Cobra Gamble by Timothy Zahn

  "I'm here," the woman's cool voice came back.

  "Any update on the curtain timeline?"

  "Just a minute." There was a brief pause filled with muffled and distant voices. "They say it'll be ready by tomorrow morning," Nissa reported. "Possibly tonight, if they hurry."

  "Then tell them to hurry," Harli told her. "I want to know the minute it's ready."

  "You will," Nissa said.

  "Good. Get back to work." Harli keyed off the radio and put it away. "We'll need to rig some stands to hold the thing up," he said, almost as if talking to himself "But we were going to have to do that anyway. I figure we should be ready to march them out by mid-morning at the latest."

  "We're never going to burn them a clearing by then," Kemp warned.

  "No clearing needed," Harli assured him. "We're going to put them at the far end of the landing field."

  "That close to Stronghold?" Kemp asked, frowning. "How do you expect to keep them there?"

  "You'll see." Harli smiled tightly, then sobered. "I'm glad you've got the ship running. We need to start the evacuation this afternoon, and this'll make it a lot easier than running a line of overloaded aircars back and forth across the forest."

  "Be easier on the wounded, too," Kemp said. "At least they'll get to stretch out for the trip. You and the Governor still going to put everyone in Aerie?"

  "No, we thought about it and decided that an influx of nine hundred new citizens would strain even their traditional hospitality," Harli said. "We're now figuring three hundred each to Aerie, Essbend, and Rockhouse."

  "Even that's going to be pushing it," Kemp warned. "Especially for Rockhouse."

  "I know," Harli conceded. "But I don't see any other way. When those Troft reinforcements come, they'll be coming to Stronghold first. We have to get the citizens out of harm's way, and dividing them up is the best way to do that."

  "Unless you moved everyone into the Octagon Caves," Smitty said suddenly. "I didn't think about that earlier, but there's plenty of room in there for a mass camp-out. Or they could split up into smaller rooms—Danny and Kirstin and I found dozens of them back when we used to poke around in there."

  "Actually, I'm thinking we might use the caves for something else," Harli said. "I'll want to talk to you about that later."

  "Perhaps Smitty's right about hiding away in caverns," Rashida spoke up hesitantly. "Even if the invaders come here first, they'll surely travel afterward to the other towns you spoke of."

  "Yes, that'll probably be their plan," Harli agreed. "Our job is to make sure that doesn't happen." He gestured to her. "Your job is to get better at flying that thing. The Trofts could arrive in anywhere from two to three days. In six hours I'm going to start moving people out of Stronghold. Think you'll be ready to start taking passengers by then?"

  Rashida looked at Jody and Smitty, then back at Harli. "We'll be ready in three," she promised.

  "Good," Harli said. "Kemp, go grab Popescu and Brady and get them working on support frames for that curtain. I'll go tell Dad to alert the first evacuee list."

  He looked up at the sun. "We're burning daylight. Let's get to work."

  * * *

  Nine weeks.

  The words swirled through Jin's mind, disturbing and mocking, as the car bounced along the wide road leading toward Azras. Nine weeks.

  That was how long it took on Aventine to turn a new recruit into a full Cobra. That was always how long it had taken, ever since Jin could remember. The exact regimen had been adjusted over the years, as the instructors experimented with new techniques or as the implanted equipment itself was tweaked. But the total length of the training period never wavered. Nine weeks.

  Yithtra and the Milika villagers had had six days.

  Ghushtre and his fellow Djinn had had one.

  She focused on the back of the Yithtra's head as he steered the car along the winding forest road, smelling the very Qasaman scent of the two others in the front seat and the one on Paul's other side here in the back. Beach and McCollom thought the group was ready, though both of them had expressed varying degrees of astonishment at that fact. Certainly the villagers and Djinn themselves thought they were ready.

  But were they? That was the question that had been nagging at Jin since the convoy left Milika two hours ago. Were they really ready for war?

  But then, was anyone ever really ready for war? Or did everyone just do what they could with what they had, struggling along and hoping for the best?

  "There," Gama Yithtra said, taking one hand from the wheel and pointing ahead. "That's Azras."

