Fortune's stroke

Chapter 12

On his way back up the slope, Belisarius stopped when he came to the trenches where the handcannon soldiers were dug in. He turned to Maurice, waving his hand.

"Go on ahead, and see to the rest of the army. I want to go over our plans one last time with Mark and Gregory."

Maurice nodded, and continued plodding toward the crest of the pass. His progress was slow. The trench through which he was moving had been recently dug. The soil was still loose, making for unfirm footing. His biggest difficulty, however, came from the sheer weight of his weapons and armor. Cataphract gear was heavy enough, sitting on a horse. For a man on foot, climbing uphill, the armor seemed made of lead ingots instead of steel scale. The weapons weighed more than Nero's sins.

Belisarius felt a moment's sympathy for Maurice-but only a moment. He was wearing his own cataphract gear, and would be making that trek himself soon enough. If the war against Malwa dragged on for years, Belisarius thought the day would come when Roman soldiers could finally be rid of that damned armor. In visions which Aide had given him of gunpowder armies of the future, soldiers had worn nothing but a plate cuirass and a helmet. Just enough to stop a bullet, except at close range.

He sighed. That day was still far off. Belisarius had spent hours-and hours and hours-studying the great generals of the future, especially those of the first centuries of gunpowder warfare. Aide knew all of human history, and the crystal had shown Belisarius the methods and tactics of those men. Jan Zizka; Gonzalo de Cordoba and the Duke of Parma; Maurice of Nassau; Henry IV of France; Tilly and Wallenstein, and Gustavus Adolphus; Turenne and Frederick the Great; Marlborough; Napoleon and Wellington; and many others.

Of all those men, the only one Belisarius truly admired was Gustavus Adolphus. To some degree, his admiration was professional. Gustav II Adolf, King of Sweden, had reintroduced mobility and fluid tactics into a style of war which had become nothing more than brutal hammering. Massive squares of musket and pike slamming into other such squares, like the old Greek phalanxes.

But, for the most part, Belisarius was attracted by the man himself. Gustavus Adolphus had been a king-a very self-confident and ambitious king, in point of fact-who was by no mean immune from monarchy's vices. Still, he had been scrupulous about consulting the various estates of his kingdom, as he was required to do by Swedish law. He had managed to win the firm loyalty of his officers and soldiers by his fair and consistent conduct. He was as good a king as he was a general-Sweden was, by far, the best administered realm of his time. He had been the only king of his day who cared a fig for the needs of common folk. And his troops, when they entered the Thirty Years War under his command, had been the only soldiers who did not ravage the German countryside.

I would have liked to meet that man, he mused.

Aide's voice came into his mind. The crystal's thoughts were hesitant, almost apologetic.

He will never exist, now. Whatever happens. If Malwa wins this war, and Link establishes its domination over mankind, there will be no kings like that. Not ever.

Belisarius' face tightened. Link, the secret master of the Malwa dynasty, was an artificial intelligence sent back in time by the "new gods" of the future. Belisarius had met the creature, once, when he was in India. It had taken the form of Great Lady Holi, the aunt of the Malwa emperor. Aide called it a cybernetic organism.

Belisarius' eyes drifted across the landscape of the Zagros, as if that rugged mountain range was a metaphor for human destiny. The slopes of those mountains were rocky, treacherous, and at least half-hidden by spurs and crests. Belisarius had learned much, over the past four years, about mankind's future-it would be better to say, futures, because the "new gods" had their own plans for shaping human destiny. But he still did not know much about the "new gods" themselves. Aide, he was sure, was not withholding information from him. The crystal was simply incapable of understanding such mentalities.

Belisarius thought he understood them. They reminded him of religious fanatics he had met. Orthodox or Monophysite, it mattered not. All such men were imbued with the certainty that they-and they alone-understood the Will of God. Those who opposed them were not simply in error, they were the minions of Satan. To be scourged, that others might be cleansed.

That was the vision, he thought, which animated the "new gods" of the future. Outraged by the chaotic kaleidoscope of humanity, as it spread through the stars, they were seized by a determination to purify the race.

There had been no conceivable way to accomplish that goal, in their future time. Humanity had settled throughout the galaxy, and all the galaxies nearby. Isolated by incredible distances and the speed of light, each human planet went its own way. The human species was evolving in a million different directions, like the branches of a great tree, with nothing to bind it but a common heritage and the slender threads of the Great Ones in their travels.

So, the "new gods" had sent Link back in time, to alter history when humanity was still living on a single planet. To crush the mongrel empire called Rome, and to build a world state centered in north India. The "new gods" intended to use the Hindu caste system as the germ for what they called a "eugenics program." They would purify the race-and if, in the doing, they slaughtered millions, they cared not the least. Those were cattle, at best, if not outright vermin. Only the "new gods," and those they would shape in their image, were truly human.

