Conflagration by Mick Farren

had been inducted into their army, he had been given the rank of major as a matter of convenience, and so, in the chain of command, he was technically their superior. Raphael also did not share the young staff officers’ view of the war. He knew too much about Mosul discipline and Mosul tenacity to believe the armies of Hassan IX could simply be herded back to Savannah like so many stray sheep. He kept his own council, however, and said nothing. Since he had come to Albany, Raphael had learned the knack of keeping himself to himself.
    The fighting machine was now lumbering on, laying a pall of smoke and vented steam and leaving deeply gouged tracks in its wake. Two more of the massive contraptions followed, also bothering his horse, and forcing Raphael to keep the mare on a very tight rein. A troop of lancers passed behind him at a brisk trot, their reined-in mounts tossing their heads and snorting. The army of Albany was dividing into its components, making ready for battle in a state of controlled military chaos that made no sense to those actually in the middle of it, but, Raphael devoutly hoped, was perfectly clear to the commanders with the overall view. A column of infantry formed ranks, and then marched out with slung rifles and the peaks of their caps down over their eyes. As this column of fours hit their stride, one of the chosen men struck up a song, and the whole company joined in with the lusty and reckless confidence of swaddies who had drunk their gin ration fast and early and are deliberately not thinking about what the future might have up its sleeve.
Oh, farewell Mary, I must march
On and on and on and on
I’ll miss your tits and I’ll miss your arse
On and on and on and on
From Brooklyn Town to Carver’s Bay
Over the hills and far away.
    The infantry company moved out, and their song merged into the general cacophony of mobilization; the shouts of sergeants, the noise of horses, the grind and cough of machinery. He glanced around, and then pulled out his pocket watch. Where were the others? They should have been at the assembly point by this time. He experienced a second of unease. He was in the right place, wasn’t he? He checked and quickly reassured himself that this was the part of the camp specified in the orders that they had all received the previous night. It was not unusual for Raphael to be the first to arrive at any designated meeting. Since he remained so much on his own, feeling more secure in the company of his sketch pad than other people, he usually had less to delay him than Cordelia, Argo, or Jesamine. Argo might well be still curing a hangover. Jesamine had become quite unpredictable since she’d taken up with the Ohio, and Cordelia made no secret that she considered punctuality a petty bourgeois preoccupation, well below the considerations of a lady. Even during the rigors of training, she was habitually late, and when she did arrive, she could usually be counted on to complain.
    Of course, during training, they had all complained, but only Raphael had been unable to air his supposed grievances with total conviction. He had been through the horrors of a Mosul boot camp, and nothing in the long winter training could compare with that nightmare. Except, maybe in one respect. The training of The Four had been a whole lot harder on the intellect. The Mosul’s goal was to turn their Provincial Levies into mindless automatons, who would simply obey like brutes, without thought or question. It was made clear that the packed rank and file of the Mosul infantry were valued less than the horses of the Mamalukes. They were worth nothing and they need expect nothing, except to be a lowly component in one of the infamous “human waves” that were hurled against the enemy and expected to prevail by sheer weight of numbers, regardless of the death toll. Hadn’t Gunnery Instructor Y’assir always reminded Raphael’s squad when he threatened them with execution for one of the dozen or more