He was right about that, but only for a little while. “Some of those sons of bitches in blue would turn up-they always do. So we’ll have to bring some company along, that’s all.” Doubting George waved once more, this time back toward the southern bank of the Hoocheecoochee. Colonel Nahath’s regiment of men from New Eborac had earned the right to cross first, but a great many other regiments were lined up behind them now. Once this force got over the river, Joseph the Gamecock would have a hells of a time throwing it back.
On came the New Eborac regiment, each company with its standard fluttering at its head. One of the standard-bearers made George blink. He turned to Nahath. “Excuse me, Colonel, but did I just see a blond carrying a flag?”
“Yes, sir, you did,” Nahath answered. “That’s Corporal Rollant, who earned the spot for himself on Commissioner Mountain. You may remember, I brought the question of promoting him to you before I went ahead with it. You said he deserved the chance to fail, but he hasn’t failed yet.”
With his memory jogged, Doubting George nodded. “I do recall now, thanks. He still makes a strange sight, though.”
“This war has shown us a great many strange sights, sir,” Colonel Nahath said. “I think we’d better get used to it, because the kingdom won’t get any less strange in the peace that’s coming.”
“You’re likely right, Colonel.” George shook his head. “No, as a matter of fact, you’re certainly right. But I’m a northern man myself, you know, and I have to tell you that some things strike me as very strange the first time I see them.”
“You asked if Rollant was a good fighting man, a good soldier,” Nahath replied. “I told you he was, and I meant it. He hasn’t had much trouble since he got promoted-less than I expected. If he were an ordinary Detinan instead of a blond, he’d surely be a sergeant by now, and he might well be an officer.”
Contemplating the blond corporal was quite enough for Doubting George at the moment. Being a conservative had led him to radicalism, a step he hadn’t planned on taking. Blonds freed from the land, blonds promoted to underofficer, blonds who might eventually get promoted further still…
As he did whenever such notions disturbed him, he thought, I’d sooner have that than theKingdom ofDetina torn to pieces. It was true. Were it anything but true, he would have been fighting for Geoffrey, not Avram. But sometimes, as now, it was also cold, cold comfort.
He left a solid garrison to protect the bridge, then ordered the rest of his force forward toward Marthasville. As long as he was doing, he didn’t have to brood. And the chief city of Peachtree Province lay only a few miles away. George knew the northerners had a ring of forts around Marthasville, and entrenchments between those forts, but how many men did they have to put into the entrenchments? As long as the Army of Franklin remained on the east bank of the curving Hoocheecoochee, not many.
His army didn’t meet its first traitors in arms till it had been marching for most of an hour. Then a couple of unicorn-riders rode right up to the head of his column-and were promptly captured. They were indignant about it. When their captors brought them before Doubting George, one of them demanded, “What are you sons of bitches doing here? You’re supposed to be on the other side of the river.”
“Life is full of surprises,” George said.
“It isn’t fair,” the second unicorn-rider said. “We wouldn’t’ve come right on up to you gods-damned bastards if we’d known you were southrons. You ought to let us go.”
“I’m sure you’d do the same for a couple of our men,” George said. The northern unicorn-riders didn’t have the crust to claim they would and to make that convincing. George gestured to the men in charge of them. “Take them away and send them south.”
“Yes, sir,” the grinning guards said. They led their glum prisoners back toward the new bridge across the Hoocheecoochee.
An hour or so after that, real fighting began. Geoffrey’s men turned out to have more than a couple of unicorn-riders in the neighborhood. A squadron galloped through the fields that ran by the road on which the southrons were marching. They shot at the men in gray and then galloped off out of range. Some of Doubting George’s men shot back. One enemy rider tumbled off his mount, while a couple of footsoldiers in gray howled when quarrels struck them.
Another couple of squadrons of blue-clad men on unicorns got in front of the marching column and tried to stop it by sheer brute force. They had a battery of engines with them, and flung darts at the southrons from a range longer than that from which George’s men could shoot back at them. They were very brave-a lot of northern soldiers were-but it didn’t do them much good. George ordered his leading regiments to shift from column into line. They swept forward. The ends of their line lapped around the unicorn-riders on either side. The northerners had to retreat in a hurry to keep from being surrounded. They tried to set up for another stand half a mile farther north, but the southrons made them fall back again before they’d shot more than a couple of darts.
By the time the sun set, George’s force was almost halfway to Marthasville. He had a solidly garrisoned supply line leading back to the bridge over the Hoocheecoochee, and ordered his men to entrench around the camp they made. Once that was done, he told his scryer, “Now put me through to General Hesmucet.”
“Yes, sir,” the scryer said, and got out his crystal ball. George had already sent a runner back to the commanding general, but hadn’t spoken with him till now.
Before long, Hesmucet’s face appeared in the crystal ball. “Congratulations, Lieutenant General!” he said heartily. “You’ve stolen a march on Joseph the Gamecock-and you’ve stolen one on Major Alva, too.”
“That did occur to me, yes,” George said with a smile. “How’s he taking it?”
“He’s disappointed,” Hesmucet answered. “He was shaping what would have been a really magnificent masking spell, and now we don’t need it. He’ll just have to learn to live with it-part of growing up, you might say.”
“Yes, sir.” Doubting George hadn’t thought Hesmucet would be angry with him for moving before the planned moment, but was glad to be proved right. Hesmucet put success above method, as any good soldier did. George said, “We’re over the last barrier in front of Marthasville now.”
“So we are,” the general commanding agreed. “And it will be interesting to see what Joseph the Gamecock does about it.”
“He can’t very well stay on that side of the river,” George said. “If he does, we take the city and we smash up his army.”
“We’re liable to do all that even if he pulls back,” Hesmucet replied. “You’ve put him in a very nasty position, very nasty indeed. Congratulations, Lieutenant General.”
“Thank you, sir,” George said. “I was wondering what in the hells I would do if I were Joseph the Gamecock. By all the gods, I’ve got no good answers. I’d sure rather be where I am than where he is.”
“Don’t blame you a bit,” Hesmucet said. “But he’s kept his force in being. He can still hurt you-he can still hurt all of us-if he gets the chance. We can’t afford to be careless, not now.”
“Not ever,” Doubting George said.
“No, not ever.” Hesmucet leaned forward, so that he seemed about to step out of the crystal ball and sit down beside George. “Can I tell you a little secret?”
“Sir, you’re the one who’s in charge here,” George answered. “Only you know whether you can or not-or maybe I ought to say, whether you should or not.”
“Well, I’m going to, gods damn it.” Hesmucet bared his teeth in a fierce grin. “I’m glad you’re the one who found the way over the Hoocheecoochee, and not, say, Fighting Joseph.”
“I can’t imagine why, sir,” George said, deadpan. Both officers laughed. Doubting George had no trouble imagining how puffed-up and full of himself Fighting Joseph would have been had he got across the river ahead of every other southron officer. He would have started agitating for command over the whole force, and would have slandered General Hesmucet, Lieutenant General George, and Brigadier James the Bird’s Eye to anyone who would listen. To make sure people listened, Fighting Joseph would have pounded a drum and played a trumpet, too.