Aide was right. If Malwa won, there would be no kings in the future like Gustavus Adolphus.

And if we win? he asked. But he knew the answer, before Aide even gave it.

Then you will have changed history also. The course of it will remain, like a broad river, but the banks will be altered. There may not even be a country called Sweden, in that future. There certainly won't be a man named Gustavus Adolphus. Or, if there is, he's as likely to be a peasant or a glassmaker as a king.

For a moment, the thought saddened Belisarius. The Roman general had no doubt of the righteousness of his cause. None at all. But even the most just war causes destruction. Saving that great, flowering tree of humanity's future, Belisarius would crush many of its buds. There would be no Gustavus Adolphus. No Shakespeare; no Cervantes; no Spinoza and Kant; no Sir Isaac Newton.

The moment passed. But there will be others, like them.

Yes, came Aide's reply. Quietly: And there will be a place, too, for others like me. We are also people, with our own rightful place in that great tree.

Belisarius' musings were interrupted by a voice.

"How soon do you want us ready, general?"

Belisarius snapped out of his reverie and focused his eyes on the speaker. It was Mark of Edessa, the commander of Belisarius' new unit of handcannon soldiers.

An idle thought crossed Belisarius' mind. I have got to come up with a new name for them. "Handcannon soldiers" is just too much of a mouthful.

Belisarius took a moment to examine the man. Mark was in his early twenties. He was a Syrian, of predominantly Arab ancestry. That was useful, given that most of his men were of similar stock. Like all Roman soldiers, the men spoke Greek-or learned to, at least, shortly after enlisting. But Mark's fluency in Arabic and several of the Aramaic dialects had proven valuable many times.

But that was not the principal reason Mark had been given this new command. The young officer, during the course of the previous year's campaign in Mesopotamia, had shown himself to be resourceful and reliable. He also-this was quite unusual for a cavalryman-had no objection to fighting on foot, and had proven to have a knack for the new gunpowder weapons.

Belisarius remembered the first time he met Mark, almost four years earlier. The general had just taken command of the army at Mindouos. His predecessor had let that army rot, and Belisarius had found it necessary to purge many of the existing officers. A number of men had been promoted from the ranks. Mark had been one of them, recommended by Belisarius' cataphract, Gregory.

He saw two more figures scuttling up the trench.

"Speak of the devil," he murmured. Gregory himself was arriving. He and Mark had become good friends, and had shown they could work together well in combat. That was one of the reasons that Belisarius had put Gregory in command of another new unit, the pikemen who served as a bulwark for the handcannon soldiers.

Call them "musketeers," came Aide's thought. Technically, it would be more accurate to call them arquebusiers, but-

"Arquebusiers" is ridiculous. Musketeers it is!

Belisarius broke into a smile. The new name was a minor triumph, true. Picayune, perhaps. But he was a firm believer in the axiom that large victories grow out of a multitude of small ones.

Gregory had arrived, now. He and Mark were eyeing their general quizzically, wondering why he was smiling. Almost grinning, in fact.

"I've got a new name for your men, Mark," he announced. "From now on, we'll call you musketeers."

Mark and Gregory looked at each other. It was almost comical the way each began mouthing the word.

"I like it," pronounced Gregory, after a moment's experimentation. Mark nodded his head. "So do I!"

The third man came up, and now Belisarius did break into a grin.

"And what have we here?" he asked. "The three musketeers?"

Oh, that's gross! There followed a mental, crystalline version of a raspberry. Low, low.

Gregory gave the new man, whose name was Felix Chalcenterus, an unkind look. The same little glare was transferred to Mark of Edessa.

"Give me a break, general," he growled. "You won't find me fighting with these new-fangled gadgets. Cold steel, that's still my business."

Mark and Felix matched Belisarius' grin. "He's hopeless, General," stated Mark. "Set in his ways, like an old village woman."

Belisarius chuckled at the quip, even though it was quite unfair. For the past year, Gregory had served as Belisarius' chief artillery officer. In this campaign of fluid maneuver, Belisarius had left his cumbersome artillery behind, so Gregory had been free to take on another assignment. The main reason Belisarius had put the man in charge of the new unit of pikemen was that Gregory was one of those officers who seemed almost infinitely flexible. He was one of the very few Thracian cataphracts who didn't squeal like a stuck pig when asked to fight on foot, with a pike instead of a lance. The pikemen were an elite unit, true, but Gregory had still been hard-pressed to find enough Thracians to volunteer. In the end, he had relied heavily on the new Isaurians who were enlisting into the general's corps of bucellarii.

