“Glathriel is not open,” the Ambreza maintained.
Marquoz felt his stomach tense slightly. He turned and pointed back up the hill. “As you know, up there is the start of fifteen thousand creatures just like me. Most conventional weapons simply will not harm us. I realize that you have some very sophisticated weaponry that would, particularly the rays, but be aware that we, too, are from a high-tech hex and have our own. We also have seven hundred additional allied troops of various forms, many aerial and a number poisonous. My race is bred as a warrior race. We are not concerned with casualties or arguments. If you refuse us, we will march anyway, using all weaponry within our command to facilitate our course. Should we be opposed we will destroy utterly and without mercy any and all, soldiers and civilians, plants and animals, that are in our path.”
“You say ‘we,’ ” Gunit Sangh put in, his voice through the translator sounding still nasty and threatening. “You are not of our world. Those are not your people. I tend to think that, if we overlooked the diplomatic courtesies and simply eliminated you right here and now, that army would have no fight left.”
Inwardly, that idea did nothing for his stomach, but he kept his impassive stance and tone. “You’re wrong. I have just come from arguing with my generals because the men are upset. They have marched here without killing anyone or anything and that makes them unhappy. They want to fight. Should anything happen to me at this moment, you would lose the only moderating force around. You all would die immediately, of course—and after that Ambreza would be just a memory. Right now two Jorgasnovarians are over principal population centers in Ambreza carrying bombs made from designs I furnished. These are ancient weapons from my old sector of space, fairly easy to make once I discovered that there was uranium in Hakazit. Each bomb is atomic. Each will destroy an entire city and poison the countryside for generations with radioactivity. We can effectively deal with any remaining forces you have here. Make up your mind now. Yes or no. I intend to give the order to march immediately. How they do it is determined by your answer now.”
The Ambreza looked shocked. One turned to another and whispered, “Is such a weapon possible?” The other nodded.
Thoth, hearing this, shivered a bit and turned back to Marquoz. “We must have some time to discuss this!” he argued. “Please, a few minutes, at least!”
“You have no time. Yes or no? I want your answer now,” he pressed cooly. He actually found himself feeling a bit sorry for the Ambreza; they were so damned politically naive. That was the hole card for this entire business, he knew. A world with a lot of political and military intrigue in its past would never be taken in so quickly.
“He is bluffing,” Gunit Sangh snapped. “We have a solid force here. Let us join with them at this point and make an end to this matter.”
Of course, Marquoz conceded to himself, there were exceptions.
The Ambreza, however, were done in. After a quick, whispered conference there were nods and Thoth turned to the strange white creature. “Commander, it is our hex, you know.” He turned to Marquoz. “You may enter for transit,” he said hoarsely, gulping a couple of times. “Your march will not be impeded.”
Now Gunit Sangh unfolded himself. He was an impressive, vicious-looking creature, with three pairs of sticky tentacles and a face that said here was a thing that ate only living flesh. The tentacles showed sharp reflective shields of cartilage that obviously could cut like knives. The whole creature, close to three meters long, was in its own way as much a killing machine as the Hakazit—and unlike the Hakazit it looked very much in practice, not bluffing at all.
“I can do nothing if the host country forbids it,” Sangh spat. “But your untried army will have to face mine yet, off-worlder. You mark my words. I am the enemy you will have to face one day soon.”
“Any time,” Marquoz responded as casually as he could manage. “And, in case you think I’m a pushover, well, Colonel Asam sends his regards.”
“Asam!” the Dahbi hissed. “Eating the two of you will be the most supreme pleasure of my very long life!” And, with that, to the amazement of both sides, Gunit Sangh seemed to change his color to a more milky white, becoming slightly glowing, less substantial. He folded himself back into his ghostly shape and, without another word, sank into the ground itself as if it were water.
Marquoz felt well satisfied even though the troops would be upset at still no battle. He had faced down the Ambreza and removed another potentially nasty threat, neutralized that big multiracial force, and snubbed the enemy commander all at one time. He was particularly happy to have met Colonel Asam by chance in Zone; otherwise, he would never have known about that story…
He turned, nodded to a subordinate, and green flares were lit and shot into the air. The army started to move. He and his aides stood there and let it march past, looking damned menacing and impressive. The Ambreza and allied forms got out of the way fast; most, he guessed, were heading to nearby communications tents to radio the news.
One of his Hakazit aides inched over to him as they tramped by, masking most other sounds.
“Sir?”
“Yes?”
“Those bombs—superbombs or whatever. Was that for real?”
He drew himself up to full attention. “General, I would no more bluff than I would tell a lie,” he huffed, and that closed the matter.
And, of course, it took some time before the aide realized that he had not had an answer at all.
The passage across Ambreza had been swift and easy. Roads were cleared for them; vehicles, in fact, were provided. They avoided the major cities—no use in giving any provocations, he decided—and the Ambreza and allied forces they met along the way mostly stared, gawked, and even snapped pictures occasionally. The cold, crisp weather had the Hakazit breathing steam, and that leant an even more sinister touch to everything. Marquoz liked it. It was good theater.
It was easy to see where Ambreza ended and Glathriel began. It was winter in Ambreza, and the trees were barren and the soil frosted. But there, shimmering slightly, was a lush, green world ahead of them. It was like walking through some sort of invisible curtain from late fall into deepest summer. Glathriel was a tropical hex, and, as they saw, it was one that didn’t stop just because an army was passing through.
They were all around, these creatures that looked so much like the dominant race of the Com from which he had come. And why not? These were the prototypes, smaller than the average Com human, but that might have been climate or diet or a combination of things, and darker, too, but very much “human” all the same. Most were naked or wore only clouts or loincloths—that, and collars.
Here were the great plantations from which Ambreza tobacco came, and tropical fruits as well, men, women, children, all ages out in those fields working, working, working, all worked by these human slaves supervised by Ambreza overlords. Occasionally they would stop and gawk at the hordes passing along the road, but not for very long and certainly not without cowering in abject fear and terror.
Over a thousand years, Marquoz guessed, they’d had the aggressiveness bred out of them and the traits needed to do this sort of job emphasized.
There was a commotion ahead, and Marquoz rushed to find the reason for it. To his surprise, he found three very young human women there, seemingly begging or pleading and looking nervously around. They were naked, wore brass collars, and seemed no different from the rest—except they had the nerve to approach the column where nobody could understand them or would even deign to notice them.