Demontech: Rally Point: 2 (Demontech Book 2) (25 page)

Work on the defenses progressed well over the next two days. The evacuation of Eikby’s didn’t. Too few people were willing simply to pack up what they could take and leave the rest behind. But only the poorest of the villagers were able to take everything; others piled carts and wagons so high that carts fell over or collapsed under the weight. But too many people were convinced that the tales of Jokapcul rapacity were exaggerated and refused to leave or make any preparations at all.

A small cloud of bees buzzed in through a window in a tower room. It wasn’t the highest room of the highest tower in Penston; that room was reserved for the exclusive use of the Dark Prince, titular head of the Jokapcul armies that had conquered all of southern Nunimar as far as this westernmost of the Princedon city states.
This
tower room was slightly more than halfway up a tower of middling height—high enough to see above the surrounding houses, but not so high as to give its occupant the impression he was more important than he was.

The room’s occupant, a magician of slightly more than middling rank, perched on a stool at an oak board alchemist’s table, hunched over one of the magic tomes conjured so many years earlier by the Dark Prince. His eyes had nearly glazed over, the pathways of his mind clotted with useless data, and his thoughts twisted themselves into a Möbius strip as he struggled to understand the workings of the
M249 Light Machine Gun (SAW)
. He was charged with deciphering the drawings that accompanied the largely unintelligible text, to learn which demons properly lived in the object, and its best use as a weapon—if, indeed, it was a weapon.

To be sure, the
M249 Light Machine Gun (SAW)
had vague resemblances to the
M1911A1 .45 Caliber Pistol
and the
AT4 Light Anti-Armor Weapon
, both of which were demon spitters in use by the invasion force. It stood to reason that the
M249 Light Machine Gun (SAW)
also was a demon spitter—it was described and illustrated in the same tome as the two known demon spitters. But the most baffling thing about it was the “(SAW)” in its nomenclature. “Saw” was one of the relatively few words in the tomes to have been deciphered with a reasonable degree of certainty. Peer as he might at the illustrations of the
M249 Light Machine Gun (SAW)
, the magician could discern neither the bladelike structure nor the teeth one expected to find on a saw. Equally baffling to the magician was why a demon spitter would be combined with a carpentry tool. Unless it was a demon-operated carpentry tool that had nothing to do with weaponry. In which case, why was so much space devoted to it in a weapons tome? And why did it bear a familial resemblance to other demon spitters rather than to other carpentry tools?

The magician sorely needed to unglaze his eyes, clear out his mental pathways, and untwist the Möbius strip of his thoughts. He sat straight and winced at the quite audible popping from his spine and shoulders. He really
must
, he told himself again, see a research healing mage to find out if they had yet discovered a demon that could do something for the aching backs of magicians and mages whose charges required that they spend long hours bent over tomes. He twisted and stretched one last time, grimaced once more at the popping as he reached for an amplifying glass, then bent over the tome again. Perhaps examination of the illustrations themselves would do for his thoughts what stretching and twisting failed to do for his back.

The illustrations in the tome never failed to bedazzle him in their felicity of detail. Never before had he seen such, not from the hands of the finest artists and draughtsmen of Jokapcul, or any of the other nations whose paintings, drawings, and tomes he had examined. They had to be engravings or drypoints, but the fingertips he lightly brushed over them felt none of the ridges and burrs left by the press when it squeezed the paper into the ink-filled lines and holes in the printing plate. Neither did the amplifying glass show any ridges or pitting. If they weren’t engravings or drypoints, by what magic had these illustrations been printed? They clearly weren’t woodcuts or wood engravings; wood was simply incapable of holding the detail of these illustrations. Neither were they lithography; no lithographer’s sticks were capable of the fineness of line and detail found here. And the illustrations in color! Both woodcut and lithography required the use of multiple blocks, one for each color. It was inevitable that there be some discrepancy between blocks, it was simply impossible for the registration of lithography stones or wood blocks to be so precise. Moreover, the water used in lithography caused a certain amount of bleeding of colors—bleeding that was not in the least bit evident in these illustrations! And it was simply impossible for hand coloring to be so exact.

