A submachine gun resting on his lap, Gulthar Kro rode in a commandeered Smoleni bus, sitting next to the driver, where he could see out. He'd selected twenty two-man teams, men who might at least attempt to carry out their mission, while leaving the unit most of its officers and sergeants.
For ten days he'd worked the selected teams in the forest, making sure they could use a compass and read and follow maps. He'd made competitions of it, and before the ten days were over, the men were competent and confident. Each man wore a captured Smoleni uniform; each team had a book of forest maps taken from the captured headquarters of the Smoleni Forest Survey, maps showing the major variations in forest types, every creek and pond, and every open fen larger than perhaps twenty acres, which gave them many reference points to guide on.
Finding Burnt Woods was entirely feasible with them. The question was, how many would do it. Because it was also feasible to desert now, hike westward to the Raging River and cross it on a raft or stolen boat, or even travel eastward to the border with Oselbent. He guessed that perhaps half would try for Burnt Woods. They'd been shown a sketch map of the village, with the president's house marked, and the general's, and each team had been assigned a primary target. When they got there, they'd have to play it by ear.
They'd been shown where, on the appropriate forest map, the merc headquarters was, too, but he hadn't assigned its commander to anyone. No one knew what he looked like or what tent was his, and anyway it seemed to Kro that it would simply waste a team to try for him.
The bus had taken them west along a graveled east-west connecting road, and he'd dropped off team after team at intervals marked on the maps. The first stage of the troop pull-back had been completed, and tomorrow this road would be left to the Smoleni, too. Not that they'd get any good of it; every farmstead along the road would be burned, as well as the sole village.
Now Kro was the only man left on the bus besides the driver, who'd turned it around on an old roadside log landing and was driving back eastward. Kro watched through the windshield for a landmark, and when he saw it, told the driver to stop.
He turned to the man before stepping out the door. "When you get back," he said, "tell your commander I gave you a message for the general—an important message that he's gawta get." He stopped, waiting for the man to digest that, then went on. "Tell him I'm gawn north too. And with enough luck, I'll be back.
"You got that?"
When the man had repeated it to him, Kro nodded, stepped off the bus, and disappeared into the forest. The merc commander was his target, his alone.