On the Oceans of Eternity

Alston waited while the assembled officers settled themselves around the table; the flaps were open, and the air that drifted in was rain-washed, cool and fresh, even a little chill. From outside came a distant, constant crackle of small-arms fire from the ranges-the auxiliaries getting intensive training, the Marines, militia, and Guard crews maintaining their edge-the scream of a steam whistle, the sounds of marching feet, hooves, a farrier's hammer driving home nails in a hoof, shouts and orders, a distant screech of metal on metal, a work-shanty from the piers where cargos were swung ashore.

"Gentlemen, ladies," Swindapa said, nodding as the tented room grew quiet.

"Ms. Kurlelo-Alston, the outline, if you please."

"Ma'am." She moved the tip of the ebony rod from Cadiz to where the Guadalquivir ran into the great bay. "Here- where Seville would have been-is the Tartessian forward base, at the first really firm ground. It's a town called Kurutselcarya-duwara-biden, and it means… mmmm… Place Where They Cross the River."

"We'll call it Crossing," Alston said.

There were a few chuckles at that. Swindapa went on. "This area between Crossing and Tartessos is the heartland of their kingdom, and the most heavily populated area. Most of their mines, smelters and foundries are either here"-she tapped the mountains directly north of Tartessos City, at the sources of the Rio Tinto-"or scattered through here."

The pointer swept east and slightly north, along the foothills of the Black Mountains, the Sierra Morena as they were called in the twentieth.

"South of that is the Guadalquivir, the Tasweldan Errigu-abiden-the Great River. It's navigable for ships under two hundred tons all the way east to here; where Cordoba is on the pre-Event maps. They've driven roads north into the mountains, and bring the products down to the water, float them down the river to Crossing, and then either by road to Tartessos-this road between them is their main highway, and it's asphalt-surfaced-or by sailing barge along the coast, since that isn't far.

"Right now, they're building up supplies at Crossing while their army masses just east of the river. We estimate their force at about seven thousand troops, a little less than double our number. The file you've been given has a breakdown on armaments."

"Thank you, Lieutenant Commander," Marian said, and rose. Swindapa handed her the pointer.

"At present, they're covering their main population and manufacturing centers, with this river to move supplies, and relying on their fortifications to protect their capital. They have more troops than we do, but they also have to garrison extensive territories. This area to the west, around their capital, is where the actual Tartessians live; around thirty-five thousand people. There's another seventy-five thousand living in the Guadalquivir Valley; closely related to the Tartessians, speaking the same language, much the same religion and customs. From our Intelligence reports, most of them are fairly happy with Isketerol’s rule, apart from some of the families of their former leaders. About as many people again live in the mountains and plateau areas to the north and east of the Guadalquivir; they farm a little but they're mainly herders and hunters, semi nomads, and they don't like the Tartessians. Neither do the people in those areas of northern Morocco they control.

"Now," Marian went on, "King Isketerol is actually in a bit of a strategic dilemma, although he doesn't realize it. We're going to point it out to him; we're also going to make clear the advantages our superior reco

There was a wolfish chuckle at that, and she went on: "Our war aim here is to neutralize Tartessos, either by negotiation or by kicking them to bits and stomping on the bits; and we have to do that without damaging our own forces too much, because this is simply a prelude to the real war, against Walker and Great Achaea."

She glanced over at McClintock, who sat with his regimental commanders and staff. "Brigadier, are the auxiliaries ready to take the field?"

"Reasonably, ma'am," he said. "The more time we have to drill them, the better they'll be, of course. I've got Marine or Militia officers and noncoms in command of each group, 'advising' the locals who are nominally in charge. We're providin' all the communications and heavy weapons, of course, but they'll make pretty good riflemen. They'll hold a line."

"Excellent. Lieutenant Commander Bidden, what about the airship?"

"Five more days, ma'am. We're putting up the frames and inserting the gasbags now."

"Mr. Raith?"

The head of the Seahaven Engineering liaison spread his hands, a gesture that was a probably-unconscious imitation of Ron Leaton's. "We're setting up the slipways and rollers," he said. "Nearly done. And the machine shop will be up to speed in another day. That's all we can do until we get the Merrimac itself."

The Coast Guard captains looked at him. "Herself, Mr. Raith, herself," Marian corrected him. "A suggestion; look into hauling out the Farragut on the slipway while we're waiting for Merrimac. It would be a lot easier to get her back into shape that way and it'll give your team some shakedown work."

Then she tapped the end of the pointer into her palm, eyes raking the assembled officers. "What we're going to do now," she said, "is take the initiative. I intend to have the enemy reacting to what we do, and always a day late and a dollar short, with a new surprise every time he thinks he's adjusted. We're going to get inside his decision loop. Brigadier, you'll take the Third Marines and the auxiliaries north along this route…"

"Row soft, there." The voice of the coxswain came from the tiller. "Row soft, all."

Swindapa Kurlelo-Alston blinked under the overhang of helmet as rain came hissing down out of the night sky. That hid the Tartessian fort on the bluffs over there to the east, but she could feel its hulking menace in the part of her spirit that bore the Spear Mark of the hunter-eleven-inch guns there…

The darkened oars rose and fell, a low creaking of thwarts their only sound, lost in the white noise of the rain. The water and the night hid everything, sight and sound and scent.

Marian waited quietly beside her in the bows of the launch as the fort fell away behind them and the minutes passed. To anyone else there would have been nothing in her face, nothing in the way her body waited but a tiger's patience.

Ah, you ca