"That sounds right. He was exploding about it at breakfast one morning. We were old enough to eat with our parents instead of in the nursery."
"They converted because they were offered a really advantageous marriage with the Kämmerer von Worms-Dalberg family on condition that they turned Catholic. Ever since then, they've been forcing a really assertive version of the Counter-Reformation in their lands."
"What Captain Ulfsparre said was that they might well decide to fort up and resist when they see General Brahe and the Lutherans coming."
"They're cousins of the von Hatzfeldts, too."
"Which ones? There are dozens of von Hatzfeldts."
"The important ones. The bishop of Würzburg, his brother the imperial general, and the canon who's still in Mainz looking out for their interests as best he can."
"Isn't that charming?"
"We're not going right at Landstuhl, today, though. This village we're headed for is some way to the south. A dinky little place called Krickenbach. They think we need to go there before Brahe can have a shot at Landstuhl. Something to do with the quarries and which of the villages are deserted and which aren't, but I'm not sure what. 'Need to know' and all that sort of thing, I suppose."
"Deserted?"
"Because of the war. The Ring of Fire may have calmed things down a lot in Thuringia and Franconia, but over here the mercenaries have just kept moving. For one thing, a lot of these little noble territories are, one way or the other, dependencies of the Elector Palatine, which means they've been right in the middle of the political mess from the start."
Hertling frowned at the map. "Once we secure that, then over to Linden, north to Queidersbach, through Bann . . . After that we'll hit Landstuhl and have to do something about Nannstein."
"I hate deserted villages." Merckel picked up his hat. "Too many sheds that ought to be empty but can hold really nasty surprises if the other side has thought to put them there. It's harder for them to do that when there are still people around to object."
"General Brahe's not going to try to besiege Nannstein, I hope," Sergeant Hartke said. "I hate sieges."
"No, I don't think so," Eberhard said. "This campaign is supposed to be moving fast. The Sickingens don't have much of a garrison there. The general will just surround it and cut it off. Once the we've taken the whole west bank of the Rhine down past Strassburg, they won't have many options left."
"Hey, Joel," Jeffie yelled. "Look at this. There's a place on this map called Frankenstein."
"That's not a defense point we have to worry about." Eberhard was quite serious. "It's not on our path and the walls were destroyed about seventy years ago. Nannstein's the one that might be a problem if it turns out to have more of a garrison than the general thinks it does."
He couldn't imagine why the two up-timers kept laughing.
Captain Duke Eberhard pulled up his horse. "As soon as we finish up here, Captain Ulfsparre said, we're to clear up and prepare to push south toward Pirmasens, then east to Weissenburg."
"I wish General Brahe hadn't taken most of the regiment west to Merkweiler," Friedrich said. "We're just one company."
Eberhard shook his head. "He's going to leave a good-sized garrison there to secure the Pechelbronn oil fields for the USE, since production is so far down at Wietze because of Turenne's raid. That's why he took Major Utt, Garand, and Matowski with him. He thinks the up-timers need to take a look at what's there so they can report to the technical people back in Magdeburg. It's so close to the borders of Lorraine that the French will be an ongoing problem if they keep mucking around in the politics of the Lorrainers. Then Brahe will secure Saarbrücken and head south himself. Since he'll be leaving the other regiments behind at Merkweiler, he wanted the rest of Colonel von Zitzewitz's men to be with him when he comes back toward us, just in case, even if all the information he has does indicate that Duke Bernhard has pulled back even farther, to the south of Colmar. Come on."
They came around a curve. Eberhard stopped again, the other men behind him.
"Captain, sir."
"Yes."
"I don't like the look of that village up ahead."
"Merckel, you haven't liked the look of any village we've seen these past three days."
"Are we sure we know where General Brahe's other regiments are?" Friedrich asked.
"The communications people are using the 'radio' sets. As of last night, when they strung up the antenna wire, if they really know where they are—which is by no means a sure thing in this uncertain world in which we live—then we know where they are. Manteufel is past Haguenau. Glasenapp is past Schlettstadt, nearly to Colmar. That's as far as we're going on this campaign. The general doesn't want to overextend his lines, Captain Ulfsparre said."