The Warlord of the Air Read Online Free Page A

one of our frontier stations and killed a couple of detachments of Native Police. We weren’t interested in vengeance, however, but in making sure it didn’t go any further.
    We had some reasonably good maps and a couple of fairly trustworthy guides—distant kinsmen of the Ghoorkas—and we reckoned it would take us little more than two or three days to get to Teku Benga, which was Sharan Kang’s capital, high up in the mountains and reached by a series of narrow passes. Since we were on a diplomatic rather than a military mission, we showed great care in displaying a flag of truce as we crossed the borders into Kumbalari, whose bleak, snow-streaked mountains lowered down at us on all sides.
    It was not long before we had our first glimpse of some Kumbalaris. They sat on shaggy ponies which were perched like goats on high mountain ledges: squat, yellow-skinned warriors all swathed in leather and sheepskin and painted iron, their slitted eyes gleaming with hatred and suspicion. If these were not the descendants of Attila the Hun, then they were the descendants of some even earlier warrior folk which had fought on these slopes and gorges a thousand or two thousand years before the Scourge of God had led his hordes East and West, to pillage three quarters of the known world. Like their ancestors, these were armed with bows, lances, sabres, but they also had a few carbines, probably of Russian origin.
    Pretending to ignore these watching riders I led my soldiers up the valley. I had a moment’s surprise when a few shots rang out from above and echoed on and on through the peaks, but the guides assured me that these were merely signals to announce our arrival in Kumbalari.
    It was slow going over the rocky ground and at times we had to dismount and lead our horses. As we climbed higher and higher the air grew much colder and we were glad when evening came and we could make camp, light warming fires and check our maps to see how much further we had to go.
    The respective commanders of the cavalry and the infantry were Risaldar Jenab Shah and Subadar J.K. Bisht, both of them veterans of many similar expeditions. But for all their experience they were inclined to be warier than usual of the Kumbalaris and Subadar Bisht advised me to put a double guard on the camp, which I did.
    Subadar Bisht was worried by what he called “the smell on the wind”. He knew something about the Kumbalaris and when he spoke of them I saw a glint of what, in anyone but a Ghoorka’s eyes, I might have mistaken for fear. “These are a cunning and treacherous people, sir,” he told me as we ate together in my tent, with Jenab Shah, a silent giant, beside us. “They are the inheritors of an ancient evil—an evil which existed before the world was born. In our tongue Kumbalari is called the Kingdom of the Devil. Do not expect them to honour our white flag. They will respect it only while it suits them.”
    “Fair enough,” I said. “But they’ll have respect for our numbers and our weapons, I dare say.”
    “Perhaps.” Subadar Bisht looked dubious. “Unless Sharan Kang has convinced them that they are protected by his magic. He is known to draw much power from nameless gods and to have devils at his command.”
    “Modern guns,” I pointed out, “usually prove superior to the most powerful devil, Subadar Bisht.”
    The Ghoorka looked grave. “Usually, Captain Bastable. And then there is their cunning. They might try to split up our column with various tricks—so they can attack us independently, with more chance of success.”
    I accepted this. “We’ll certainly be on guard against that sort of tactic,” I agreed. “But I do not think I fear their magic.”
    Risaldar Jenab Shah spoke soberly in his deep, rumbling voice. “It is not so much what we fear,” he said, “but what they believe.” He smoothed his gleaming black beard. “I agree with the subadar. We must understand that we are dealing with crazy men—reckless fanatics