Darkstone - An Evil Reborn (Book 4) (29 page)

“Is Peeron with you?”

Anchor made a face and then shook his head. “No, he’s holed up in Highfield, afraid to engage the army in front of us. He’s got orders to head towards Foxhome and join up with Bastian’s army that will attack Histron’s main force directly from the east.”

“North, south and east. With Foxhome tight against the mountains, you’ll have Histron penned in.”

“That’s the idea. Lessa actually takes care of the west. We’ll see if it works. We wouldn’t be here, if we hadn’t suborned the Five Duchy army. They are all on our side now. What you see before you is his Eastern army, probably Histron’s own, plus most of Happly’s mercenaries, I guess. If Peeron hadn’t unwittingly flushed them out, they could have won the day in the north. As it is, with your forces, we can inflict heavy damage. Valetan forces won’t arrive for a day or two, but now they’ll arrive just in time to guard prisoners.”

Anchor shook his head and laughed as his desperate strategy had turned less so with Tishiaki’s arrival. “Never say there aren’t surprises on the battlefield.”

“I never have,” Tishiaki said in his typically droll manner. He looked ahead and saw the fires beginning to wink out and smaller pin pricks of light stirred up the view. “The enemy is mustering.”

Tishiaki led a quarter of his army to the South, and then swung towards the southern edge forward creating a wedge of sorts to tighten up the push west. The rest of his men would guide the center rogue army towards Duke Jellas’s end of the funnel.  

The cavalry rode to establish much the same thing along the forest’s edge after being warned not to get in the way of Lotto’s battle mages. Anchor took his place in front of the rest of the Learsean army. His line formed a huge arc meant to contain the enemy. He looked to his left and right. The darkness swallowed his army, but his rear attack numbered five thousand men and women. Jellas commanded more than that ahead of him. Anchor smiled. Histron’s army will have real pressure from both ends.

The enemy’s lines were ragged. Anchor’s decision to fight a night engagement wasn’t consistent with his desire to minimize losses, but he reiterated to the soldiers that they wanted the army to surrender. He waved his torch and rode forward towards the rear of his enemy’s line. Supply wagons had been lined up as barricades. They wouldn’t stop the Gensleran cavalry, which had by now penetrated through the forest past them and could attack them along their more lightly defended north side.

“I would ask for a parlay!” Anchor shouted the words as loudly as he could, waving a white cloth on the end of his sword. “We don’t want to take your lives, men of the Red Kingdom!  Princess Sallia lives and possesses the Bloodstone. She doesn’t want more blood spilt. Those of you from Highfield will be able to go back to your homes. I can guarantee that Histron will not return to rule you.”

An armored officer rode out from a gap in the wagons. “With these men, you’ve only got a token force at Sally’s Corners. You are the ones exposed. You are a fool!”

“Look at the uniforms. These are soldiers from Learsea; trained in battle, fighting you last fall. You are caught between an ever-increasing force to the West and us. Put down your weapons. We want the Red Kingdom reunited. The southern duchies and your southern forces have joined our side under General Bastian. Death and destruction of your homes, farms and families await you, if you choose to prolong this fight.”

Anchors words would mean little to Histron’s closest officers, the mercenaries and any Dakkorans in the field ahead of him. He’d still try to get them to surrender, for Sallia.

The officer said nothing. The night sky lit up as a fireball headed for Anchor. One of the Ropponi at his side threw it back from where it came with her power. It exploded within the enemy’s ranks. She followed it up with an orange fireball of her own.

“We have powerful battle mages, as well.”

The officer put his hands up and rode forward. “I’m not one of Histron’s men, but have been charged with the supply wagons. Let me talk to my men.”

“I’ll give you a quarter of an hour,” Anchor said. He stood his ground. Explosions began to rumble in the air some distance from where they stood. Lotto’s mages would be attacking once they saw the lights to his east.

