Empire Rising (69 page)

Nevertheless, Hathor’s veterans gathered all of Korthac’s remaining followers who arrived, forced them to stand ready, and ordered them to obey his commands. Hathor, striding up and down before them, promised to kill any man who started to flee or who refused to fight. Already he had more than fifty men, half of them carrying bows, and the number continued to grow.

“We must recapture the tower,” he called out in the language of Akkad. “From there we’ll control the city.” In Egyptian, he gave different orders. “Drive the cowards toward the gate. Let them take the arrows. Then we’ll force the doorway.” He still had men in the other tower, and they would add their efforts to his.

Hathor took one last look. He had enough men, and his own bowmen would at least keep the archers atop the tower pinned down. The sun’s rays bathed the towers in a golden light. He gave the order, and, with a shout, they charged around the corner, everyone racing as fast as they could across the killing ground. Men fell, struck down by arrows, but only a few, and Hathor’s fighters surged across the open space, calling out Korthac’s name. The battle for the gates of Akkad had begun.

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Drakis swore when he saw them coming, a horde of armed men that vastly outnumbered his force. At least the waiting had ended. His archers’ arrows flashed out over the cart. Behind him, Enkidu waited on the first landing, with four archers standing single file on the steps below him, hugging the wall. If the Egyptians forced the opening, Drakis planned to retreat up the stairs fighting every step of the way, using bowmen to cover his retreat. They’d make their last stand atop the tower, where they could still control the gate.

The enemy surged across the open space and succeeded in reaching the base of the tower, ignoring their losses. The wagon shuddered in the opening, as the first of the attackers reached it, bodies slamming against its sides. Arrows flew, spear points flashed in the ever-growing sunrise, and wood creaked as a dozen of Korthac’s men made every effort to muscle the wagon aside. But the thick wheel filled the entryway, and the strakes that braced it held fast. A spear hurtled through the opening, and one of Drakis’s men screamed as the weapon took him in the chest.

Another Akkadian wrenched the spear from the dying man, and flung the weapon back through the opening. The archers fired at any target—exposed faces, hands that tried to push the wagon aside, even their enemy’s legs. But more took the place of those that fell wounded or dying, and Drakis realized that the barrier wouldn’t keep them out much longer.

The wagon moved, stopped, and moved again. Drakis heard wood snapping, and knew the men outside were tearing the wagon to shreds with their bare hands, using force of numbers to pry it loose. The smell of blood rose up in the confi ned space, mixed with the heavy breath of men shouting and cursing at their enemies. The Akkadians shot at anything that moved, any target they could see, killing shots at such close range. But despite the havoc his archers inflicted, another man always took the place of those who died.

With a lurch, the clumsy cart shifted. A moment later, the last brace tore loose, and the rear of the cart wagon lurched a pace forward, dragged away from the opening with a loud screech of wood on wood. For a moment, that gave his archers better targets, and even as the opening grew wider, they poured arrows into the crowd of men outside, snapping shafts into their ranks.

Drakis had no idea how many they killed, but the attackers began to waver. Shouting encouragement at his men, he urged them to hold the Empire Rising

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barrier, even as he plied his bow, shooting at any target that offered itself.

But by now Hathor’s bowmen had reached the base of the tower. More than anyone, they understood that safety lay in forcing the entrance. They began shooting shafts through every opening.

The man beside Drakis dropped without a sound, an arrow through his eye. Drakis stepped up into the breach and shot three arrows as fast as he could. A scream of pain rewarded him, and he kept firing, shooting at anything he could see, an arm, a leg, even a sword. He had to hold these men off, drive them back, hold until relieved. Nevertheless, half his men had fallen or taken wounds, those unable to draw a bow moving up the stairs to safety.

With a loud cracking sound, the wagon lurched away from the tower, and daylight filled the opening. Arrows from the stairs held them for a moment, but the attackers, driven from behind by Hathor, had taken on a blood rage of their own. They pressed forward into the doorway, climbing over the bodies of their own dead. Drakis shot his last arrow, then dropped his bow and drew his sword.

“Fall back,” he shouted and struck aside a spear thrust toward him.

“Fall back.”

