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The messenger hurried over to him. "I'm glad I caught up with you, sir.
Doubting George's compliments, and the orders for the morning for your wing
are hard pursuit. You are to take an eastern route, as best you can, and try
to get ahead of the traitors. That way, with luck, we can surround them and
wipe them out."
"Hard pursuit by an eastern route," John repeated. "I'm to get out in front
of the Army of Franklin if I can. My compliments to the commanding general in
return. I understand the orders, and I'll obey them." With another salute, the
runner trotted away.
George had brought engineers forward to put more bridges across the stream
that had slowed pursuit the evening before. As soon as they got near the far
bank, northern snipers started shooting at them. The southrons pushed
repeating crossbows up to the edge of the stream and hosed down the brush on
the north bank of the stream with quarrels. They sent men in gray in there
after the northerners, too. All that slowed but did not stop the sniping.
Slowing it let the bridges reach the north bank and let the southrons cross
with ease. After that, the snipers fell back.
Riding at the front of his column of footsoldiers, John the Lister pushed
ahead as hard as the tired men would go. Every once in a while, off to the
west, he got a glimpse of the remnants of the Army of Franklin, which was also
moving north at something close to double time. The traitors had to be even
more weary than his own men. How long could they continue that headlong
withdrawal? John grinned. Not long enough, or so he hoped.
He was about to order his men to swing in on the fleeing northerners when a
crossbow quarrel zipped past his head. If he could see Bell's men, they could
see him, too. And even Bell, no great general as he'd proved again and
again could see what the southrons had in mind.
Bell's rear guard came from Ned of the Forest's troopers. They were, as every
southron who'd ever met them had reason to know, a stubborn bunch. Here they
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were fighting mostly dismounted from a stand of trees that gave them good
cover.
John the Lister wanted to roll over them even so. He wanted to, but
discovered he couldn't. They knocked his first attack back on its heels.
Cursing, he shouted, "Deploy! We'll flank them out, by the Lion God's mane!"
And his men did exactly that, with some help from Hard-Riding Jimmy's
unicorn-riders. They did it, yes, but doing it took them an hour and a half.
They didn't damage Ned's force very much, either. Instead of waiting to be
surrounded and slaughtered, the northern troopers went back to their unicorns
and rode off when their position grew difficult. They wouldn't have any
trouble catching up with Bell's retreating column of footsoldiers.
They wouldn't but John the Lister's men would. While the southrons were
fighting that rear-guard action, the main body of their foes marched several
miles. John did some more cursing. "Step it up, boys!" he called.
The soldiers tried. He'd feared he was asking more of them than flesh and
blood could give. Toward evening, they came close to catching up with the
northerners again. Again, though, a detachment of Ned's troopers, this time
backed up by footsoldiers in blue, delayed them long enough to let Bell's main
force get away.
"We'll keep after them," John declared. He wondered if they would be able to
make the traitors stand and fight, though.
* * *
Ned of the Forest supposed he might have been more disgusted, but he had
trouble seeing how. One thing that might have let him show more disgust would
have been less to worry about. He was as busy as a one-armed juggler with the
itch. The southrons knew they had the Army of Franklin on the run. For once,
that didn't satisfy them. They wanted the army dead no, not just dead;
extinct.
They were liable to get what they wanted, too. Bell had given Ned the dubious
honor of commanding the rear guard against Doubting George's onrushing army.
Ned didn't want the job. The only reason he'd taken it was that he couldn't
see anyone else who had even a chance of bringing it off.
"They're going to hound us all the way out of Franklin, Biff," he said at the
end of the first day's retreat.
"Yes, sir." Colonel Biffle nodded. "Gods damn me to all the hells if I see
how we can stop 'em, either."
"Stop 'em?" Ned started. He didn't know whether he felt more like laughing or
crying. Since both would have made Colonel Biffle worry, he contented himself
with a growl that could have come from the throat of a tiger in the far
northern jungle. "By the Thunderer's belly button, Biff, we're not going to
stop those stinking sons of bitches. If we can slow 'em down enough so they
don't eat all of Bell's army, King Geoffrey ought to pin a medal on us just
for that."
"Yes, sir," Biffle said, and then, after a long, long pause, "If we can't
stop 'em, though, Lord Ned, the war's as good as lost."
Ned of the Forest only grunted in response, as he'd tried not to show pain
whenever he was wounded. He didn't think his regimental commander was
wrong which only made the words hurt worse.
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"What do we do, sir?" Biffle asked. "What do we do if . . . if King Avram's
bastards really can lick us?"
"The best we can our ownselves," Ned answered firmly. "They haven't done it
yet, and I aim to make it as hard for them as I can. As long as we keep
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