Think of a myth, Chaya.
I have, she told the voice in her head. Juchi, for one, and how Aisha fought to have him buried, for another.
Now it was time to return to Gideon.
Gideon, Chaya thought several meetings later, would have recognized the situation. Must have been quite a fight when you announced you needed fighters—but only three hundred? And how did you pick them when you had a Citadel to attack, a town to sack, and a half million tribesmen to keep from killing themselves while they killed Saurons?
Which was worst, Piet old boy? The planning, the battle, or the aftermath?
She didn't quite dare to cast her mind free again, for fear that the old, old warleader might answer her.
"What is your Book to us?" shouted Suleiman Tepe. He had more balls than brains, that was for sure, seeing that not long ago, Hammer-of-God had executed his khan and held a pistol to his own head.
"It is not just the Book of the Ivrit or of the men of Eden," Nazrullah cut in. Smart man, that. Literate. "The hills are full of such stories, chief among them the tale of Iskendar Khan. Long ago, bandits told him that to take their fortress, he must grow wings. So he chose out three hundred men, bound them with the oath of death commandos, and sent them up the cliffs to victory and undying fame."
An invitation to high-altitude suicide, Chaya thought. Irresistible. How did you select three hundred out of the tens of thousands of honor-mad lunatics who would clamor to be allowed to swear away their lives? Must be getting old to be this cynical, she told herself. What have I done what have I done what have I done keened in her consciousness like a widow of the tribes, veil pulled over her eyes.
What I must, she snapped, setting the phantoms adrift. She had a problem to solve—selecting death commandos. And, as each khan or clan leader shouted out his claims, she paid them the tribute of her full attention.
"One at a time!" Hammer was roaring, pounding on the table for quiet in which separate claims could be heard.
How did you choose? Even if the camp didn't teem with spies, if you announced a mission of great peril, chances were you'd have not three hundred but thirty thousand honor-mad tribesmen clamoring to volunteer. With their guns and their knives and, Yeweh help us, all their noise. And Gideon's option of selecting only the men who drank a certain way—there wasn't a body of water near Nûrnen that was big enough or clean enough to allow that many warriors to drink from at once.
"It is not only honor," Hammer was saying in Turkic as fine as Chaya had ever heard, "but undying glory. For those of us who scale the Wall of Allah to drop upon the Godless Saurons as they sleep shall be not as hashishayun, for they are mortal. I have slain them. We shall be fedaykin, death commandos."
The shout that went up was one of pure excitement. Want to run for office, General? You have a great future ahead of you, Piet help you, as a politician. The Edenite's voice turned reassuring, the way he might encourage a recruit before his first battle.
"We swore as brothers, and well I know my brothers have the hearts of cliff lions to drop upon the Godless and harry them. You will all find peril enough, honor enough, reward enough. But as you would not use an axe to carve bone, I must choose those of you best suited for this fight."
They would learn, yes. Those whose hearts did not burst with effort, or whose bodies did not freeze or limbs blacken, or who did not reel and fall from high peaks. There was no time to learn. They needed mountaineers or those familiar with the hills. Nazrullah's people. The few Tibetans who had ventured from their peaks and were willing to risk allying not just one life but all their lives with the horde. Those tribes and clans—Gasim's and Shamyl's and Suleiman Tepe's among them—who ventured into the hills at need. A few of the Bandari shepherds who had chased flocks up past Haven's wretched excuse for a treeline.
Still, too many. And too little time. From time to time, messengers called Hammer-of-God or Karl or even Aisha away to other tasks. At such times, Barak took over, as if Hammer groomed him as a replacement. What does he know that I don't? Chaya thought. Perhaps he really means not to come back. They could not afford to lose him. They could not afford to lose any of the leaders. And she dared not allow fear, for it was fear she felt, to interfere with her judgment.
If she were a Cyborg, she could put it out of mind. She was not. She tried.
Cut the group further. Age, health, wounds . . . how far could you go? There were always special claims; every khan had a special claim.
"I am not too old to go," Gasim declared, breaking into an explanation of mountain sickness. "And I tell you, go I shall!"
"It is said," Nazrullah said, "that you have need to go. That so your tribe might live—and I honor you for the sacrifice—your own daughter went with the tribute maidens to the Citadel."
Gasim's face went white, then flushed with the sort of anger that washes away pain. That will teach you to interrupt, Chaya thought. Let them rant. She would watch. The Seven would handle it.
"I have no daughter!" Gasim spat.
"No?" Nazrullah raised an eyebrow. "There is still, there is always the tie of blood. Your daughter is your daughter, even if you must kill her for unchastity."
"And what do you know of it, you who bought your women's freedom from . . ."
"Were it my child in the Citadel, I would seek to reclaim her from what she was sent into, as—so it is written—the lady Bortei was regained by Temujin from his enemies—him they called Chingiz Khan, Emperor of All Men. And I should bring her sons to my hearth and welcome them. For they would be blood of my blood."