  Jin leaned across Paul's chest to look past Yithtra's head. Ahead and to the right, she could see the top edge of a city wall above the rolling hills a couple of kilometers beyond the edge of the forest.

  On the other side of the road, a kilometer from the city itself, she could see the top of another of the tall, narrow Troft warships.

  "I see they've learned from their Sollas drubbing," Paul murmured. "Sitting way out there, they can shoot down any SkyJos the Qasamans launch from Azras before they get into their own attack range."

  "Their cunning goes far deeper than that," Yithtra said. "They have the entire city under siege, with eight of their armored troop trucks roaming the streets at all times. They also have drones overhead, watching every gathering of citizens and tracking where they come from and where they go."

  "Trying to find a way into the subcity," Jin said, nodding. "Still, if they're waiting for someone to get sloppy, they're going to have a long wait."

  "Ah, but they aren't merely hoping for carelessness," Yithtra said grimly. "They hope also to elicit treason."

  Jin snorted. "Good luck with that one."

  "Perhaps," Yithtra said. "But as you'll see, we and the food we bring to the blockaded citizens will be readily allowed in. But we'll find that we're then forbidden to leave."

  Jin frowned; and then she got it. "Thereby increasing the number of mouths that need to be fed, which adds more strain on the city's resources."

  "And adds more to the usual tension existing between city dwellers and villagers," Yithtra said. "Especially as the villagers now trapped by their errand of mercy will be increasingly frantic to return to their homes and families."

  "Let me guess," Paul murmured. "Point out an entrance to the subcity and you can go home."

  "Exactly," Yithtra said. "Or deliver a military weapon to them, or identify a Djinn or soldier to the invaders, and likewise buy your escape." Yithtra made a spitting sound. "A futile hope, of course, that any villager would betray our world. We aren't city dwellers, who might—"

  "Enough of that," Jin interrupted firmly. "You're not a villager anymore, Gama Yithtra, any more than the Djinn riding behind us and the people you'll meet in Azras are city dwellers. You're Qasamans. Nothing more, nothing less."

  "Of course," Yithtra said. But he didn't say it like he really believed it. Or meant it.

  Jin looked sideways at Paul. He grimaced, but merely gave a small shrug.

  Even under the pressures of war, the old rivalries remained.

  There were four of the Troft armored trucks arrayed around the main gate into Azras: two of them flanking the road, facing opposite directions with their roof-mounted swivel guns guarding both approaches to the city. The other two trucks flanked the short access spur that led from the main road to the gate, their swivel guns both pointed into the city.

  There were also Troft soldiers on duty, at least twenty of them, standing guard at the gate, perched on top of the trucks, or manning the checkpoint barrier that had been set up along the road. All were dressed in the enemy's familiar armored leotards and full-face helmets, all carried big hand-and-a-half lasers, and all had their full attention on the eight-car convoy now rolling toward the checkpoint.

  As a no doubt unintentional touch of irony, the Azras gate itself stood wide open.

  One of the Trofts strode toward their car as Yithtra brought the vehicle to a halt. "State your name, point
of origin, and business," the translator pin on the alien's left shoulder said in a flat voice.

  "Gama Yithtra, son of Bejran Yithtra of Milika," Yithtra identified himself. "We bring aid and food for the besieged citizens of Azras."

  The Troft looked back at the other seven cars now stopped in a line behind them. "You will leave your vehicles," he ordered, stepping back and leveling his laser at Yithtra. "All will remove their tunics and upper robes."

  "Our group includes two women," Yithtra objected. "Such public exposure is shameful and cannot be allowed."

  For a moment the Troft regarded him silently, his mouth moving behind his faceplate as he either discussed it with his fellow guards or else checked in with higher authority. Jin watched him closely, mentally crossing her fingers. Stripping to their underwear, she knew, wouldn't bother either her or Jennifer nearly as much as it would a typical Qasaman woman. But that was the point: they were supposed to be Qasaman women, with typical Qasaman sensibilities. If the Trofts refused to grant them an exemption, they would have to leave the men here and hope they could figure out another way into the city.