The officer returned, again with his hands held high. “Some men will take up your offer, others won’t. I’ll not force them.”

“You do them a disservice, but I understand. Have them walk from the wagons without their weapons. Any evidence of hostility and we will cut those with weapons down where they stand. Understood?”

The officer nodded and rode back. Men began to dribble out of the rogue army encampment. Anchor had his men clear a wide space for them. The officer walked with them and stood at Anchor’s side.

A roar of shouting and then a clash of weapons sounded near. The rogue army began to turn on itself. Wagons were moved out of the way. As men surrendering began to be cut down by their fellow soldiers.

“We will have to go in, officer,” Anchor said.

“Do what you have to. Give quarter where you can.”

“My men have already been instructed to do so.”

Anchor told officers in the rank behind him. “Fight the men with weapons and those who don’t let them walk back.” Anchor raised his sword and plunged into the gap. The torchlight was enough to find the glint of swords and pikes and spears. Battle cries came from the Gensleran cavalry and the hoped-for orderly surrender became a melee.

~

From his perch in a tree, Lotto located a group of battle mages by their lack of uniforms, sitting by fires close to one another. In the darkness a bright red fireball arced high in the East where Anchor’s cavalry should be. Lotto had to smile as it reversed course to slam into the enemy forces. An orange fireball flew back from where Anchor. Where did Anchor find a mage? The enemy’s battle mages rose from the warmth of their fires along with others in the enemy army gazing towards the South.

“Get ready,” he said to his battle mages. The army this far to the front were still gathering at fires or sleeping in their tents. “We will attack the mages with explosions and fire of our own. Once we have started, we move left and then right and then back. Don’t stay in the same spot.”

They nodded in the darkness. All of them used a small spell of enhanced sight that Lotto taught them, so they could quickly move in the forest. Lotto nodded and the enemy battle mages disappeared behind sparkling fireballs and deafening explosions.

The men under Lotto’s command ran left as the mages began to return their fire. Blasted trees obliterated the area where they had once stood.

One of the enemy mages spelled a wind to carry away the dust and smoke. The effort not only aided the enemy mages, but Lotto could tell what damage he had done. Less than half of Histron’s battle mages stood. Again, the alliance mages attacked and ran through the desolation towards standing trees.

Lotto just shook his head at the stupidity of the enemy battle mages. Only a few still remained standing fists clenched peering into the woods, totally exposed. He remembered the Valetan mages that accompanied Morio and his rangers into Happly the previous year. These men were no smarter than they. As the remaining mages threw fire and destruction towards their last location, Lotto pointed at them. The smoke didn’t clear from any spells this time. The smoke meant one small victory over the enemy.

He hoped they had obliterated the biggest group of mages in the army, but they would move a bit more east towards the center of the army camp in case they saw more mage fire.

~

Duke Jellas began to advance towards the enemy. Their lines weren’t orderly since they had to cross the same tortured ground that had stopped his foe that afternoon. He worried that the terrain would hamper their retreat, but he moved forward until he had established his lines along a line of newly made earthen walls on both sides.

The Ropponi had effectively cleared out the sentries. He stumbled over one of them, armed to the teeth, but without the life to use his weapons. When he had assembled his battle line at least ten deep, he nodded to the buglers.

The cacophony of bugles and drums and swords on shields pierced the night. He heard the sounds repeated along his lines. The enemy lit torches as they began to prepare for action. Archers at the forest’s edge, to the North, let arrows fly into the enemy ranks. Then another flight hit the army at the center, followed by more arrows from the South.

Jellas took his four thousand men and plunged into the enemy. They hadn’t been able to form any kind of lines and the duke found that bloodying the enemy was easier than expected. The commanders of this rogue army didn’t expect an attack. He let the flow of battle move around him and further towards the enemy.