The magician’s mental Möbius strip took another, unexpected turn and his eyes crossed. The amplifying glass slipped from his fingers and he straightened up with a groan. Gingerly, with a hand clamped on the small of his back, he slid from the stool to his feet and hobbled to the south-facing window. Perhaps if he stuck his head out of the window a waft of sea air would buffet his face and clear his mind and eyes.

That was when the bees, their cloud in the form of a large scavenging bird or smallish dragon, flew in through the north window.

“Gwah?”
the magician exclaimed, surprised, when he heard the long-awaited buzzing. He turned away from the south window and saw the cloud of bees, retaining its formation, come to perch on the alchemist’s table. The tribulations of understanding the tome forgotten, he cautiously approached the bees, watching the pattern of their dance within the cloud, listening to the changing inflections of their buzzing, peering closely at them for signs of damage.

The cloud was thinner than it had been when he sent it out from Zobra City. The bees within it were thinner as well.

“Poor seekers,” the magician crooned. The bees were obviously too tired and hungry to deliver their message. “Poor messengers.” His hand brushed soothingly over the cloud, not quite touching the dancing bees. “I will send for sustenance. Is it warm enough for you in here? I can light the brazier if you need.” The magician turned his head toward a precariously balanced stack of tomes in a corner of the room and summoned the demon, who warily peeked one eye at the bees from behind a tome.

Hardly taller than the length of a man’s hand, the demon pulled itself out far enough to expose chest and shoulders. It tapped itself on the chest and mouthed,
“Ee? Oo wanzz ee?”

“Yes, you. Right now, right here.” The magician firmly pointed the forefinger of his free hand at the top of the table a foot from the buzzing cloud of bees.

“Oo zurr tha’ ”
the demon squeaked as it darted back behind the tomes.

“I’m sure. Over here. Now.” He continued his soothing brushing at the bees.

“Ee?”
the demon squeaked. But the magician didn’t reply, merely jabbed his pointing finger. The demon sighed with a timbre that belied the squeaking of its words, and clambered to the top of the stack of books, which teetered most threateningly when it bounded from the top of the pile to the end of the table.

The magician tapped the table where he’d been pointing, and the bald, naked demon slunk hesitantly toward the spot indicated, warily eyeing the bees the entire way. Its gnarled muscles bunched and stretched in exaggeration of human muscular movement.

“Nectar. Bring many bowls for our tired and hungry friends.”

“ ‘Annee?”
the demon asked, holding up two lumpy fingers.

The magician solemnly shook his head and held up five fingers. “Many.”

“ ‘Annee?”
The demon unfolded another finger.

The magician splayed his fingers.

“ ‘Annee?”
The demon held up four fingers but kept his thumb folded.

The magician swatted at it, but the demon hopped back out of the way. It held up all five fingers.
” ‘Annee. Ee gittum epp?”

The magician flashed five fingers twice and nodded. “Get help. Many.” He flashed five fingers twice again.

The little demon’s face screwed up like it was about to cry. It flashed five fingers twice back at the magician, then hopped off the table and scampered from the room. The magician returned his attention to comforting the tired, hungry, bees.

Sooner than he expected, the door of the tower room slammed open and something at the door gave a menacing grunt.

“Bring it over here, please,” the magician said without looking around. He pointed at the table next to the formation of bees.

Another deep grunt was followed by heavy footsteps that shook the floor and caused the table to shiver. Then the last footstep thudded next to the magician and a tray slammed onto the tabletop where he’d pointed.

The magician gestured and the bees broke formation to feed. He reached out a hand and scratched the troll behind a pointed, tufted ear.

“Thank you,” he said. “They needed that.”

The troll keened in pleasure and turned his head so the magician could scratch behind his other ear.

