Daniel Abraham
AN AUTUMN WAR
Tor Books by Daniel Abraham
(The Long Price Quartet series):
A Shadow in Summer
A Betrayal in Winter
An Autumn War
The Price of Spring
Daniel Abraham
AN AUTUMN WAR
To Jim and Allison, without whom none of this would have been possible
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Once again, I would like to extend my thanks to Walter Jon Williams,
Melinda Snodgrass, Emily Mah, S. NI. Stirling, Terry England, Ian
Tregillis, Ty Franck, George R. R. Martin, and the other members of the
New Mexico Critical Mass Workshop.
I also owe debts of gratitude to Shawna McCarthy and Danny Baror for
their enthusiasm and faith in the project, to James Frenkel for his
unstinting support and uncanny ability to improve a manuscript, and to
Tom Doherty and the staff at Tor for their kindness and support.
AN
AUTUMN
WAR
PROLOG
Three men came out of the desert. Twenty had gone in.
The setting sun pushed their shadows out behind them, lit their faces a
ruddy gold, blinded them. The weariness and pain in their bodies robbed
them of speech. On the horizon, something glimmered that was no star,
and they moved silently toward it. The farthest tower of Far Galt, the
edge of the Empire, beckoned them home from the wastes, and without
speaking, each man knew that they would not stop until they stood behind
its gates.
The smallest of them shifted the satchel on his back. His gray
commander's tunic hung from his flesh as if the cloth itself were
exhausted. His mind turned inward, half-dreaming, and the leather straps
of the satchel rubbed against his raw shoulder. The burden had killed
seventeen of his men, and now it was his to carry as far as the tower
that rose tip slowly in the violet air of evening. Ile could not bring
himself to think past that.
One of the others stumbled and fell to his knees on wind-paved stones.
The commander paused. He would not lose another, not so near the end.
And yet he feared bending down, lifting the man up. If he paused, he
might never move again. Grunting, the other man recovered his feet. The
commander nodded once and turned again to the west. A breeze stirred the
low, brownish grasses, hissing and hushing. The punishing sun made its
exit and left behind twilight and the wide swath of stars hanging
overhead, cold candles beyond numbering. The night would bring chill as
deadly as the midday heat.
It seemed to the commander that the tower did not so much come closer as