Wace grabbed the parapet to steady himself.
There was no more pier, no more sheds at the waterfront- — it all stood in one black smoke. But the rafts and canoes of Drak’ho had edged into the shallows, forming a bridge to shore; and over this the sailors were dragging dismounted catapults and flamethrowers.
“They have too good a commander,” said Tolk. “He has gotten the idea too fast, that our new methods have their own weaknesses.”
“What is… Delp… going to do?” whispered Wace.
“Stay and see,” suggested the Herald. “There is no way for us to help.”
The Drak’honai were still superior in the air. Looking up toward a sky low and gloomy, rain clouds driving across angry gunmetal waters. Wace saw them moving to envelope the Lannacha air cover.
“You see,” said Tolk, “it is true that their fliers cannot do much against our walkers — but the enemy chief has realized that the converse is also true.”
Trolwen was too good a tactician himself to be cut up in such a fashion. Fighting every centimeter, his fliers retreated. After a while there was nothing in the sky but gray wrack.
Down on the ground, covered by arcing bombardment from the rafts, the sailors were setting up their mobile artillery. They had more of it than the Lannachska, and were better shots. A few infantry charges broke up in bloody ruin.
“Our machine guns they do not possess, of course,” said Tolk. “But then, we do not have enough to make the difference.”
Wace whirled on Angrek, who had joined him. “Don’t stand here!” he cried. “Let’s get down — rally our folk — seize those — It can be done, I tell you!”
“Theoretically, yes.” Tolk nodded his lean head. “I can see where a person on the ground, taking advantage of every bit of cover, might squirm his way up to those catapults and flamethrowers, and tomahawk the operators. But in practice — well, we do not have such skill.”
“Then what would you do?” groaned Wace.
“Let us first consider what will assuredly happen,” said Tolk. “We have lost our trains; if not captured, they will be fired presently. Thus our supplies are gone. Our forces have been split, the fliers driven off, we groundlings left here. Trolwen cannot fight his way back to us, being outnumbered. We at Mannenach do outnumber our immediate opponents by quite a bit. But we cannot face their artillery.
“Therefore, to continue the fight, we must throw away all our big shields and other new-gangled items, and revert to conventional air tactics. But this infantry is not well equipped for normal combat: we have few archers, for instance. Delp need only shelter on the rafts, behind his fire weapons, and for all our greater numbers we’ll be unable to touch him. Meanwhile he will have us pinned here, cut off from food and material. All the excess war goods your mill produced is valueless lying up in Salmenbrok. And there will certainly be strong reinforcements from the Fleet.”
“To hell with that!” shouted Wace. “We have the town, don’t we? We can hold it against them till they rot!”
“What can we eat while they are rotting?” said Tolk. “You are a good craftsman, Eart’a, but no student of war. The cold fact is, that Delp managed to split our forces, and therefore he has already won. I propose to cut our losses by retreating now, while we still can.”
And then suddenly his manner broke, and he stooped and covered his eyes with his wings. Wace saw that the Herald was growing old.
XIV
There was dancing on the decks, and jubilant chants rang across Sagna Bay to the enfolding hills. Up and down and around, in and out, the feet and the wings interwove till timbers trembled. High in the rigging, a piper skirled their melody; down below, a great overseer’ s drum which set the pace of the oars now thuttered their stamping rhythm. In a ring of wing-folded bodies, sweat-gleaming fur and eyes aglisten, a sailor whirled his female while a hundred deep voices roared the song:
“…A-sailing, a sailing, a-sailing to the Sea of Beer, fair lady, spread your sun-bright wings and sail with me!”
Delp walked out on the poop and looked down at his folk.
“There’ll be many a new soul in the Fleet, sixty ten-days hence,” he laughed.
Rodonis held his hand, tightly. “I wish—” she began.
“Yes?”
“Sometimes… oh, it’s nothing—” The dancing pair fluttered upward, and another couple sprang out to beat the deck in their place; planks groaned under one more huge ale barrel, rolled forth to celebrate victory. “Sometimes I wish we could be like them.”
“And live in the forecastle?” said Delp dryly.
“Well, no… of course not—”
“There’s a price on the apartment, and the servants, and the bright clothes and leisure,” said Delp. His eyes grew pale. “I’m about to pay some more of it.”
His tail stroked briefly over her back, then he beat wings and lifted into the air. A dozen armed males followed him. So did the eyes of Rodonis.
Under Mannenach’s battered walls the Drak’ho rafts lay crowded, the disorder of war not yet cleaned up in the haste to enjoy a hard-bought victory. Only the full-time warriors remained alert, though no one else would need much warning if there should be an attack. It was the boast of the forecastle that a Fleet sailor, drunk and with a female on his knee, could outfight any three foreigners sober.
Delp, flapping across calm waters under a high cloudless day-sky, found himself weighing the morale value of such a pride against the sharp practical fact that a Lannach’ho fought like ten devils. The Drak’honai had won this time.
A cluster of swift canoes floated aloof, the admiral’s standard drooping from one garlanded masthead. T’heonax had come at Delp’s urgent request, instead of making him go out to the main Fleet — which might mean that T’heonax was prepared to bury the old hatred. (Rodonis would tell her husband nothing of what had passed between them, and he did not urge her; but it was perfectly obvious she had forced the pardon from the heir in some way.) Far more likely, though, the new admiral had come to keep an eye on this untrusted captain, who had so upset things by turning the holding operation on which he had been contemptuously ordered, into a major victory. It was not unknown for a field commander with such prestige to hoist the rebel flag and try for the Admiralty.
Delp, who had no respect for T’heonax but positive reverence for the office, bitterly resented that imputation.
He landed on the outrigger as prescribed and waited until the Horn of Welcome was blown on board. It took longer than necessary. Swallowing anger, Delp flapped to the canoe and prostrated himself.
“Rise,” said T’heonax in an indifferent tone. “Congratulations on your success. Now, you wished to confer with me?” He patted down a yawn. “Please do.”
Delp looked around at the faces of officers, warriors, and crewfolk. “In private, with the admiral’s most trusted advisors, if it please him,” he said.
“Oh? Do you consider what you have to say is that important?” T’heonax nudged a young aristocrat beside him and winked.
Delp spread his wings, remembered where he was, and nodded. His neck was so stiff it hurt. “Yes, sir, I do,” he got out.
“Very well.” T’heonax walked leisurely toward his cabin.
It was large enough for four, but only the two of them entered, with the young court favorite, who lay down and closed his eyes in boredom. “Does not the admiral wish advice?” asked Delp.
T’heonax smiled. “So you don’t intend to give me advice yourself, captain?”
Delp counted mentally to twenty, unclenched his teeth, and said:
“As the admiral wishes. I’ve been thinking about our basic strategy, and the battle here has rather alarmed me—”