The Road to Hell - eARC (70 page)

“Yes, Sir.”

“Tell Galvara I need him.”

“Yes, Sir!”

Forstmir slapped his breastplate in salute and headed off into the gathering twilight, shouting orders to the shaken men of 2nd Platoon. Ustmyn looked after him for a moment, then sat on one of the fort’s burned timbers, pulled a recording crystal out of his belt pouch, and began dictating his report.

* * *

“You wanted me, Sir?”

Ustmyn looked up as Lance Gordymair Galvara, the leader of the three-man hummer section Hundred Gorzalt had attached to 2nd Platoon, slid to a halt beside him. Gorzalt hadn’t sent his most capable hummer master out to share 2nd Platoon’s misery, but at least Galvara didn’t seem to be panicking.

Probably lack of imagination
, the fifty thought mordantly.

“Yes, Galvara,” he said out loud and extended the crystal. “Get this transferred and into the air as soon as possible. It’s critical this message get through, so copy it to every hummer you’ve got.”

“But if we send them all off, Sir, we won’t have any left for additional messages,” Galvara pointed out.

“No, we won’t,” Ustmyn said almost gently. “On the other hand, I don’t really think we’re going to need them. Do you?”

Galvara stared at him. Then his eyes widened and he swallowed.

“No, Sir. Don’t reckon we will,” he said, reaching for the crystal.

“Which makes it especially important to get this one right.” Ustmyn gripped the lance’s shoulder. “Make sure you do, Gordymair.”

“Aye, Sir. I’ll do that thing.”

The lance’s Limathian accent was more pronounced than Ustmyn had ever heard it, but his jaw firmed and he nodded sharply.

“Good man.” The fifty squeezed his shoulder again. “Now, go get it sent,” he said and turned to follow Forstmir as Galvara ran towards the hummers.

* * *

“Oh, laddie, that’s a bad, bad idea,” Wendyr chan Jethos said softly.

“Can’t blame them for trying,” Fozak chan Gyulair replied and drew a deep breath as he settled even more squarely behind his Mark 12. “And it’s why we’re here.”

“I know.” Chan Jethos shook his head. “Doesn’t hardly seem fair, though.”

“And what those bastards did to every Voice between Hell’s Gate and Traisum
was
fair?”

“Didn’t say that.” Chan Jethos closed his eyes, concentrating on his Talent. “Good news is there’s only one of ’em so far. Might be the others’ll take the hint.”

“Maybe.”

Chan Gyulair had his own eyes closed as he squeezed the rear trigger, transforming the one in front of it into a hair trigger that could be touched off almost with a thought. He ignored the bulky, powerful telescopic sight mounted atop his rifle. In fact, he hadn’t even opened the protective lens caps. There were times he needed that sight, because his was a very special Talent. He was a Predictive Distance Viewer. His range was too short to be useful for the artillery, where ranges of up to fifteen or even twenty miles might be required, but it was more than long enough for other purposes, and the Army aggressively recruited men like him for its snipers. He had to know where to Look, which was why he was normally paired with chan Jethos, whose Plotting Talent located his targets for him. Without that sort of spotter, he had to search for them the old-fashioned way, using his eyes first and his Talent second, which explained the sight.

But today, he
did
know where to Look, and as he Watched Gordymair Galvara racing towards the hummers, he recognized the exact moment when he’d be in exactly the right spot.

Of course, it wasn’t enough to simply know where the target was. No Talent could provide the breath control, the steadiness, the ability to gauge the range and put a bullet precisely where it needed to be precisely when it needed to be there. That took years of training and constant practice, but Fozak chan Gyulair had invested those years in mastering his trade.

* * *

The 320-grain bullet was still traveling at almost nine hundred feet per second when it struck Lance Galvara directly above his right eye like a five hundred and seventy-pound hammer.

Chapter Forty

March 23

“Your boys have done one hell of a job, Renyl,” Arlos chan Geraith said, exchanging a forearm clasp like hammered steel with Brigade-Captain Renyl chan Quay. “I knew I was asking a lot of you, and you’ve done all of it and more. Especially chan Malthyn and young chan Mahsdyr.”

