Robert Adams: Trumpets of War

The blade entered deep into Benee’s bowels well below his navel. He gasped, and his eyes looked to burst from out their sockets. Then, as the inlander twisted his blade and removed it by way of a vicious, upward-slanting drawcut that literally gutted Benee, the boy-warrior shrieked in a nameless degree of agony. Such a noise so close to him hurt Gil’s ears, so he stepped back and swung his gory weapon like a sword, allbut decapitating Benee.

Back in camp, he hastened to show the blowpipe, holder of darts, two knives and a horn tube of poison paste to Tomos Gonsalos and Mahvros of Lohfospolis, with whose infantry unit—long accustomed to the proximity of pachyderms—he and Sunshine had been marching, and recount the tale of the brief, bloody encounter.

At the conclusion, Gonsalos nodded. “You were right and I was wrong, Mahvros, this clinches the fact. We’re just too close to those damned salt fens and that race of murderous lunatics who inhabit them, so inbred that they don’t know which end to wipe.”

To Gil, he said, “Keep closer to camp from now on; find somewhere else to wash your elephant. And get rid of that pipe and those darts and that container of venom—just the sight of them makes my skin crawl. Throw them in the watchfire there.”

Then, back to Mahvros, he ordered, “Best get back to your command and prepare to break camp. We’re going to move our location a mile or so upstream. Those baltohtheesee stick at coming very far inland, even to avenge the execution of one of their sneak-thief murderers. But even so, we’ll be having double pickets, overlapping perimeters and so on until we’ve put a goodly amount of distance between us and this area.”

The camp was duly moved, the soldiers and noncoms grumbling, as soldiers always have and always will. Directional markings in the code of the army of Kehnooryos Ehlahs were left to indicate to those who could understand them where the units had gone. In the new encampment, Tomos Gonsalos ordered a ditched perimeter, but this was incomplete by nightfall, so Gonsalos settled for extra watchfires and an enlarged guard force and perimeter patrol, with the prairiecats prowling to the east and along the watercourses leading down into the fens.

On seeing the security precautions, Mahvros doubted aloud and in a joking manner that even a muskrat would be able to invade their new camp without raising an alarm that night.

But the next morning, when Gil awoke and rolled out of his blankets, there were ’wo elephants lying where only Sunshine had been when he had composed himself in sleep the night just past. Staring in silent wonderment, a bit stunned and a bit more disbelieving of the witness of his own eyes, he still noticed details about the newcomer—she was a cow, also, but a little bigger and seemingly fatter than his sister.

Rather than approach Sunshine and the strange elephant, he mindspoke her. Not until he had had the entire story, and been formally introduced to the other elephant and allowed her to give him a head-to-foot trunk-tip examination (as, too, had Sunshine, he recalled, on first meeting), did he saddle his sister and, side by side with the larger cow, cross the camp to the central headquarters area.

Tomos Gonsalos stood up from his breakfast to gape for a moment at the approaching pair of behemoths. Turning to Mahvros, who was stillseated and chewing, his back to the sight that so astounded Tomos, Gonsalos demanded, “Why did you not tell me that elephants reproduce like ahmoeebahs—splitting into two identical parts, overnight?”

Mahvros swallowed hurriedly and looked up, grinning. “Is that wine you’re drinking, or neat brandy? Man, elephants breed just like any other beast, but it takes about a year and a half from coupling to birthing, they say.” He turned fully to look in the same direction as his friend, and it then was Mahvros’ turn to gape and stare.

“Her Ehleenoee name is Ohxathees, or something like that,” said Gil Djohnz, after he had dismounted and accepted an offered mug of watered breakfast wine. “But she wants to be called Tulip. It seems that she was the other half of the team that drew old King Zastros’ pavilion wain, and she it was that turned about and ran back off the Lumbuh Riverbridge after it was fired and Sunshine had jumped into the river. She says that she just kept running until the camp was far behind her. After she had rested, she searched out food and water, then began to try to get off the elephant armor they had hung and strapped and tied on her. It took her several days of off-and-on tries, but she finally shucked it all. Since then, she has been wandering about the countryside, avoiding men. Then, yesterday, she cut the trail of Sunshine, followed it first back to the old camp, then here. She came into camp sometime last night, chatted with Sunshine for a while, then lay down and went to sleep beside her, and there they both were when I awakened, Chief Tomos.”

“But how the hell did a full-grown elephant get into this camp without being seen?” demanded Mahvros. “Man, Tomos had guards tripping over guards last night, a ditch halfway around the camp, and those trained cats out beyond the perimeter, too.”

Gil answered, “Chief Mahvros, Tulip says that she did not want to be seen and that so she was not seen but once. On that one occasion, however, she says she thinks that they who saw her in the dark there thought that she was Sunshine.”

“So, you can telepath with her, too?” said Mahvros. “Man, down south, you and your ilk will soon put the damned, arrogant, overweening Epithiseesos family out of the elephant business in short order, I vow, and none too soon, either.

“But that still doesn’t make my mind any easier for the here and now. Just how safe are any of us by night if a beast that stands at least threemehtrahee at the withers and weighs as much as a dozen big horses can just stroll into a supposedly tightly guarded camp? Man, the mere thought of it sets my mind aboggle and my nape hairs all aprickle. What if she’d had a dozen swampscum on her back and had ridden them in here? What if . . . ?”

Tomos sighed. “Oh, come on, friend Mahvros, we could sit here and play ‘what if?’ until hell freezes over solid. Look, the elephant is here, with us, this morning, and she was not here last night. As there was no alarm last night, one would assume that any who did see her thought she was the elephant they knew about—after all, recall that the beasts are not native to this countryside hereabouts, so who would have or could have suspected that a stray one was running loose around here?—and just dismissed her as a wakeful but benevolent beast, which is just what she appears to me to be. As 1 recall, you were almighty pleased that you would have the one elephant to take south to this Thoheeks Grahvos, so you should be twice as pleased to be able to take him two, right?”

“Yes, yes, of course,” answered Mahvros. “Nonetheless, such laxity on the parts of the sentries and guards should be, must be, severely dealt with, punished, flogged, at least.”

Tomos frowned and shook his head. “What you mete out to your troops, your retainers, is your business, of course, but please bear in mind that a thorough flogging often leaves a man unable to march as fast or as far as his fellows. As regards Hehluh’s unit, you can bet that he’ll flay yards of skin from off them with that acid-dripping tongue of his before all is said and done in this elephant matter. Nor do I think that Portos or Chief Pawl of Vawn will be pleased at all when they are apprised that their vaunted troopers failed to interdict or even see a titan like our Tulip wandering through our guardlines last night.”

Captain Mahvros seemed a bit mollified. After another draft of the wine, he advised Gil, “Taking care of one of those beasts is a full-time job, as I’m certain you know by now. Therefore, I’d advise you to find one of your people who, if possible, can also telepath to an elephant. Let him take over the new one. Saddles aren’t really needed for them, you know—feelahkseeride them even into battle without any saddle, down south.”