On his side of the road was forest. On the other side lay a field, and beyond it more forest, all deep in snow. Kelmer Faronya tromped a place for himself in forty inches of it, then released the toe-bindings of his skis and stood one of them upright. With the other he swept the snow from the leaning trunk of a blowndown jall and clambered onto it, steadying for balance against a stout branch stub. From there he had a view of the troops moving south along the road. The Smoleni wore army green. Rifles slung, one company after another skied by, as silently as an army ever moves. Occasionally Kelmer murmured to his camera, sometimes narrating, sometimes verbally switching it off or on. After several minutes he cut it off, and waited till he saw the guidon of Battery C, one of 7th Regiment's howitzer batteries, the last unit before the sleigh column. Then he switched the camera back on and watched them pass, their guns with the wheels mounted on broad flat runners.
The sleigh column came into view behind it. The horses were not in good condition, though better than they may have looked to most eyes. They were shaggy against the season's cold, and unkempt like the old men who drove them. And somewhat gaunt, which was particularly undesirable in winter; it had been most of a year since they'd tasted grain.
Fortunately for the horses, the weather was mild. Just then, in early afternoon, it was about twenty-five degrees, not a lot below freezing. Had the weather been severe, it would have been much harder on them than it was.
The sleighs they drew were mismatched and crude, their runners and bunks rough-sawn timbers, or in some cases ax-hewn. Their cargo boxes were partly of boards, but mostly of slabs with bark on one side. Just now the cargo on each was only a pile of hay bales. They'd started out with more, had eaten some and left others in piles along the road for the return trip—hopefully a return trip. The cargo boxes would hold other than hay then, if things went well.
He watched the whole long column pass, 114 logging sleighs drawn by 228 horses, with a small herd of spare horses trailing. When they were by, Kelmer jumped down and donned his skis again. All he had to do now was pass the entire sleigh column and most of the brigade, and catch what was temporarily his outfit—Headquarters Company of the Smoleni Army's 2nd Brigade. Before dark if he could.
The Iryalan 1st Battalion was along, but operating at a little distance. And with the brigadier's ready agreement, Romlar had detailed Kelmer to 2nd Brigade, had said it was more important to get cubeage of the column than of the troopers in this raid, at least until the sleighs were loaded and the return underway. Kelmer felt a certain resentment at this—to him it seemed rejection—but mostly he felt relief. Around regimental headquarters, he'd felt a deep current of excitement, as if they'd be going into some particular and unusual danger. Which it seemed to him could only mean they expected to fight the T'swa. And if, in the past, he'd felt a deep visceral fear of combat, he'd added to it now an intellectual fear. For he'd gained a wife, someone he very much wanted to return to.
And there was something more. At Blue Forest he'd trained for a year under T'swa cadre, and felt a strong affinity with them—with their whole species. An affinity which he couldn't reconcile with killing them or being killed by them.
The weather held unseasonably mild, which helped progress. Troop morale was stronger, too. The packed snow was slicker, and the sleighs, growing ever lighter as the hay was eaten or loaded off, pulled more easily and rapidly.
Second Ranger Battalion was the point force, scouting the route in advance of the brigade. The Iryalan 1st Battalion was ahead on the right, and the 1st Rangers ahead on the left. There'd been no sign of Komarsi, nor of T'swa patrols. There'd been no recent tracks of anyone, only traces of old snowshoe trails buried by later snow.
Finally, on the next to last day of the trek south, Romlar sent a courier to Brigadier Carnfor, saying he planned to visit him in camp that evening, needing to speak with him.
Wearing the regiment's white winter field uniform, something new to Maragor, he arrived after nightfall, after camp was made, and they hunkered on an area of tramped-down snow around a fire. There was no joma, not even war joma; grain was too precious now to scorch for drinking. There was hot tea though—melted snow boiled with fex buds to make a brew that was hot, bitter with tannin, and rich in vitamins. Very briefly they traded trivia and sipped. Then Romlar turned to business. "In the morning," he said, "the Third Ranger Battalion will take over the right flank. My battalion has something else to do."
The brigadier raised his eyebrows. "The Third? I thought they were at Shelf Falls."
"They've been following a mile or two behind the sleighs. My analysis is that the depot is bait for a trap. There are reasons to suspect there'll be concealed forces on the south side of the Eel, waiting to jump you after you've crossed. If so, the T'swa will be involved. If I'm right about this, they plan to chop you up badly. I'll take my battalion, along with the ranger battalions, and surprise their ambush, hit it from behind."