  Fortunately, it wasn't going to come to that. "The females will pull back their sleeves and show their arms to be bare," the Troft ordered. "The males will remove their tunics and upper robes."

  Jin gave a silent sigh of relief. Still, the concession to modesty wasn't all that unexpected. The Trofts were clearly looking for Djinni combat suits, and the Qasamans were even worse at permitting women into the ranks of their elite soldiers as Aventine was at accepting female Cobras.

  "Understood," Yithtra said. He opened the door and started to get out of the car.

  "And after you have done that," the Troft continued, "you will leave your vehicles and carry your supplies by hand through the gate."

  Jin had never done any acting herself, and didn't know the first thing about the art or science of that craft. But she knew a good performance when she saw it, and Yithtra's was definitely it. He froze in mid-step, his eyes widening as he looked sharply at the Troft. "What?" he asked, his tone more bewildered than anything else.

  "You will carry your supplies in through the gate," the Troft repeated. "Your vehicles will remain here."

  Yithtra shot a disbelieving look back down the line of cars, then turned back to the guard. "Why?" he asked. "What's wrong with the cars?"

  "You will carry your supplies—"

  "Yes, I heard you the first two times," Yithtra cut him off, outrage starting to replace bewilderment in his voice. "That makes no sense. You have any idea how Heavy those parcels are? And one of our doctors is on crutches—you expect him to walk the whole way to the aid center?"

  The Troft lifted his laser warningly. "You will go into the city now," he said, the flat translator voice somehow managing to carry an edge of menace. "If you leave the supplies, they will be confiscated along with the vehicles."

  Yithtra glared at him. But there was no power behind the defiance, only frustration and anger. He looked through the window at Jin, looked back along the cars again, and muttered a long, feeling curse. "Everybody out!" he shouted, waving his arm over his head. "And—" He grimaced. "Take off your tunics."

  Five minutes later, with their tunics now tied around their waists and stacks of food and medical supplies in their arms, they all marched silently between the sentries and through the open city gate. There was another sentry line of Trofts inside, apparently positioned to keep the city dwellers back.

  After all, Jin thought cynically, the invaders wouldn't want anyone shouting a warning to all those well-meaning visitors about the trap they were walking into.

  Given what newcomers meant to the supply situation within the city, Jin had wondered if the citizens would greet the newcomers with disdain or even hostility. But as they passed the inner sentry line and approached the line of onlookers who'd gathered to watch this latest version of the oft-repeated drama, she saw nothing but resolve and solidarity in their faces. In fact, as she and the others approached, many of the citizens broke ranks and stepped forward, probably risking Troft laser fire, quietly greeting the villagers and gently but firmly relieving them of their burdens. Two of them, spotting Paul lurching along on his crutches, found a wheelchair somewhere and had it ready by the time he reached the edge of the crowd. Another of the citizens, this one a well-dressed man in his sixties, gestured toward a store a block away, which from the stacks of boxes around it had apparently been set up as a distribution center, and led the way toward it.

  They had covered half the distance, and the Trofts at the gate were no longer visible through the crowd, when a slightly scruffy-looking man sidled up beside Jin and took her last remaining package. "Welcome to Azras, Jin Moreau," he murmured. "We're pleased you arrived safely."

  Jin smiled. "Thank you, Siraj Akim," she greeted him in turn. "I'm pleased to find you also safe and well. I was told you and Ghofl Khatir had come here, but I never heard what happened after that."

  "Like everyone else on Qasama, we've been busy," he said with a touch of dry humor. "As you clearly have also been." He threw a glance behind them at the rest of the group. "The recruits seem eager for combat."

  "They are," Jin agreed heavily. "And their instructors also seem to think they're ready. But whether they actually are..." She shook her head. "I'm hoping we'll have a few days before we leave here so that Beach and McCollom can run them through a few more drills."

  "You weren't told?" Siraj asked, an odd tone to his voice.

  "Told what?"

  Siraj moved a little closer and lowered his voice. "We won't be going to Purma or elsewhere," he said. "The attack will be here. And it'll be launched tomorrow."