Belisarius got down to business. "Are you ready?" he asked. The question was directed at all three men simultaneously. Felix Chalcenterus served Mark as his executive officer.

"We're set, general," came Mark's reply. Gregory and Felix nodded their agreement.

"Good. Remember-don't start up the slope until I signal for you." Belisarius made a little head toss toward the east. "You can be damned sure that Sanga will have some of his Pathan scouts perched on the nearby hilltops, watching everything we do. They'll have some means of signaling Damodara-mirrors, if the sun's right. If not, they'll have something else. Banners, maybe smoke. It's essential that they can't see you until the time comes for your countercharge."

Belisarius gave the three men a quick scrutiny. Satisfied that they understood the point, he added: "You'll have to come up the hill in a hurry, mind. I won't give the signal until the last minute. In a hurry-and in good formation. Can you do it?"

There was no verbal reply. Just three self-confident smiles and nodding heads.

"All right," said Belisarius. He gave out a little sigh. "The moment's come, then. It's my turn to climb that damned hill."

He turned and set off, slogging his way. Every step forward was marked by half a step backward, sliding in the loose soil. Progress was marked by the soft, crunching sounds of semifutility. Within a few yards, his armor and weapons felt like the burden of Atlas.

"Some day," he muttered. "If this war goes on long enough. I'll be skipping through the meadows with nothing but a helmet and a linen uniform. Not a care in the world."

Except frying in napalm, or being shredded by high explosive shells, came Aide's unkind thought. Not to mention being picked off at five hundred yards by a sniper armed with a high-velocity rifle. And while we're at it, let's not forget-

Not a care in the world! insisted Belisarius. His thought was perhaps a bit surly. Death is a feather. Cataphract gear is the torment of Prometheus.

Then, very surly: Spoilsport.

By the time he reached the trench at the crest of the pass, Belisarius was exhausted. He half-collapsed next to Maurice. Valentinian and Anastasius were still in the trench, a few feet to his right.

Maurice gave him no more than a cursory glance before resuming his study of the enemy troops on the slope below. "You'll get over it soon enough," he said. The words were unkind but the tone was sympathetic. "You'd better," added Maurice grimly. "The Ye-tai aren't wasting any time."

Wearily, Belisarius nodded. Fortunately, his exhaustion was simply due to heavy, but brief, exertion. It was not the kind of fatigue produced by hours of relentless labor. He knew from experience that his well-toned muscles would recover in a few minutes-even if, at the moment, he didn't feel as if he could ever walk again.

The general's head was below the parapet, resting against the sloped wall of the trench. He was too tired to lift it. He could hear the faint sounds of orders being shouted in Hindi, coming from far down the slope.

"What are they doing, Maurice?" he asked.

"The Ye-tai will be making the main assault. Nothing fancy, just a straight charge up the slope. On foot. They've just about finished dressing their lines." He gave a little half-incredulous grunt. "Good lines, too. Way better than I've ever seen barbarians do before."

"They're not exactly barbarians," said Belisarius. He made a brief attempt at raising his head, but gave it up almost instantly. "They act like it, sure enough. The Malwa encourage them to behave barbarously, not that the Ye-tai need much encouragement. But they've been an integral part of the Malwa ruling class for three generations, now. All of their sub-officers, to give you an idea, are literate. Down to a rank equivalent to our pentarchs."

Maurice emitted another grunt. From Belisarius' other side came Valentinian's half-incredulous (and half-disgruntled) exclamation: "You've got to be kidding!"

Belisarius smiled. Valentinian's attitude was understandable. Even in the Roman army, with its comparatively democratic traditions, not more than half of the sub-officers below the rank of hecatontarch could read and write.

Valentinian himself carried the rank of a hecatontarch. That was the modern Greek equivalent of the old Latin "centurion"-commander of a hundred. But in his case, the rank was a formal honor more than anything else. Valentinian didn't command anyone. His job, along with Anastasius, was to keep Belisarius alive on the battlefield.

Valentinian was literate, just barely. He could sign his name without help, and he could pick his way through simple written messages. But he had never even thought of trying to read a book. If someone had ever suggested it to him-

"You should read a book sometime," commented Anastasius mildly. "Be good for you, Valentinian."

"You've got to be kidding," came the instant, hissing response.

He's got to be kidding, echoed Aide.

Listening to the exchange, Belisarius' smile widened. Anastasius was literate-and not barely. The giant Thracian cataphract read any book he could get his hands on, especially if it dealt with philosophy. But his attitude, for a Roman soldier, was unusual-it might be better to say, extraordinary.