Carnfor stared. "A trap," he echoed. The brigadier had foreseen that as a possibility, but to have it set before him with such seeming confidence . . .
Romlar unfolded a forestry map of the area. The depot had been inked in on it. Contour lines showed a respectable ridge a mile west of the depot; a green wash showed it forested. "I expect they'll have artillery here," he continued, pointing, "along the ridge top. They'll probably let you cross the bridge, then knock it out. And besides the predictable units emplaced to guard the depot, they should have a strong infantry force hidden here." He pointed to the stretch of forest between the ridge and the open ground the depot was set in. "There's woods enough there for a brigade."
He pointed to the open country south of the depot. "This would be a logical place for their artillery, especially if they expect you to answer with some of your own. But I don't think that's where it will be. And odds are they'll have no forces north of the river. Our scouts would almost surely find them, and that would spoil their trap.
"Also, there'll probably be a freight train parked at the depot, a long one. If there is, it will no doubt be full of concealed troops, waiting to jump out when you've been cut off south of the river. Be ready for that."
The brigadier gazed into the flickering campfire, his drawn face ruddied by its flames. "How sure are you of this?" he asked.
Romlar shrugged. "I have no explicit evidence; I'm basing it on hints—peculiarities and anomalies in the situation. But I'm reasonably confident there'll be something of the sort. The reason I didn't bring this up in War Council was the danger of spies. You people need all the supplies you can get, and this is an opportunity. And if you're to get them, it's best the Komarsi don't know we suspect.
"If I'm wrong, well and good. You should get the supplies without too much fighting. If I'm right, you should get the supplies anyway, and we should be able to surprise and shoot up their ambush force."
"What makes you think you can do that? Especially if the T'swa are involved."
Romlar didn't elaborate on his plans. He simply said, "The Rangers will coordinate with us."
The brigadier gazed long at Romlar. He looks so damned young, Carnfor thought. And it seems too pat! But so far he's pulled off everything he's tried. And if confidence means anything . . . "Thank you, Colonel," he said. Grimly now. "We'll be ready."
They discussed coordination then, and Romlar left. We do need supplies, Carnfor thought, munitions even more than food. But can we afford to risk so much for them? He watched Romlar ski away, perhaps finding some slight assurance in the boy-colonel's broad white back and his easy skill on skis.
Romlar's battalion broke camp early and set out well before dawn. They crossed the ice early the next evening, more than eight miles upstream of the Mile 40 Bridge. South of the Eel much of the country was open farmland, but between it and the Welvarn Morain were areas of forest, some of it rather thin from long-time summer grazing. The troopers then moved eastward, mostly under cover of woods. After a bit they came to an abundance of ski tracks they took to be those of the 3rd Ranger Battalion, which had crossed before them, as intended. At a point just east of Road 45, the troopers camped that night in a stretch of ungrazed forest along the west slope of a little ridge.
Romlar traded his skis for the snowshoes he'd carried on his pack, and scouted cautiously ahead with two men. When he reached the ridgetop, the moonlight showed him the larger ridge a mile or so ahead, on which he expected the Komarsi artillery to be set up. Between the two was another ridge, smaller than either. If he was correct, the T'swa would be on the middle ridge. The map indicated that all three ridges and the ground between were wooded, and as far as he could see, that was right.
The 3rd Rangers should, he thought, be ahead and well to his left, waiting for morning, and for the sounds that would cue them into action, sending them up the higher ridge to attack the Komarsi artillery ambush. The T'swa, hearing the firefight, would hit them from behind, hopefully thinking they were his troopers. The 3rd, meanwhile, would be expecting them.
A lot of ifs—more than he liked. His genius as a commander was that his ifs almost always worked out; his attunement to the reality matrix was remarkably good. The trick was to get the necessary hard evidence as well, or as much as you could, and put it all together. But sometimes hard evidence was short when you wanted it.
Tomorrow would answer his questions, he told himself. As for wasting his regiment—his fear, any fear, was aberration. He'd do what he had to, what the situation called for.
Beckoning, he backed down below the crest, then followed a contour southward till he came to a brushy saddle. There he crossed the ridge, watching carefully ahead. Moonlight and starlight on the snow provided excellent visibility. In the near-level bottom between the two ridges, he saw ahead of him the broad, heavily tracked trail of many men on snowshoes. He gestured the other two to stop, and alone slipped ahead to where he could see the tracks better—close enough to see their direction. Northward; it fitted. Turning, he started back to camp, to brief Major Esenrok and his company commanders on what he'd found.
