The Grace of Kings (44 page)

Then, Marana heard the sound of an explosive
pop
, followed by hundreds more. Bright flashes of light sparkled over the hulls of the other airships, and the sunlit air between them also filled with the showering sparks of unattached lanterns exploding.

“Retreat! Order a general retreat!” Marana shouted, and his officers waved the signal flags from the gondola frantically.

But it was too late. The oars of some of the great airships dangled uselessly, the oarsmen having been killed by shrapnel; others began to lose altitude, the gasbags having been punctured; fires spread on hulls and gondolas.

The lanterns were Pering's invention. He had collected what little firework powder could be gathered from King Dalo's royal warehouses—a luxury reserved for important ceremonies and New Year's celebrations—and had the powder packed into bamboo tubes along with many sharp metal spikes to increase their kill capacity. These bombs were then attached to floating lanterns with a slow-burning fuse, and the lanterns themselves slathered with a coat of sticky pine tar.

Spirit of Kiji
escaped from the swarm of deadly floating lanterns back to the safety of the sea, the rest of the surviving aerial fleet limping along behind. Altogether, four Imperial ships were lost, and two more lost so much gas that they could barely keep afloat and were no longer useful except as reserve float gas containers.

Although Marshal Marana believed that the Imperial armada could ultimately prevail—the rebels' supply of firework powder must be limited—the victory would have been achieved at heavy cost. He decided to withdraw from Toaza Harbor.

Toaza celebrated the victory wildly, and General Roma and King Dalo heaped praise upon Torulu Pering, the Savior of Wolf's Paw, as a master tactician, a Lutho among mortals.

But Roma refused to give pursuit to the retreating armada. All remaining rebel ships would stay in Toaza Harbor. Despite this victory, the might of the Imperial armada had deeply impressed Roma. He wanted to have plenty of ships around to be used as transports to evacuate the rebel troops from Wolf's Paw, if it came to that.

General Pashi Roma summoned all rebel commanders and advisers.

“Marana's latest plan appears to be an attempt to land along the less well defended north shore of Wolf's Paw and then advance to Toaza over land,” Roma said. “What is your counsel?”

The commanders from the various Tiro states looked at one another, but none spoke up.

Torulu Pering regarded them contemptuously. These men were unwilling to speak because they treated this council of war as some kind of political game, a jostling for positions. Whoever spoke up first was sure to be criticized by others, and unless he had a perfect plan, he'd lose face for the Tiro state he represented.

Pering stepped forward. “The north shore of Wolf's Paw is sparsely populated and has no good harbors, and so Marana would have to land his troops with small transports vulnerable to warships. Traditional tactics would suggest a naval engagement to prevent a landing.”

Some of the other advisers were about to object, but Pering held up his hand to silence them. “However, since there are no batteries or coastal forts, our ships cannot match the armada at sea.”

Roma nodded. “Exactly. We seem to have no good options.”

Pering shook his head. “Just because some options are closed to us doesn't mean that we don't have even better ones. I propose that we cede the beaches to them and fight them on land—this was King Thufi's plan from the start.”

“Cede them the beaches!” roared Huye Nocano, the Gan commander. “What gives you, a man of Cocru, the right to dictate the disposition of Gan territories?”

“Besides, Kindo Marana has twenty thousand troops with him, and Tanno Namen will soon bring more,” said Owi Ati, commander of the allied troops from Faça. “The advantage of numbers is overwhelmingly with them. Master Pering, just because you won an aerial and naval victory at Toaza Harbor doesn't mean you know everything there is to know about fighting a war on land. Allowing them to land is not a decision to be made lightly. Strategies in books are not the same as conditions in the real world.”

Pering smiled. These theatrical outbursts were exactly what he had expected—these men had no ideas of their own, but they were ready to shoot down others' proposals. Patiently, he said, “I didn't say we should just allow them to land wherever they want. We should station troops along the northern and eastern shores but leave Big Toe open.”

Big Toe was the northernmost peninsula of Wolf's Paw, which jutted forth from the main part of the island.

“But Big Toe is large enough to comfortably hold all of Marana's troops,” said Pashi Roma. “Why give them such a good base?”

