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  Evertsen said nothing. His batman would sweep up the glass. It was the colonel's duty to the State to deal with the irregulars. . . .

  "Naw, the luck's good because we walk around while Oleg fixes the motor," Bruchinsky resumed, sunny following the momentary squall of the empty bottle. "Pedr thinks he sees a track. I don't see shit, but Pedr, he good tracker. Near as good as your blond bitch-dog, Colonel, that's right?"

  Evertsen offered a thinly noncommittal smile. He didn't like to hear a Slav animal refer that way to a Draka, but more than policy might have kept him from reprimanding Bruchinsky in this particular case.

  "We go a little ways in and I think `a rag,' but we look at it and it's a doll," the Rallier continued. "So Pedr's right, and six of us we follow up fast while the rest stays with the truck."

  Kuyper broke another roll of aurics with a golden tinkle. There were five adults and three children in the string. The latter were very fresh.

  "We find the place three miles, maybe, off the road," Bruchinsky said. "It's hid good, but a kid's crying before we see anything and we crawl up close. There's a man hoeing squash and corn planted together, but he's patting a kid who's bit on the neck by a big fucker horsefly. One burst—" he slapped the submachine gun "—and I get them both. Not bad, hey, even though the boy wiggles till we twist his neck."

  Kuyper set six coins behind the first of the small ears, then looked at the Rallier with an expression Evertsen couldn't read. The administrator resumed counting, his fingers moving a little slower than before.

  "There's two girls in the dugout," Bruchinsky said. "They got good gun like this—"

  He pumped his submachine gun in the air for an example.

  "—but they little girl, they cry and cry but they can't cock it, you see?"

  Bruchinsky racked back his charging handle. His weapon was already cocked, so it spun a loaded round out onto the floor.

  Evertsen managed not to wince. He supposed being shot by accident in his office by a drunken Slav would be a fitting end to his career.

  "Pedr finish them with his knife after he have a little fun, you know?" the Rallier said. "So we run back with four more kills, the truck fixed, and we drive like hell to catch up with the convoy almost. Lucky, not so?"

  "That completes the count, Captain Bruchinsky," Kuyper said, closing the lid of the strongbox. "Six hundred and eighty aurics."

  "Shitload of money," the Rallier said admiringly. "It all be shit gone soon, but we party tonight!"

  "If that's all . . . ," Evertsen said. It had gone better than he'd dreamed a few minutes before. Not that his superiors would care about the skill with which he and Kuyper had covered Capetown's idiocy. . . .

  "One thing," Bruchinsky said, fumbling in another of his pouches. "This I get from the farmer today. Does it spend? It's broke, but it's real gold by Jesus!"

  He held it out for the others to see. It was a sovereign, snapped in half and mounted for an ear stud. The legend and lower portion of the bust of George III were worn to shadows.

  Janni began to laugh. The sound started normally but rose into hysterical peals.

  Bruchinsky, the only man in the room who didn't get the joke, looked in growing puzzlement at his Draka companions.

  The Big Lie

  Jane Lindskold

  Jane Lindskold is a former professor of English; despite that, she is also a crackerjack storyteller and wordsmith. She lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico, with her archaeologist husband Jim Moore (who I pump unmercifully for research material) and the inevitable writerly pride of cats. Her work includes science fiction, high fantasy, and the recent and unforgettable tale of supernatural creatures among us, Changer. I particularly liked the Yeti who compulsively haunted Internet chat rooms and King Arthur's consulting business in the sunbelt.

  When I wrote Marching Through Georgia, the first of the Draka books, I aimed for a tone of tragic intensity. Jane rather effectively sticks a pin in my hero's self-image, using a cheerful ruthlessness in the service of her art. It's also an homage . . .

  To George MacDonald Fraser and David Case

  Well, I suppose you've heard it all and believe it, too, the more fool you, but I was there and I can tell you. It wasn't anything like that, nor were the Draka anything like you believe. The whole pot of rot is a big lie like God or love or the perfect deviled egg.

