Into The Darkness

"My lord," Corbeo said, "I regret to report that my dragon's tom wing membrane has not yet healed enough to let her fly." He hung his head in shame. "Had the war but waited another week-'

"It was not your fault, and it can't be helped," Sabrino said, adding,

"Cheer up, man! A week's not such a long time. You'll see our share of action, never fear. They may even throw you aboard a fresh mount before then, if they decide they need trained fliers in a hurry."

Corbeo bowed. "May it be so, lord!"

Sabrino shook his head. "No, for that would show our beloved kingdom was in great danger. I hope you relax and drink wine and pinch the pretty girls till your dragon heals." Corbeo bowed again, grinning now.

Pleased with himself, Sabrino addressed the whole wing: "Men, prepare to fly. My captains, to me."

One of the captains, Domiziano, asked the question Sabrino was about to address: "My lord, will we have force enough to turn back the invaders?"

"We must," Sabrino said simply. "Algarve depends on us. We yield as little ground as we can. Whatever we do" - he remembered Mezentiols words from the balcony - "we don't let Forthweg and Jelgava join hands."

"To block that, our lives mean nothing. Do you understand?" Domiziano and the other three squadron commanders nodded. Sabrino slapped each of them on the back. "Good. Splendid. And now we needs must ready ourselves as well."

When he was mounted at the join of his dragon's neck and shoulders, when he spurred the soft skin there and the beast sprang into the air, when the ground fell away beneath him and the dragon's wings thundered, he could understand for a moment why some people sighed over the great beasts. When the dragon twisted and tried to bite till he whacked it in the snout with a long-handled goad, he cursed those people, who knew nothing about real dragons, as a pack of fools.

The Elsung Mountains formed the land border between Unkerlant and Gyongyos. Precisely where they formed the border was a matter on which King Swerrimel of Unkerlant and Ekrekek Arpad of Gyongyos had trouble agreeing. Because they had trouble agreeing, some thousands of young men from each of the two kingdoms were settling the question for them.

Leudast wished he were back on his farm, not far from the Forthwegian border, rather than sitting around a campfire here in the rock-strewn middle of nowhere. As far as he was concerned, Arpad was welcome to every one of these boulders if he was crazy enough to want them.

He didn't mention his opinion. Sergeants took a dim view of such sentiments. Officers took an even dimmer one. From what people said (whispered, actually), King Swemmel took the dimmest view of all.

Having finally won the long civil war with his twin brother, King Swemmel thought anyone who disagreed with him a traitor. A lot of people had disappeared because Swemmel held that opinion. Leudast did not want to add his name to the list.

He leaned for-ward to toast a piece of sausage skewered on a stick over the fire. He twirled the stick between the palms of his hands to get the hard, peppery sausage done on all sides. His sergeant, a veteran named Magnulf, nodded approval, saying, "Very efficient, Leudast."

"Thank you, Sergeant." Leudast beamed. That was high praise. He'd never heard the word efficiency before the impressers pulled him off his farm and put him in a rock-gray uniform tunic, but King Swemmel was wild for it, which meant everyone beneath Swemmel was wild for it, too.

Along with learning how to slaughter the foes of Unkerlant, Leudast had learned to mouth the phrases: "Time and motion - least and fewest."

"Least and fewest," Magnulf agreed around a mouthful of his own sausage. Leudast had a little trouble understanding him, but waiting to swallow would have been inefficient. Magnulf scratched his formidable nose - though it was less formidable than those of Leudast and half the other troopers in his squad - and went on, "The stinking Gongs are liable to try something tonight. That's what we hear from prisoners, anyhow."

Leudast wondered how they'd squeezed out the news. Efficiently, without a doubt. His stomach did a slow flipflop as he thought- about how efficient interrogators could be.

One of his squadmates, a fellow named Wisgard who was slim by Unkerlanter standards, spoke up: "Back home, it would be midnight or so, and here the sun's barely down."

"We are a great kingdom." Magnulf thumped his broad chest with a big, thick-fingered fist. "And we are going to be a greater kingdom still, once we drive the Gongs off the mainland and over to the islands they've taken to infesting."

"That'd be easier if they hadn't stolen this stretch of land from us during the Twinkings War," a trooper named Berthar said.

"Proves how important efficiency is," Magnulf said. "A kingdom gets on fine with one king - that's efficient. Try to put two in the space meant for one, and everything goes to pieces. "