Swinging the sword like a madman, knocking away spears and swords, Drakis retreated slowly, found the first step with his heel, and started climbing upward. For a moment, Enkidu’s archers, farther up the steps, held the enemy back, but then an arrow flashed into the tower, and an Akkadian archer fell off the steps, groaning from his wound.

To his dismay, Drakis realized the situation had worsened. The sun rays now reached the tower’s arrow slits, illuminating the interior. From the cover of the doorway, the enemy archers could fire at his men, exposed on the steps. They’d be picked off one by one if they continued to fight like this.

“Up the stairs. Everyone up the stairs.”

Two arrows struck him as he continued to back up the steps, one graz-ing his ribs and the other ripping into his left arm just above the elbow. He stumbled and would have fallen off the steps, but Enkidu reached down and grabbed him. They scrambled up the steps to the second landing, out of sight of the doorway for a moment. Cursing at his wound and shaking off weakness, Drakis kept his feet moving upward. He heard Enkidu directing the men, telling them to form another line, even as his subcommander pushed him up the steps.

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“Get to the top,” Enkidu shouted. “See what’s happening there. I’ll hold them here.”

Wincing with pain, Drakis climbed the steps, practically falling as he reached the battlement atop the tower. The sun had cleared the horizon, and the blue sky shimmered in the morning air. The fresh scent of the morning river washed over him, driving the stench of blood away for a moment. He slipped to his knees, and leaned back against the wall.

“Sit still,” Tarok said, kneeling beside him while he took a quick look at the arrow protruding from Drakis’s arm. “It’s in the bone. Stay here and I’ll bandage . . .”

“Rip it out,” Drakis ordered, his eyes shut tight against the pain washing over him. He opened them, and stared at Tarok’s sweating face, a hand’s breadth from his own. “Rip it out now.”

Tarok didn’t argue. With a grunt, he put his knee against Drakis’s shoulder, then took the wounded arm in one hand and pushed it against the wall. Tarok grasped the arrow with his other hand. Drakis flinched when Tarok gripped the shaft, but before the pain could mount, Tarok twisted the arrow and yanked on it with all his strength. A wave of agony shut out the sunlight, and Drakis couldn’t hold back the moan of anguish that forced itself from his lips. But the bloody shaft came free, bits of flesh still clinging to the arrowhead.

“Still good,” Tarok said, tossing the arrow toward the archers behind him. “Don’t move. I’ve got to bind it up, or you’ll bleed to death.” Using his knife, Tarok cut open Drakis’s tunic, tore a long strip from it, and used it to bandage the wounded arm, stretching the cloth tight to stop the bleeding.

Drakis blacked out for a few moments. When he opened his eyes, Tarok had gone, and Enkidu, blood streaming from his leg, had backed the men into the opening at the top of the battlement. Drakis struggled to his knees, found his sword, and crawled beside Enkidu. One man had found a shield, and they used that to cover themselves as they dared quick looks down the steps.

“We’re killing them,” Enkidu said. “The stairs are covered with bodies, but they keep coming. These Egyptians know how to fight. How goes it up here?”

Drakis glanced about him for the first time. “I don’t know. Can you hold . . .”

“I’ll hold them. See if help’s coming.”

Tarok, his red hair glinting in the sunlight, had returned to his men.

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Drakis saw that less than half of his original force remained, and most of those had taken wounds. Using his good hand on the top of the battlement, he pulled himself over the rough surface toward the archers still facing the other tower. A loud booming noise told him something had just struck the gate, shivering the massive wood logs. Risking a look over the wall, Drakis saw a half-dozen men trying to unbar the gate.

“Tarok! Stop those men. The gate must not open.” Drakis had lost his bow, but he picked up one lying under the battlement. When he attempted to draw it, his wounded arm refused to bear the strain, and he dropped the weapon. Cursing at his own weakness, he drew his sword again.

Tarok recognized the danger. “Don’t let them open the gate. Pin those archers down,” he shouted, jerking his head toward the enemy archers in the opposite tower. Then he stood, leaned over the wall, and began firing.

He emptied his quiver, shooting his last six arrows so rapidly that Drakis could scarcely follow his movements. Ducking back down, Tarok moved to Drakis’s side.

“I drove them off, but they’ll be back.”

