Harry Turtledove - Through the Darkness

“What I wish they’d fly in is enough Kaunians to make a magic that’d fry the Unkerlanters’ toes off,” Panfilo said. “But it doesn’t look like they can do that, either.”

It didn’t look as if the Algarvians outside of Sulingen could do enough of anything to stave off defeat here. Trasone resolutely didn’t think about that. Along with the rest of the Algarvian soldiers in the square, he unloaded crates of food and other crates full of eggs and charges, loaded them onto sledges, and hauled them away. Soldiers were draft animals in Sulingen these days, for most of the real draft animals were dead.

Most of the dragons that flew north out of the square bore only their fliers. Some carried wounded men slung beneath them as the crates of supplies had been. Trasone sighed as he watched one of them get off the ground. “Just about worth taking a beam in the brisket,” he remarked.

In thoughtful tones, Panfilo replied, “These days, they’ve got mages checking the wounded. If you blaze yourself, you don’t go.”

“That’s fair,” Trasone said at once, and then, hotly, “And futter you, too, Sergeant, if you think I’d do that to myself.”

“I don’t.” Panfilo chuckled. “And you can’t get out by being court-martialed for cursing a superior, either.”

Unkerlanter dragons visited the square as the last of the Algarvian beasts were leaving. Heavy sticks around the farm blazed down a couple of the rock-gray dragons. Others attacked the Algarvian dragons in the air. Still others dropped eggs on the square. Huddled in a hole, Trasone said, “If they were as efficient as they like to brag on being, they would have hit us while our dragons were still on the ground here.”

“If they were as efficient as they like to brag on being, they would have killed the lot of us a long time ago,” Panfilo said, and Trasone could hardly argue with him.

A few days later, he and Trasone, along with most of the soldiers who’d been holding the line in the east against the Unkerlanters they’d never quite managed to drive from Sulingen, trudged north toward the outskirts of the city: the great belt of rubble they’d created that now sheltered them against the worst the Unkerlanters could do.

“You think we can break out?” Trasone asked Panfilo: one professional talking to another, figuring the odds.

“Sixty, eighty miles, maybe more than that for all I know? Against all the Unkerlanters in the world, and most of the behemoths? Won’t be easy.” Panfilo gave a professional answer. Still, he added, “If we’re going to try, we’d better try now. We probably should have tried two weeks ago, or longer than that. But I’ll tell you something: we’ve got a better chance now than we would in another couple of weeks. And if we don’t break out, it’s only a matter of time.”

That was professional commentary, too. Trasone thought it over. After a few paces, he kicked at the snow. Panfilo nodded as if he’d answered in words.

All the Algarvians-and the Sibians and Yaninans trapped in Sulingen with them-looked as ragged as Trasone did. He was surprised to see they’d managed to muster a couple of troops of behemoths; he hadn’t thought so many were left alive in the ruined city on the Wolter. An officer not far away was haranguing his men: “Every one of you lousy buggers is a stinking, nasty son of a whore. You ever want to get between your mistresses’ legs again, you’re going to have to fight like it. Just remember, these fornicators who fight for Swemmel are standing between you and all the pussy in Algarve.”

The soldiers cheered. Trasone joined in. The officer swept off his hat and bowed. He knew how to get his countrymen ready to fight, all right.

Egg-tossers sent their cargoes of death flying toward the Unkerlanters entrenched out beyond the northern edge of the city. Chainmail clanking on them, the behemoths lumbered forward to batter a way through the enemy’s lines. And footsoldiers went forward with them, to protect them from Unkerlanter soldiers.

Going forward in the open seemed wonderful to Trasone after so long scuttling among the ruins like a rat. And, for the first few hours, the Algarvians did nothing but go forward, smashing through one Unkerlanter line after another. “They didn’t think we had it in us,” Trasone exclaimed. “They don’t know what we’re made of.”

But the Unkerlanters, though they buckled, did not break. They fought fiercely even when taken by surprise, and soon began throwing swarms of behemoths at the Algarvians. Panfilo had been exaggerating when he said they had most of the behemoths in the world around Sulingen, but not, it seemed, by much. The Algarvian crews were better trained than their Unkerlanter counterparts, but that mattered only so much. Swemmel’s men could afford to lose three, four, five behemoths for every one they slew and still come out ahead in the game.

Despite everything, the Algarvians kept making progress to the north through most of the second day of the attack. By that afternoon, they were down to a bare handful of behemoths. The Unkerlanters still had plenty. And dragons painted rock-gray appeared overhead in large numbers. They dropped eggs on the Algarvians and swooped low to flame soldiers caught out in the open.

“I don’t know how we’re going to go any further tomorrow,” Trasone told Panfilo.

“Got to try,” the sergeant answered.

Try they did the next morning, a convulsive, desperate attack that carried them another couple of miles farther north. And then, try as they would, they could advance no more. When the Unkerlanters counterattacked, behemoths leading the way, the Algarvians fell back before them. They retreated faster than they’d advanced. By the time the sun rose yet again, they-or those of them who still lived-were back among the ruins of Sulingen. The Unkerlanters had fought for those ruins street by street; now Mezentio’s men would have to do the same.

Having beaten the Algarvians into the city once more, Swemmel’s men showed no great eagerness for a final struggle among the ruins. Trasone understood that; it would have cost them more men than even Swemmel might feel comfortable paying. They gave the Algarvians three days of near quiet to rebuild their defenses as best they could.

On the fourth morning-a freezing cold one-Trasone stood sentry at the northern outskirts of the city when he spied a lone Unkerlanter coming toward him. The fellow wasn’t a solitary madman or an infiltrator; he carried a white-and green-striped flag of truce. “Parley!” he shouted in Algarvian. “I come from Marshal Rathar with a message for your commanders.”

“What kind of message?” Trasone asked.

“A call on them to surrender,” the Unkerlanter answered. “If they yield now, they and all of you will be well fed, well housed, generally well treated. So Marshal Rathar swears, by the powers above. But if you go on with this senseless, useless fight, he cannot answer for what will happen to you.”

“Well, I can’t answer for my generals,” Trasone replied. He stood up in his trench and waved the Unkerlanter forward. “Come ahead, pass through. I’ll take you to them-or I’ll take you to somebody who’ll take you to them, anyhow.” He didn’t suppose there’d be any fighting till the generals made up their minds. If nothing else, that bought a little more time.

“And what did the Algarvian generals say, Captain Friam?” Marshal Rathar asked when the young officer who’d gone into Sulingen with his surrender demand came into his presence once more.

“Lord Marshal, they rejected your call out of hand,” Friam answered. “They were full of oily politeness-you know how Algarvians are-but they said no, and they didn’t say anything else.”

“They’re out of their fornicating minds!” General Vatran burst out. “They’re crazy if they think they can hold us back very long. And they’re worse than crazy if they think they can lick us.”