Anastasius himself ascribed his peculiarity to the fact that he had a Greek father. But Belisarius thought otherwise. There were plenty of Greek soldiers in the Roman army who were as illiterate-and as uninterested in literacy-as any Hun. Belisarius suspected that Anastasius' obsession with philosophy was more in the nature of a personal rebellion. The man was so huge, and so strong, and so brutal in his appearance, that Belisarius thought he had turned to reading as a way of assuring himself that he was a man and not an ogre.

The thought of ogres brought his mind back to the moment. Literate they might be, but the Ye-tai were the closest human equivalents to ogres that Belisarius had ever met.

Speaking of which, muttered Aide, you'd better gird your loins, grandpa. The ogres are coming.

Belisarius heard the sound of kettledrums. "They're coming," said Maurice. He spoke softly, as he usually did, but his tone was as grim as a glacier. "Fierce bastards, too. Nobody's got to drive them forward. They're coming on like starving wolves after a crippled antelope."

Belisarius had recovered enough. With a little grunt of effort, he heaved himself half-erect and looked over the parapet.

He gave the Ye-tai charging up the mountain pass no more than a quick, almost perfunctory, study. He had seen Ye-tai in action before, and was not surprised by anything he saw-neither the vigor of their charge, nor the way they still managed to keep their lines reasonably well dressed even while storming up a rock-strewn slope. It was impressive, to be sure. But there was nothing in the world as sheerly impressive as a charge of Persian heavy cavalry. Belisarius had faced Persian charges, in the past, and broken the armies who made them.

He spent a little more time gauging the kshatriyas who were accompanying the Ye-tai. In the Malwa Empire, unlike other Hindu realms, the warrior caste was devoted almost exclusively to gunpowder weapons and tactics. Except in Damodara's army, in fact, they had a monopoly on such weapons.

There were a number of kshatriyas dispersed through the ranks of the oncoming Ye-tai. All of them were carrying grenades-one in the hand, with several more slung from bandoliers. Their free hands held the strikers to light the fuses.

None of the kshatriyas, of course, were in the first few ranks. As lightly armored as they were, the grenadiers could not hope to match Roman soldiers in hand-to-hand combat. But Belisarius was impressed to see that the kshatriyas were not, as he had observed in other Malwa armies, hanging far back in the rear.

Here, too, Damodara's style of leadership was evident. Over time, Malwa's pampered kshatriyas had lost much of the martial rigor which that warrior caste possessed in other Hindu societies. They were held in open scorn by Rajput kshatriyas. Damodara, it seemed, had reinstituted the old traditions. Those grenadiers storming up the hill alongside the sword-wielding Ye-tai bore no resemblance to the arrogant idlers whom Belisarius had seen while he was in India.

But there were still not many of them, he was relieved to see. Not enough to change the equation in the immediate battle. No more than one in twenty of the enemy soldiers in the oncoming charge were carrying grenades. That was an even smaller percentage than usual. Whatever armaments complex Damodara had succeeded in creating, it was apparently still small. Belisarius suspected that Damodara was doing what he would have done himself-had done, in fact, when Belisarius created his own weapons industry. Concentrate on quality, not quantity. Build a few good cannons, and improve the rocketry, rather than try to churn out simple grenades.

So, the general's eyes were soon drawn to the enemy's flanks, where the Rajput cavalry were massed. That was the real threat. Belisarius was confident that he could handle the Ye-tai charge. He had his own surprise waiting, on the back side of the slope. But, no more than Damodara, had Belisarius been able to produce gunpowder weapons in great quantity. His one thousand musketeers could break the Ye-tai but-

Aide's voice interrupted his train of thought. There was a tinge of annoyance in the crystal's words. A tinge of annoyance-and more than a tinge of worry.

They're not musketeers. Not really. Eighteenth-century musketeers could fire three volleys a minute. But they had flintlocks. You don't even have arquebusses as good as Gustavus Adolphus' soldiers, and they couldn't fire more often than-

Aide broke off, with the mental equivalent of a sigh of exasperation. He and Belisarius had already had this argument. As always, when the dispute involved purely military affairs, Belisarius' opinion had carried the day.

The general did not bother with a reply. He was too preoccupied with studying the Rajputs.

Not to his surprise, Belisarius saw that most of the Rajput cavalry-two out of three, he gauged-were now concentrated on the enemy's right flank, under Sanga's command. The pass in which Belisarius was making a stand was saddle-shaped. The flanks of the pass were not sheer cliffs, but rounded slopes. The slope on Belisarius' left was almost gentle. If the Ye-tai could pin the Roman center, Sanga would have no real difficulty leading a mass cavalry charge against the Roman left.

Belisarius, of course, had read the terrain the same way as Damodara and Sanga. And so he had positioned his heaviest troops, the Greek cataphracts under Cyril's command, on his left. He would hold the center and the right with the lighter Syrian forces, and the new units of musketeers and pikemen.

