“They'll tear it down in a minute,” Valentine said to Nail.
The door swung open. General Martinez appeared on the wide porch, holding his hands up for quiet. The men broke into cheers and whistles.
Martinez's small round eyes were sorrowful. He was sweating, even in the cool of the winter night. “Soldiers, soldiers! Quiet, men, quiet,” he said, still moving his arms as if giving a benediction.
Even the men stomping on the roof stopped and waited for him to speak.
“I convinced them to let me speak to you. This madness has to stop. The camp is tearing itself apart because of these charges and this trial. As you have heard, the court-martial has found me guiltyâ”
Boos drowned him out until he held up his hands again. Valentine saw a self-indulgent smile cross his face, as if he found the whole proceedings to be a poorly executed practical joke.
“Yes, guilty, for doing my duty to the best of my ability. They are trying to destroy our army, the last, best hope for freedom for this land. Therefore I declare my emergency powers to be in effect, and these proceedings voided. This camp is in a state of martial law; the judges, Captain Styachowski, Captain Valentine, and any who helped them are under arrest for treason.”
Valentine and Nail exchanged incredulous looks. The legalistic gibberish made no sense to them, as technically the soldiery of Southern Command had always been under martial law, from the moment they raised their right hands to be sworn in. A general in Southern Command had no emergency powers over his troops to invoke, any more than he had wings to fly. But the words sounded fine to the men, at least to the more stirred-up among them. Martinez stood aside while a dirty flood of them poured into the guardhouse. Valentine heard fighting, a pained cry. A man flew backward out of the front window and lay on the porch, folded like a clasp knife, cradling his solar plexus and gasping for air. In a few seconds Styachowski was dragged out, held aloft by the mob with a soldier at each limb, followed by the judges, guns to their backs.
“General, sir, I've been on your side the whole trial,” Randolph said, his mustache black against his fear-paled face.
“I'll make my mind up about you later, Randolph.”
“None of the General's orders are legal,” Styachowski shouted, held aloft by the mob. Blood ran from her nose as she turned to bite at a hand pulling her hair. “He's no longer in command. He can'tâ”
“Take her shirt off,” someone shouted. Others cheered and whistled. Valentine heard cloth tearing.
“General Martinez,” Valentine boomed, stepping up beside Ahn-Kha. “I started this. I arrested you. I held a gun to your head.”
The mob quieted at this; the men wanted to hear the exchange between their idol and his usurper.
Valentine felt a hard hand on his shoulder. “What the hell are youâ” Nail began.
“I'm the one responsible,” Valentine continued, shrugging off the Bear. “Nobody had a choice once I arrested you; there had to be proceedings from that point on. This is still Southern Command. I'm the only one you should charge with treason.”
“Randolph, here's a chance to redeem yourself,” Martinez said. “Shoot that mutinous bastard right now. Here, in front of his pet Grog.”
“Auuugh!” Styachowski shouted, still writhing atop her holders. “This is insane! Don't be an idiot, Randolph. Put me down, now!”
Valentine saw the desperation in her upside-down eyes.
“You'll be on the ground, all right,” Martinez said.
Valentine stepped forward. “What's the matter, Martinez? Afraid to do a summary execution yourself? How come somebody else has to pull the trigger for you? You never been blooded?”
“Somebody shootâ” Martinez began. Randolph reached for his holster.
Ahn-Kha chambered a round in his long Grog rifle, and Martinez looked down the barrel of .50 caliber of death sighted on his chest.
Nail and his Bears came forward, again surrounding Valentine. “No,” Nail said, slowly and clearly. A short submachine gun appeared like magic in his hands. “Anyone shoots, Martinez, and my team comes up on that porch. After you. We won't leave enough of you to fill a shoebox. Then we start killing everyone with a hand on Styachowski. Then everyone who tried to interfere with either of those jobs. How many of y'all do you think we'll get before we go down. Twenty? Forty?”
“Whose side are you on,
Lieutenant?
