Champions Battle for the Fate of the Future!: The Wild Finale of (Swords Versus Tanks Book 5) Page 2

  “Ha!” said Lord Redmain. “You are afraid my cavalry will steal your glory.”

  Ranulph flushed. Redmain had wanted him to say no. He raised his spyglass to give himself time to reply. “It would be said that I sent you to your death.”

  “The other half of the cavalry are subjects of His Excellence the Emperor Sigismund,” said the young Duke of Kriegstein, captain of the Imperial knights. “And we will go gladly where the Best Knight in the West sends us. After all, only a handful need to reach the guns. What are a few horses when the fate of nations is in the balance?”

  Ranulph winced. It was nice that the younger knights respected him, but now he was starting to feel old and wise. With the tide out, the horses could certainly ford the river where it carved a shallow runnel through the beach. However they would still have to get onto the ridge. “It’s too much of a scramble,” he said. “Even were the road climbs the ridge, riders usually dismount.”

  Maud drew herself up to her full height. “This witch shall win you your battle.”

  The nobles exchanged glances, edged away. Thorolf took a pace closer to Maud and nonchalantly rested his right hand on his belt, near his dagger.

  “What, my lords?” exclaimed Maud. She opened her palms to indicate herself. “That’s why I am here, the only woman amongst men. I am a sorceress.” She said the word slowly, as if talking to idiots. “I can bind the elements to my will and I will see to it that the priests do not bother you.”

  “What do you need, milady?” asked Ranulph.

  “The Seasnake and your Northmen,” said Maud.

  “I shall not send my future wife into danger,” said Ranulph.

  “Yes you will,” said King Edward. “Peril is the price of our high station, and Lady Maud does well to embrace it.”

  Ranulph looked from his king to his betrothed. He knew that this wasn’t about her duty, it was about Maud having her place at the table. It was the red-haired sorceress’s will as much as her wildness that made him love her and the price of that love was the possibility of losing her. Was that what Albrecht had gone through every time Ranulph went into battle? “Very well,” he said. “Thorolf, please signal the Seasnake to make landfall.”

  Again, everybody started talking at once.

  Tom of Fenland leaned closer to the King and Ranulph caught the words, “Fuck it Eddy, I’m coming with you.”

  #

  The back of Jasmine's neck prickled. Here she was sitting on a tank surrounded by soldiers, but knights snaked past the mountain at the northern end of the bay, pennons fluttering in the breeze, plate armour glittering like jewellery.

  She kicked her tank’s armour plating just to check everything was real.

  It rang comfortingly.

  High in the grey sky, the sun flashed on firesilk. Chivalry was riding out for one last battle, oblivious of the scout airship hovering thousands of metres above. "Welcome to the future, gentlemen."

  “Did you want something, Field Marshal?” Mary Schumacher had bobbed out of the conning tower where she was crewing the radio.

  Jasmine shook her head. "Just talking to myself."

  “Oh.” The girl blushed winningly, turning the heads of Jasmine’s staff who clustered in the shelter of the tank’s horns.

  Hiding a grin, Jasmine swept the glasses seaward down the ridge. The mist softened the rhomboid shapes of Sheila Cromwell's fifty tanks who guarded her left flank. Beyond them rose the Holy Mount, looking like nothing more than a load of shoe boxes dumped on a saggy old armchair. Jasmine shuddered and her Tolmec tattoo throbbed. She put a hand to her sternum.

  What did the Archbishop have stashed in the fortified place that kept the magic down? For the hundredth time, she raked her childhood memories of tattered cloisters and vaulted chambers. There was no easy way to get answers — the Archbishop had closed the gates and was refusing to accept a garrison.

  The radio crackled from inside the tank. "Airship Three to Command. Do you copy?"

  "Command to Airship Three. We copy." Mary Schumacher's voice sounded hollow inside the metal tomb. Jasmine grimaced. She would keep that girl alive one way or another.

  "You should have the enemy now, over?"

  "We see them," said Jasmine.

  “Confirm. We see them,” echoed Mary Schumacher.

  At the other end of the bay, the native army slowly emerged onto the wide expanse of sandy pastureland behind the dunes. Not everybody was on horseback. A column of Imperial Landmarchers undulated across the landscape, pikes like the spines of an exotic caterpillar.

