“Attrition then,” Martellus said grimly. “If he cannot be subtle, he will simply attack head on. He may find it difficult here, with the dyke and the river to cross.”

“I think he will assault with little preparation,” Corfe informed them. “He knows our strength by now, and he has lost much time in the passage of the Western Road. I think he will come at us with everything he has as soon as his host is assembled. He will want to be in possession of the dyke before the worst of winter.”

“Ho, the grand strategist,” one of the senior officers said. “Someone after your job there, General.”

Martellus the Lion grinned, but there was little humour in the gesture. His canines were too long, the set of his face too cat-like.

“Corfe is the only one of us who has experienced a full-scale Merduk assault at first hand. He has a right to air his views.”

There were some dark murmurings.

“Did the Aekir garrison sortie?” Martellus asked Corfe.

“In the beginning, yes. They harassed the enemy while he dug his siege lines, but there was always a large counterattack ready to be launched—mainly by Ferinai. We lost so many men in the sorties and they did so little damage that in the end Mogen gave up on them. We concentrated on counter-battery work, and mining. They are not so skilful with their heavy guns as we are, but they had more of them. We counted eighty-two six-gun batteries around the city.”

“Sweet Saints!” Andruw the gunner exclaimed. “Here at the dyke we have less than sixty pieces, light and heavy, and we thought we were overgunned!”

“What about mortars?” Martellus asked. Everyone hated the huge, squat weapons that could throw a heavy shell almost vertically into the air. They rendered the stoutest protecting wall useless, firing over it.

“None. At least they used none at Aekir. They are too heavy, perhaps, to bring over the Thurians.”

“That is something at least,” Martellus conceded. “Direct-fire weapons only, so we will be able to rely on the thickness of our walls and the refugee camps cannot be bombarded while the wall stands.”

“They should be herded out of the defences at once,” Corfe blurted out. “It is madness to have a crowd of civilians in the fortress at a time like this.”

Martellus blinked. “Among those civilians are would-be nurses and healers, powder and shot carriers, fire-fighters, labourers and perhaps a few more soldiers. I will not cast them out wholesale before seeing what I can get out of them.”

“So that’s why you have tolerated their presence for so long.”

“Tomorrow they will be given orders to march west once more, except for those who are willing to place themselves in the aforementioned categories. I am willing to take help from any quarter, Ensign.” Martellus’ senior officers did not look too pleased at the news, but no one dared say anything.

“Yes, sir.”

The group of men stared out at the deploying Merduk army again. The elephants looked like richly painted towers moving among the press of soldiers and horses, and the huge, many-wheeled wains they pulled were being unloaded with brisk efficiency. More of the animals were advancing with heavy-wheeled culverins behind them, drawing them up in batteries, and Merduk engineers were hurrying hither and thither marking out the hillsides with white ribbon and marker-flags. For fully three miles to their front, the hills were covered with men and animals and waggons. It was as if someone had kicked open a termite mound and the inhabitants had come pouring out searching for their tormentor.

“He will attack in the morning,” Martellus said with cold certainty. “We can expect the first assault with the dawn. He will feel his way at first, feeding in his lesser troops as they come up. And the first blow will be here, on the eastern barbican.”

“I’d have thought he’d at least spend a day or two setting up camp,” one gruff officer said.

“No, Isak. That is what he expects us to think. I agree with our young strategist here. Shahr Baraz will hit us at once, to knock us off balance. If he can take the barbican in that first assault, then so much the better. But the Merduks love armed reconnaissances; this will be one such. He will watch our defence and the way we respond to his attack, and he will note our weaknesses and our strengths. When he knows those, he will commit his best troops and attempt to wipe us off the face of the earth in one massive assault.”

Martellus paused and smiled. “That is how I see it, gentlemen. Ensign, you seem to have a head on your shoulders. I hereby promote you to haptman. Remain here in the barbican and stay close to Andruw. I want a full report on the first assault, so don’t get yourself killed.”

Corfe found it unexpectedly difficult to speak. He nodded at the tall, feline-swift general.

The senior officers left the parapet. Corfe remained behind with Andruw, a man not much older than himself. Short hair the colour of old brass, and two dancing blue eyes. They shook hands.

“To us the honour of first blood, then, in this petty struggle,” Andruw said cheerfully. “Come below with me, Haptman, and we’ll celebrate your promotion with a bottle of Gaderian. If our esteemed general is right, there’ll be little time for drinking after today.”

SEVENTEEN

12th day of Midorion, year of the Saint 551.

Wind nor’-nor’-east by north on the starboard quarter, veering and strengthening. White-tops and six-foot swell. Course due west at seven knots, though we are making leeway I estimate at one league in twelve.

Now three weeks out of Abrusio, by dead-reckoning some 268 leagues west of North Cape in the Hebrionese. Aevil Matusian, common soldier, lost overboard in the forenoon watch, washed out of the beakhead by a green sea. May the Saints preserve his soul. Father Ortelius preached in the afternoon watch. In the first dog-watch I had hands send up extra preventer-stays and bring in the ship’s boats. Shipped hawse bags over the cable-holes and tarpaulins over all the hatches. Dirty weather on the way. The Grace of God is drawing ahead despite all Haukal does. Lost sight of her in the first dog-watch. I pray that both our vessels may survive the storm I feel is coming.

There was so much that the bald entries in the ship’s log could not convey, Hawkwood thought, as he stood on the quarterdeck of the Osprey with his arm wrapped round the mizzen backstay.

They could not get across the mood of a ship’s company, the indefinable tensions and comradeships that pulled it together or apart. Every ship had a personality of its own—it was one of the reasons that he loved his willing, striving carrack as she breasted the white-flecked ocean and slipped ever further westwards into the unknown. But every ship’s company also had a personality of its own once it had been at sea for a while, and it was this which occupied his thoughts.

Bad feeling on board. The sailors and the soldiers seemed to have divided into the equivalent of two armed camps. It had started with the damned Inceptine, Ortelius. He had complained to Hawkwood that though the soldiers attended his sermons regularly—even the officers—the sailors did not, but went about their business as though he were not there. Hawkwood had tried to explain to him that the sailors had their work to do, that the running of the ship could not stop for a sermon and that those mariners not on duty were seizing four hours of well-earned rest—the most they ever had at one time, because of the watch system. Ortelius could not see the point, however. He had ended up calling Hawkwood impious, lacking in respect for the cloth. And all this at Murad’s dinner-table whilst the scar-faced nobleman looked on in obvious amusement.

There were other things. Some of the sailors had gone to several of the passengers on board for cures to minor ailments—rope-burns, chilblains and the like, and the oldwives had been happy to cure them with the Dweomer they possessed. Friendships had sprung up between sailors and passengers as a result; after all, a large proportion of the crew were, so to speak, in the same boat as the Dweomer-folk: frowned upon by the Church and the authorities. Again Ortelius had protested, and this time Murad had backed him up, more out of devilry than for any real motive, Hawkwood suspected. No good could come to a ship which tolerated the use of Dweomer on board, the priest had said. And sailors being the superstitious lot they were, it had cast a pall over the entire crew. For many of them, however, the Ramusian faith was just another brand of Dweomer, and they did not stop their fraternization with the passengers.