  Jin felt her eyes widen. "Tomorrow. But—" she broke off. "I thought we'd want to run at least a few more groups through Isis first."

  "Such was indeed the original plan," Siraj said grimly. "But it's not to be. Five days ago a Drim courier ship arrived at the invaders' Sollas encampment, carrying what our spotters described as a highly agitated commander and crew. They were taken into one of their demesne's warships, where they stayed for two hours. Four hours after that, two other Drim warships lifted from the encampment and left Qasama."

  Jin's stomach tightened. "They found out about Caelian."

  "So we believe," Siraj agreed. "We feared our new ally was about to come under renewed attack."

  Jin nodded, feeling suddenly ill. And when that happened, the Caelians wouldn't have a chance. Not a second time. Not with the Trofts knowing what they were flying into.

  And Jody was there with them.

  "There was nothing we could do directly to help them," Siraj continued. "But what we could attempt to do was create the conditions that would hopefully end the entire war, our part as well as Caelian's."

  Jin nodded again as she understood. "By handing the invaders a massive defeat," she said. "Thereby giving the Tlossies and the other local demesnes the leverage they need to step in and force the Drims and their allies to back off."

  "Exactly," Siraj agreed. "Even at that we may have waited too long—our estimate is that the Drim ships are now only a day removed from Caelian. But we needed all the new warriors we could get, and it was decided to wait until Ifrit Ghushtre and his Djinn had completed the Isis transformation."

  "So that's why they were so adamant about leaving Milika with us," Jin said, the past few days' worth of puzzling conversations suddenly coming clear. "And why they insisted they didn't need any further training."

  "Which may in fact be the truth," Siraj said. "Their combat suit capabilities in many ways parallel their new internal ones. That expertise combined with the learning drugs makes it quite possible that a few hours of practice with the attack plan will be all the further training they need. We'll find out shortly."

  "I hope we're not all going to the subcity together," Jin warned. "I'm told the Trofts are watching for that kind of parade."

  Siraj chuckled. "Never fear, Jin Moreau. After we deliver the supplies t
o the distribution center, your group will be broken up into three-man teams and escorted by different routes to the subcity and the designated practice arena."

  "Good," Jin said, forcing her mind away from Jody and Caelian. "I trust that Paul will instead be taken directly to the hospital?"

  "He and you both," Siraj said, nodding. "The doctors have been briefed about his leg and your tumor, and are already prepared to begin their work."

  "Thank you." Jin glanced behind her. Paul was far enough back to be safely out of earshot. "But they'll only be working on Paul. I'll be coming with you to the briefing."

  "We appreciate your courage and your commitment to Qasama," Siraj said gravely. "More than you can imagine. But your part of the war is over."

  "No," Jin said firmly. "My husband's may be, but mine isn't. Not as long as Lorne is still fighting. Certainly not as long as Merrick is a prisoner of the invaders and Jody is in their crosshairs."

  "Jin Moreau—"

  "And whether you like it or not, you need me," Jin said. "You said it yourself: you need all of us that you can get."

  "We'll have enough," Siraj assured her.

  "Will you?" Jin countered. "By my count, you have exactly four—Lorne, Beach, McCollom, and me—who've fought as Cobras, plus ten who've only fought as Djinn, plus ten who've never fought at all. So tell me again how you've got all the warriors you need."

  Siraj was silent a few more steps. "If I were braver, I'd stand up to you and simply tell you no," he said. "If I were more like my father, I'd find a clever way to make you think you were getting what you want while also achieving my own goals. But I'm neither. Besides, I suspect far too many of those marching with you would come to your support, and I have no interest in fighting all of them."

  "Thank you," Jin said quietly.

  "Just promise you'll come to my defense when your husband learns of your decision." Siraj gave a gentle snort. "Do you recall, back when you and your son were first brought into the Sollas subcity, Kami Ghushtre questioned my father on the place of honor and pride in warfare?"

  "Very well," Jin assured him, wincing at the memory. She and Merrick had come very close to dying that day. "Your father told him that victory was more important even than honor."