  Jasmine frowned. They would have been sitting ducks for tracer bullets and priest-blessed bombs. Which reminded her… She leaned over the hatch and caught a familiar whiff of oil and perspiration. "Mary – raise Postmaster General Smith and ask where the fuck my barbed wire is."

  Her staff exchanged worried looks.

  Jasmine ignored them and glanced downhill. Almost invisible in their field grey, Carbineers hunkered along the near edge of the gully, covering the fords. She had General Woodsman down there as her second in command. He’d make sure nothing would get through to the tanks and artillery on the ridge. Even so...

  Hooves rumbled over the sound of the radio traffic.

  "There's so many!" wheezed General Ibis-Bear. Her horse stamped and whinnied – the sign of a nervous rider, or perhaps it didn’t like the look of the tank with its newly attached wooden carapace. "Shall we open fire, Field Marshal?"

  Jasmine shook her head. "Stick to the plan, General. We don't want to send them scurrying for the hills with just over an hour of daylight left. We want to kill them all!"

  "I have reservations about the…" Ibis-Bear nudged her horse closer to Jasmine’s command tank and hissed. "Priests." She nodded. "Yes, but we…” — she glanced around expansively to indicate the three artillery officers she had in attendance — “…did a runic crystal reading this morning and… the omens were good. Weren’t they?" ]

  The others nodded sagely.

  "Great," said Jasmine. A priest waited by each field gun, looking not a little spooky in their white cowls. "They give me the creeps too," she said, trying to put the old lunatic at her ease for at least long enough to win the battle.

  "It's not that," said Ibis-Bear. "They are the same religious order which burned… burns so-called witches." She shuddered theatrically and her horse snorted in sympathy.

  Jasmine frowned. Albrecht's painting came back to Jasmine, flames coiling around Maud's freckled legs, singeing the soft red down. She flinched. "No witch burning on our watch."

  "Field Marshal?" Mary Schumacher's voice was loud enough to make her jump. Leads trailing from her earphones, the girl stood half out of the hatch like a prairie dog... a voluptuous, bushy-haired prairie dog. She was no longer blushing, but everybody was looking at her.

  Jasmine grinned. There was something about the prospect of battle which heightened the senses. "Yes?"

  Schumacher blushed. "The Postmaster General says he has engine trouble and the barbed wire will be delayed."

  "Engine trouble!" General Ibis-Bear snorted.

  A murmur went through the staff.

  "The dog fucker!" Jasmine rubbed her temples. When she next saw Smith she was going to... But anger would not help her lead her army. She glanced at the enemy. She did a mental calculation of time and distance. "It will be an infantry attack. We'll manage. Mary, pass the word to General Woodsman."

  The knights began to dismount. Unarmoured figures cast long shadows inland as they led the horses to the rear.

  Jasmine surveyed Ibis-Bear's artillery — twenty field pieces ranged along the ridge, served by barely-armed specialists, with just a handful of Post Office Security Workers as guards. "Damn Smith!"

  She glanced inland to where the ridge rose into the Heart Mountain. A white torrent glittered down the face of the rock: a high tarn draining into the Slaughterburn. If things went to plan, there would be no need for the barbed wire. "Mary – ask General Woodsman to detach a
company of Carbineers to assist the Post Office Engineers. And... explain to him about the issue with barbed wire."

  Jasmine shifted her weight and forced herself to take measured breaths. She'd done this before, albeit with a smaller command. She could do it now. Even with Smith trying to foul things up, she wasn't going to lose – not unless the enemy general was some kind of military genius, or the world's most inspiring leader. Hell! He’ll need to be both.

  His timing was good, at least. Navigating the dunes in daylight made sense, and twilight would fall as – if — the armies clashed. He must think that the reduced visibility would give the knights a chance to get in close without being harried by ranged weapons. Jasmine smiled. "Got plenty of star shells, Stella?"

  Still mounted, Ibis-Bear sucked, nodded vigorously, then frowned. "But I don't like the feel of that fog. I must check my omens to see if the karmic energy is still flowing."

