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.Before he could think anymore along those lines, Sela rose painfully to her feet.She undid the coarse wool robe that was her only garment and let it slip to the floor.The candlelight sent gleams up and down her body as she took Blade's hand and led him to the pile of furs in the corner.As they lay together afterward, Sela gave a long, luxurious sigh and said, with her mouth half-muffed against his chest, "This must be the last time for us.""Geetro?" said Blade."Yes.He and I will do well together, I think.He has many of your qualities, and he is also of Mak'loh.You are of England, and sooner or later you will be going back there.""That is true," said Blade."I'm glad you've seen this without my having to tell you." Unseen in darkness, he smiled.Were any of Geetro's qualities as important to Sela as his probably being the next ruler of Mak'loh? Blade wondered.Well, Geetro might end up ruling Mak'loh, but Sela would very likely rule Geetro.The city and its people could do much worse.Blade stood at the bottom of the hill and watched the flyer swooping low over the Wall.Sela was at the controls of the flyer, and at a radio signal from her the explosives placed under a section of the Wall would be detonated.The way into Mak'loh would be open for the army of the Warland villages.Blade turned and looked at the fighting men of the villages, twelve thousand of them drawn up and ready to march.They carried spears, swords, bows, and axes.The two thousand shock rifles they'd been promised would be handed out when they reached Mak'loh.As Blade turned, the sun glinted from a massive collar he wore around his neck, over his faded black Authority coveralls.Each piece of the collar was a bar of gold weighing nearly a pound, and Blade felt that it would crumble his collarbone into powder if he had to wear it much longer.It was the War Collar of a High Chief of all the villages.Blade smiled as he remembered what Naran had said as he fastened the collar around Blade's neck."We have seldom needed a High Chief, we don't really need one now, and we probably won't need one after all this is over.If we do need one, you'll have to give the collar back.Meanwhile, though, you're doing what a High Chief is chosen to do-leading all the villages into a great war.So we might as well give you the collar." Then he lowered his voice and spoke so that only Blade could hear, "I do this also out of gratitude for what you did for Twana."Blade looked up at the hill, raised his rifle, and fired into the air three times.Sela's flyer climbed away from the Wall, until it circled above the Warlanders.The radio signal flashed down from it, and suddenly half a mile of Wall vanished in gray smoke.Seconds later the roar of the explosion reached Blade's ears, and the ground began to shiver under his feet.The roar and the shivering built steadily, and the smoke billowed higher and higher, as if the earth were catching fire.In the grayness Blade saw darker chunks, first rising and then falling-bits of the wall hurled into the air.At last the smoke began to drift away, and Blade saw more bits of the Wall rolling down the hill toward him.Long before they reached him, the last of the smoke was gone.Along the whole half mile the Wall was crumbling into dust and gravel.Behind him Blade could hear the swelling cheers of the Warlanders.In throwing Mak'loh open to its new allies, Geetro had certainly chosen to make a grand gesture!Chapter 21The march of the Warland villagers started off with a literal bang, but rapidly became a first-class headache for Richard Blade.The villagers had great enthusiasm and great endurance, but they had no real discipline.They straggled behind, they ran on ahead, they made camp when and where they pleased, they built fires until Blade was sure the smoke would warn the Shoba's army.None of the men would willingly follow the orders of any chief but his own, and none of the chiefs would take orders from anybody at all except Blade and Naran.Blade was certain these people would be brave enough on the battlefield-if he could get them that far without throttling half of them in sheer frustration.He was not at all sure if that courage would be enough against the disciplined advance and firepower of the Shoba's infantry or the hammering charges of his cavalry.The villagers could not really hope to face the Shoba's army in the open field.Neither could the people and androids of Mak'loh, not when the Shoba's archers could outrange the shock rifles.How could they avoid such a battle, though, unless the Shoba's men could be baited into an attack on the city itself?Blade's beard grew longer and his temper grew shorter as he led the twelve thousand villagers in a wide swing to the south.They came up on the opposite side of the city from the Shoba's army and made camp under cover of the forest beyond the range of the enemy's scouts.It was five days since they'd passed through the breach in the Wall.Luck was on their side.The Shoba's commanders knew their business well-too well to risk dispersing their forces in the face of an enemy whose powers had not yet been fully revealed.So they set up a vast, fortified camp three miles from the northern edge of the city.That was well beyond the range of the mortars, and Blade wondered at first if the enemy had guessed Mak'loh's secret weapon.A quick flight over the camp set his doubts to rest.The camp site had been chosen because it lay between two streams, and therefore had plenty of fresh water.The camp was a formidable thing, a square over a mile on a side.It was surrounded by a protective ditch, high earth embankments, and a palisade of sharpened logs on top of the embankment.It would take the mortars to do much against the camp, but to get within range they would have to be brought out of the city.In that case they'd have to be protected, and protecting them against the Shoba's army would take every man the city and the villagers had between them.Otherwise, the mortars would be quickly overrun, and with them would go Mak'loh's best chance of victory [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]