“They have done the Brigade proud, haven’t they, Sir?” Renyl chan Quay was almost a foot taller than chan Geraith, with hazel eyes and the dark hair of his Teramandorian birth, and white teeth flashed against his dark complexion as he smiled broadly, pleased with the division-captain’s well-deserved praise.

“They’ve done the whole damned
Army
proud,” the division-captain corrected. “There were so many things that could’ve gone wrong with this march that I couldn’t even begin to count them. I’d say probably at least a third of them
did
go wrong, for that matter. But the entire corps pulled my arse out of every hole we almost fell into, and your brigade’s done more of that than anyone except—possibly—chan Hurmahl and the other engineers.”

Chan Quay nodded, his smile fading into a more sober expression, because chan Geraith had a point.

Breakdowns had accelerated at an alarming rate over the last couple of weeks. Third Corps was down almost half of the Bisons which had been assigned to it at the beginning of its epic march. Some of those had been made up out of additional Bisons sent down-chain as replacements, but the corps remained thirty percent short of its theoretical establishment and the Steel Mules and steam drays couldn’t compensate for the missing Bisons’ massive hauling capacity. It was like using switching engines in place of one of the TTE’s Paladins, and it was beginning to bite their logistics badly.

Despite that, there’d been enough redundancy—barely—in chan Geraith’s original planning to compensate for their losses. So far, at least.

“I’ve been following all your Voice reports,” chan Geraith continued, “but it’s not the same as a face-to-face briefing.”

Chan Quay nodded again, his expression neutral. Unlike chan Geraith, the brigade-captain was a Voice, although his range was only a few hundred yards. Had chan Geraith been equally Talented, the two of them could have conferred directly through their staff Voices, despite the distance between them, a point he had no intention of making. The division-captain needed no Talent to read his non-expression, however, and snorted dryly.

“Wasn’t the first time I’ve regretted being deaf as a post when it comes to Hearing reports, Renyl. Won’t be the last, either…I hope. So why don’t you just step over to my office and my maps.”

“Yes, Sir,” chan Quay said respectfully and followed chan Geraith back to the division-captain’s HQ Steel Mule.

Unlike the icy winter in Nairsom, the weather here, about midway between what should have been the towns of Carotal and Simaryn, was clear, dry, and much, much warmer. The early afternoon temperature hovered in the mid-fifties, though chan Geraith’s staff Weather Hound predicted it would drop well below freezing overnight. At the moment, however, it seemed almost balmy to the division-captain, and the windows in the shell covering the Mule’s cargo bed were open to let in the brisk southeasterly breeze.

That breeze ruffled the corners of the map paperweighted down on chan Geraith’s desk as he and chan Quay bent over it.

“We’re here,” the division-captain said, tapping a point roughly two hundred miles west of Chindar and a thousand miles east of the New Uromath portal. The long line of the Sand Rock River, snaking from northwest to southeast, lay a hundred and thirty miles to the south, and the terrain offered firm, relatively easy going for their vehicles as they rolled along, throwing up a vast plume of dust—which he hoped to every Arpathian hell there were no Arcanan eyes to see—from the dry soil.

“Yes, Sir,” chan Quay acknowledged. “As of twelve hours ago, Regiment-Captain chan Malthyn had the rest of Second Battalion here at High Rock City, a couple of hundred miles behind chan Mahsdyr’s Gold Company,” he touched a spot just over two hundred miles northwest of their current location. “Chan Grosvar’s been holding First Battalion here, about ten miles west of us, at Broken Shoe Butte, for the last couple of days.” He tapped another spot. “He’ll be moving up to join Second Battalion tomorrow morning. He’s been waiting for that load of engineering supplies Battalion-Captain chan Hurmahl needs. Assuming nothing untoward happens, he should reach chan Mahsdyr day after tomorrow.”

Chan Geraith nodded slowly, leaning forward to take his weight on his arms, his palms spread on the map while he considered the positions of the rest of his division. The 9th Dragoon Regiment had closed up with Teresco chan Urlman’s 16th Dragoons five days ago, and the 23rd would overtake the main body within another seventy-two hours. At that point, two of his three brigades would be concentrated in a single fighting force, ready to hand.