  Jasmine raised her field glasses. Beyond the army's left, the fog carpeted the Ocean of Thule, hid the promontory, and lapped the base of Holy Mount. However, it showed no sign of advancing inland. She shrugged. "Fuck all I can do about the fog — I'm a soldier, not a magician."

  The dismounted knights shook themselves out into two deep lines. Banners unfurled in the centre of each so that for a crazy moment they looked like one of those battle diagrams – neat rectangles with outsize flags poking out the top.

  "How far do you make their piquet lines?" asked Jasmine. When last had a Egality commander asked that? Not since the Battle of Harecote at the start of the War when Egality machine guns swept away the Elitist Shock Dragoons. Unfortunately, she was down to one magazine of tracer per tank. Otherwise, she could have guaranteed the same result.

  Ibis-Bear took a range card from one of her staff. "Two thousand metres – well within range."

  The enemy general evidently had no concept of the reach of modern artillery. "Kill the horses first," said Jasmine. She remembered the slaughterhouse stench of the field at Harecote. "Poor bloody animals."

  "I see the Redmain Gauntlet in the rearguard," declared the Integration Worker she’d had attached to her staff. "The vanguard – that's the Westerland Royal Banner, but the young king will only be nominally in charge. The yellow eagle is Von Kriegstein, young but high ranking. He must be leading the Imperial knights. The Imperial Grand Marshal will be running the show, though. That's his red two-headed dragon standard."

  "I wonder which doddering pensioner the Emperor hauled out of retirement?" Jasmine raised her field glasses, dialled up the magnification and found the Westerland Sun and Stars. The youth in fancy armour could only be King Edward. Next to him... her stomach lurched. There, looking nervous in some sort of studded armour, a sword and modern service pistol on his hip, was Tom. And next to him, under the dragon standard, stood an armoured giant, a gilded marshal's baton hooked into his sword belt.

  Ranulph had an ornate telescope pressed to his right eye.

  And he was looking at her.

  Without putting down his spyglass, the giant knight drew Steelcutter, flourished it, then returned the sword to his belt.

  “Have you spotted the enemy commander?” asked General Ibis-Bear.

  Ignoring her, Jasmine returned the salute in military style. She lowered her glasses and chewed her lower lip.

  "What's the matter?" asked Mary Schumacher.

  Jasmine unslung her Stormgun and started snapping solid slugs into the magazine. "Nothing," she said. "Nothing at all."

  CHAPTER THREE

  Ranulph raised his marshal’s baton, bellowed, "For Chivalry and Westerland!" and set off towards the ridge. The trumpets blared, the banners lurched forward, and seven thousand knights tramped with him. Each man kept his own clattering gait, feeding the continuous din. Then the Landmarcher drums began to beat and all marched in unison.

  Ranulph reached for Steelcutter.

  King Edward put a hand on his arm. “No, Sir Ranulph. Today you wield the baton, not the sword.”

  “But Your Grace…” began Ranulph.

  “The army needs a general, not a knight,” said the young monarch. “Swear you shall not draw Steelcutter.”

  “I swear, Your Grace, not while the army needs a general,” said Ranulph.

  They marched on a few paces. Then the Imperial Standard Bearer stumbled on a rabbit hole. "A mile is a hellish long way to walk, Grand Marshal."

  Ranulph suppressed a grin. Most of the knights were more landowner than warrior, accustomed to the lists and tiltyard where they were never more than a bowshot from the nearest cold beer. "At least the ground is solid, Sir Heinrich."

  "Be glad you're not at the Battle of Love's Marsh," said King Edward. "Six miles through sweltering mud, was it not, Sir Ranulph?"

  "I was wearing somewhat less armour, Your Grace.

  "You were — so I hear — bollock naked!"

  Ranulph had made Albrecht burn that sketch. Now he remembered his artistic squire's crestfallen look, and flushed.

  The Royal Knights laughed, and the laughter spread through the Vanguard to become something more animal, more menacing.

  Ranulph checked Steelcutter was loose enough in its belt hanger. Had Albrecht confessed his love, what would he have said? But Albrecht had confessed, through his drawings, and Ranulph had chosen not to see. And now, thanks to Jasmine's Invaders from the future, they had swapped fates; Ranulph would wield the sword where his friend should have wielded a pen or brush.

