We arrived over the mountain range and crawled above the treetops, seeking Droad’s coordinates. Just in case the enemy had smart missiles, we approached warily.

  A battle was in progress when we arrived. It wasn’t dark yet, so perhaps Droad had been wrong about the enemy tactics.

  Or, possibly, the enemy had figured out that a rescue was coming, and they’d decided to press their advantage now. Whatever the case, Droad’s ragged force was under heavy assault.

  Killbeasts milled at the bottom of the mountain. On the west side, there was a sheer cliff. On the south, there was only an open rocky slope. Attack was possible from that angle, but unlikely to be successful. There was simply too much open ground to charge across.

  So the attack came from the northeast. On that side, the strange forest of purple-black trees marched up right to the mountain’s crown. Accordingly, the killbeasts were filing up that way to assail the defenders at the top.

  The aliens weren’t having much luck, as they’d been forced into narrow channels. Still, thousands of them were making the attempt. If just a few made it into Droad’s ranks—or if Droad’s men ran out of ammunition…

  I sent Trask an urgent message. “We have to help them.”

  After several long moments, he replied. “You’re going down. Land on that flat rock to the north. Pick up Droad and a few of his best officers. Tell him I’ll listen to his battle plans on my own ship. In the meantime, I’ll use my light cannons on the aliens from up here to stop this attack.”

  I grumbled, wishing we’d brought more ships and men, but I had to admit Trask’s plan was a good one. My ship was small enough to land on the mountaintop—his fat cruiser simply couldn’t fit.

  Swinging around low to the west, I roared up and over the cliff and surprised the defenders by landing among them. As it was, a few rounds spanged off the hull, but they didn’t shoot us down. I imagined it was all Droad could do to keep his nervous troops from blasting us out of the sky.

  Jort, Huan and I charged down the ramp and ran in a crouch toward Droad’s encampment. It hadn’t looked like much from the air, and it was even less impressive from the view of a footman.

  We knelt behind rocks and fired down into the trees to the northeast. I couldn’t tell if we were hitting anything, but now and then a killbeast was knocked flat by the steady drumbeat of defensive fire.

  Droad looked at me in surprise. “Three men? Is Trask joking? How can he expect to win this fight without commitment?”

  In answer, I gestured toward the dark hulk of the cruiser, which was even now looming overhead. “I suggest you and your men should all duck, sir.”

  Droad looked at me for a moment, then he relayed the order with urgency. The defensive fire died down all around us, as the Tulk-infested troops took cover and hid behind whatever they could.

  In immediate response, the enemy surged forward. They boiled out of the trees in numbers I hadn’t suspected. I realized then that they had possibly been massing for just such an opportunity to charge into close combat with the mountain’s defenders.

  That’s when the sky ripped apart. There were flashes—seven of them, I think—and a bank of autocannons sprayed the trees. The aliens were torn apart. Hundreds died, and the rest eventually retreated. The few wounded specimens that made it to our lines were torn apart by Droad’s grim-faced men.

  Droad looked at me with appreciation. “That wasn’t what I expected… but give Trask my regards. He saved these men.”

  I nodded, but I didn’t speak. I didn’t trust Trask. He was full of surprises—and they weren’t always happy moments for everyone involved.

  “I’m here to take you up in my ship. The cruiser can’t land—it’s too big.”

  Droad eyed me for a long moment. “Perhaps I should just stay here and fight to the finish with my men instead.”

  I shook my head. “I don’t think you can win, sir.”

  “Dammit!” Droad hammered a fist on a boulder. “These Sword Brothers of yours… they aren’t a trusting lot, are they?”

  “No, sir. They’re not. Are you coming aboard my ship or not?”

  Droad heaved a sigh, coughed, then stood tall. “I’ll go. Maybe I can talk some sense into these pirates of yours. I’ll bring my best Tulk officers as well.”

  I nodded, and six tired looking men followed Droad up the ramp into my ship. Those who were left behind looked after us longingly. There was some muttered talk of Droad having saved his own skin. I could hardly blame the men for thinking that.

