Yet ... it was awful to think that Vendacious would live after he had killed and betrayed so many. She realized that two of herself were keening rage, lips curled back from clenched teeth. Her puppies huddled back from threats unseen. The tented area stank of sweat and the mindnoise of too many people in too small a space. It took a real effort of will to calm herself. She licked the puppies, and daydreamed peaceful thoughts for a moment. Yes, she would keep her promises to Vendacious. And maybe it would be worth the price. Vendacious had only speculations about Steel's inner secrets, but he had learned far more about Steel's tactical situation than the other side could have guessed. Vendacious had known just where the Flenserists were hiding and in what numbers. Steel's folk had been overconfident about their super guns and their secret traitor. When Woodcarver's troops surprised them, victory had been easy -- and now the Queen had some of these marvelous guns. From behind the hills, those cannons were still pounding away, eating through the stocks of ammunition the captured gunners had revealed. Vendacious the traitor had cost her much, but Vendacious the prisoner might yet bring her victory. "Woodcarver?" It was Scrupilo. She waved him closer. Her chief gunner edged out of the sun, sat down an intimate twenty-five feet away. Battle conditions had blown away all notions of decorum. Scrupilo's mind noise was an anxious jumble. He looked by parts exhausted and exhilarated and discouraged. "It's safe to advance up the castle hill,
GHD Hair Straightener, Your Majesty," he said. "Answering fire is almost extinguished. Parts of the castle walls have been breached. There is an end to castles here, My Queen. Even our own poor cannons would make it so." She bobbed agreement. Scrupilo spent most of his time with Dataset in learning to make -- cannons in particular. Woodcarver spent her time learning what those inventions ultimately created. By now she knew far more than even Johanna about the social effects of weapons,
BEATS POWERBEATS, from the most primitive to ones so strange that they seemed not weapons at all. A thousand million times, castle technologies had fallen to things like cannon; why should her world be different? "We'll move up then --" From beyond the shade of the tent there was a faint whistle, a rare, incoming round. She folded the puppies within herself,
Dre Beats Studio (Black) High Definition Powered Isolation Headphones, and paused a moment. Twenty yards away,
复件 (74) air max1, Vendacious shrank down in a great cower. But when it came, the explosion was a muffled thump above them on the hill. It might even have been one of our own. "Now our troops must take advantage of the destruction. I want Steel to know that the old games of ransom and torture will only win him worse." We'll most likely win the starship and the child. The question was, would either be alive when they got them? She hoped Johanna would never know the threats and the risks she planned for the next few hours. "Yes,
air max1, Majesty." But Scrupilo made no move to depart, and suddenly seemed more bedraggled and worried than ever. "Woodcarver, I fear ..." "What? We have the tide. We must rush to sail on it." "Yes, Majesty.... But while we move forward,
复件 (65) air max1, there are serious dangers coming up on our flanks and rear. The enemy's far scouts and the fires." Scrupilo was right. The Flenserists who operated behind her lines were deadly. There weren't many of them; the enemy troops at Margrum Climb had been mostly killed or dispersed. The few that ate at Woodcarver's flanks were equipped with ordinary crossbows and axes ... but they were extraordinarily well-coordinated.