The Tide of Victory

He paused for an instant, giving Maurice a level gaze. The chiliarch tightened his lips and looked away. Years earlier, when Maurice had been training a brilliant but inexperienced Thracian officer, he had convinced the youth to adopt the logistical methods of the great Philip of Macedon. Use mules as much as possible for his supply train, instead of the cumbersome wagons preferred by other Roman armies. The methods had proved themselves in action since, over the course of many campaigns.

"Still . . ." he grumbled, staring at that portion of the map which showed the terrain in question. "We don't know how good the foraging will be. Mules can only carry so much, and you have to use some wagons for the artillery supplies. And if that territory is all that fertile, you can be sure the Malwa will have plenty of troops stationed there."

Belisarius scratched his chin. "I doubt it, Maurice. Not now. The Malwa commanders have probably pulled most of their soldiers back to the river. They'll be expecting us to use the Indus as our marching route, not the Nara. The more so since—"

He fell silent, groping for a way to explain. Over the years, fighting Link, Belisarius had come to have a certain sense for how the monster's mind worked. The same superhuman intelligence imparted to Link by those "new gods" of the future was also, often enough, a gap in its armor.

Aide understood. It always knows so much, but the knowing comes from recorded history. Not experience. And it doesn't listen, really. It hears, but it does not pay attention. Because it "knows" already. History—the records Link will have, which are the same as I do—will tell it that the Indus valley is largely arid. But that's because of the environmental degradation caused by the later centuries of human habitation. Its subordinates may have told it otherwise, but . . .

The thought trailed off for a moment, then came back as firm as ever. It will not really think about it. I have been surprised myself, many times, by how much more life there is in lands which my "knowledge" told me was half-barren. But I am not Link. I do not think the way it does. So I have learned to listen, not just hear.

Belisarius nodded. To his subordinates, the gesture carried that certain solid air about it which they had come to recognize and respect deeply even if they were not privy to its origin. Aide agrees with me.

"I doubt they stationed a large force there to begin with," he stated firmly. His officers, recognizing the weight of Aide's opinion which nestled inside that confident statement, nodded their acceptance. Even Maurice.

The chiliarch sighed. "All right, then. But we should take all the mitrailleuse with us. And all the sharpshooters." He gave Mark of Edessa, standing well back in the tent, a glance of approval. "They've been trained as dragoons, so they'll be able to keep up."

Belisarius eyed him skeptically. Maurice snorted. "All of them, dammit. Ashot will be counter-besieging the Malwa at Sukkur, with a supply route as wide as the Indus—literally—and a fortified position guarded by our entire infantry once Bouzes and Coutzes arrive."

Another look of approval came to Maurice's face, as he thought of the twin brothers who, in the course of the Mesopotamian and Zagros campaigns, had hammered Belisarius' infantry into shape. If there was one thing in the world that Maurice treasured, it was veteran troops. True, most of the soldiers in the gigantic Roman army which was now taking the war to the Malwa were recent recruits, pouring into military service in hopes of sharing the spoils which smaller armies of the famous Belisarius had gleaned from earlier campaigns. But every branch of that army had been built around a core of veterans, experienced against the Malwa.

Bouzes and Coutzes' Syrian infantry and cavalry, Gregory's artillerymen, Felix's musketeers and pikemen, Mark of Edessa's new force of sharpshooters, Belisarius' own Thracian bucellarii directly commanded by Maurice himself—and, not least, the magnificent Greek cataphracts who had broken the Malwa at Anatha and the Dam, and held off Rana Sanga's ferocious cavalry charges at the Battle of the Pass.