The fact remained that he was badly outnumbered, and the ground was open enough that the Malwa could bring all their forces to bear. Not easily; not quickly-but surely, for all that.

Belisarius shook his head a little, reminding himself that he was not trying to win this battle. He just needed to put up enough of a fight so that his retreat to the south, when the time came, would not seem too puzzling to his opponents. Belisarius could afford the tactical setback involved in giving up this battlefield, as long as his troops weren't badly mauled. He could not afford the strategic defeat which would be certain, if Damodara or Sanga-or Narses, if the canny eunuch was with them-ever figured out what Belisarius was planning for, months from now.

Maurice verbalized Belisarius' own thoughts.

"It's going to be a bit touch-and-go," growled the chiliarch. "More than a bit, if your little surprise doesn't work as well as you think it will. Which it probably won't," he added sourly. "Nothing ever works the way it's supposed to, on a battlefield."

Belisarius started to respond, but fell silent. The Ye-tai were almost close enough-

Time. Belisarius gave the hand signal, and the small group of cornicenes just a few yards away immediately began blowing on their horns.

The peal of the cornicens immediately brought thousands of Greek cataphracts and Syrian archers to their feet, standing hip-high in their trenches with bows already nocked. A volley of arrows swept down the slope.

Like a scythe, came the simile to Belisarius' mind, but he knew it was inappropriate. Plunging fire was difficult. He was not surprised to see many of the arrows sail right over the approaching mass of Ye-tai. And it was often ineffective even when it struck, against experienced troops.

The Ye-tai were veterans, and had been expecting the volley. As soon as they saw the cataphracts rearing up, the Ye-tai crouched and sheltered behind their shields. The shouted orders of their officers were quite unnecessary. Because of the angle, they presented smaller targets to begin with, and each Ye-tai was experienced enough to keep his shield properly slanted.

Those were good shields, as good as Roman ones. Laminated wood reinforced with iron-nothing like the flimsy wicker shields with which the Malwa Empire armed its common soldiers. Most of the Roman arrows which hit their targets glanced off harmlessly.

The Ye-tai immediately resumed their charge, bellowing their battle cries. Another volley; another shielded crouch; another upward surge. They lost men, of course-plenty of them-but not enough. Not for those warriors. Ye-tai had many vices; cowardice was not one of them.

"Not a chance," grunted Maurice. There was no amazement in those words. Not even a trace of surprise. Maurice sounded like a man remarking that there was no way a sand castle was going to hold back the tide.

The chiliarch glanced at Belisarius. "You'd better see to your gunmen. We're going to need them."

Belisarius was already turning. As he began giving the new signal, he heard Maurice mutter: "Oh, marvelous. The Rajputs are already starting their charge. God, I hate competent enemies." A few seconds later, hissing: "Shit. I can't believe it!"

Belisarius had been watching the musketeers climbing up the slope. Hearing the alarm in Maurice's voice, he immediately turned around.

Seeing the speed with which the Rajput cavalry was charging up that side of the saddle, Belisarius understood Maurice's shock. Belisarius himself had never seen cavalry move that quickly in mountainous terrain.

Silently, he cursed himself for an idiot. He had forgotten-it might be better to say, never understood in the first place. Belisarius was accustomed to Roman and Persian heavy cavalry, whose gear and tactics had been shaped by centuries of war on the flat plains of Mesopotamia. But the Rajputs were not heavy cavalry-not, at least, by Roman and Persian standards-and they were unfazed by rough terrain.

Rajputana is a land of hills, chimed in Aide. The Rajput military tradition was forged in expeditions against Pathan mountaineers, and battles fought against Marathas in the volcanic badlands of the Great Country.

"Like a bunch of damned mountain goats," growled Maurice. He cocked his head. "You do realize, young man, that your fancy battle plan just flew south for the winter." For all the grimness of the words, there was a trace of satisfaction in the voice. Maurice was one of those natural-born pessimists who took a strange pleasure in seeing the world live down to their expectations.

Belisarius had already reached the same conclusion. The weakest part of his tactical plan had been its reliance on close timing. The Rajputs had just kicked over the hourglass. Shattered it to pieces, in fact. Sanga's forces would strike the Roman left long before Belisarius had expected them to.

"Get over there quick, Maurice," he commanded. "Work with Cyril to get the Greeks reoriented. They'll have to hold off Sanga now, as long as they can. Forget about any countercharge against the Ye-tai." He pointed to the large force of Thracian cataphracts positioned halfway down the back slope, as a reserve. "And send a dispatch rider to the bucellarii, telling them to move left. We're going to need them."

"What about the Mamelukes?" asked Maurice. He looked southwest, to where the Kushans were holding the fords at the river half a mile below. "Do you want them up here, with you?"