” Martinez said, making the rank sound like an epitheth. “Sounds like you boys are getting set to do the Kurians' work for them.”
“That's so, General,” the largest of the Bears said. He had the smooth, rounded accent of the rolling Kentucky hills, rather than the trans-Mississippi twang of Nail. He pulled a knife from his belt, tossed it in the air and in the second before he caught it again drew a tomahawk with his left hand. “But only if you start it. My finishers are out. Any blood spills, they won't go back in again without your guts strung on 'em.”
“He's not a general, Rain,” another Bear said. “Not anymore.”
“Martinez is right,” Valentine said. “Let's not do the Kurians' work for them. What'll it be, Martinez? A blood-bath?”
The Bears and Ahn-Kha must have made an impression. The crowd shrank away, perhaps not wanting to be the first to be tomahawked on Rain's way to the General.
“Name your terms, Valentine,” Martinez said.
“First, nobody gets arrested for treason. Second, Styachowski and the judges walk out of camp with us. Somehow I think there'd be reprisals if any of us stayed. Third, you let anyone who wants to go with us leave. Peaceably.”
“This is mutiny, Valentine.”
“You have to have military organization to mutiny against. Your command is that of a warlord, maybe, but not armed service as Southern Command defines it.”
“Then it's to the warlord to give his terms to those he's defeated. You and your men can leave. You may take personal possessions only. No Southern Command weapons, food, or equipment. You walk out of here as civilians, and I'll be sure to let my superiors know why that's the case. We won't be sorry to see you go; my men don't want to breathe the same air as traitors.”
“He's awful free with that word,” the Bear called Rain muttered.
“Try to get our guns. We'll walk out overâ” Nail began.
“Wait, Lieutenant,” Valentine said, putting a hand on his shoulder. “Nobody gets killed, that's good enough.”
“Is this a surrender, my David?” Ahn-Kha asked in his ear.
“A tactical retreat, old horse,” he said. Then louder: “You have it, Martinez. We walk out with just our possessions. Now let Captain Styachowski go. We'll be gone in twenty-four hours.”
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“This looks like a conference of war,” Finner said the next day, as Ahn-Kha opened the tent flap. Styachowski, Post, Nail and, strangely enough, Colonel Meadows all sat around a folding camp table spread with maps.
“An informal one. Jess, they tell me you know the mountains east of here better than anyone. What are our chances of getting seven hundred people to the Arkansas River without using any Kurian-patrolled roads?”
“I don't see anyone smiling, so I guess this isn't a practical joke. Seven hundred?”
“That's what the numbers packing up look like,” Colonel Meadows said. “Some are good soldiers, sick of hiding in the hills. Some are afraid that the General's gone loco.” Meadows tapped his chest with the hand missing the fingers for emphasis.
“Styachowski says the hills are our only hope for moving that many without being noticed,” Valentine added. “The Quislings stay out of the mountains because of those feral Reapers, except for big truck patrols. We'd hear those coming.”
Finner looked at the maps. One, covered with a sheet of clear plastic, had a cryptic mark over where Valentine's refugees had been camping when the General added them to his command. “I was coming here to tell you that we've got two platoons of Wolves ready to go out with us. With them screening we might be able to do it. The lifesign will be horrendous. We'll draw trouble like a nightlight does bugs.”
“And we'll be short, very short, on weapons,” Post said. “It makes the route even more critical.”
“How are you going to feed everyone, sir?” Finner asked.
“Working on it,” Meadows said, with a glance at Styachowski. She looked tired.
“That's been most of the conversation. We'll take livestock. Like the myriads out of Egypt, we'll go with our flocks,” Valentine said.
“What happens at the Arkansas? The river's watched and patrolled. I'd have trouble getting across with a platoon.”
“Just get us there, Lieutenant,” Valentine said.
“Sergeant, sir.”
“You're going to be in charge of two platoons of Wolves. That's a lieutenant's command,” Meadows said.
Finner looked nonplussed. “Any chance of turning down this promotion?”
