The Guns of Empire (46 page)

“We are well supplied, yes,” Whaler said.

“Tell Dorsay I need a gesture of good faith to give to
my
people before we can negotiate.”

“If you're going to suggest we withdraw from Polkhaiz—”

“No, of course not. But if you were to ship food to our side of the river—not much, say enough to supply the army for a day . . .”

“Then that would buy us a day.” Whaler frowned. “We'd be in the same position tomorrow.”

“And you'd provide another shipment. And so on. Until we either strike a deal or decide to fight it out after all.”

“Hmm.” He tipped his head. “It's unorthodox, I'll say that much. But it may work. Orlanko will scream bloody murder, but he doesn't actually have command over military operations. You realize, of course, that this won't hold for long.”

“It doesn't need to.”
Just long enough.
“But I need your assurance tonight.”

“Damn.” Whaler levered himself to his feet, wincing. “And here I thought I was done with riding for a while.”

—

“Stay here,” Raesinia told Barely.

“Your Majesty . . .” The woman hesitated. “Are you sure?”

“I think I'll be safe visiting one of my own generals.”

Joanna raised an eyebrow eloquently, but as always said nothing. Barely scratched the side of her head and nodded. Raesinia left them at the intersection and followed the aisle down the row of Third Division tents. The rest of the camp was a good deal more ragged than it had once been, but here, within sight of their commanders, standards were still kept up.

Two sentries waited in front of General Kaanos' tent. They looked down at her curiously, and then she saw recognition in their eyes. Both bowed deep.

“I need to see the general,” Raesinia said.

“He's sleeping, Your Majesty.” One guard looked at the other.

“It's important.”

If Kaanos had given them specific orders, they still might keep her out.
Then we'll have to wait until morning and toss the dice.
But she wanted to talk to him, at least, and see if there was a way to avoid a confrontation.

“One moment, Your Majesty.” The guard turned and rapped, hesitantly, at the tent pole. After a moment a sleepy voice answered.

“What?”

“The . . . ah . . . queen is here to see you, sir. She says it's important.”

Silence for a long moment. Then, “Let her in.”

The guards stepped aside. Raesinia pushed through the tent flap, blinking as a lantern flared. Kaanos sat at a folding table, shaking out a match. He wore his underclothes, with a thick blanket wrapped around his shoulders. With his hairy face, it made him look even more like a bear.

“Forgive me if I'm not properly dressed, Your Majesty,” he said. “But you didn't give me much warning.”

“I don't stand on ceremony.” Raesinia crossed the tent and stood in front of the table. “You have to call off the attack.”

“This again?” Kaanos shook his head. “You said it was important.”

“I've exchanged messengers with Dorsay. We can come to an agreement—”

“I told you,” Kaanos said wearily. “He'll string you along until we're so weak we'll have to surrender. Didn't they teach you politics at Ohnlei?” He cocked his head. “Or was it all just dancing and smiling?”

Raesinia returned his gaze levelly. After a moment of silence, she said, “May I ask a question?”

“You're the queen,” Kaanos said. “You can ask whatever you like.”

“What have I done to so offend you?”

There was another pause. Kaanos shifted the blanket around his shoulders and ran his fingers through his bristly beard.

“You know I served in Khandar,” he said.

“With Column-General d'Ivoire,” Raesinia said. “I know.”

“Do you know why?”

She shook her head.

“Sometimes it's hard for me to even remember,” he said. “There was a fight. Some noble brat who said some things he shouldn't have in a tavern. That sort of thing happens every night, but shiny spurs went out a window and landed badly. Broke his leg, and the cutters said he'd need a cane to walk. He went to his father, and his father talked to his friends . . .” He spread his hands. “And there I was, eating sand for the rest of my career.”

Raesinia nodded. Marcus had told her that Khandar was used as a dumping ground, a hardship post for officers who'd ruined their careers.

“It was just as well, I told myself,” Kaanos went on. “In the old Royal Army, captain was as high as someone like me could ever make it. We were just about worthy to keep a battalion pointed in the right direction, as long as
someone with the right blood was actually in
charge
. At least in Khandar I only had to put up with old Colonel Warus.

