Harry Turtledove - Darkness Descending

Unkerlanters, whether on the ground or in the air, carried far fewer crystals than did the Algarvians. If any of their fliers spotted Algarvians dragons dropping out of the sky on them, he could do little to alert his fellows. It might not have mattered much anyhow. The Unkerlanters were outnumbered close to two to one.

Sabrino flew out of the westering sun down onto the tail of an Unkerlanter dragon. He didn’t bother raising his stick, but let his own beast have the pleasure of flaming the foe from the sky. The Unkerlanter flier had no notion of aught amiss till fire washed over him. He and his dragon tumbled toward the ground.

More rock-gray dragons plummeted, too. So did a couple of Sabrino’s men and their mounts. He cursed when that happened. He cursed again when a few of the Unkerlanters managed to escape his trap, flying off toward the west with the last desperate energy their dragons had in them.

“Pursuit, sir?” Captain Domiziano asked, his image tiny in the crystal.

Regretfully, Sabrino shook his head. “No. We did what we came down here to do: We held them off our men on the ground. And night’s almost on us. We’d better head back toward the farm. We’ll want our beasts fresh come morning, because the powers above know we’ll be flying again.”

“Aye, sir.” Domiziano seemed regretful, too, but obedient. Sabrino approved of the combination. He wanted aggressive subordinates, but not so aggressive as to set their will above his.

He led the wing back to the latest temporary dragon farm, which lay at the edge of a good-sized estate a little east of Sommerda. The manor at the heart of the estate hadn’t suffered; the Algarvians had taken it by surprise, overrunning the area before King SwemmePs men could decide to use it for a strongpoint. They’d fought hard in Sommerda itself. Spiraling down toward the farm, Sabrino could see how his own countrymen had had to level half the town before finally clearing it of the stubborn Unkerlanter defenders.

On the ground, he was glad to let the handlers tend to his dragon. The beast liked them better than him, anyhow; he worked it hard, while they gave it the meat and brimstone and quicksilver it craved. It liked no one very much, though. Sabrino knew dragons too well to have any doubts on that score.

He ate hastily roasted mutton himself, along with hard bread, olives, and a nasty white wine the cooks who ran the field kitchen should never have bothered stealing. “Too sweet and too sour at the same time,” he said, staring at his cup in dismay. “Tastes like a diabetic’s piss.”

“If you say so, sir,” Captain Domiziano said innocently. “Myself, I wouldn’t know.” Sabrino made as if to throw the mug at him. He almost did it for real; it wouldn’t have been a waste of the wine. But he was laughing even as he reared back, and so were the officers who ate with him.

“Hello!” Captain Orosio pointed toward the manor house. “Looks like the old boy in there has finally decided to come out and see what we’re up to.”

Sure enough, an elderly Unkerlanter approached the dragonfliers. Sabrino had ordered the manor house and whoever lived in it left alone, except for taking what he needed from the flocks to keep men and dragons fed. Until now, the Unkerlanter noble--for such Sabrino assumed him to be--had also ignored the Algarvians.

He was straight and spry and, for an Unkerlanter, tall. He wore a bushy white mustache, a style outmoded in his clean-shaven kingdom since the middle of the century, the days before the Six Years’ War. And he proved to speak excellent Algarvian, saying, “I never expected to see your folk come so far into my land.”

Sabrino got to his feet and bowed. “Here we are, sir, nonetheless. I have the honor to be the Count Sabrino; very much at your service.” He bowed again.

A small, bitter smile crossed the Unkerlanter’s face as he returned the second bow. “In my younger days, I had some considerable experience with Algarvians,” he said. “I see the breed has changed little during my retirement.”

“And you are, sir?” Sabrino asked politely.

“I doubt my name would mean anything to you, young fellow,” the Unkerlanter replied, though Sabrino was not so young as all that. “I am called Chlodvald.”

Not only Sabrino but some of his officers exclaimed at that. “Powers above!” the wing commander said. “If you are that Chlodvald, your Excellency”--and he had no doubt the old man was--”you were the best general your kingdom had during the Six Years’ War.”

“You compliment me too highly. I had good fortune,” Chlodvald said with a shrug. In his place, an Algarvian would have preened and boasted.

“Will you give us the privilege of dining with us?” Sabrino asked. Several of the junior officers added eager agreement.

Chlodvald raised an eyebrow. “Generous of you to offer to share with me what is mine.”

“Sir, it is war,” Sabrino said stiffly. “Did you never feast from the fruits of victory?”

“There you have me,” the retired general admitted, and sat down among the dragonfliers. His kingdom’s enemies fell over one another to give him food and drink. When he tasted the wine, that eyebrow rose again. “This did not come from my cellars.”

“Your Excellency, with all my heart I should hope not,” Sabrino said. After Chlodvald had eaten and drunk, the wing commander asked him, “How is it that you live quietly here, sir, and are not engaged in helping Unkerlant against us?”

“Oh, I have lived quietly here a good many years, and I did not expect King Swemmel to call me into his service even when war broke out anew,” Chlodvald replied. “You may not recall, but I fought for Kyot in the Twinkings War.”

“Ah,” Sabrino whispered.

Captain Orosio blurted what was in Sabrino’s mind: “Then how come you’re not dead?”

Chlodvald smiled that bitter smile again. “King Swemmel didn’t spare many. I’d known both the young princes well back in Cottbus, of course, before their father died and they went at each other. Maybe that had something to do with it. I don’t know; he slew others he knew as well as me. But he said he was letting me live because of my earlier service to Unkerlant, which partly excused my madness. Anyone who opposed him was and is in his mind mad.”

“What is in himself, he sees in others,” Sabrino said. Chlodvald did not disagree.

Captain Domiziano said, “Algarve is the broom that will sweep him away. King Mezentio will arrange this kingdom as it should be.”

For the third time, the strange smile appeared on Chlodvald s face. “If only you had come twenty years ago, we should have welcomed you with open arms. But now it’s too late. We were just getting back on our feet after the Six Years’ War and the Twinkings War, and now you come and throw us back so we shall have to start all over again. Now we are fighting for Unkerlant, and in that cause we are all united.”

Sabrino eyed his officers. They all looked amused, as he felt amused. Politely inclining his head to Chlodvald, he said, “Your Excellency, Unkerlant may be united, but we would not be here by Sommerda were that doing King Swemmel any enormous amount of good.”

“Perhaps not,” the retired--forcibly retired--Unkerlanter general replied. “But then again, while you are winning, you have not yet won. Tell me: has the fight been easy for you?”

Sabrino started to nod. In some ways, the fight had been very easy. The Unkerlanters weren’t skilled, either in the air or on the ground. They blundered into traps that would have fooled no Valmieran or Jelgavan officer. Sometimes, though, they battered their way out of those traps, too, as the Valmierans or Jelgavans would not have even tried to do. They fought hard all the time; if they were doomed to defeat, they did not admit it even to themselves.