Belisarius shook his head. "Not unless I'm desperate. I can't risk having any of them captured. Even a dead Kushan body could give the game away."

Maurice gave a skeptical glance at the musketeers who were nearing the crest.

"Do you really you think you can hold-" he started to say, but broke off. A second later, the chiliarch was scuttling down the trench, toward the Roman left. For all Maurice's frequent sarcasms on the subject of Belisarius' "fancy damned battle plans," the Thracian veteran was not given to arguing with him in the midst of actual combat. A general's willingness to command-instantly and surely-was more important in a battle than whether the command itself was wise. Maurice had seen battles won, more than once, simply because the commander had stood his ground and given clear and definite orders. Any orders, just so long as the troops felt that a steady hand was in control.

Belisarius peered over the parapet. The Ye-tai were very close, now. Their battle cries filled the air, thick with confidence, heavy with impending triumph. They had been bloodied by the Roman archery, but not badly enough. Several thousand would still reach the crest, where outnumbered and lightly armed Syrian infantry would be no match for them.

He rose, half-standing, and looked over the other parapet. The musketeers and the pikemen were almost at the crest, just a few yards down the slope. They had stopped, actually, to make a final dress of their lines. Belisarius saw Mark of Edessa watching him, calmly waiting for the general's order.

Here goes, thought Belisarius.

He gave the signal. Again, the cornicens blew. As he turned back to face the enemy, Belisarius saw small figures on nearby hilltops frantically waving banners. The Pathan scouts had caught sight of the new Roman unit surging forward, and were signaling Damodara.

Too late.

Belisarius took a deep breath, and gave a small prayer for the soul of a man he had never met, and never would. A general of a future that would never be. A man he didn't much care for, as a human being, but who had been one of history's greatest generals.

May your soul rest in peace, wherever it is, Iron Duke. I hope this works as well for me as it did for you at Busaco.

Aide's words, when they came, surprised Belisarius. He had been half-expecting some muttered reproaches. Something to the effect that Wellington's men could fire three volleys a minute; or that Wellington had the massive fortifications of the Lines of Torres Vedras to fall back on; or even-Aide had a bit of the pedant in him-that the title "Iron Duke" was an anachronism, in this context. The nickname was political, not military. It had been given to Prime Minister Wellington by English commoners, years after the fall of Napoleon, when he responded to a mob breaking his windows by installing iron shutters on his mansion in London.

But all that came, instead, was reassurance.

It will. The reverse-slope tactic was Wellington's signature. It worked at Salamanca, too. And even against Napoleon at Waterloo.

Belisarius was grateful for that quiet voice of confidence. He needed it. This battle was shaping up to be the worst fight of his life, rather than the simple cut-and-run he had anticipated. Once again, he had underestimated the Rajputs.

The musketeers reached the crest of the pass, and leveled their handcannons at the Ye-tai storming forward. Belisarius rose to join in his world's first use of a musket volley in battle, but not before giving himself a small curse.

Don't ever do that again, you jackass. Just because you've got brains, and a friend who can show you the future, don't ever forget that other men have brains too. And damned good ones, with the will to match.

The muskets roared, all across the line. Instantly, the crest of the pass was shrouded in gunsmoke. It was impossible to see more than a few feet through those acrid billows. Impatiently, while his musketeers went through the practiced drill with their clumsy muzzle loaders, Belisarius waited for the smoke to clear.

There was a good breeze coming through the pass. The clouds of gunsmoke were swept away within seconds. And Belisarius, seeing the havoc wreaked by a thousand.80-caliber smoothbores firing at close range, felt himself relax. Just a bit. The Ye-tai army was like a bull, half-stunned by a hammer blow between the eyes.

He raised his eyes, staring across the mounded heaps of Ye-tai corpses to his opponent's distant pavilion. Belisarius had just sent his own message-to himself, as well as Damodara. Reminding them both that if Belisarius had no monopoly on intelligence, neither did he have a monopoly on overconfidence.

And don't underestimate me again, Lord of Malwa, he thought. Better yet-do underestimate me again.

The Ye-tai, stubborn and courageous, were pushing forward. They clambered up and over the corpses and hideously shattered bodies of their wounded comrades, roaring with rage and hefting their swords. The Ye-tai were no longer trying to maintain formation. They were just a mob of enraged berserks, burning to reach their tormentors. The bull was half-stunned, but it was still a bull.

The second line of musketeers stepped forward and fired. While the smoke cleared, the third line took their place. Behind, the first line had already finished reloading and was preparing for a second volley.