“Then everything went to shit there. You have no idea what that was like. One minute we owned the city, and the next minute mobs of grayskins were killing anyone in a blue uniform.”

“I might know more than you think,” Raesinia said quietly. “I was at the fall of the Vendre.”

Kaanos inclined his head, conceding the point. “It was Marcus who got us out of that. We all would have ended up roasted if not for him. He kept the Colonials together long enough to get clear of the city and send for help.”

“And my father sent you Janus,” Raesinia said.

“Another goddamned noble with a brilliant plan,” Kaanos said. “I told Marcus we ought to have stuffed him into a dune and taken ship for home.”

“But Janus
won
. He beat the Redeemers.”

“And what good did that do anybody? I lost friends all through that fight, and in the end we left everything behind and scuttled back to Vordan to save
you
.”

He didn't know about the Thousand Names, of course, or the secret war against the Priests of the Black. Raesinia felt an unexpected surge of sympathy.

“He's mad,” Kaanos said. “You know that, don't you? Vhalnich's crazy. He'd have to be crazy to bring us to a place like this. Snow in June!”

“So what are you doing here?” Raesinia said. “You could have left the army after the revolution. Why stay?”

“Because Marcus asked me to,” Kaanos said softly. “Vhalnich had his hooks in deep by then. I couldn't say anything to Marcus, so the only thing left was to go along for the ride. I owed him that much.” He shook his head. “Now they're both dead.”

“We don't know that.”

“We didn't leave them any supplies. If they'd broken through, we'd have heard by now. They're dead,
Your Majesty
. Marcus left me in charge of this army, and I'll be damned if I let it starve in the snow. Tomorrow we'll break Dorsay's line, and then we'll get the
hell
out of this godforsaken country.”

There was grief in his voice, under the anger. Raesinia considered.
If I tell him the plan, I might be able to bring him around.
But that would sacrifice the element of surprise if he
didn't
agree.
And he won't.
He'd fixed the idea of an attack in his head, one more charge to avenge Marcus and show everyone. She felt sorry for him.

“Division-General,” she said. “I believe that Marcus will make it back alive. But more important, if he were here, you know he'd do whatever he could to keep the soldiers safe—”

“Bullshit,” Kaanos said. “If that were true, we'd never have come this far. Marcus would do whatever Janus told him to, because Janus hypnotized him along with the rest of you.” He sighed. “First chance Vordan's ever had to be rid of the whole batch of noble parasites and the revolution turns things over to Janus bet fucking Vhalnich first chance they get.”

“All I'm trying to do is make peace,” Raesinia said.

“Then you shouldn't have chosen that mad bastard for First Consul. Now Dorsay has us where he wants us, and all we can do is try to fight our way out.” He fixed her with an angry glare. “Now, if you'll excuse me,
Your Majesty
, I'd like to get a little more sleep. God only knows what's going to happen in the morning.”

He gave a stiff, shallow bow, and turned away. Raesinia watched him for a moment longer, then left the tent, nodding her thanks at the guards. They'd most likely heard every word, but they stared straight ahead and said nothing.

Sothe and Cyte were waiting for her back at her own tent, with Barely and Joanna.

“No luck?” Cyte said.

“He's in mourning for Marcus,” Raesinia said. “I don't think he heard a word I said.”

“Dorsay's people are waiting for the signal,” Sothe said.

Raesinia turned to look south, across the frozen river. The lights of Polkhaiz were just visible.

“Do it,” she said.

—

The Grand Army was thrown into chaos at first light by the smell of frying bacon.

It came from the Second Division camp, where the Girls' Own had taken down some tents to make a clear space and set up makeshift tables. Bonfires had been lit, with big cauldrons set to boiling above them. When cooking equipment was lacking, the soldiers had improvised; bacon sizzled on upside-down kettles, on the backs of shovels, and even carefully laid out on bayonets.