That was good, but the erosion of his Bison strength meant that Brigade-Captain chan Sharys’ 3rd Brigade had actually
lost
ground. As of the latest Voice report, his lead regiment remained almost two hundred miles short of the Nairsom-Thermyn portal, waiting out a bitter late-spring blizzard. The Weather Hounds predicted that would take at least three days, and even after the weather cleared, he’d make slower going than the rest of 2nd Brigade, thanks to the newly fallen snow and—even more—to his relative shortage of transport.

Well, two brigades ought to be enough to be going on with
, he told himself.
And look on the bright side. If we hit a snag
getting across Coyote Canyon there’ll be plenty of time for him to
catch up with us. Hells, there’ll be time for chan Bykahlar’s
infantry
to catch up with us!

“Chan Malthyn’s left Battalion-Captain chan Hyul at High Rock City to mind the store while he moved up to Battalion-Captain chan Yahndar’s command group,” chan Quay continued, “and chan Yahndar still has chan Mahsdyr’s Gold Company out in front. According to chan Malthyn’s last Voice message, Gold Company’s actually on the rim of Coyote Canyon now.”

“Ah?” Chan Geraith looked up. “When did that come in?”

“About fifteen minutes ago, Sir.” Chan Quay grinned. “I thought I’d just save that news to give it to you personally.”

“It’s a little late for a Midwinter gift, but I’ll take it,” chan Geraith replied with an answering grin. 3rd Brigade might have been delayed, but chan Malthyn was thirty-six hours
ahead
of schedule. “Any sign the Arcanans’ve been poking around the bridging site?”

“None, Sir.” Chan Quay shook his head.

“Good,” chan Geraith said. “Good.”

Of course, dragons flying overhead wouldn’t leave any convenient tracks for chan Mahsdyr’s men to spot, but if the Arcanans had noticed the preparation work TTE’s advanced construction parties had done they would almost certainly have landed to inspect it in person. Or that was what
Sharonians
would have done, anyway. Gods only knew what sort of “magic” Arcanans might use to carry out detailed reconnaissance!

Stop that!
he told himself firmly.
You’ve already had plenty of evidence that there are limits to what they can do. Don’t start giving them godlike powers at this stage!

“Is the site in good shape?” he asked out loud.

“Chan Hurmahl says it is, Sir.” Chan Quay straightened and propped his hands on his hips as he and his superior gazed down at the crooked blue line of the Stone Carve River.

Coyote Canyon was scarcely the equal of the enormous chasm of Vothan’s Canyon, a hundred miles farther south, but it was still a dauntingly impressive terrain obstacle. Fortunately, the Trans-Temporal Express had realized it would have to bridge Coyote if it meant to run a line across Thermyn to New Uromath. It had already done that in one other universe, and its engineers had chosen to use the same location in Thermyn. It wasn’t at the closest spot to Fort Ghartoun and the New Uromath portal, but TTE was intimately familiar with its terrain. The best news from chan Geraith’s perspective were the steep, rough ramps crews staged through Fort Ghartoun had already blasted down from the lip of the canyon. They’d been intended to get construction equipment down to river level when the time came to build the bridge pylons, and anywhere construction crews could go, his Bisons and Steel Mules could go…when they weren’t broken down, at any rate.

“Has Battalion-Captain chan Hurmahl been able to evaluate the water level?” he asked after a moment.

“He says the river’s a little higher than we’d hoped but not enough to make problems. He’s confident he can throw the bridge across within forty-eight to seventy-two hours once chan Grosvar catches up with Second Battalion and hands over the bridging material.”

Chan Geraith nodded again, stroking his mustache with a thoughtful index finger. The construction crews who’d blasted the gaps into Coyote Canyon’s walls had also surveyed the riverbed itself. The Trans-Temporal Express and Portal Authority had learned the hard way that terrain was never identical from universe to universe. It was usually very similar, enough so that routes could be picked from maps with a fair degree of certainty, but the gods clearly delighted in variations on a theme. Even without the often bizarre effects generated in proximity to portals, each universe enjoyed its own subtly different but always unique geological history. In this instance, the painstaking survey of the Stone Carve had allowed the fabrication of steel supports and a plate steel roadway that would allow chan Hurmahl’s men to throw a bridge capable of supporting Bisons and Steel Mules across the rocky riverbed. Chan Geraith didn’t like to contemplate the amount of labor involved, but in addition to his own battalion of highly trained engineers, chan Hurmahl could draft additional bone and brawn from chan Quay’s entire brigade. In theory, that gave him three thousand more strong backs, and when the rest of the division came up, he’d have the next best thing to ten thousand additional sets of hands available.