  “Tulk brothers,” Droad told the assembled group. “We’re going to transfer to the bigger ship. We’ll make our best plea for help.”

  “That’s nonsense,” said one of the colonels. “We shouldn’t have to beg. Harkaman is dead, but Rago was allied with him. He’s obligated to fight with us to the last.”

  Droad slid his eyes toward me, but I didn’t move a muscle. I didn’t like being the one to give a Sword Brother bad news—whether he had a Tulk in his liver or not.

  “The situation has changed,” Droad explained. “Rago lost his army—Trask has replaced him.”

  The six officers snarled at this. “Trask is a worm. He’s not trustworthy. He—”

  “He saved your asses with his cannons and sent me down to pick you up,” I reminded the men. “Are you going to talk to him on his ship, or not?”

  They grumbled, but they had little choice. Such was the vagaries and shifting alliances of men who fought on the Fringe. It was a no-mans’ land really, without clear authority. Warlords and governors had always done whatever they felt like doing out here, and everyone knew it.

  As my ship lifted off, Trask’s ship moved in tandem. He retreated up and up, making me follow him into the stratosphere. I suspected this was to make sure that none of the aliens could reach us with a surface-to-air missile.

  Riding high in the atmosphere, we docked, and I watched as Droad and his officers transferred across to Trask’s ship.

  I moved to follow them into the docking tube—but I was met with a barrier that surprised me. It was Huan.

  “Don’t go,” he said.

  I stared at him for a moment. “Why not?”

  “Nothing you can do or say will change events.”

  My eyes narrowed. I brushed his mechanical arm out of the way, and he said nothing more. I stepped into the tube, and I followed the other men with a fresh worry in my heart.

  When I arrived strong hands seized my arms, and I was hauled out of the tube. I was stunned to see a struggle was in progress. Armored men were standing to either side of the docking tube, and they’d clearly grabbed every man who came through just as roughly as they handled me now. Droad and his men were all on the deck, grabbing their sides—

  Then, I knew the truth.

  “No! I’m not one of them!”

  It did no good. A stiletto was thrust into my side. I doubled over in pain. “Damn you, Trask,” I hissed out. “You knew I was clear of any Tulk!”

  “It’s best to be sure…” he said.

  Baron Trask was standing over the proceedings with his thumbs thrust into his belt. He rocked on his bent knees and seemed to be enjoying the show.

  The injured men crawled and groaned. White worm-like things crawled out of the guts of some of them, trying to scuttle away. Trask’s men hooted and stomped the Tulk to death.

  “They fought for us—with us,” I gasped. “We need their help.”

  Trask loomed over me, his big face leering into mine. “Correction: we needed their help. No longer. No Sword Brother can be trusted with a worm in his guts. I won’t have it. This business of coddling aliens ends today!”

  And so I was forced to watch helplessly as Trask’s men killed every Tulk and welcomed the injured men with hugs afterward. Their minds were clear, and they all seemed happy about it.

  The last man to stand up again was Droad himself.

  “I’m sorry about this, Lucas,” I said. “They don’t trust any nonhuman—and precious few humans make the grade, either.”

  Droad looked at me thoughtfully. He took his hand away from his injured side. He showed me a bloody mess in his palm, I was shocked to recognize what I saw there.

  “Is that a Tulk?”

  “Yes. It’s my rider. Don’t feel bad about what your barbaric friend did today. Sometimes, harsh measures must be taken.”

  I watched as he dropped the slimy mess on the deck and trod upon it. He didn’t seem to have much love for the parasite. I guess I could understand that.

  “How long?” I asked him. “Was that thing in you when I first met you at the spaceport?”

  “No. It took me during the battles in the nests. Didn’t you think it was odd that the Tulk would follow me after Harkaman fell?”

  “Yes… I guess I thought it was due to your natural charm.”

  He laughed and clapped me on the back. He left a bloody handprint behind, and I thought to myself that I’d never heard him laugh before.