When soldiers from the other divisions came to investigate, they were welcomed. Parked beyond the frying bacon and the cauldrons of army soup were wagons full of bread and vegetables, a bounty that seemed to the hungry men to
have been shipped in from a different world. It had been easy to forget, over the past few weeks, that there was a land beyond this endless, unnatural snowscape with its dark forests and frozen rivers. Now they were forcibly reminded.

Rumor spread beyond the ability of the officers to control it. Girls' Own soldiers drove smaller wagons into the other camps and tossed loaves of fresh-baked bread into grateful hands, unloaded box after box of hardtack, and even brought fresh meat for the pots. All across the Grand Army, men piled up anything that would burn, shoveled snow into cauldrons, and watched the flames grow with desperate hunger.

The queen, the women told the other soldiers. The queen had negotiated with the Borelgai, and this was the result.

Raesinia sat in her tent, cutting slices from a ham that the Duke of Brookspring had sent to her in particular, with his compliments. One by one, the generals arrived, and Sothe led them aside and spoke to them in low tones. Then they waited by the side of the tent; Raesinia was amused, though not surprised, to hear stomachs growling.

Kaanos was the last to appear. His face was bright red with fury under his vast spray of whiskers.

“What the
hell
do you think you're doing?” he said, stalking past Barely and Joanna to stand in front of Raesinia. “We ought to be getting into formation
right now
. Do you have any idea how much danger this puts us in? If the Borelgai were to attack at this moment, they could roll up the whole army before we could fire a shot!”

“They must know that,” Raesinia said. “And yet they don't attack. Odd, no?”

What it meant, she knew, was that Dorsay's faction still held sway over Orlanko's.
But no need to tell
him
that.

“This is treason,” Kaanos said. “You've sold us out.”

“I've negotiated for food when we were starving,” Raesinia said. “That's a strange definition of ‘selling us out.'”

“You've undermined my authority!” Kaanos shouted.

“Ah. As to that.” Raesinia pushed back from the table and stood up. The top of her skull barely came up to Kaanos' chin, and she had to tilt her head back to look him in the eye. “Division-General Morwen Kaanos, you are under arrest for refusing to obey orders from your queen.”

“You can't be serious.” Kaanos looked up at the other generals. “You're not going to stand for this, are you?”

“The queen has my support,” said Cyte.

“And mine,” Giforte added.

“The thing is,” Solwen said wretchedly, “the thing
is
, Mor, I'm not sure what I can
actually
do about it.” He scratched the side of his head, looking embarrassed. “I mean, she
is
the queen, when all is said and done.”

“She doesn't have any right to give orders here!” Kaanos shouted.

“She disagrees,” Solwen said. “And what should I do, order my men to shoot her?”

“Put
her
under arrest for treason!” Kaanos looked from Solwen to de Manzet. “You both know I'm right. If you bring your men here—”

“My men are mostly enjoying their first hot breakfast for weeks,” de Manzet said quietly. “What do you think they'd say if I told them to put it down and come arrest the queen?”

“That's about the shape of it,” Solwen said.

“
My
men won't stand for it,” Kaanos said, whirling back to Raesinia. “Unlike these fucking cowards.”

“As Division-General de Manzet said,” Raesinia murmured, “your men are . . . busy. And we will explain things to them.”

“You highborn are all the same,” Kaanos hissed. “Traitors, all of you.”

Raesinia gave a tired shrug and nodded to Barely and Joanna. They had a half dozen hard-eyed women behind them, handpicked by Colonel Giforte for reliability. Joanna took Kaanos by the arm, and all the fight went out of the general. He seemed to deflate.

“Hell,” he said. “It's your party, then.”

He left, the soldiers falling in around him. Raesinia turned back to the other generals.

“Legally,” she said, “since the Deputies-General have yet to approve a full constitution, the procedure may be a bit unclear. But I think we can speak in broad terms. The Crown and the deputies designated the First Consul, Janus bet Vhalnich, to command the armed forces of Vordan. He is now missing, however, and in his absence that authority descends back to where it has traditionally rested—that is, with the sovereign.” She let her eyes roam down the short row of officers. “Are we in agreement on this?”