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Gasam had taken his ships and gone south. He formed an alliance with the king
of Chiwa, helping him subdue petty rulers in the southern islands and
mainland, always growing in strength, until he attacked his former ally
without warning, taking Chiwa as a prize. Then he had taken Sono in a
lightning campaign. They had had no warning that Gasam was on the way until
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refugees began pouring into the capital. He had attacked Gran while in the
midst of peace negotiations and now had it all but subdued.
That was Gasam: a rapacious predator, always hungry, always jealous of
another's wealth and strength. He plotted and fought, capable of fair words to
another monarch, but never meaning them, always playing on the other's fears
and hopes for peace. Always, he attacked when there was no legitimate cause
for aggression.
Hael felt a tingling in his spine, knowing that he had found the key. It was
folly to fight Gasam on his own terms. Why had Gasam never seriously mounted
an expedition against his hated enemy, Hael? Because Hael was ready for him.
Instead, he fell upon unsuspecting victims. And this, Hael knew, was the key
to Gasam's character and to his weakness: Gasam had never been attacked!
Abruptly, Hael realized that the sun was rising. He had
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missed the dawn entirely, so absorbed had he been in his spirit trance. And
the spirits had given him the answer. He now knew how he would defeat both his
enemies. With a whoop, he tossed his spear high into the air, the light from
the rising sun glittering along its spinning length. He caught it before it
could touch the ground and began to run down the hill.
Sleepy tribesmen, just risen to the new day, blinked in astonishment as they
saw the near-naked king running through the encampment, frisky as a boy and
grinning like a man who has just been told that his wife has borne twin sons.
When he got to the royal tent Hael saw one of his sub-chiefs, an Amsi,
loitering with a group of his young warriors. They saluted at his approach.
"Amata, how many of the chiefs are here?"
"More than half, Spirit-King," the chief said.
"That will be enough. Round them up. I will hold a war council at noon." The
young warriors whooped and ran. Within seconds, there was whooping all over
the camp. Hael went inside the tent and found his wife sitting up in their
bed, rubbing the sleep from her eyes. When she looked at him her stare was
bleak.
"I know that sound," she said. "It's war." She took in his appearance. "You've
been in the hills again. Have the spirits told you you must be off to war
again?"
"I needed no spirits to tell me that. I told you last night what I learned in
Mezpa. I have two choices: I can fight a war and win, or I can fight a war and
lose. I would prefer to win." He began to pull on his clothing.
"Did I get you back only to lose you again? Will we never have peace?"
"What I learned out there this night is how to defeat Gasam, and in doing so,
to neutralize Mezpa, before they can combine forces against us. If all goes as
I foresee, we will have peace, perhaps for the rest of our lives."
"That will happen only if Gasam is dead."
"I see no reason why he should not die along with his warriors."
208 John Maddox Roberts
"Do you really think you can do this thing?" she said, aghast.
"It can be done. It must be done. Rather than let Gasam conquer the whole
world, it is better that the world should die. Gasam and the Mezpans both want
to make slaves of everyone else. I will not allow it to happen. I have
transformed these plains into a training ground for an army such as the world
has never seen and now I am going to use it. No one can say that the war will
be unjust."
"But it will take you away from me again!" she cried. "And our sons! They will
demand to go and I cannot stop them."
"Nor should you," he said, sitting by her side. "How could I demand that my
young warriors, who are as dear to their families as are our sons to us, to
risk their lives in my service if I spare my sons the same risk?"
"You can't," she said. "But is there no way out of this without war?''
"If there were I would take it without hesitation, you know that. But the
world will not know peace while Gasam lives. Now I know that the Mezpans form
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the same threat. They are merely not so colorful."
There were more tears, but she could not sway him from his path. It grieved
Hael that his queen had to suffer so, but these matters were no more within
his control than they were in hers. He had no choice, except the choice to
fail, which he would not consider.
At noon Hael took his spear and walked through the encampment. The only people
to be seen were women, children and the merchants and travelers who looked
about themselves wide-eyed, wondering where all the men had gone. At the edge
of the camp he found his two sons and he embraced Ansa.
"You avoided me yesterday," he chided.
"No, I avoided Mother. Is she resigned yet?"
"It will take a few days, but she will recover. As soon as
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the council is over, I want to hear all that happened to you in the south."
"Yes, you must hear. I learned some things that are very important, and we may
have an ally in the Canyon." Then he smiled boyishly. "I told Little Brother
last night that you would have the answer to everything by today. Are we to
hear it at the council?"
"It may not be the answer to everything, but it's a plan to pull us out of our
present predicament."
"Wonderful!" said Ansa. "What is it? A raid to kidnap Gasam and Larissa?"
"An assault against the Mezpan city where they make the firetubes?" Kairn
suggested.
"When faced by problems such as these, one cannot think on a small scale,"
Hael told them. "What I have in mind is the biggest war in history." That kept
his sons silent until they reached the council site.
Beyond the encampment a huge tent had been erected. Around it sat the massed
warriors who had come at the queen's behest, a si/able fraction of Hael's
military might. When the king and his sons came in sight, the thousands of
warriors got to their feet and chanted his name, waving spears, bows and
swords in the air. They were men from a score of tribes, united in their
loyalty to their spirit-king.
The men made a lane for him to pass through and Hael walked to the huge tent
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