Chapter Thirty-five

The trunks of mammoths moved ceaselessly to squeeze rain from the fur where their bodies were not covered by cargo nets. The slight sounds the huge animals made as they padded through the main gate of Frekka were lost in the human cries within the walls.

Hansen's pony whickered in irritation as it waited, unable to find even a twig to crop so close to the gate. Hansen stroked its neck absently. Life wasn't perfect, even for a horse.

But maybe it was better for a horse.

"Ah," said Culbreth, who had halted a cautious three meters away from his leader. "Ah, I think that's the lot of them, sir."

Rain had turned the sky black, though it was still an hour short of sundown. A lantern hung from a pole above the pack saddle of each mammoth, above and behind the driver. The red glow which marked the last animal in line swung into view.

"I'm not keeping you, Culbreth," Hansen snapped.

Culbreth did not reply.

Arnor began to hum a song that Hansen had taught him around the campfire two nights before the battle, when it was safe to be drunk and not so safe to think soberly about the future. Taught Arnor and Culbreth; and Maharg was there too, joining in the choruses. . . .

"Sorry, Culbreth," Hansen said. "I'm on edge. I thought maybe I'd let the crowd thin."

Maybe some of the tearful accusing faces would have gone back to their empty rooms by the time Hansen rode through the city gate.

"Yet I've always sort of missed her," Hansen murmured under his breath as Arnor hummed, "Since that last wild night I kissed her. . . ."

On the way to battle, the mammoths carried the army's provisions and the battlesuits to be worn by the royal army. Now, on the road back, the cargo nets slung from the pack saddles were swollen with loads of booty besides: armor stripped from the enemy dead, often in separate pieces.

Virtually any damaged suit could be repaired more easily than complete new armor could be constructed. The result would be a battlesuit whose quality was lower than the virgin unit before high-amplitude currents surged through its circuitry; but it would do for somebody to wear.

There had been battles where the margin of victory was one warrior more or less in the line.

"Left her heart and lost my own," Hansen whispered as cold trickles of rain ran down his spine. " 'Adiós, mi corazón. . . .' "

The red lantern swung under the archway at the mammoth's smooth, ground-devouring stride.

Much of the armor that had gone out of Frekka whole was returning gouged with molten fury, and freemen led strings of ponies whose riders had gone to North or Hell in a great pyre after the battle. The dead men's families waited inside the gate, hoping against hope. . . .

"You weren't responsible, sir. You weren't in charge."

"I was there, Arnor," Hansen said. "Don't tell me I wasn't responsible."

Fathers with stiff faces and dry eyes. Sons trying to copy the old men, succeeding well enough but not understanding why it had had to happen to their father.

Hansen knew why it had happened. It had happened because Nils Hansen hadn't been good enough to stop it from happening.

Culbreth laid his fingers on the back of Hansen's hand.

Hansen jumped. He hadn't heard Culbreth cluck his pony closer. He hadn't realized how hard he was gripping the saddlehorn until the other warrior touched him, either.

"Yeah," said Hansen. "Let's go"

He nudged the pony with his heels. "Somebody's got to explain to King Prandia why the Searchers took so many of his men," he muttered, "and it may as well be me."