While they slept, an overcast developed, and at first dawn it was warmer than it had been the previous afternoon. When the officer of the guard made out the faint beginning of day, he woke Romlar, then sent men to waken the company commanders, who in turn had their men wakened. The troopers crushed heat capsules and dropped them in their canteens, that they might start their day with hot water instead of eating snow. Then they sat hunched in their sleeping bags, munching cold iron rations while the sky paled. One by one they stood, swinging their arms, running in place, bending, getting ready for the day. Somewhat before full daylight, they had their packs and snowshoes on, rifles ready. Romlar moved them to the top of the first ridge. It was the warmest dawn they'd seen since autumn.
There they waited—longer than they'd have preferred, but patiently, calmly. Anxiety was something they'd banished years before, primarily in Ostrak sessions. At 1007 hours, Romlar's radio brought him a code phrase that told him the brigade was in place, about to come out of the forest and start across the bridge.
Then nothing, and more nothing, then distant rifle fire that quickly increased. Machine gun fire followed, also distant, swelled briefly, then leveled off. Ahead, the 3rd Rangers would be slipping through the trees now, ready to begin their assault of the ridge. Romlar whistled, not shrilly, and gestured, then started forward on his snowshoes, white-painted skis and poles strapped on his pack. His whistle was echoed by others.
Abruptly there was nearer rifle fire that intensified; the 3rd Rangers had engaged the infantry protecting the Komarsi artillery ambush. Now the troopers moved quickly. From the main ridge ahead they heard the sound of light mortar bombs. Almost at once, howitzers began to thunder, and the troopers moved still more quickly, down the slope through deep soft snow, from time to time sliding sideways till they reached the bottom. There they began to trot. Quickly they reached the T'swa tracks, and still they trotted. The sound of firing was closer. Then scouts saw T'swa ahead, and knelt. The line of troopers drew even with them and moved forward; they hadn't yet been seen.
They opened fire before they were noticed, aimed fire, deadly fire, and at once the T'swa began returning it. But dressed in white and kneeling in the snow, the Iryalan troopers were not good targets. They pressed forward. Romlar visualized the 3rd Rangers dropping two companies back to hold off the T'swa, who had to press uphill against them, slow heavy work on snowshoes. The other two ranger companies should be pressing on to reach the artillery at the top. The howitzers continued to boom, but mortar bombs should still be dropping among them, reaping gunners.
Then, from the left, Romlar heard more rifle fire. The 2nd Rangers, he thought, or companies from it. His whistling now was loud and shrill, as he ordered his battalion to shift to the right, to flank the T'swa right if they could.
Kelmer had reached the timber bridge with the first elements of the 2nd Brigade. His stomach was nervous, his bowels knotting, but he felt no great fear. There was no hint of paralysis. He stood beside the north end of the bridge, recording the troops crossing, the depot visible in the distance. The first Smoleni platoons were across before there was any sign that the Komarsi knew they were there. From outposts came first the popping of rifle fire, then the crackling of machine guns. At first it was at long range and not heavy, so not many men fell. The Smoleni companies continued to cross. It was warm enough that, with the exertion of the march, they went with earlaps up and coats open, their mittens in their pockets.
Kelmer was almost the only one on skis. The Smoleni infantry had stacked skis, poles, and bedrolls along the road in the forest, to cross the bridge on snowshoes. Through his visor, Kelmer watched and recorded the first companies deploying and advancing under light fire. The Smoleni riflemen had the cover of deep snow, which, along with distance, made them poor targets. They were not returning fire themselves. They might have if their ammunition supply had been greater; as it was, they were holding off till they were nearer, and could aim their fire.
Thus there was no nearby gunfire to cover the sound when more intense fire began to the west. Kelmer guessed that the White T'swa were involved. That would be the action Romlar had left him out of.
The artillery commander listened nervously to the small arms fire on the slope behind him. He was protected by three rifle companies and four additional machine gun sections, which seemed like a lot, crouched as they were behind log parapets with cleared fields of fire. But the firefight hadn't slackened in what seemed to him five or six minutes of furious exchange. He didn't hear the Smoleni mortars thump, and the first bombs arrived without warning, some exploding in treetops, some on contact with the ground.
He panicked then. His orders were to begin fire on a radioed command, but fear froze his mind, fear that his crews would be decimated if he waited. He gave the firing command at once. The howitzers bellowed, sending a salvo toward their initial targets—a salvo very premature.
More mortar rounds exploded. A fragment bit him and he yelped, sat down abruptly in the snow and rolled backward, grabbing at his right arm.