“Do what you can. Keep the gate closed.” His left arm was useless, but Drakis could still hold a sword. Keeping low, he crawled back toward the tower’s entrance. Enkidu and four men defended the doorway, all of them bleeding from one wound or another.

“They’re getting ready to rush us,” Enkidu said. “Any sign of help?”

Drakis had forgotten to look toward the barracks. He moved to the other wall, pulled himself up, and endeavored to focus on the lanes leading to the gate. An arrow flew past his head, but he ignored it. A plume of thick black smoke, wavering in the morning sun, trailed up into the sky from what appeared to be the barracks. That must mean Bantor had broken through the river gate and attacked. From his vantage point, Drakis could see two of the lanes that fed into the expanse behind the gate. Men ran toward the gate, but whether friend or foe, he couldn’t tell.

He went back to Enkidu’s side, kneeling next to the opening. “Men are coming, but . . .”

A roar went up from inside the tower, as four or five arrows flashed through the opening, miraculously striking none of the defenders. Then the Egyptians, shouting their war cries, rushed the last few steps separating them from their enemies.

Staying on his knees, Drakis used his sword, thrusting at anything that appeared on the landing. Tarok’s men, crouched over to avoid arrows from 412

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the other tower, took their time, using the last of their arrows against those attackers trying to force their way onto the battlement. Swords clashed, spears shoved and prodded, and men screamed in each other’s faces. The attackers surged toward the opening again and again, but each time they faltered. Only a few men could approach on the stairs at one time. After the third attempt, the Egyptians halted their efforts, returning to the safety of the landing to regroup.

Drakis looked about. Enkidu had taken another wound, and leaned against the battlement, trying to catch his breath. Tarok, sword in his hand, had taken his place. It took only a moment to count those able to fight. Five men remained, and only one had a bow in his hands. That one scrambled about, picking up any stray shafts that lay about.

One more attack, Drakis decided. One more rush and they’d be finished, overwhelmed. He heard the attackers gathering inside the tower, taking their time now that the Akkadians had exhausted their arrows. Suddenly Korthac’s war cry echoed eerily throughout the tower, as the Egyptians’ followers raced up the last flight of steps, and hurled themselves at the opening.

Alexar paused when he reached the main gate, studying the situation while he struggled to catch his breath. The sounds of battle echoed from the left tower, and he guessed that Drakis and his men had taken refuge in there, no doubt fighting for their lives. The expanse now held plenty of panicky men, most of them heading toward the gate itself. In a few moments, they’d have the gate open.

The right tower, only a few dozen paces away, seemed deserted except for some of Korthac’s bowmen on the battlement above. He made up his mind. Eskkar had said to keep the gate shut, and clearly Drakis didn’t have enough men.

“We’ll take the other tower. Let’s go.”

Alexar, Yavtar, and their men burst out of the lane, running at full speed toward the tower’s entrance, mixing in with the crowd of frightened villagers and bandits rushing toward the gate. Alexar never hesitated or slowed. He dashed into the tower, sword in his right hand, bow in his left.

No one challenged him, so he sprinted up the stairs, expecting resistance at each landing, but finding no one to oppose him.

At the top, he broke into full daylight, never stopping. Almost a dozen Empire Rising

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men, bows in their hands, faced away from him, searching for targets on the opposite tower. Alexar was on them before they knew he was there, dropping his bow and striking at a dark-skinned Egyptian.

At such close range, swords were more useful than bows, and he had two men down before they could react. By then Yavtar and the others were beside him, all of them hacking and shouting Eskkar’s name, making the battle cry again echo over the city. The Egyptian archers, taken by surprise and with their bows in their hands, couldn’t react fast enough.

They clutched at their swords, but by then Alexar and his seven men had joined the fight.

Pinning their opponents to the tower wall, the Akkadians wielded their swords like men possessed by demons. Two men fell screaming over the wall, to land with a loud thud just in front of the gate. In a few savage moments, Alexar’s men swept the battlement clean.

Alexar’s lungs burned with every breath. The dash up the tower steps, the furious, close-in fighting, had sapped his strength. Gathering his bow from where he’d dropped it, Alexar peered over the wall toward the other tower. He saw men struggling there, and picked out Tarok, his red hair waving, fighting with a sword. Drakis must have retreated to the top of the battlement, and the Egyptians must be about to swarm over the Akkadians.