“That is the point, General. Big Toe appears ideal to Marana, and if we leave it undefended, he will not be able to resist taking the bait. But from Big Toe, the isthmus would neutralize the empire's numeri­cal advantage and force both sides to fight across a narrow strip of land. If we set up our defenses in layers, the hills of the isthmus will be impregnable. Big Toe will become a trap for Marana and Namen, and we will grind their troops down until the demand for supplies by their large army forces them to retreat.”

As predicted by Pering, Marana landed on Big Toe. By then, Namen's twenty thousand veterans had made their way across the Big Island to the end of the Shinané Mountains on the coast. Marana's supply ships worked nonstop to transport all of them over to Big Toe. Added to the twenty thousand fresh recruits originally carried there by the armada, the empire now had forty thousand troops camped on Big Toe, ready for the final assault.

In the hills of the isthmus south of them, ten thousand troops from Cocru were dug in behind heavy defensive fortifications. Faça had sent five thousand men, and they were stationed behind the Cocru troops as a second line of defense. Remnants of the armies of Gan, Rima, and the other Tiro states made up the final defense around Toaza, Gan's capital.

“What are they waiting for?” General Roma asked his advisers. “It has been a month since Marana and Namen landed, and they're just camped there on Big Toe, day after day, doing nothing except consuming their provisions. Even the empire surely cannot afford such expenditures for long.”

Again, Torulu Pering was the one who spoke up. “Marana's supply lines are long, and his soldiers are fighting far from home. There is no reason to wait unless he is working at some plot or trick, as is his wont. We should not wait but attack first and drive them into the sea.”

But Roma was a cautious man. For most of his career, he had risen through the ranks of support and logistics, more an engineer than a soldier. He had been in charge of repairing Çaruza's walls, maintaining the dikes and levees along the Liru, building sturdy bridges and smooth roads for the Cocru army—and after the Xana Conquest, for the Imperial garrisons. This was a man who had little instinct for the shifting vagaries of the battlefield.

Roma preferred to react rather than act. He deliberated for hours, asking for the opinions of each adviser and then asking them to give yet more advice. Hours became days, then weeks.

Three times he almost decided to give the order to attack the Imperial camp, but each time he changed his mind.

He continued to wait.

To King Shilué of Faça, Marana's secret messenger presented this argument: The emperor understood that the rebellion had largely been the doing of Cocru. Faça and the other Tiro states had been coerced into joining, or, at worst, jumped onto the bandwagon only as minor participants.

The emperor was willing to contemplate granting Faça some measure of autonomy after the inevitable defeat of the rebellion
if
Faça's troops would remain neutral in the coming battle on Wolf's Paw.

“Why should Faça's boys die for Gan and Cocru?” Marana's messenger whispered to King Shilué. “Indeed, even now Gan is arguing that the Ogé Islands belong to them rather than Faça. If you were amenable to the offer, the emperor may be willing to support Faça's claim once the battle is over.”

King Shilué nodded, deep in thought.

Just outside of Toaza, King Dalo of Gan met Marana's secret emissary. The two men, disguised as merchants, huddled over plum wine and fried squid dipped in hot pepper sauce in a cheap inn, out of the sight of General Roma's spies.

“Your Majesty, permit me to speak bluntly. Your country is already under Cocru occupation. Although the coming battle will be fought on Gan territory, the largest contingent of armed men on Wolf's Paw belongs to Cocru, and General Roma of Cocru is in charge.

“Even if the rebels were to achieve the impossible and win the coming battle against far superior Imperial troops, do you imagine that Roma or Thufi will leave Wolf's Paw willingly? It's easy to invite a foreign army onto your soil, but far harder to get them to leave peacefully.”

King Dalo had already been uneasy when he heard that King Thufi had appointed himself princeps in that mockery of an election. Gan was the only Tiro state to win a naval victory over the supposedly invincible Imperials in Toaza Harbor—even Marana showed Dalo enough respect to humble himself and send an emissary to negotiate with him. Yet, the Cocru commander, General Roma, simply dictated plans for the defenses of the island without consulting him. His ministers had already warned him multiple times about the cost of feeding and providing for the armies from Cocru and Faça, and Roma never once mentioned that Cocru would help with the bill.