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Genius inventor from apprentice smith, commander of the Guard from simple guardsman, second in command from a family of fish-gutters. That was K'Vaern's Cove ... and it was why he would willingly lay down his life for it.
Kar slid the telescope closed again and tapped it on one true-hand, his lower arms crossed in thought.
"It's a relief column," he said.
"Damned small one, then," Flain responded. "Barely three thousand."
"But what three thousand?" Kar mused. "The Northerners' lead ba
"Impossible," Flain scoffed. "It was overrun in the first wave!"
"True. But there were rumors that some of them had escaped. And the ba
"Diaspra?" Flain said in astonishment. "But ... they would never. They don't involve themselves in wars at all."
"This war is different," Kar pointed out. "But what I don't understand are all the turom and pagee. There seem to be an awful lot of them for a relief column that size. It's almost more like a giant caravan, and there are some figures out there-strange ones that look a bit like women but are obviously something else. Many of them are on the pagee, too."
He opened the telescope yet again, peered through it for long, thoughtful minutes. Then, suddenly, he gave a whoop of delight.
"That's what they're packing!"
"What?" Flain asked.
"Iron, by Krin! Those beasts are loaded with iron bars!"
"They must've come by way of Nashtor," the second in command mused. "Somebody was using his head for something besides holding up his horns."
"Send out a rider," Kar said. "Let's find out what we have here. I think we're going to like it."
The Mardukan who greeted them was the biggest damned scummy-with the possible exception of Erkum Pol-Roger had ever seen. Which, given the size of normal Mardukan males, was saying something. Not only was this one damned near four meters tall, he was disproportionately broad even for that towering height and looked as if he could bench press a flar-ta.
"Bistem Kar," Rastar said with obvious relief. "You live."
"Yes, Prince Rastar," the monster responded in a deep, rumbling grunt of laughter. "And as amazed as you are to see me, I'm ten times as amazed to see the heir of Therdan at the door."
"We tried to win through to you when first we fled, but there were too many Boman," Rastar admitted. "And, as the gods would have it, perhaps that was for the best." He turned from the K'Vaernian commander and gestured to Roger. "Bistem Kar, Captain of K'Vaern's Cove, may I introduce His Royal Highness, Prince Roger MacClintock of the Terran Empire."
"I greet you, Prince MacClintock, in the name of the Council of K'Vaern's Cove," the Mardukan responded, admirably restraining his obvious curiosity about just what in hell a "Terran Empire" might be. "And I greet your loads with even greater happiness," he added.
"That's why we stopped by Nashtor," Roger said. "And may I introduce my senior commander, Captain Armand Pahner, who was the one who insisted on retrieving the metal."
"I greet you as well, Captain Pahner," the Guard commander said, casting a close eye over the human. He looked from the chameleon-clad CO to the similarly clad Marines spreading out to either side of the caravan and suppressed an audible grunt of pleased laughter. "Welcome to K'Vaern's Cove."
"K'Vaern's Cove," Rus From said with more enthusiasm than he'd shown since leaving Diaspra. "We're here."
"Wonderful," Bogess responded in a much grumpier tone. "Another city, another battle. Just wonderful."
The area between the i
"But this is K'Vaern's Cove!" the priest said. "K'Vaern of the Bells! All the world meets in K'Vaern's Cove! This is where over half the devices in the entire Chasten Valley come from. This is where the impeller pump system was invented. There's no other city like it!"
"Uh-huh," the general scoffed. "And all the streets are paved with gold. It's still just another city and just another battle."
"Well, we'll see," the cleric replied, refusing to be suppressed by the pessimistic soldier.
"And another new way of doing battle," Bogess continued. "It's not as if we can just teach them pikes and be done with it. No, we have to create these 'muskets' and 'mobile ca
"Not quite," From corrected as the two representatives from Diaspra were called forward. "In fact, you'll have to, somehow, learn how to use them while they're still being created. And without the help of the humans."
"Podder mocker," Poertena muttered as the column rounded the first hill.
The basis of the city's name was immediately clear. Far below them lay a perfect natural harbor-a cove cut off from the worst effects of weather by hills on either side. All of the hills were extremely steep, with sheer-sided inlets or fjords between several of them, and the bay and the inlets had been linked to create a sheltered, multipart port. Clearly, some of the smaller side harbors could support only small craft, but there were hundreds of those circulating around the city.
The deep-water portions of the port were packed with ships. The most common was a single-masted, square-rigged, round-hulled design very similar in most respects to a medieval Terran cog. There were differences-the beam to length ratio was a bit better-but generally, the resemblance was remarkable. Most of them were about twenty meters from stem to stern, but a few larger ones ran to a bit over thirty, and one of the larger ones was being towed out by a galley, assisted by the slight puffs of the land wind coming over the hills.
One of the side-harbors seemed to be given over to military vessels, of which there appeared to be two basic types. At least two-thirds of them were sleek, low, needle-slim galleys armed with rams, but with no apparent sign of seagoing artillery. The remaining warships were larger, heavier, and clumsier looking. Like the galleys (and unlike most of the merchantmen in the harbor), they carried both oars and masts, but their main armament was obviously the batteries of heavy guns bristling from their heavily built forecastles above their long-beaked rams. Their banks of oars precluded any sort of broadside-mounted artillery, but they were clearly designed to lay down a heavy forward fire as they closed in on their enemies, and there was something very peculiar about those guns. Poertena dialed up the magnification on his helmet and grunted in sudden understanding and surprise, for the guns he could see weren't the built-up, welded-together bombards they'd seen on Diaspra's walls. These guns were cast, by God!
The four major hills around the port were part of a series of hills that ran for kilometers to the north, and all of them were covered by interlocked buildings. Houses were built on warehouses were built on shops, until virtually all the open spaces were filled with places of work or living, and often both simultaneously in the same structure.
And everywhere the eye looked, there were bell towers.
Sergeant Julian stood beside the little Pinopan and shook his head in bemusement. It surprised him a bit to realize that nowhere else in all their weary trek had he seen a single Mardukan bell. Not one. But now there were dozens-scores-of bell towers in sight from his single vantage point. God only knew how many there were in the city as a whole ... or what it must sound like if they all tolled at once. He could see little bells, like carillons, in some of the towers, but there were also medium bells, big bells, and one great big giant bell which must have weighed as much as eight or nine tons in a massive tower near the center of the city, and he wondered why there were so many of them.
Roads twisted through the architectural crazy-quilt, packed with Mardukans. Everywhere Julian and Poertena looked in the city, there were Mardukans selling and buying and going about their business. From the edge of the sheltering hills, the city looked like a kicked anthill.
But anyone who actually wanted to kick this anthill had his work cut out for him. The city was encircled by another immense wall, much larger and stronger than the outer defense work and crowned with artillery which probably threw nine- to twelve-kilo roundshot, with bastions every sixty meters or so. The harbor mouth itself was protected by immense citadels, each liberally supplied with its own ca
The wall extended upward on the highest hill, bisecting the city, and co
"I can see why everybody thinks this place is impossible to take," Julian said.
"Yeah," Poertena said, then thought about it. "But, you know, you gotta wonder. Where's tee supplies?"
"Huh?" Gro