The Duke was winded enough from leading his men and retreated behind a berm with a small group of soldiers to protect him along with his buglers. He observed the sounds of battle, but little could be seen in the chaotic darkness. Men began to leave the field heading for them with their hands held high. He smiled at that. Their pleas to those loyal to Princess Sallia began to work just as they had elsewhere.

Far in the distance, he noticed the arc of a mage’s fireball, and then many more began to light up the night, Lotto’s mages must have attacked a specific knot of the enemy who returned with spells cast back towards Lotto. He’d never seen such power displayed at night before and he stood transfixed by the power expended by the two groups. After a few violent exchanges the clashes stopped. Lotto’s group sent the last volley. He hoped they had taken care of Histron’s mages. Good men on both sides would be saved from that kind of damage. Despite Lotto and Anchor’s history as mages, Jellas didn’t really mind a thinning of battle mages on Besseth.

Jellas had the buglers sound the retreat. For a few tense moments, Jellas couldn’t see any change in the battle, and then he heard curses in the dark as men tripped and fell over the broken land and finally assembled at the cleared area where they would make their stand and grind Histron’s army to bits.

He expected the enemy’s pressure to grow, but the men stood fighting the enemy, but it didn’t seem like the press of ten thousand men.

A Ropponi appeared at his side. “A Learsea force has arrived and has moved to flank the Histron army. Anchor fights with them. Together with the cavalry, they number nearly five thousand. Many of the enemy are surrendering,” she said with a thick Ropponi accent.

“Tell Anchor that the expected press of troops has not yet happened. We are taking in surrendering enemy troops as well.”

She winked out.

Disarmed enemy continued to walk past him, guarded by his men. So many were deserting Histron. He worried about his men adequately guarding them. “Make sure we have the surrendered forces surrounded by our men in the village main street,” Jellas said.

A commander rushed to his side. “The enemy army is fighting itself.”

“Get our men out of the fight and reorder.” Jellas said. He’d been through enough battles in his years to recognize that this one would soon spin out of control if they didn’t withdraw.

He looked back at the village and heard the sounds of fighting. Not with swords but fists. A sorcerer’s ball of flame slammed into The Traveler’s Rest.

Jellas gave the command of the troops to the officer and ran back to the center of the village.

“Where is the sorcerer?” he said, as his men began to restore order to the riot.

They all withdrew from a still figure on the ground.

“Torch!” the Duke commanded. The man had the black hair and honey-colored skin he recognized as Dakkoran. One of their sorcerers had infiltrated the surrendering men. He looked at the inn and called to the prisoners. “Stop that fire!  You’ve surrendered, now you’re on our side. Get to work!” He pointed at the growing flames, the ground grew brighter with flickering shadows and a bucket brigade began to form.

Satisfied that the fire wouldn’t spread to the rest of the village, Jellas hurried back to the front. Another Ropponi appeared where the duke had stood before.

“You there!  Are you from Anchor?”

The woman nodded.

“Message?”

“Withdraw your men from the fight and let the invaders fight each other. That is from Anchor.”

Jellas had already done that. “I’ve anticipated him. Tell Anchor that there are Dakkoran wizards surrendering with Bessethians. Be careful.”

~

Shiro would be busy with the Sunstone tomorrow, Anchor thought, as he finally persuaded his men to withdraw. So many to determine if they were really sincere.  Shiro would have to find a way to prioritize his winnowing. One of Shiro’s women walked over to him.

“Duke Jellas says that there are Dakkoran wizards among the deserting foe.”

Anchor nodded. “Stay close.” He found Tishiaki giving quick commands to his officers as the wedge converged on the enemy army.

“We are not fighting, but have become guards,” Tishiaki said.

Anchor nodded, but he already knew that. “Do you know what Dakkorans look like?”

Tishiaki nodded curtly the way Ropponis did. “I do.”

“Take a few of your Ropponi and go through the prisoners. If they look like a Dakkoran, or dress like one, put extra guards around them. Jellas said he found a Dakkoran sorcerer.”