  Trouble is, people believe what they want to believe and those books—those damn novels—they've been taken for fact when there are plenty who could tell you otherwise, but if they did they'd have to admit the truth about themselves and who wants to do that when the Lie is so much bigger and grander and finer?

  I'm an old man now, old as Sin or Eric von Shrakenberg, which is about the same thing as I see it. When you read this, I'll be dead, so the Big Lie won't matter to me any more. In fact, I get rather a chuckle out of the idea of your reading this, of shattering the Lie for you when it has served me well enough all my life.

  You might ask why would I do that when "Glory to the Race" has replaced "Please and Thank You," "Hello and Good-bye," and "By Your Leave" for the Draka people. Well, as I see it those long-limbed, high-cheekboned, super-strong, genetically engineered mutants are no more my race than are the chimpanzees that the Draka geneticists used for their early experiments.

  White Christ! The divergence between us is probably greater. Think about that for a moment, then maybe you'll understand why I'm telling you this story, why I'm breaking down the Big Lie.

  Then again, you might not understand. After all, you're one of those mutants, aren't you?

  * * *

  I was born in 1918, the same year as Eric von Shrakenberg, the same year that the Draka Women's Auxiliary Corps was abolished and women were integrated into the military. Unlike Eric, who was born a plantation owner's eldest brat on the Oakenwald Plantation. I was born in Cairo, Egypt. My parents named me Covington.

  That's right. Start and look amazed. Your humble author is none other than the much decorated, ever-so-famous Covington Coemer, Arch-Strategos, Retired. I did say that the Big Lie had served me well, now, didn't I?

  Growing up as I did under the shadow of the Great Pyramid, I never did quite buy into the myth that the higher-ups were pushing even then—the myth that Draka Citizens were the pinnacle of human evolution and that the rest of the world's populations were mere serfs. There was just too much evidence to the contrary.

  Oh, I didn't waste my time griping and moaning about the way of the world as Eric would have you believe he did. I enjoyed the power and privilege that being at the top of the food chain brought me. I just didn't believe that somehow we Draka were better than the rest of humanity. Meaner, tougher, better trained—I had no problem with believing that. Thor's Hammer! Hadn't I been hustled off to boarding boot camp at an age when most children were still toddling about under their parents' loving care? If such brutality didn't produce a better trained product, then what was the use?

  After boarding school ended, I went into the military just like every good, obedient Draka does. There I ran and jumped and crawled and sweated and learned what I was best at—sharpshooting. Although I didn't escape the normal grind, from my first year in I was given extra training on all sorts of distance rifles: ours, the Fritz's, the Ivan's, the Abdul's, anyone and everyone's. The idea was that wherever my company found itself, I would be prepared to kill the inconvenient enemy from a distance, opening a door for those whose duty it was to rush in and die valiantly. It's almost as safe a job as being Arch-Strategos.

  The other thing I learned to do in the Army was to bunk and run—not letting my commanders know what I was about, of course. In the process of perfecting this art, I learned how to claim credit for other soldiers' achievements. This was easier to do than you might imagine, since most of the real heroes were reduced to artful red smears on the landscape.

  Yes, those were golden years. As I was promoted and decorated for what I knew was arrant cowardice, well now, the cynicism that my Egyptian birthplace had
nurtured got a healthy dose of fertilizer. Then my presumed heroism gave me a kick in the butt when in the spring of 1942, I found myself assigned to the First Airborne, Century A. That was where I met Eric von Shrakenberg, one of the primary architects of the Big Lie.

  Now wait! Before you crumple up this memoir and toss it in the trash, you hear me out. I'm no crank. I was there and I know what I saw and heard. Hel! I know what I did and said. And I know what Mr. Perfect Draka, Eric von Shrakenberg did and said, too. I'll swear on anything you like that his version of what happened that Spring is about as true as Father Christmas.

  I can imagine you frowning (an elegant expression, stern yet fierce on that high-cheekboned viz) despite my reassurances. Therefore, before I proceed any further, let me point out something that is damned suspicious when you bother to think about it. (Not that you young mutants are trained to think—just to plot and analyze, but that's neither here nor there).

