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"Final review at noon, Major. Colonel's orders. Three generals will be in attendance."
"Thank you. Eat up-" Valentine said, indicating the tray. Narcisse always issued him three times the breakfast he could consume and there was a pile of sliced ham on the tray the height of a New Universal Church Archon's bible.
Ahn-Kha wedged himself between chair and desk.
"Generals, eh?" Duvalier said. "I'm going to make myself scarce. Striped trousers are for clowns."
Valentine looked at his row of battle dress and wondered which one could be pressed sufficiently for the occasion.
None of them, really. Whatever the Razors were all about, whatever was dying that afternoon, wasn't about creased trousers.
* * * *
"I'm sorry, Valentine," Meadows said out of the side of his mouth as they approached the four generals on the bandstand that last night had barely contained Black Lightning. "He tagged along at the last minute."
Post and some of the other nonambulatory wounded sat behind them on the stand so they could see. The remaining Razors were drawn up in a great U of six attenuated companies in the open parking-lot space in front of the bandstand. Ahn-Kha stood with the senior NCOs, Hank with a group of Aspirants, and Narcisse watched from high on the shoulder of one of his soldier's husbands. In the center, a color guard of Bears took down the Razors' boar-silhouette flag. They did it badly, and the men coming together as they folded it looked like a mistimed football hike. The Bears did everything badly.
Except fight.
They presented the triangular folded flag to Meadows, who accepted it as he would a baby.
Valentine looked at the rows of men for what was probably the last time. They looked hard in their battle dress, hard in the relaxed way that only men who'd seen bloodshed could manage. But Valentine didn't see them as iron-thewed heroes. They were more like blown-glass sculptures, beautiful in their irregularity, their variety of colors, heights, and shapes. And just like the glass vessels, tiny shards of fast-flying shrapnel could convert them into a shattered ruin of gristle, blood, and half-digested food in an eyeblink. He'd seen it more than once, and once was enough for any sane man.
Their delicacy made them all the more precious.
Then he and Meadows turned and walked to the generals. Valentine knew each, one by name, but only one from experience.
General Martinez.
The man who'd executed two of his Grogs, and would have killed Ahn-Kha right before Valentine's eyes, was the second-highest-ranking officer gathered at the ceremony, subordinate only to MacCallister, who'd supervised the drive on Dallas-Fort Worth. Valentine knew that he held some rear-area post as a reward for his resistance-such as it was-during Solon's brief reign over the Ozarks.
Old and very bad blood linked Valentine and Martinez. In the crowning irony, Valentine's whole rising in Little Rock and his defense of Big Rock Mountain had taken place under Martinez's command. But only technically; Martinez hadn't moved a man to his assistance when he was most needed.
There were salutes, and when the salutes were done, handshakes.
"Congratulations on your staff appointment, Major Valentine," MacCallister said from beneath a white mustache that mostly hid a missing incisor when he spoke.
"Richly deserved," Meadows put in.
They sidestepped.
Valentine gave Martinez a formal salute, returned equally formally.
"General," Valentine said.
"Major," General Martinez returned. He still looked like a turtle, even in his green-and-brown dress uniform. He didn't offer his hand.
Meadows led Valentine to a chair behind and to the right of the generals. He passed Valentine the Razors' flag.
"You deserve this more than anyone," Meadows said quietly. "They always were yours."
"Co-"
"Shut up, Major. That's an order."
MacCallister said a few words thanking the men for their bravery, devotion, and sacrifice. He read out the Razors' list of regimental achievements and citations, and explained that skilled men were desperately needed elsewhere, and it was his sad duty to order the dissolution of the battered regiment.
"A grateful Free Republic thanks you," General MacCallister said as he dismissed the men. Evidently progress had been made in the governance of the bits of four states that comprised the Freehold.