Kelmer pulled his attention to what was happening in front of him. A battalion had crossed, and another, and the beginning of a third, almost as if drilling. Only the lead units were receiving enemy fire. It seemed to him too easy, that something was bound to happen.
He heard the first artillery salvo—first the booming of the guns, then the sound of the shells in flight. The guns had been registered in advance, and their rounds hit on or near target, one striking the bridge span between the center and north-bank piers, the explosion throwing Kelmer bodily backward into the snow. Others landed on the far side. Two fell short and another long onto the thick river ice, throwing chunks of it into the air on geysers of water. More landed in the woods on the north, rending trees, flinging snow and frozen earth. Fragments of steel and wood whirred and warbled. Men screamed, shouted, fell shocked or bleeding or died.
Kelmer realized he wasn't hurt, and untangling his skis, struggled to his feet. For a moment then he hardly moved, not from fear but indecision. Cross the river on the ice? Or drop back along the road into the forest, to record what was happening there? He chose the forest.
More than a mile away, the howitzers roared again, this salvo with time fuses, targeting the troops who'd crossed.
A Komarsi intelligence agent had reported by radio, the day before, that Smoleni scouts had passed the Valar Road. Colonel Ko-Dan had led his regiment into position a few hours later. He'd assumed that the Iryalans would attack the artillery ambush, and planned to strike them against the anvil of the emplaced Komarsi defense. But now, the word passed to him was that the force engaging him from behind was dressed in white, and he realized at once that they were the Iryalans. He'd been outguessed and set up. The troops assaulting uphill ahead of him must be rangers.
He assumed that the entire White Regiment was behind him. He couldn't know that Romlar, hedging his intuition, had left the Iryalan 2nd Battalion at Burnt Woods, in case Ko-Dan had outguessed him and sent a force by some wide-swinging route to attack the Smoleni government there.
Neither confusion nor hesitation were any part of Ko-Dan. He ordered one company to strike hard against the new pressure on their left, and another at the Iryalans behind him. The rest would continue uphill. It was important that the batteries on the ridgetop not be overrun.
He knew the ranger units were good. He didn't realize how good.
Among Komarsi veterans, the Smoleni already had a reputation for marksmanship, but the Komarsi infantry protecting the artillery had never experienced the kind of accuracy these rangers showed them. To expose yourself enough to use your weapon was deadly dangerous. Nor was all the mortar fire directed at the batteries on the ridgetop. Rounds were detonating in the treetops above the infantry, and on the ground among and behind them. Thus the rangers were able to press on uphill despite casualties.
The Komarsi had built their parapet with trees cut from the field of fire, and in the process, trampled the snow heavily. Thus the leading ranger elements had removed their snowshoes. When they began to come over the Komarsi parapet, the Komarsi broke and tried to flee uphill. It turned into a slaughter.
The ranger battalion C.O. radioed to the mortar sections to discontinue their fire on the hilltop and direct it against the T'swa. It was too late. The mortars, protected by machine guns, had been set up in a glade where they wouldn't have to fire through a screen of treetops. Their machine guns were under heavy attack by the T'swa, whose accurate fire had decimated the gunners, and before the mortarmen could reset their sights, the T'swa were overrunning them.
When the rangers reached the ridgetop, most of the gun crews fled down the east side of the hill. The rangers took no prisoners; the gunners who didn't flee were shot down. The Komarsi wounded were left unmolested but untended; the ranger medics were busy looking after their own.
The first company commander to reach the top called for any men with experience in artillery. There were three in his company. He gave a fourth man a compass and sent him up a tree to give him azimuths and range estimates as needed. The three ex-artillerymen became instant gun commanders, showing others how to load, aim, and fire the 4.2-inch howitzers. Within a couple of minutes he had five guns manned, each with three instant crewmen. Most of the 3rd Rangers, though, manned the parapets lower on the slope, to hold the top against the T'swa pushing upward.
The captain's attention was on the man in the tree. "Can you see a train from up there?" he shouted.
"Yessir! A great long sonofabitch!"
"Gimme an azimuth on it!"
The man sat on a branch, holding himself in place with one arm, and sighting through the compass, gave the captain the reading. The captain decided the present range settings were good enough to start with, and had his novice gunners traverse their guns to the new azimuth. Then he ordered what he'd dubbed gun number one to fire for range. It boomed, stunning the gunners, who had no ear protection.
They waited. After a few seconds the observer called down, "She 'sploded in the air 'bout two degrees left of the train and 'bout even with the locomotive!"
