1635_ The Eastern Front - Eric Flint [101]
His infantry force—what was left of it; there were at least twenty bodies scattered not far from the gorge entrance—was in full retreat. Rout, rather. No, even "rout" didn't do justice to it. They were racing off like so many mice, discarding their weapons and even their armor as they ran.
Thereby displaying the intelligence of rodents, as well. Disarmed and scattered, in these mountains, they'd never survive the pursuit that Kresse's men were sure to set underway.
Had already set underway, rather. The sounds of gunfire were continuing. Those were all rifles, too. Hunters' weapons.
There was nothing Bravnicar could do about it. All that was left now was to get his Slovenes out of the disaster, if possible.
He had no great hopes.
As soon as Georg Kresse saw the cavalry officer trotting out of the gorge, he stood up and cupped his hands around his mouth.
"Hey there!" he shouted. First in German, then in Slovene. His knowledge of that language was limited, but Kresse knew some words in several of the Balkan tongues. Then, for good measure, he shouted the words again in Czech. He was almost as fluent in that language as he was in his native German.
The Slovene officer had stopped his horse and was staring up at Georg. He'd drawn a wheel-lock pistol from a saddle holster and had it at the ready, but he wasn't pointing it up the slope. At this range, he didn't have much chance of hitting Kresse anyway and they both knew it.
"Parlay!" shouted Georg, in German and Czech. He didn't know the word in Slovene, so he used the term for talk instead. Probably not in a grammatically correct manner—he could be saying "talking!" or "to talk!" instead of "let's talk!"—but he figured the enemy officer would get the point.
After a moment, the officer nodded. He put the pistol back in its holster and then shouted something to the cavalrymen under his command. They were now positioned some fifty yards down the trail and had dismounted and taken up defensive positions. They'd done that fairly well, for cavalrymen.
Not that it would do them much good if fighting resumed. Georg had no doubt at all that he'd win any battle here. But these Slovenes were tough enough and good enough that he'd lose at least half a dozen men and have twice as many wounded. Some of those would die later.
He saw no point to it. The Slovene officer's behavior made it obvious that he'd found the elector—his body, rather—and had no further duties here. With John George dead, Kresse wanted to intervene as soon as possible and as effectively as he could in the political situation that would already be unfolding in Dresden. By now, the CoC contingent should have arrived in the city and become active. They'd grow very quickly, too. The Saxon capital already had a large number of people who considered themselves members or sympathizers of the CoCs. They hadn't had much organizational experience, but the newly arrived cadre from Magdeburg would take care of that soon enough.
Kresse considered the CoC people to be allies. But allies did not necessarily see everything the same way. After the years he and his people had spent fighting the elector in the mountains of the Vogtland, Georg was determined to have a say in what came next.
To do that, however, he had to get to Dresden, with as many of his people as possible. It would be foolish to delay or suffer casualties in a fracas with Slovene mercenaries with whom he had no real grievance.
He didn't hold their profession against them. These were hard times for any man. Several of his own relatives—an uncle and three cousins—had gone off to fight in the wars. Only one of them had ever come back, a cousin who was now missing his left arm below the elbow.
Once the Slovene officer was satisfied that his men understood the situation and wouldn't unsettle anything, he dismounted from his horse and took several steps away from it. Then, spread his hands a bit to show that he held no weapons. All he was now carrying was the saber belted to his waist.
"Come with me," Georg said to Wilhelm,