«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 21

The 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.

It would have to be a battle in the open field, however unsuited this weirdly assorted army Blade led might be for such a battle. He resigned himself to this fact and set about planning the best tactics.

The Shoba's army kept a close watch on the northern wall of the city. In fact, they cleared all the ground between their camp and the city until nothing larger than a rabbit could get in or out without being noticed. On the other three sides of the city, they kept watch with nothing more than occasional cavalry patrols. They seemed to be waiting for Mak'loh to show its hand.

Blade would be happy to let them wait as long as they pleased. The night after the Warlands army made camp, a convoy of trucks rolled out of a gate in the south wall of the city. It brought to the camp a month's food and the promised two thousand shock rifles, then returned before dawn brought the enemy's patrols. Doubtless the drun-riders saw the wheel tracks, but could not follow them up. Druns were stronger than horses and faster on level ground, but much less surefooted. As long as the villagers were shielded by the forest, they'd be safe from detection.

A number of Geetro's people came out in the convoy to instruct the villagers in using the rifles. Blade gave them their orders, then flew back into the city, and sat down with Geetro and Sela to make their plans for the battle.

Mak'loh had a number of assets that could give it a resounding victory if they were properly used. There were the mortars. There were the six-wheeled trucks. There were the robots-the last few Watchers and all the work models. There were the thousands upon thousands of worker androids. They could build or tear down anything that might be needed for any plans Blade might make. Finally, there was the wall around the city. Blade had often cursed it, for Twana had died there. Now he was grateful for it. It kept the Shoba's men out of the streets of Mak'loh and completely concealed from them anything that might go on there. The androids patrolled it too well for anyone to climb it. The Shoba's men could only stare at it from a distance and wonder who and what lay behind it.

Dawn, and Blade was climbing up through the branches of a tree on the edge of the forest nearest the enemy's camp. The leaves were still damp.

He found a high branch that would bear his weight and crawled out on it. The camp was already coming awake in the gray light, with drums and trumpets, smoke curling up from cook fires, and the clink of armor and thud of feet as the night guard marched in and the morning guard marched out. Both lines of men marched with the snap and precision Blade had always seen in the Shoba's men. Their discipline and training were unbroken.

Surrounded by their own palisade, three wooden siege towers rose to the left of the camp. Each tower stood fifty feet high and was mounted on solid wheels that were sections of whole trees. Three more were under construction. All six would soon be spearheading an assault on the walls of Mak'loh. They would be virtually invulnerable to the shock rifles or to any weapon the Warlanders carried. As Blade had expected, it wasn't safe to leave the initiative to the Shoba's soldiers. They could do too much with it. An army like that had to be confronted with an attack so violent and so sudden that it simply couldn't react fast enough.

Behind him under cover of the forest lay the twelve thousand fighting men of the Warlands villages. They were stripped to weapons and loinguards for speed and ease of movement. Their chiefs walked among them now, promising death to any man who held back or who spoke above a whisper before the High Chief Blade gave the signal. They needed surprise.