The magician groaned as well, but not with pleasure. He stopped scratching the troll’s head to suck on his abraded fingertips. He simply
had
to remember to wear a chain mail glove when scratching a troll’s head.

At length, sated and rested, the bees resumed their formation. They danced their dance. The individual bees in the cloud hovered, swayed side to side, flitted up and down or to and fro, they curlicued around one another. Every seemingly random movement modulated their buzzing, and the modulations had meaning. The magician listened carefully. He had the bees repeat their message twice to be certain he had it right. Then he thanked them and opened a chest containing an old hive for the bees to live in until more suitable quarters could be found or constructed. Then he ran off to deliver the message.

When the message reached the Kamazai Commanding, after going through several levels of the magician’s chain of command, then several levels of the KC’s own staff, he considered for a moment, checked his order of battle, and quietly swore.

“Who’d have thought they would come so close to where we were going?” he said to his aide, who wisely said nothing in reply. “I sent that fool knight north just to get him out of the way. He might be able to effectively put siege to that town, but he probably can’t defeat its home guard, much less the sole bandit band that has caused us any problem.” He looked at his aide, who did his best not to flinch at the look. “I sent no other knights, no other officers with him. The fool is liable to get that entire troop killed if he encounters that bandit band!” The aide swallowed and nodded. The Kamazai Commanding then told his aide which knight to send north with which troops—with a full complement of officers. At greatest speed. With the intent of catching the fool and his mixed troop before they reached that town. Destroy the town first, then hunt down and destroy the bandit band said to be led by two Frangerian Marines.

Destroy, of course, meant pillage or destroy all property and kill all the people.

The southern defenses progressed rapidly enough so they were able to spare people to complete the western defenses and strengthen the weak northern ones. The eastern were the weakest, but they didn’t see much reason to defend the eastern approaches to Eikby.

Three blacksmiths turned out hundreds of caltrops, which were scattered in the near part of the open ground between the fence and the forest. Lanes were left open through them so the defenders could safely counterattack if the opportunity arose. The open lanes were marked, but the marks were disguised so they weren’t obvious from the forest side. The defenses were constructed to conform to the lay of the land.

“Integrated planning and construction,” Captain Stonearm mused. “I like that.”

A two-hundred-yard-long, hip-deep, trench was centered on the south road, perpendicular to the funneling fences. Dirt from the trench was used to form a broad berm to its front. More dirt was piled on the berm from a wide knee-deep trench lined with pointed wood stakes that were angled away from the berm. That shallow trench wasn’t studded thickly enough with stakes to stop a charging enemy force, but it would slow it down and cause some casualties. A light latticework covering with ground-hugging legumes made the moat invisible. Between the fence and the trench foot-size pits were dug, each with a short, sharp, stake sticking up from its bottom. All were lightly covered with crawling foliage for camouflage.
Lord Gunny Says
called the small foot traps “punji traps” and said they had been very effective in wars where he came from. Everybody believed the claim. Markers, visible only from the trench side, revealed the location of the punji traps. No caltrops were scattered inside the fence. Fourscore men—the Eikby guards’ archers, archers from the company, and woodsmen and hunters from the town—were ready to drop their building implements and man the trench when the enemy came into sight. Swords and spears lay with the bows and quivers that stood ready in the trench.

Ten yards behind the archers’ trench was a row of chest-deep pits where swords- and pikemen would crouch unseen by the attackers and safe from the Jokapcul demon spitters. When the foe was almost on the archers’ trench, these fighters would clamber from the pits and rush forward to join battle with Jokapcul who managed to survive the rain of arrows. When the enemy closed, the archers would retire to the pits where the swords and spears of the attackers couldn’t harm them, and fire at the attackers whenever they had a clear target.

That was the main plan. Spinner and Haft—and just about everybody else—knew the plan relied on the Jokapcul to be foolish enough to maintain a frontal assault.
Lord Gunny Says
was quite clear on the fragility of plans.

“No plan, no matter how good,”
the
Handbook for Sea Soldiers
said emphatically,
“ever survives the first shot.”