"Frankowski, Leo - Stargard 5 - Lord Conrad's Lady" - читать интересную книгу автора (Frankowski Leo)

There were perhaps sixty thousand horses still alive, mostly Mongol ponies but also some of the war-horses used by the conventional Christian knights who had been massacred on the field while we had stood by helpless. After I had discussed the matter with some of my officers, it was decided to simply let them all go free. Untrained for the job, they wouldnТt have been much use as cart horses even if suitable harnesses had been available. The truth was that they would only slow us down. There was no way for us to take care of them and still get the rest of our work done. When the peasants returned, theyТd find a use for the Mongol ponies. Most of the Polish war-horses were either branded or had had their ears punched with identifying marks, so they could eventually be returned to the families of their owners.

Each fallen conventional knightТs arms and armor were carefully bundled along with his jewelry and personal effects, and one of his dog tags served as a label for its eventual return to his heirs. Each Christian body was properly buried with the other dog tag on a lance to mark the grave, but nothing of value was actually buried with the body. This was standard army policy, for history shows that the bejeweled dead are never allowed to rest in peace. Someday we would set up proper tombstones. Someday.

For now there was still a much bigger cleanup job to do. Far more Mongols had been killed on the eastern bank of the Vistula than had ever crossed it, perhaps as many as five or six times as many. There was probably a far greater booty to be taken, and certainly a far bigger mess to be cleaned up before the weather turned warm and rot and disease started to spread. But at least there we wouldnТt have to do the sad job of burying our own people. Our casualties had all been on the riverboats, and most of them, those who hadnТt gone down with their boats, had already been taken to the army city of East Gate.

I sent Baron Vladimir east to the Vistula with two-thirds of our men, there to get over to the east bank and take care of the cleanup there. That was about a hundred thousand men, eleven of our Уbattalions.Ф IТd once read that God was on the side with the biggest battalions, so IТd made ours almost as large as a modem division just to be safe.

Just how Vladimir was to contact the boats to cross the river was a bit problematic, since the weather was still foul and the radios still were not working. Our spark-gap transmitters and coherer-type receivers were very sensitive to atmospheric disturbances. WeТd been out of touch with the rest of the world for almost a week.

I left with the other third of our land forces, which included all our industrial workers. It was important to get our factories going again as soon as possible, since we had lost most of our riverboats and were out of some kinds of ammunition. We were taking back to Three Walls our booty, along with fifteen aircraft engines. Nine reasonably intact planes had already been sent ahead to the boys at Eagle Nest.

The pilots of our entire air force had deliberately crashlanded along with my former liege lord, Count Lambert, in order to take part in the final battle with the Mongols. They had taken part, all right, and had died to a man, along with most of the other valiant but undisciplined conventional knights. They had vainly spent their lives and accomplished nothing. idiots, the lot of them!

One should not think badly of the dead, but by God I wish those planes were still flying! They could have kept our communications intact. As it was, what with the weather making our radios useless, I didnТt know what was happening in the rest of the country. I had sent couriers to Cracow, Three Walls, and Legnica, but so far none of them had returned. Was Duke Henryk still waiting at Legnica for the rest of the foreign troops to arrive? Had the Hungarians been invaded at the same time we were? How bad was the destruction on the east bank of the Vistula? Was my wife, Francine, alive and well? I had no way of knowing.

Baron Vladimir pulled out at dawn, and I left with my own troops shortly afterward, leaving two companies behind to care for our pitifully few wounded.

I was riding the new white Big Person IТd found on the battlefield. Anna, my usual mount, wasnТt at all happy about this, but the new bioengineered horse understood only English, and so I was the only person in this century who could use her properly. Big People were too valuable to waste, so I lent Anna to one of the scouts who was screening our force. There were few enough Big People to do the job. I had only ten out of our total of thirty-three, and thatТs a thin screen for a force of over fifty thousand men, especially when there were who knows how many Mongol stragglers around. WeТd spotted a few. The job couldnТt be done with men on ordinary horses, since once we got on the railroad, our men could pull a war cart six dozen miles a day at a walk, far faster than any war-horse could travel.

I wished that the white mountТs rider was still alive. There were a lot of questions I wanted to ask that man. In the few moments that IТd been able to talk to him, he had spoken with an American English accent! Further, if he was riding a bioengineered horse, he must have had something to do with whoever it was that had built the time machine that had brought me to this century. He had to be some kind of observer at the battle, or even a tourist, but he had been killed by a Mongol spear before I had had time to get some answers out of him. IТd like to know just why I was dumped into this brutal century! There canТt be that many time travelers around. Would I ever get another chance to talk to one?

It took all our men to haul the carts over the half-frozen fields, but we got to the railroad track south of Sandomierz around noon, and once on it we could go much more quickly. Further, riding on iron tracks, it takes only a dozen and a half men to pull one of our big war carts, and they can pull it easily even with the rest of the men riding on or under the cart, slung on hammocks, sleeping. This let us travel day and night without stopping. The men all had full plate armor, although it was common practice to leave the helmets and leg armor in the carts while pulling.

Cookstoves were slung from the rear of each cart, with the cooks walking behind as they did their work, and dinner was being prepared when a wounded rider on one of our Big People came galloping up to me. I recognized him as being one of the couriers I had sent out, the one who had gone to Legnica. His right side and leg were drenched with blood, and he didnТt waste time conveying any message to me from my liege lord, Duke Henryk.

УLord Conrad, Cracow is burning!Ф he said before he fell unconscious from the saddle.




Chapter Four


I STOPPED the five-mile-long column that I was leading, turned to the captain of the leading company, and shouted, УDump the booty on the ground! Dump it, I say! We have to lighten the load and go as fast as we can. Dump it and then get your men going at double time. Cracow is burning!Ф

He looked at me aghast, and it was a moment before he could comprehend what I was saying. Dump an unimaginable fortune on the ground? Victory had been turned into defeat? How was that possible? But discipline and training took over. He turned and obeyed orders. Men scurried off the carts, the big lids were taken off the six carts that the captain commanded, and thirty tons of gold and silver were dumped on both sides of the double track.

A banner had the wounded courier hauled onto a cart, and a medic bent over him. A new man was appointed scout and, with the Big Person, was added to our screen. Actually, it wasnТt necessary to make a new scout. We had twice as many scouts as we had mounts for them, a fact that made sense once you realize that Big People didnТt need sleep, but us Little People did. But there wasnТt another scout present, so I let the man have his promotion.

As the new scout started to ride out, I called to him and had him come back. Instead of joining the screen, I had him ride back toward Sandomierz and tell Baron Vladimir about the attack on Cracow. This action turned out to be one of my major tactical errors.

УGet the pullers moving!Ф I shouted. УThey can run while the other half of the men dump the load. Throw out everything but weapons, ammunition, and four daysТ food. Double time!Ф

The men on the carts behind were staring in unbelief at what the first company was doing, and I realized that this was an order that I would have to give personally to each officer. They wouldnТt have believed it otherwise! I signaled DOUBLE TIME, PASS THE WORD and rode down the long line of troops and carts, shouting orders.

After a bit, one of my captains asked, УThe radios, too, sir? And how about these airplane engines?Ф

УHell, yes! TheyТre not doing us any good now, are they?Ф There were a dozen radios with the companies farther up the line, enough in case the weather cleared.