  One man alone did not join in the laughter. Against all advice, the King's favourite stumbled along next to his royal lover, his face the hue of the snow on the mountains beyond Jasmine's ridge. The riveted brigandine hid the rise and fall of his chest, but the signs were familiar enough. As the royal party split to flow around a raised dune, Ranulph let his path take him next to the youth. Just as he had seven years before to another reluctant comrade-in-arms, he said in a low voice, "It helps to breathe, Sir Tom."

  Colour flooded the pale cheeks. "I'm not a knight."

  "You rescued the King, which makes you worthy."

  "You know we're well in range of the guns. Any moment now..." Tom interrupted himself to breathe. "...we'll be blown to pieces."

  Ranulph laughed. Colonel Eckhart had told him all about the Emperor's secret experiments with priest-blessed field artillery. He drew closer still. "A royal… favourite should be brave," he said, trusting the noise of the advance to give them privacy. "...lest people recall how he earns that role. Do you know the story of King Aelric?"

  Tom flinched as if Ranulph had struck him. "I saw that Tragedy at the Regensburg Lyceum. Bloody awful play. Mostly bloody, actually. And that thing with the poker… Oh…"

  Ranulph grimaced. Another reference from the future. But it seemed he had delivered his message.

  "How do you do it... Sir Ranulph?" wheezed Tom. "Face the random chance of death... the prospect of some giggling psycho hacking off your head."

  "I trust in God and steel. And I breathe."

  Tom laughed. "Mostly you are that psycho." He threw a look at Ranulph. "When I rescued Eddy – I emptied my guts after."

  "It happens. An overexcited child throws up on his name day. A bride before her wedding. A newly dubbed knight on the morning of his first tournament – God's teeth, I did!"

  Tom negotiated a rabbit-ridden pit where the turf gave way to sandy soil. "Really?"

  Ranulph laughed. "I was fifteen, and going against my father's wishes. And — in truth — not yet dubbed. I had been up all night painting my armour black."

  Tom seemed puzzled.

  Ranulph smiled. Now the lad knew how it felt to be the ignorant one. "If you want to be anonymous, you deck yourself out as the Black Knight."

  "So what happened?"

  "I fought my way into the final round of the foot tournament and came up against Sir William Northwind. It was a short match."

  "You won?" Tom’s boot snagged in a rabbit hole.

  "Against Sir William Northwind?" Ranulph scooped him up by
the armpit and set him aright. "No, but I put a dent in his armour."

  "Well, Sir Big Guy, I don't believe in God. And blades scare me. That leaves breathing."

  Finally. "In for the count of three steps. Hold for another three. Breathe out for three. And repeat."

  "That's-" Tom stumbled on a rock. Ranulph scooped him up without a word. "-it?"

  "Or disgrace His Grace," said Ranulph and wove his way back to the Grand Marshal's standard.

  Lights flickered along the ridge, as if a shoal of silvery fish had broached the surface then plunged back into the depths. A demonic chorus split the air — thunder mingled with the whistle of gunstones.

  "Did we miscalculate?” asked King Edward.

  Ranulph shook his head. "No, Sire. Her guns will do her no good at this range."

  "Her?"

  From behind the army came an appalling tattoo of hollow thuds punctuated by equine screams. A rolling thunder enveloped them.

  The knights halted. All looked back. A head taller than most men, Ranulph could see beyond the Redmain rearguard. A pall of smoke rose from where they had left their horses. A few short heartbeats had seen the piquet lines turned into a smoking abattoir. Now there could be no mounted flight or pursuit.

  Around them, knights halted in mid pace, turned around to look, or huddled with their comrades.

  “That shouldn’t have worked!” said Colonel Eckhart.

  “Well it bloody well did,” said Tom of Fenland.

  Ranulph nodded. He should have felt horror, anger even. Instead, he relaxed his grip on Steelcutter and smiled. "We are half way. They will murder us whatever we do." He clambered up a sandy bump and roared, "Our remounts are that way!" Which was almost true. He waved his baton in the direction of the ridge. “Forward, by God! Forward!”

  The drums beat and the army lurched back into motion.

  Another flicker on the ridge. The gun-stones howled overhead…

  To a man the army froze, flinched.