Of course, if it takes that long, there’s a really good chance of the Arcanans happening by overhead, isn’t there?
the division-captain thought, then snorted harshly.
There you go, looking for problems again!

March 26

The racket, the heat, and the humidity hit with the force of a hammer as Brigade-Captain chan Bykahlar climbed down from the rail car. It had been hot enough inside the car—the “air-conditioning” available for luxury rail traffic back home was a relatively recent development, and the Trans-Temporal Express didn’t send its most sophisticated rolling stock to the arse-end of nowhere—but at least the train’s steady motion had driven a cooling breeze through the cars’ open windows and wind scoops. Now that breeze had disappeared, and the steam bath of the Dalazan rain forest had to be experienced to be believed.

The racket, on the other hand, was purely man-made. No self-respecting jungle bird or animal would have been caught dead within ten miles of the railbed being driven through the primeval jungle. The sheer volume of noise produced by steam locomotives, steam bulldozers and graders, steamrollers, track cars delivering endless lengths of rail, sledgehammers, wrenches, steam drills, rivet guns, and the occasional roar of explosives from the advanced parties had sent any local wildlife packing in short order.

At the moment, the railhead was two hundred-plus miles farther north than it had been when 3rd Brigade embarked for its trans-Vandor crossing and it was being driven steadily farther even as he watched. The TTE’s track-laying crews, with well over three-quarters of a million miles of railroad construction on their logbooks, were the most experienced in human history. When
they
decided to drive a railhead, it advanced at a rate which had to be seen to be believed, and the current railhead was the site of yet another burgeoning supply dump. The same trains whose troop cars had moved chan Bykahlar’s regiments forward had hauled enormous loads of freight along with them. Now TTE’s steam-powered mobile cranes were transferring that freight to the existing mountain of supplies, where a fresh line of steam drays and Bisons with their enormous trailers waited to haul it yet farther down-chain towards 5th Corps advancing spearhead.

“This way, Sir!”

Chan Bykahlar turned his head at the sound of Battalion-Captain chan Klaisahn’s shout. The brigade’s chief of staff had located—or possibly stolen—a Steel Mule with a boxy superstructure built over its cargo bed. The brigade-captain recognized one of the mobile command posts Division-Captain chan Geraith had ordered fitted up, and he eyed it a bit sourly. Certainly it would be nice to have those walls’ protection once they hit the weather waiting for them in Nairsom, but chan Bykahlar was an officer of the old school. The proper means of transport for an Army officer was either his own two feet or the saddle of a Shikowr. He fully appreciated the theoretical advantages of moving companies, battalions—even entire divisions—at the speeds steam made possible, but he had his doubts about how restful the ride would be over the so-called “roads” which had been hacked out by the engineers.

He had no doubt at all about how restful the ride
wouldn’t
be once they started heading cross-country.

He pushed that thought aside as the Mule came to a halt. It was already liberally streaked with mud, and after watching a conventional steam dray slither off the pounded down track and bog almost instantly in the mud beyond it, he decided there was much to be said for its half-tracked suspension.

Chan Klaisahn hopped down from the running board and trotted over.

“I’ve got the maps and dispatch cases aboard, Sir,” he said, saluting crisply. “We can move out as soon as Gershyr’s transferred your personal gear. Regiment-Captain chan Ferdain’s already loading the Three Hundred Twelfth aboard its Bisons and Mules, and TTE’s mating the heavy equipment and artillery with the transport. Of course, we won’t dare move until Gershyr tells us
he’s
ready!”

He rolled his eyes, and chan Bykahlar chuckled. Senior-Armsman Gershyr chan Lorak had been his batman for five years, and he ruled the rest of the brigade with an iron will. It would have taken a hardier soul than any mere brigade-captain to deflect Gershyr from The Way Things Ought to Be where the care and feeding of one Desval chan Bykahlar was concerned.