The Protector's War by S. M. Stirling Page A

elaborate harness of an A-lister—the Bearkiller elite force—and there was a crisp lordliness in the gesture he made to the troops.
    â€œTo the Mackenzie—salute!”
    His squad lined the road and crashed the ironshod butts of pike and halberd and glaive down on the pavement. The leaves of the inner gate were pulled back to either side—massive doors of welded steel beams running on tracks set into the concrete of the roadway.
    Juniper led her people into the echoing gate tunnel, under the chill shadow of the massive stone. As she rode, she looked up at the murder holes above, where boiling oil or water, flaming gasoline or hard-driven bolts could be showered down at need; and at the fangs of the twin portcullis that could be tripped to drop and seal the passageway off.
    You could call Mike Havel a hard man, but not a bad one; he and his friends were capable, rather—and realists. But you could say they were businesslike to a daunting degree, which was mostly a good thing, and had saved her life and others’ many times, but…
    There was still a hulking brutal strength to the stonework; when she looked at it the ancient ballads she’d sung for so many years came flooding back, with a grimness added to their words by hard personal experience since the Change. You could hear the roaring shouts and the screams, the wickering flight of arrows and the ugly cleaver sound of steel in flesh, smell the burning.
    â€œMy, and haven’t we come a long way in nine short years,” she murmured, as they rode out into the bright sunshine and the rolling vineyards beyond the earthwork, their hooves beating hollow on the planks of the drawbridge.
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    It’s a good thing that there’s no more copyright, Mike Havel thought. Astrid would be going to the big house for all the places she ripped off the details for this, not on a visit to her friends’.
    This ceremony was much more private than the testing of the gunpowder, although it also involved a circle of watchers standing with swords drawn. It was on the rear patio behind the big house, with all the registered A-list members not on inescapable duty standing in serried, armored ranks on either side of the broad pathway that led to the old swimming pool. Otherwise only the apprentice candidates were present. There were seven this time—inductions were held every few months—all sternly controlling their excitement, all between eighteen and twenty-one, and showing the effects of a night spent sleepless and fasting. They were in the full kit of the Bearkiller elite, except for the helmet and blade.
    Havel stood beside the brazier where the iron heated, near a trestle that bore seven swords; the light crinkle of sound from the charcoal could be heard clearly; the only other sounds were the sough of the wind and an occasional chinking rustle from two hundred ninety-one chain hauberks.
    Not that I’ve got any objection to ceremonies. Any force needs them, like uniforms and flags and medals and songs. The Corps had some great ones…well, people have already died for the Bearkillers. All it takes is time to add majesty, I suppose. To these kids it’s the biggest deal there is. Let’s make it perfect for them.
    The military apprentices approached. Will Hutton stepped out to bar their path, resting the point of his backsword against the breast of the first; he was a wiry man well into his forties, with blunt features and skin the color of old oiled walnut wood and tight-curled graying hair, the drawling Texan rasp still strong in his voice.
    â€œWho comes?” the second-in-command of the Bearkillers asked. “And why?”
    â€œMilitary apprentice Patrick Mallory, sir,” the young man answered clearly. “I come to claim membership in the Outfit’s A-list.”
    â€œHave you passed all the tests of arms and skill and character?”
    â€œSir, I have.”
    Hutton raised his voice: “Is there