  The novels that have done the most for creatively presenting the image and philosophy of the Draka to the world at large have also served as propaganda for one of the most prominent Draka families—the von Shrakenbergs. Chew on that while I tell you the truth behind the campaign that pulled dear Eric out of reach of the Politicals and injected him firmly into the Draka ass.

  * * *

  As I was saying, I was assigned to the First Airborne, Century A, as a sharpshooter under the command of one Centurion Eric von Shrakenberg. Now all of you think that you know what kind of man dear Eric was during that period in his life. You've read the biographies of our famous Archon. You've read his own The Price of Victory, that sensitive novel that became such a best-seller among the young World War II veterans.

  Dreck! I tell you. Dreck and drivel. Far from being a sensitive young warrior, handsome and genteel, nursing doubts about the righteousness of conquest, but ready nonetheless to die for his people, the Eric von Shrakenberg I met when I reported for duty was a stoop-shouldered, dead-eyed young brute who looked like something right off a Fritz recruiting poster. He even wore his pathetic bristle of a mustache in the same style as the Fritz dictator, Adolph Hitler. This pathetic item of facial decoration was, as I recall, not "yellow" as is usually reported (I suppose he thought "blond" would sound too effeminate, a thing only a man uncertain of his masculinity would fear) but mouse brown. I suppose he bleached it in later years to help man match myth.

  When I reported for duty, Centurion von Shrakenberg positively sneered upon hearing my accent. You see, like many of those born and raised in Egypt, my accent is British in flavor rather than the lazy, plantation drawl affected by South African aristocrats like our dear Eric. Moreover, where Eric was fair with a tendency toward sunburn, my complexion was slightly swarthy with the usual accompaniment of dark eyes and hair. My bluff, good-natured features were graced by a set of truly fine whiskers. Our meeting was like night outshining day and putting day into a right funk, if I do say so myself.

  Well, I could tell from that first meeting that Eric was a bigot and I knew there would be trouble between us. Still, faithful to my training, I snapped off a pretty sharp salute. The pompous son of a bitch even managed to belittle me for that courtesy.

  "At ease, Coemer," he drawled. "Yo' don' need be so formal with me here. In Century A, we're all Draka."

  I blinked, uncertain how to reply to such nonsense. Of course we were all Draka. What else could we be? Century A was a Citizen's unit, not some hoard of jungle bunny Janissaries. I held my tongue, resolving to keep my eyes wide open and my mouth tight shut while I learned as much as I could about our commander.

  Quickly enough, I discovered Eric's great "secret." Secret! Faw! He all but bragged about how he'd had the chit he'd fathered on a favored serf wench smuggled out of the Domination.

  Later Eric's own writings would lovingly lick the liberal ass, garnering sympathy by implying that he committed this crime against Draka law out of the greatness of his heart—that he couldn't bear to see his own daughter (no matter that her mother was a wench bought for a few aurics so Eric'd stop tupping the kitchen staff and delaying dinner) raised as a slave. In this fashion, Eric presented himself to the non-Draka world as being possessed of great sensitivity, deeper than what most Draka are capable of feeling. The rest of us, of course, have had ample opportunity to recognize the discrepancy between what he wrote and how he has acted.

  Let me set you straight. Eric smuggled his serf-spawn, Anna, out of the Domination not from any love for her or her mother, but out of hatred and distrust of his father. It's well-known that there was tension between old Karl and his son—tension that came to the fore when Eric became heir upon the death of John, the old man's favorite, who was killed while mishandling a serf uprising at some mine.

  In the early years of his career, Eric never had the sense to know when to put on a pleasant facade or stop his gob. By the time he became famous, too many people knew about the tension between him and his father for him to deny it. Therefore, in an effort to save face, Eric portrayed his relationship with his father as one of like spirits possessed of different philosophies.