It was true that Belisarius' musketeers, with their awkward matchlocks, could not match Wellington's three volleys a minute. The guns themselves were not much better than sixteenth-century arquebusses. John of Rhodes, working with sixth-century technology, couldn't possibly match the precision of nineteenth-century gunmaking. But Belisarius had all of Aide's encyclopedic knowledge to draw upon, so he had been able to leap over centuries of military experimentation in other ways. It was within the capacity of the Roman Empire to manufacture the prepared cartridges which Gustavus Adolphus had introduced. The muzzle loaders themselves were clumsy things, but there was nothing clumsy about the way they were being used.

His musketeers couldn't manage more than one volley a minute, but Belisarius could rely on that rate. And, as the smoke cleared, and he saw the carnage which the second volley had created, Belisarius knew that would be enough.

Wellington's reverse-slope tactic depended as much on the shock of surprise as it did on rates of fire, said Aide.

Belisarius nodded. An enemy storming forward in expectation of furious victory had its spirits shattered, along with its bodies, when it was struck down by a hail of bullets. Not even warriors like the Ye-tai could withstand such a blow.

No more than Napoleon's Imperial Guard at Waterloo.

The third line stepped forward, their weapons ready. There was no need for plunging fire, now. The vanguard elements of the Ye-tai had reached the crest and were not more than ten yards from the trenches. Felix Chalcenterus, the executive officer, was in charge of fire control. He called out the orders, in sure sequence.

Level! The guns came up like so many blunt lances.

There was no command to aim. Belisarius' musketeers, like Wellington's, were simply trained to fire in the general direction of the enemy. The weapons were so inaccurate, beyond fifty yards, that marksmanship was pointless.

Fire! The handcannons erupted. Another cloud of smoke obscured everything.

Obscured sight, that is, not sound. Belisarius could hear the bullets slamming into the struggling mass of Ye-tai. The sounds had a metallic edge, where bullets impacted armor, but he knew the armor was irrelevant. At that range, the murderous lead pellets punched through the finest plate armor as if it were mere cloth. The muzzle velocity of a matchlock arquebus was extremely high-supersonic, more often than not. The high-velocity rifles which would replace them in the future would do no more than double that, even after centuries of arms development and refinement. An arquebus' round shot lost its muzzle velocity very quickly, of course-far sooner than the spinning bullets of rifles. But at this range, the heavy-caliber arquebusses were probably even more effective than rifles.

The shrieks of wounded Ye-tai began to fill the pass, like the wail of a giant banshee. The Ye-tai were tough-as tough as any soldiers Belisarius had ever seen. But no soldiers are that tough.

The bull was on its knees, now. Bellowing, still, but dying for all that.

Their bloody work done, the third line retired. Even with the breeze, the pass was still half-obscured with smoke. But Belisarius could hear Felix commanding the first line back to the front. Chalcenterus' voice still had the timbre of his youth, but the voice itself was relaxed and confident.

I didn't make any mistake there, at least, Belisarius consoled himself. Felix had first caught the general's eye at the battle of the villa near Anatha, the previous year. Belisarius had been impressed by the Syrian soldier's alert calmness when the Roman army was subjected to its first experience with rocket fire. He had kept an eye on the youth, and seen to his rapid promotion.

The first line, back in position, went through the sequence. Another roar of handcannon fire. The pass was completely shrouded in smoke. Even with their clumsy weapons, the men could still keep up a rate of fire that outmatched the breeze.

The sound of bullets slamming into the enemy had a sodden quality, now. Belisarius was thankful that he couldn't actually see the results. This was sheer slaughter. He knew that the rear elements of the Ye-tai would already be staggering back in defeat. But the barbarian soldiers trapped at the front were helpless. Immobile targets. The bull was no longer even bellowing. It was just a dying beast, dumbly waiting for another blow of the hammer.

The second line returned, and the blow came. Belisarius heard Gregory calling out an order. His pikemen had been in position since the first line of musketeers stepped forward, ready to fend off any Ye-tai who made it through the gunfire. But they had not even been needed. Gregory had obviously come to the conclusion that they wouldn't be, and so he had called on his men to use their grenades.

The pikemen lowered their twelve-foot spears and plucked grenades from their bandoliers. Each pikeman carried only two of the devices. More would have impeded them in performing their principal duty. But these were special grenades. The pikemen had been equipped with the new grenades which John of Rhodes had developed-the ones with impact fuses.

The grenades had a simple "potato-masher" design. A strip of cloth was attached to the butt of the wooden handle. Like the cloth strips often attached to javelins, it would stabilize the grenade in flight and ensure that the weapon would strike in the proper orientation to set off the fuse. There was no need to fumble with a striker, or cut a fuse to proper length. Each pikeman simply yanked out the pin which armed the device, and sent it sailing down the slope.