"They would be Saurons!"
"Mingling the blood is not always bad," Karl Haller put in. "I beg the khans not to quarrel. As the General says, there is honor enough for all—and I speak as a man who is not to go."
Another wrangle for the next day's meeting, after the palisades were inspected outside and a myriad of other tasks: why were some women allowed to be considered when so many warriors vied for the post? Chaya sighed. Sannie, secure of her place as a member of the Seven, kept silent. The shouts and the boasts went on. Far too long.
Time was not their friend, Chaya told herself for what she vowed was for the last time. To her mind, too many people knew now of the meetings that had nothing to do with camp or horde or fortifications. And others, who knew less, were skilled at drawing conclusions—like that Sigrid. She raised her head.
"Draw lots," she said. "Let Yeweh—or Allah—decide." That was far too close to kill'emallandletGodsortitout, but it would do. With as much dispatch as there had been shouting before, smooth stones were gathered. Some were marked—less than three hundred, if the truth be known, since some places were already filled. Hammer-of-God as leader. Barak as aide and, God Yeweh forbid, second in command. Sannie. Lobsang and his people. Nazrullah and a son of his. Shamyl's eldest son. Gasim. Suleiman Tepe. Ladislas and Algirdas. Sapper. Be-Courteous and Smite-Sin Jackson, cousins of Hammer and even more dour, if that was possible.
And then, told only that their leaders required it, the fighters considered most fit to storm the Citadel's unguarded back each drew from the box in Chaya's keeping.
And they had their list. It was not the band that any one of them might have chosen, Chaya thought, scanning the blotched and crossed-out scroll. The lots had turned up some damned strange candidates. Even among our own. A couple merchants turned fighter. A mediko or two—along more for their climbing and weapons skills than for any chance they'd have to save life.
The further Sharku ran, the closer to the Citadel he got, the more nomads he and his comrades eliminated, the more he worried about the future of the Race on Haven. The Bandari had put everything they had into this assault on the Citadel. If it fell . . . if by some dreadful mischance it fell, how would his people be able to rebuild their lives? All the technical knowledge on Haven was concentrated there. If it were destroyed, no one knew enough to reconstruct it.
They would never go back to the stars. This world would be prison and grave to the Race forever.
The realization chilled Sharku. How could so much go so wrong so fast?
"Not so far, now, Deathmaster." Mumak's voice held little of the concern that he must have felt.
"Not far at all," Vizgor echoed. "Then we'll show them, Regiment Leader."
"I think we will," Mumak answered. He looked significantly at Sharku. "He will, anyway."
"Nice to know you've got confidence in me," Sharku said.
"Oh, we have that," Mumak said. He raised his voice. "Don't we, lads? Let's hear a cheer."
"Sharku!" Vizgor shouted.
"Sharku!" the staff ranks answered. "Deathmaster!"
The road stretched out ahead. "Increase the pace," Sharku said. "If you've got the breath to shout, we're not marching fast enough."
They were still cheering as they broke into a loping trot.
Another day to pack, to gather the charges, to assemble the food, the ropes, and the sturdy hooks and spikes for hands and feet that Nazrullah scorned as luxury, but that they might need; and the three hundred assembled before those of the Seven who remained behind.
They gathered in the largest room of the mayor's house, which happened to be a basement. A fire and the press of bodies took the chill off. Closely guarded and wearing a heavy collar, Strong Sven was held nearby until needed: until then, it was thought, his presence would only pollute the assembled fedaykin.
"Brothers." Hammer-of-God's voice all but purred in the silence. "And sisters, in no less honor. When we swore to the jihad, we made oath in word and blood before the Judge and the entire host. Today, we swear the oath offedaykin in secret, known only to the God of Battles and to those who rule us. I would ask each of you to swear today, in the silence of your own hearts and souls, not to flinch, not to falter or to betray your brothers by action or inaction, but to go forward until you take the Citadel or death takes you. I further swear that none of us shall return until the Citadel falls.
"Do you so swear?"
There was a murmur of assent. Then, the General walked over to Chaya. Trying not to favor his weak leg, he knelt and looked up at her. The irony had gone from his face, she realized. As much as the men he had spent a lifetime fighting, he believed in this. For what you believe it may do, she thought, laid hands on his head, and seemed to bless him.
He rose and looked at his fedaykin, his face oddly happy. "Khans and princes and simple warriors you have all been. Today, you claim a tide more rare and more glorious. And I tell you, I could not ask for a finer group to live and die among."
He drew his sword and the firelight shone on the blade. "God with us!"
Then, detaching the scabbard from his belt, he snapped it and threw it into the fire. The others followed suit. And the flames, fed by some trick of the engineers, blazed up to consume them.
"Let's go," he said simply. They broke ranks, to disperse and meet at the appointed place among the tumbled rocks of the foothills near a disused entrance to the mines. Barak strode from the room without a backward glance. Someone handed him Strong Sven's leash.
And then they were gone.