“We get back to Southern Command, and I'll fill out the rank reduction paperwork myself,” Valentine promised. “Let's give Finner some time alone with the maps.”
“Don't need 'em, sir,” the new lieutenant said.
“You'll at least need to know where we're starting. First waypoint is the old campsite where we dumped that load of lumber.”
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“Captain Styachowski, a word,” Valentine said as they left the tent.
“Yes, Captain?”
“You still have friends on the old intelligence staff?”
“Staff? Friends? I had one nearsighted military analyst. She's coming with us; she doesn't like this moonshine brewery any more than I.”
“I need everything you have on enemy organization on the Arkansas River.”
“That's a lot of data. The river's their backbone running up the Ozarks.”
“You've got to find us a way across.”
“Short of stealing some flatboats or swimming the whole column, I don't see how we do it. Only bridges up are in Little Rock, and that's their new headquarters.”
“Think about it for me.”
Styachowski's eyes narrowed, but she spoke with a cheerful bounce to her voice. “I can't count on the waters parting, can I?”
“Sorry.”
“Ah, well. When a Saint came marching into camp, I had hopeâ”
Valentine laughed. “What's the crossbar for?
“Hunter staff. I'm a Bear. Never made it on a combat team, though. Always some excuse.”
“What did they invoke you for, then?”
“Didn't. I was sort of born into it. Only action I've seen was Hazlett, and that was in a mortar team.”
“I was up that way. Didn't see the fighting, just the cleanup,” Valentine said.
“Lucky. But it was a picnic compared to the last few months.”
“One more thing. You had a rough time, at the trial and after. Are you okay?”
Her eyes narrowed. “What do you mean?”
“You don't look well. Have you been sleeping enough?”
She ran her hand through her hair and rubbed the back of her neck at the end of the gesture. “I always look like a slice of fresh death. Don't worry.”
“I mean the fight at the trial. Hell of a thing to go through.”
“I'm a bit numb still. I'm glad we have a lot to do . . . I'll just work till I drop tonight. Be better tomorrow.”
“Don't short yourself sleep. Just makes everything worse.” Valentine spoke from experience. “Sometimes a drink helps.”
“I've had three drinks my whole life, Captain. Two of them were last night, after all that. Didn't help. Thanks for hearing me out about the Bear stuff. Lieutenant Nail just laughed. Our good General said I had too good a brain for fighting, and too tight an ass for uniform pants. I hope you'll give me a chance to prove myself.”
“You proved yourself when you stepping in at the Grog shooting.”
“I should have taken action before then. Been watching and waiting too long, should have followed my gut a long time ago. When he started letting the gargoyles overfly us without so much as a shot . . .”
She left the last to hang for a moment, and Valentine wondered at her absent stare into the distance. Then she swallowed and threw her muscular shoulders back. “Okay, time to round up some livestock and then sit down with a map. If you'll excuse me, I have a lot to do.”
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Colonel Meadows put himself between Valentine and Martinez as the column made ready to leave.
“You've nothing to fear from me, Meadows,” Martinez said. He glanced up to Randolph, perched on a rock above. Randolph had decided to stay, and sat atop the rock, rifle in his lap, looking out at the assembled “mutineers.”
“That whole farce was my fault,” Meadows said. “You should have been tried from your cell in the guardhouse. You're a disgrace, but I'm the bigger disgrace for letting it happen.”
Valentine looked out on the road, filled with files of people in their assortment of Southern Command uniforms, rain ponchos, coats and hats. Perhaps six hundred soldiers were interspersed with a handful of tagalong civilian specialists. Packhorses and mules, leashed pigs, chickens and geese in baskets, and a total of four wagons added to the noise and smell. Squads of Guard soldiers were relieving the men of Southern Command rifles, while others poked in the pack-horse loads. A cold wind coursed through the hollow.
“None of the animals have a Southern Command brand,” Valentine said, continuing the argument Meadows had interrupted. Ahn-Kha wandered up the file, cradling his long Grog rifle.
Out of Martinez's hearing, Valentine heard Ahn-Kha make an aside to Post.