Alan Foster - The Icerigger Trilogy

“What do you think they’ll try next?”

“If I were them, lad, and foolish enough to continue this, I’d make a try at breaking in the gate. Since they can’t sail a ram into this wind, that means bringin’ up a hand-carried log or something or usin’ oil to try and burn it through.”

“The Moulokinese cables will still stop any raft from sailing through, Skua.”

“Right, feller-me-lad. That means they’d have to get enough infantry through to take over the wall and lower the cables themselves. I don’t see they’ve got a chance. We can have archers and arbalesters pick ’em off outside the gate, and can mass fifty soldiers behind the gate for every one who fights his way in. Be suicidal to try. That doesn’t mean they won’t. Humans have been known to try similar stunts.”

“They can keep us bottled up here in Moulokin indefinitely, though.”

“That’s so.” He fingered the gold ring in his right ear. “Don’t bother me much. I like Moulokin. But it will keep us from gettin’ our important discoveries to the padre in Brass Monkey. More important is what it’ll do by blockading all commerce. Traders and ship buyers will go elsewhere rather than fight their way into Moulokin. Rakossa’s officers probably know that, even if he can’t think of anything but gettin’ his hands on Teeliam. I don’t think our friends the Moulokinese will crack, but too many wars are decided by factors economic instead of military.

“Now me,” and he fingered the haft of the huge axe, “I’m hoping the Poyos get frustrated and try another frontal attack. It’s more likely they’ll get frustrated and speak off, ship by ship, for their homes and hearths.

“Meanwhile, we might as well lean back and enjoy the hospitality of our hosts, ’till the Poyos decide which way their frustration’s goin’ to drive them.” He put both massive hands behind his head and closed his eyes. After a few minutes, he indicated to Ethan that he hadn’t fallen asleep by popping one eye open.

“Barbarians against us, barbarians with us, and we three supposedly civilized folk helpless to influence ’em one way or the other. Think about it, lad.”

Then he did fall asleep, oblivious to the cold and the noise of a thousand alien soldiers chattering around him,

“With all due respect, my lord, we cannot attack.” The Poyo officer looked uncomfortable under the glare of his mercurial ruler, wished he were back on his own raft instead of here in the royal stateroom.

“Oduine is right, my lord,” said another of the assembled captains. “To have a normal wind before us would be disadvantage enough. But the wind in our faces here would give pause to a god! At their whim, they could sally out and do us much damage. Their weapons outrange us badly. And these peculiar small arrows,” he held up a Sofoldian crossbow bolt, “are fired with a force greater than our best archers can muster.”

“Their catapults have the wind behind them too, sire,” a third officer added. “I was with the group that entered the city many days ago to search for this accursed great raft. The wall before us is fully half a suntt deep and solid as these cliffs around us. It cannot be breached by any siege weapon I know of.”

Tonx Ghin Rakossa, Landgrave of Poyolavomaar, slouched in his chair at the far end of the triangular table and quietly regarded his commanders. He let the silence grow until many were shifting nervously in their seats.

“Do you have any more good news to give us, my soldiers?” They looked at one another, at the walls, their chairs, anywhere but at the dangerously soft-voiced Landgrave. Most of them despised their hereditary ruler, only a few shared his perverse dreams. There had been mutterings of disloyalty ever since the erratic Rakossa had ascended the throne following the suspicious death of his older brother, but the Poyos were a tradition-minded people. There was no outright rebellion then. There was none now.

None, however, could deny the wealth (however questionable the methods) which Rakossa had brought to their city-state. Many felt guilty at accepting wealth obtained by devices so callous, yet there were none who brought themselves to refuse it when their share was offered them.

Having spoken with quiet control, Rakossa now leaned forward and screamed at them. “Do you think we are blind, like the doublebody Gilirun who travels the ice by feel? Do you believe that as we face the refuge of that unmentionable woman and those off-world interlopers and that knot of fat merchants we cannot feel the wind blowing hard in our face?” He sat back, dropped his voice to an insinuating purr.

“’Twas not we who failed to jam with cable the steering runner of the coveted ice ship.”

One of the other officers held up another crossbow bolt. The tip and shaft were stained brown. “My lord, this came out of my back this morning.” A murmur of support sounded from the other captains.

“We ourselves were also wounded, T’hosjer,” said Rakossa. He had always to be careful. As ignorant and stupid as these warriors were, they were all he had to make reality of his dreams. Though devoid of vision, they could still be dangerous.

“Our soldiers would have jammed that raft’s steering, my lord,” said T’hosjer emphatically, “would have sent it crashing into the cliffs. Would have jammed it so it would have taken forty men a ten-day to untangle it… save for these!” and he snapped the bolt angrily in two,

“’Tis truth sire, save for that—and for this!” A sub-officer guarding the door into the cabin shouldered his way into the assemblage. Facing the Landgrave, he stood on one of the chairs and slammed his right leg onto the table. Triple chiv stuck in the hard wood.

A black line only a few millimeters wide ran from just below the furry knee around to the back, which was bulkier than any human calf. “The offworlders did this.”

Several of the other captains leaned forward, examined the remarkably symmetrical wound. Fur and skin had been burnt away.

“They have strange weapons which shoot pieces of sun,” the subofficer was saying. “They are long and thin and will go through the thickest shield.

“I had a woman in my command hight Zou-eadaa. A good fighter, afraid of nothing. She chivaned almost near enough to throw her cable at the raft’s huge runner. I myself saw what happened next, for I was closest to her.

“One of the offworlders pointed a tiny piece of metal at her. There was a flash of fire, blue instead of red, that was for a moment brighter than the sun.” An awed murmur rose from several officers. “It went through Zou-eadaa’s shield, her war coat beneath, her chest, to come out her back and strike the ice, which melted under it to a deep puddle.

“After the fight today, I went out on the ocean to retrieve her sword and armor and cut a muzzle lock for her family.” He held up his right paw, extended the index claw. “Were this finger long enough, I could have passed it completely through her body, through the hole the light weapon made. I did not watch myself enough this morning, and received this.” He brushed his palm sharply, bitterly, across the black line on his leg.

“’Tis no clean way to fight, against a weapon that makes one’s own leg smell like cooking meat.” He pulled his leg free of the table, stepped down off the chair. “Can we fight those who magic with the sun?”

Angry agreement came from several of the most disgruntled captains. Rakossa let them jabber on for a decent period, then said quietly, “Idiots.”

Conversation ceased, though there remained barely masked stares of rebellion. Rakossa stood up. “Did you know that, that you are all fools and idiots? Your mothers gave water!” He held up a paw. “Before you babble cubbish objections, we will tell you something else. We have already won this battle.”