  Disgusted with my wounded side, I showed Trask my empty hand. I wanted him to know that he’d injured me again without purpose.

  He didn’t seem overly sympathetic. He shrugged. “Sorry about that, mate. I couldn’t be sure they hadn’t gotten to you.”

  “You could have asked!”

  “Right… Well look, if you want me to slip a parasite into your guts later on, I might be able to arrange it.”

  “No thanks… What are we going to do next?”

  “What? You don’t know?” He smiled grimly and took me to his bridge.

  The cruiser was impressive. I’d never been aboard such a large, effective warship. Instead of a mere holotank or a table that projected grainy images, the deck itself could be transformed into a screen.

  It truly appeared like we were walking on glass. The planet’s dark forests spread out below us, obscured only by boots and an occasional cloud.

  Trask walked three paces to the north and made a mark on the glowing deck with his boot. The mark brightened and remained there after he lifted his boot. “That’s the location of one of the nests. There are two others.”

  Walking around the deck, pushing back his officers, he marked two more spots. They formed a triangle that was perhaps twenty kilometers on a side.

  “In addition, we’ve located some of the Tulk troops—here and here. I’m sure there are others, but we can’t have everything.”

  I looked at the Baron in concern, and Droad did as well. He’d come up to the bridge to hear what the baron had to say. Both of us had our hands on our bandaged sides. We were in pain, but not so much that we couldn’t walk and talk.

  “What are you up to, Trask?” Droad asked in a strong voice.

  Trask didn’t look at us. Instead, he pulled out a pistol and aimed it at us. Then, he turned to his officers. “Do it. Launch everything at once.”

  The men glanced at one another nervously, but they did as they were told. They fired a barrage of missiles.

  Watching in horror, I saw the missiles arc downward. One flew toward each of the three points Trask had marked with his boots. Several more plunged down into various spots in the forest.

  “What are you doing?” I demanded.

  “You know what I’m doing.”

  “We could have brought all the ships from the spaceport,” I said angrily. “We could have picked up thousands of survivors.”

  Trask laughed at me. “The day I risk my fleet to save a broken alien army is the day I deserve to lose every ship I have.”

  I took a step toward him, but Trask raised his pistol, and Droad gripped my arm with a surprisingly strong hand. He held me back, and I looked up at Droad.

  “He’s planned this,” he said. “There’s nothing you can do.”

  “But one of those missiles is headed toward the mountain! The exact spot you left your troops.”

  Droad nodded. “It never really was my army, Gorman. Trust me, the Tulk also planned to get rid of us if we’d won this fight, if it had come down to just us and them.”

  “How do you know that?”

  He smiled grimly. “I shared minds with one of their top officers—remember?”

  “As did I back on Gladius,” Trask said loudly. “Now, watch and see how the Sword Brothers deal with traitors.”

  The planet flared white as seven nuclear warheads went off at almost the same moment. Each missile had reached its target and detonated.

  At first, there were only seven glaring sources of brilliant radiation. Then the fireballs formed, destroying everything for kilometers around.

  Next, each of the explosions gushed upward. It was all silent and unreal-looking, but I felt sick inside. So many deaths, so much poisoned land…

  For several minutes, we all watched in silence—then Trask launched another barrage of missiles. I looked at him in horror.

  He shrugged. “I want to be sure.”

  The process began again. Soon, the forest burned even more brightly, and the skies filled with smoke. An hour passed, and the skies turned a lurid red as the sun began to set. The radioactive dust always did that after a strike, as I knew.

  The bombing took less than half an hour in total. When Trask was finished, Vindar was scarred and burning—but she was clean now. I doubted if there were more than a handful of intelligent aliens left anywhere on her wounded crust.

  Chapter Forty-Five

  It was hard to look Droad or Trask in the eye that evening. I’d held romantic ideas, I guess—hopes for a permanent truce between the Tulk and the human race.