  One has to admire old Eric for this. He's almost as much of a sneak as I am. By claiming a similar spirit to Arch-Strategos Karl, Eric managed to co-opt the greater man's reputation into his own. In his self-created mythology, Eric von Shrakenberg becomes the best and finest product of a great line, the one in whom everyone else's deeds find their culmination.

  Dreck! The truth was, Eric hated his father for preferring his brother, John. Karl, for his part, hated Eric for living when his favorite son was dead. When it became evident that little Anna was going to resemble her mother—about whom Eric had been obsessively possessive, just ask anyone who ever tried to borrow her for a bit of fun—Eric realized that Karl could use Anna against him. The mind boggles at the possibilities.

  So Eric had seven year-old Anna smuggled off the family plantation and into the United States. There she followed in the tradition of her loving and loyal family by writing nasty (but true) things about her papa's people in books such as Daughter to Darkness: A Life.

  I know I've wandered off the subject of Century A's great deeds on the North Caucus Front, but it's important that you understand the vile sewer lurking beneath Eric's aristocratic veneer. In fact, there's one rumor—rumor only, mind you—that circulated in our company during the dark watches while Eric and his snoops slept. Keep in mind, though, that it's just a rumor.

  There were those who said more sinister things about Eric and his daughter, and these others knew him well. These said that Eric was tempted to incest with the little Anna and got her out of reach before he could give into the impulse and be reprimanded for it. Child abuse—even of serfs—is one of the few things we Draka find abhorrent. It's such a waste of good property.

  But I'm not saying that Eric von Shrakenberg really wanted to screw his own daughter. I wasn't present—like those of our company who had known him from a child—to make a fair judgment. All I can say for certain is that Eric von Shrakenberg hated his father with a passion so fierce that his entire military career was in one way or another an attempt to one up the old solider.

  * * *

  This Eric was the man I found myself serving under on April 14, 1942, when at 0400 hours we readied ourselves for our parachute drop into the partisan infested, German-held lands in the Caucasian Front. While I busied myself making certain that my gear was properly packed, I noticed the centurion idly smoking and staring at the wall while Sophie Nixon, our comtech, leered at him with what I guess she thought was hidden lust.

  Eric wants everyone to believe that he was thinking deep thoughts during those ten minutes before we leapt out of the plane, but my sincere belief is that his bowels were in as much of an uproar as were mine.

  Don't believe the nonsense they tell you—jumping out of a plane is not as good as sex. (Well, maybe it is for Eric. I've heard what the wenches at the officers' Rest Center snigger about his equipment.)

  Jumping out of a p
lane is a terrifying thing. As you walk to the hatch, your mind is flooded with memories of classmates who died during training. You see their broken, mangled bodies etched in sharp relief against the dirt. When you try to distract yourself, the statistics on how many trained skydivers die or are seriously injured during a jump rear their ugly heads for inspection. You find yourself considering which would be worse. Having a broken leg on enemy turf is no picnic, but Draka armies don't like to haul the wounded along.

  Then you make the jump, your bowels turning to water, your dry lips counting the seconds until you can pull the cord, an overstimulated imagination dreading that the parachute you so carefully packed will fail you in the end. Even when it doesn't and you're jerked up, harness straps digging into your shoulders, there's the landing to worry about. All it takes is a patch of uneven ground and you're presented with that shattered ankle or blown knee. You dangle weightless from the 'chute, straining your gaze downwards, trying to see what portion of real estate you've drawn. All around, more solid spots against the friendly darkness, are the silent figures of all those who are falling with you.

  I'm a fair man. I don't blame Eric von Shrakenberg for the loss of our legion armor, but it was a blow nonetheless. By some miracle, Century A came down with personnel and communications gear intact, but the armor we'd counted on to make our job possible landed in a gully. There was no possibility of fetching it out in time, not with our fellow Draka sprinkling onto the landscape all around, geared up to carry out their parts in the battle plan. So we left the armor where it fell. I suppose someone fished it out later. I never bothered to find out.

  No, I don't blame Eric about the armor, I don't even blame him for our being separated from the main Draka force. He isn't responsible for the vagaries of wind and terrain. On the other hand, perhaps I should blame him.