Harry Turtledove - Sentry Peak

Was he talking about himself? Even more than General Guildenstern, before the war he’d had a reputation as a hard-drinking man. But Guildenstern had kept right on tippling, while Hesmucet couldn’t recall seeing General Bart with a glass of brandy or even wine in his hand since the fight against Grand Duke Geoffrey started.

Bart went on, “And, by the gods, we know who can get along with people and get the most of out of them and who can’t, don’t we?”

At that, Hesmucet threw back his head and laughed out loud. “Now who could you be talking about, sir? The chap who changes his wing commanders the way a dandy changes his pantaloons?”

“Count Thraxton is a fellow with a little bit of a temper on him,” Bart said, “and since we know that, we ought to take advantage of it, don’t you think?”

He did make things sound simple, simpler than they’d seemed to Hesmucet. He made good sense, too. Hesmucet could see that. He ran a hand along his closely trimmed beard. Maybe, as Bart said, the simple ability to see and to do all the obvious and important things-and to realize they were obvious and important-was what set fine generals apart from their less successful counterparts.

In that case , Hesmucet thought, we’re in pretty good shape here in Rising Rock .

“No, no, no,” Doubting George said, not for the first time. “I don’t mind in the least. This is one of the things that happen in a war.”

Absalom the Bear shook his big, shaggy head back and forth, as if he were indeed the great beast that gave him his ekename. “It’s not fair, sir,” the burly brigadier said. “It’s not right. This ought to be your army now. You’re the one who made sure it’d still be an army.”

“It wasn’t my army when I did that-not that I did so much,” Lieutenant General George replied. “It was General Guildenstern’s.”

“So it was.” Absalom snorted. “And a whole great whacking lot of good he did with it, too.”

“What should I do-raise a rebellion?” George asked. “If I do, how am I different from Geoffrey?”

After that, Absalom looked like a flustered bear. “I certainly didn’t mean you should do anything of the sort, sir.”

“I doubted that you did,” George said dryly. “If you don’t want me leading my soldiers against General Bart and Lieutenant General Hesmucet, what do you want?”

“I want you to get the credit you deserve for saving this army,” Absalom said stubbornly. “You did that, and everybody knows it. You ought to be commanding here-you and nobody else.”

“No, no, no,” Doubting George said yet again. He was more flattered than angry, but he knew he had to look more angry than flattered, and he did.

“But why not?” Absalom the Bear demanded. “You saved the army, and-”

“Enough,” George broke in. Now he really was starting to get angry. “For one thing, I’m a long way from the only one who’s done something like that, you know. Bart saved King Avram’s army at Pottstown Pier, sure as sure he did, and that was an even bigger fight than the one by the River of Death.”

Absalom tried again: “But-”

“No, no, no.” George cut him off again. “I named one thing, but it’s the small one. Here’s the big one coming up. The big thing, the important thing, the thing that really matters, is that we lick Grand Duke Geoffrey and the traitors. How that happens doesn’t matter a copper’s worth. That it happens is the biggest thing in the world. Have you got that, Brigadier?”

Absalom the Bear was eight years younger than Doubting George, and close to a head taller. Had he so desired, he could have flattened George without breaking a sweat. George knew that. If he knew it, Absalom had to know it, too. But the big, muscular brigadier quailed before him like a young lieutenant taking a dressing-down from the king. “Yes, sir,” Absalom said earnestly. “I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t mean any harm, sir.”

“No one will use me to play the game of factions in King Avram’s army. No one,” George said. “Have you got that ?”

“Yes, sir,” Absalom repeated. “I… I hadn’t seen it like that. Now that you point things out to me, I know you’re looking at them from higher ground than I was.”

“All right, then. I’ll say no more about it.” But Doubting George held up a forefinger. “No, I will say one thing more after all. If by any chance you have friends who think the same way you did, make it very plain to them that I will not be a party to any of this. I ask no names. I don’t want to know. But if there has been some stupid conspiracy, I expect it to dissolve.”

“Yes, sir. It will, sir.” Absalom the Bear fled as precipitately as most of General Guildenstern’s army had when James of Broadpath threw his soldiers into the gap in the southrons’ line. But he hadn’t fled quite fast enough. He’d told George what George hadn’t wanted to hear.

Now alone on the streets of Rising Rock, George sighed. His breath smoked in front of his face. The day, like a lot of days lately, was cool and damp and misty. Maybe that mage Hesmucet had found was doing his job. Maybe the weather would have been like this anyway. How could anyone not a mage tell?

At the thought of Hesmucet, Doubting George sighed again. He did want a larger command, and recognized that the other lieutenant general was more likely to get it. But that mattered only so much. He’d meant every word he said to Absalom the Bear. As a Parthenian, he, like Duke Edward of Arlington, had had to choose between ties to Detina and ties to his province. Unlike Edward, he’d chosen the large kingdom. He knew the choice he’d made, and didn’t regret it.

Smashing the traitors is the most important thing . Doubting George had to make himself believe that beyond the shadow of a doubt. He’d given up too much not to believe it. He would get his confiscated estate in Parthenia back if Avram beat Geoffrey, but how much would it be worth with the serfs freed, with no hope of bringing in the crops that supplemented his meager army pay?

“I don’t care,” he said, as if someone had asked him the question aloud. “By all the gods, I don’t.” If that weren’t true, he would have been wearing blue pantaloons and calling Geoffrey his sovereign. And, as if that weren’t bad enough, he might have been serving under Thraxton the Braggart. Next to that dreadful prospect, the thought that Hesmucet might gain some extra preferment didn’t look so bad.

George looked toward Proselytizers’ Rise and then toward Sentry Peak. He couldn’t see them, which meant the northerners there couldn’t see him, either. He wondered what Count Thraxton was planning. He couldn’t have much of an attack in mind hereabouts, not if he’d sent James of Broadpath off towards Wesleyton.

I wouldn’t have done that . Doubting George shook his head. No, I wouldn’t have done that at all . He was a defensive fighter, first, last, and always. You have to be daft to send a big part of your army away when the other fellow is building up his forces. Well, maybe you don’t have to be daft, but it certainly helps .

Did Thraxton really think his magecraft could make up for his lack of men? Maybe he did. It hadn’t at several other fights, but maybe he did. That, in George’s opinion, was another bit of daftness. Well, Thraxton’s troubles weren’t his, for which fact he heartily praised the gods.

He began walking toward the north end of town, toward the trenches and barricades he’d ordered built after General Guildenstern’s army had had to fall back to Rising Rock from the River of Death. Magecraft or no magecraft, anyone who tried to take those fieldworks would have his work cut out for him. The works were stronger now than they had been when first made right after the grinding retreat from Peachtree Province, and better manned, too, but the traitors wouldn’t have enjoyed trying to take them even then. No one enjoyed trying to take a position Doubting George chose to defend.