The grenades disappeared into the clouds of smoke which were wafting down the pass. Before they hit, Felix had ordered another round of gunfire. Not more than a second after that roaring lightning, Belisarius heard the sharp claps of the grenades exploding down the slope. The sounds harmonized like music composed by a maniac. A homicidal maniac. Those Ye-tai at the rear, trying to retreat, were being savaged by the grenades even while their comrades at the front were being hammered into pulp by the guns.

For an instant, Belisarius was seized by a savage urge to order a countercharge. That had been his plan from the beginning. The Ye-tai were already broken-as badly as any army could be, driven back from an assault. A rush of pikemen now would complete their destruction. The fierce army which had charged up the slope not minutes earlier would be as thoroughly beaten as any army in human history.

Mark and Gregory were at his side now, awaiting the order. Their faces were tense and eager. They knew as well as Belisarius that they were on the verge of total victory.

Fiercely, Belisarius restrained himself. Yes, the enemy was beaten here. But-

Distantly, he could hear wails from another direction. To his left. Wails of pain, and the steel clash of weapons. He couldn't see anything through the wafting clouds of gunsmoke, but he knew the Rajputs were already hammering his left flank.

All ferocity and sense of satisfaction fled. His counterstroke at the saddle had worked, just as it had worked in another future for a man named Arthur Wellesley. But battles are rarely neat and tidy affairs which go according to plan. Not against well-led enemies, at least.

This battle could still wind up a disaster, came Aide's forceful thought.

Belisarius had won the struggle at the center, true. But if he didn't withdraw his army quickly, and in good order-which was the most difficult maneuver of all, in the face of the enemy-Sanga and the Rajputs would roll up his flank.

"No," he commanded, pointing toward the slope of the saddle to their left. Only the crest of the pass was still visible, due to the gunsmoke, but they could see hundreds of Rajput cavalry pouring across the terrain. Ten times that number would be hidden in the clouds below, on the lower part of the slope. Twenty times, more likely. There had been at least ten thousand Rajputs massed on the Malwa right, under Sanga's command.

Mark began to argue-respectfully, but still vehemently, but Gregory restrained him with a firm shake of the shoulder. The Thracian cataphract was older than the Syrian, more of a veteran-and more familiar with Belisarius.

"Shut up, youngster," he growled. "The general's right. If we charge down that slope, we'll be completely out of position when the Rajputs hit us. They'll turn us into sausage."

Belisarius didn't pick his officers for reticence and timidity. The young Syrian flushed, a bit, from Gregory's rebuke, but plowed on. "The Greeks'll hold them! Those are Cyril's men-and Agathius', before him. The same cataphracts who broke the Malwa at Anatha, and then at-"

"There are only three thousand of them, Mark," said Belisarius mildly. He wasn't going to spend more than a few seconds, arguing with a subordinate in the middle of a battle. But he was prepared to spend those seconds. There was no other way to train good officers.

"They're facing four times their number-probably five," he continued. "They're splendid troops, yes. But they don't have as good a position as we did here in the center. There's no one protecting their flank. Sanga will just send enough men to keep them pinned while he sweeps around them. He won't even try to crush the Greeks, not now. He'll bypass them and fall on us."

He pointed to the line of musketeers. The men had ceased firing now, and the pikemen had used up all their grenades. The center of the battlefield was almost quiet, except for the cries of wounded Ye-tai.

"How do you expect to form a defensive line against that charge-here? Straddling a mountain pass, with the enemy coming down the slope?"

Mark fell silent. His face still had a stubborn look to it, but Belisarius knew that the young Syrian was-not convinced, perhaps, but ready to obey.

Satisfied with that, Belisarius turned to Gregory and said: "Fall back southwest, toward the river. Upstream." He pointed to a location where the narrow river below the pass broadened a bit. "Where Vasudeva's guarding the fords. Set your men, and the musketeers, to hold the river after I get the rest of the army across."

Gregory nodded. A moment later, he and Mark were shouting commands to their men.

And now, thought Belisarius, looking toward his left flank, I've got to try to get those men out of here. Which is not going to be easy. Sanga will be like a tiger, with me trying to pry meat from his jaws.

Belisarius heard Valentinian and Anastasius stirring behind him. As the general's personal bodyguards, they hadn't been expecting to do much in this current battle beyond looking grim and fearsome. But they were veterans, and could recognize a battle plan in tatters when they saw one.

"Looks like we're going to have to work, after all," groused Valentinian. Anastasius was silent. "What's the matter, large one?" came Valentinian's sarcastic voice. "No philosophical motto for the occasion? No words of wisdom?"

"Don't need 'em," rumbled Anastasius in reply. "Even a witless weasel can see when he's in a fight for his life."