t stomach serving Swemmel--drew back. Sidroc knew what that meant. It meant trouble; Puliano was dead right. And it means we aren’t strong enough to stop the trouble, he thought. He shrugged a broad-shouldered shrug. He’d been in a lot of trouble in this war. What was once more?