Good, the captain thought. They've got time fuses, and the range they're set at is good enough to start with. "Add two degrees more azimuth," he called to the gunners. "Gun number one, add one degree to your elevation; number two add two degrees; number three add three . . ." He shook his head when he'd finished, not knowing if he'd made any sense at all. He didn't even know whether elevation was set in degrees. "All guns fire when ready."
Again the number one gunner pulled the lanyard, again the gun roared. After a few seconds, the others began echoing it raggedly. Briefly they waited again. Then, "Holy shit!" the observer shouted. "It blew 'bout fifty or a hundred feet above the train! Yomal! There's another, and—guys are jumpin' out like fleas!"
"Keep firin'!" the captain shouted. "And Ingols! Keep tellin' me what's goin' on!" He shook his head while the gunners reloaded. We may not know what we're doin', but we're doin' it.
The 2nd Royal Komarsi Grenadier Brigade was a show unit, yeomen drilled to the highest parade sharpness. Just now they stood on snowshoes in the woods east of the ridge, almost crowding them. Waiting, they listened nervously to the firing in the open fields ahead and on the wooded ridge behind. Their brigadier jumped at the sudden sound of the howitzers' first salvo. So soon! He barked a command to his trumpeter, who raised his long ornate horn and blew. His battalions surged out of the woods, into the field, well before the plan had called for.
When the artillery had stopped firing, Ko-Dan realized the Komarsi gunners had been overrun. And when, scarce minutes later, they began to roar again, he knew what that meant, too. Meanwhile he was taking casualties on all sides. His purpose in being here had been to trap the Iryalans; instead his own men were caught between forces, beset by what seemed to be three regiments, all of them dangerous. It was time to leave.
His right flank was taking the least fire; that was the side to break out on, before the Iryalans could get more men there. He gave the order, and almost at once his men moved, striking hard. Briefly the firing intensified, but the Iryalans in position were mostly riflemen. Some were overrun and killed, while others fell back out of the way, to fire on the T'swa as they poured past.
When the T'swa had gotten out, Romlar ordered his men not to pursue. They were outnumbered. If the T'swa became aware of that . . . After a minute's breather, he ordered his men up the hill. They had artillery training; it seemed likely that the Smoleni on top hadn't. He'd leave gunners there. Then, along with the ranger battalions, he and the rest of his troopers could move down the east side of the ridge and hit the Komarsi infantry he assumed were still in the woods there.
By midday, the Komarsi defenders, though considerably more numerous, had been routed. They'd been hit by their own artillery, by the light Smoleni howitzers on the north bank, and by the Smoleni infantry, the mercenaries, and the rangers. Nor were they allowed to reform and harass the loading of the sleigh column.
The empty sleighs had crossed the river on the ice and been driven to the depot, Kelmer with them, camera busy. Men worked furiously loading them, while at the river, the brigade's engineers worked equally furiously rebuilding the broken bridge span. The horses could never pull the loaded sleighs up the river's considerable bank, not without at least triple-teaming them, which would slow things unacceptably.
A handcar had been parked on a siding. Brigadier Carnfor had sent scouts with a radio, pumping it eastward. They were to warn him of any Komarsi reinforcements approaching.
The brigade had approached the job of loading with priorities and a plan, but given the delay, their considerable casualties, and the obvious fact that the Komarsi had expected them, they'd loaded hastily. They took almost solely foodstuffs and munitions, but not as selectively as planned. When the handcar scouts radioed that another train was coming, the final sleighs were loaded almost at random. Then the sleigh column started for the river while artillery ranged on the tracks eastward, destroying them. The three ranger battalions and the mercenaries moved east on skis to meet and discourage the Komarsi reinforcements.
Some of the munitions sleighs were too heavily loaded for the horses to pull easily, and men had to throw off cases of ammunition or shells as they went. The first to reach the river had to wait briefly while the engineers finished decking the new, temporary span with corduroy, manhandling the logs into place. They tied them down with Komarsi detonating cord.
The sleighs began to cross, while engineers chopped holes at intervals into, but not through the river ice, and set charges of Komarsi explosives in them. In the distance eastward they heard gunfire, but it grew no nearer. When the last sleighs had crossed, the brigadier radioed the battalions under Romlar's command. The brigade artillery was remounted on its skis and pulled away, and its infantry regiments began to cross the bridge. The rangers and mercenaries would cross on the ice downstream of the destruction. When the entire brigade was across, an engineer lit the det cord, and with a vicious, cracking explosion, the decking fell to the ice below. After that they blew the ice.
As the brigade moved north into the forest, a drizzle began to fall, thick and cold.