  Baron Trask was adamant in his assertion he’d taken the only possible action. I was of the opposite view, while Droad seemed resigned and agnostic.

  “We had two infections on this planet, Gorman!” Trask yelled at me. “Not just one. Two packs of aliens have invaded our worlds. Now, they’re both gone from this one at least.”

  “But at what cost, Baron?”

  “Cost? There’s always a cost in war, and it’s always a grim one. Whether you know it or not, I’m the hero here today. Maybe in time you’ll come to understand that.”

  “I hope not.”

  Trask laughed, but I could tell my words troubled him. “A true leader of armies must be hard of heart, Gorman. He must sell some good lives to save others. That’s the business of war.”

  Aboard Trask’s cruiser, we stayed above the devastation for an hour or two. I watched the inferno, unable to look away. It was mesmerizing. At last, Trask gave up on convincing me of anything. He clapped me on the back and left. Droad stepped near a moment later.

  He was a ghost, a haunted man. Tall, strange, with eyes that had seen billions die before this day. I respected him, but I didn’t really like his company. It was like chatting with the angel of death.

  “Trask is right, you know,” he told me. “He is the hero here today.”

  “I know, I know—they were thinking of infesting all of us. But did we really have to backstab them first?”

  Droad stood a little too near. He didn’t look at me, but instead his odd gaze was riveted on the scene of devastation below us. He indicated the destruction with a sweep of his hand.

  “What you see below is the work of the warrior, just as Trask said. That’s the business you wanted to be in, isn’t it? The business of war? Well then, gaze deeply into this inferno. Witness the radioactive clouds, the vaporized armies and erased natural beauty… that is the usual aftermath of any war fought with this enemy. The Skaintz are a committed species. They can no more live in peace with us than a lion can rest easy with a lamb.”

  “That’s it then, isn’t it? We have the relationship of predator and prey?”

  “Yes. That’s how they see it—I’ve come to understand that over many years.”

  “And the Tulk? Are they the same?”

  He sighed. “No. They’re nowhere near as bad. But they are, by nature, an arrogant and devious people. They’re parasites, so they see us as hosts. They think of us as a man might think of his horse. The Skaintz, on the other hand, consider us to be cows. Being a mount is better than being food, but…”

  I thought about that. I thought hard. “How are we going to drive these aliens from the Chain then?”

  He smiled tiredly. “Drive them from the Chain? I’m shocked at your lofty ambitions. I would settle for keeping them out of the Conclave.”

  “Yes, but… we can’t just let them sit out there and fester. Won’t they build fleets and invade our stars eventually?”

  He nodded. “I don’t know where they came from originally, but I know that millennia ago the Tulk fought an earlier war with them. They thought that they’d won. Centuries passed before the invaders rose again.”

  “Centuries?”

  “Yes. They’re a patient species. While humans were learning how to forge a sword, then a gun, then a starship—they waited. At last, they struck again, and they took the Chain this time.”

  “Centuries… that’s a depressing thought.”

  “We’re newcomers to this conflict. Only time will tell which of our three species will be dominant in the end.”

  Troubled by his words, I left the cruiser and went back to my ship. My crew peppered me with recriminations and questions, but I had few answers for them. Rose dressed my wounds, and Sosa clucked her tongue at me—but I ignored them all.

  Huan came to knock on my cabin door at midnight. I let him in, surprised.

  “You’ve been quiet for a long time,” I said.

  “A wise man doesn’t speak unless he has something important to say.”

  It sounded like a proverb, so I didn’t question it. “What brings you here tonight then, Huan?”

  “I wanted to talk to you about moving on.”

  I looked at him, surprised. “You want to leave my service?”

  “It would seem that this enemy has been turned back. I joined you for that purpose. If you intend to go back to running contraband around the stars… well, I think there are bigger things that need doing now.”

  “Hmm… you were a bounty hunter before we teamed up. Will you go back to that?”

  “No. The enemy—the very thing I fled my home stars to avoid—has followed me here. I realize now that running away won’t work. At least, not forever.”