The Forgotten War (50 page)

Slowly, keeping rank discipline, the two sets of men moved over the soft earth towards each other.

Cheris stopped for a second. It would take all night to drain his staff in this manner, she thought; maybe another approach was in order. Options raced through her mind and she
had decided on trying something a little more powerful when she sensed him again, earlier this time.

He was trying another fireball.

She looked ahead and to her left. The infantry was closely packed, preparing to engage the enemy; a fireball in the front ranks now would be devastating. She knew what she had to do.

For the first time that night she drew on the power of her staff. She saw the other realm in her mind, could see her foe, as before, attempting to pull power from it to fuel the conflagration he
wished to inflict upon her battle brothers.

Not this time, she thought. Not this time.

She put herself between him and the divide. The power he was drawing she pulled into herself, and as it entered her mind she felt numb and shocked, as though she had shoved her head into a
bucket of ice water. The power itself was unfocused – because it was not her who had called it forth, it was too amorphous for her to shape and use, so she released it into her staff whence
it shot forth in a spectacular display of blue, green and white light, exploding among the stars above her.

Across the field in the copse a ball of fiery red that had been growing slowly for many heartbeats sputtered and went out.

She suddenly found herself leaning on the staff, her legs felt weak; draining his power had cost her a little, after all. She collected herself, breathing heavily. She remembered Anaya talking
about how the constant use of her powers had a price; she needed a minute to gather her strength. Seeing her straitened condition, Sir Norton turned and faced her.

‘Are you all right, my Lady?’

‘Fine,’ she gasped. ‘Thank you, I am fine.’

She consoled herself with the thought that the mage facing her had tried two fireballs; he would hardly be full of vigour himself. The battle between the two of them would be as much a war of
attrition as that about to take place in the plain beneath her.

There were barely twenty yards between the opposing factions. The baiting between them was in full swing.

‘Come and get your moustaches trimmed!’ a young joker in Vinoyen’s ranks called out.

‘You can’t hold a spear with six fingers,’ a man in the Arshuman first company called back. In Arshuma the men of Tanaren were often seen as rustic or inbred.

‘My grandma could take on you lot, and she’s been dead six years!’ A Felmere man, better armoured than his companions, an obvious veteran with a poor opinion of his enemy.

‘Get some of this, you snail-eating sacks of shit!’ A man in the Lasgaart front ranks, lofting his axe. He was clean-shaven and weather-beaten with the broad musculature of the
farmer; obviously a man not educated in the language of the biting satirist.

‘I am gonna wipe my arse with your baby-blue banner!’ A young Arshuman in the Fourth Company, wearing the conical helmet so favoured by his companions. He was referring to the banner
of Tanaren, whose colour matched the traditional one of the first gift given to a male new-born back in his home town.

The pace of the drumming had got more frenetic as the sides moved closer, but then suddenly, with barely fifteen yards between them, it stopped. Just for a second, apart from the crackling of
burning wood and the mournful hoot of a single owl, silence reigned. They were close enough to see the faces of their enemy and fleetingly they saw how young they were, how small, how nervously
they held the spear wavering before them, how the sweat stood out beaded on their faces, plastering hair to their heads. They could see their stubble, their blackened teeth, their breath frosting
in the crisp night air. They imagined their personal effects, mementoes and letters from their family, small carved wooden figures of the Gods all secreted as close to their person as possible. No
one wanted to die unremembered, after all.

Then, as one, the horns sounded the charge.

Shields locked, spears gripped before them, they obeyed. And they shouted and roared, a bestial roar from the bottom of their primeval souls as the battle lust overtook them.

From their vantage point Dominic and Felmere heard the shock of the shields clashing, wood and metal hammering against each other as the great push and shove of battle began.
Ahead of them, Reynard Lanthorpe and his resplendent heavy cavalry started to move into a flanking position supported by the light cavalry.

‘We will move down shortly,’ said Felmere ‘We need to see what their cavalry does first.’

‘They have no heavy cavalry to speak of, which is good; at least there will be no lances riding into the backs of our men.’

‘Nor into theirs unfortunately; their cavalry protect them too well. Our job is to wait for a break in their ranks and to try and push a wedge through them.’

‘It may take a while,’ said Dominic. ‘Their discipline is as strong as ours.’

‘Not to mention, their general watches out for the weak links in his men so that he can execute them afterwards. Felmere indicated with his arm: between the copse holding their mage and
the furthest south of the Arshuman infantry blocks was a small, rocky hill. Perched on it under a yellow-and black-banner was the Arshuman general, mounted, surrounded by some thirty heavy cavalry,
the only unit of its type that they possessed.

‘That’s King Aganosticlan for you, a man who thinks nothing of his subjects aside from what they can do for him.’ Dominic’s tone was deeply disapproving.

‘Yet a formidable foe nevertheless; he must have drained his treasury many times over to keep this war going, and he refuses to negotiate a peace of any kind.’

‘Nor should there be one, while Roshythe and Lake Winmead are in his hands.’

Felmere sighed. ‘I have to admit, I no longer care. We have not held either of them for ten years and they are still a long way away from here. Sound the withdrawal.’

The horn signal came and the tired ranks, burnt out after a few minutes of desperate pushing and spear thrusting, withdrew from the fray, retreating until there was a gap between the armies of
some twenty to thirty feet. The wounded were left in the no-man’s-land writhing and crying pitifully. Ranks were redressed and everyone waited for the next signal.

Cheris watched the on-going conflict; she was feeling a little stronger now and her eyes were set on the Arshuman cavalry, which was effectively cocooning the flanks of the
army, keeping them protected while also being poised to try and outflank the Tanaren soldiers should the opportunity arise. Her mind was racing with the things she could possibly do when she heard
a swish and felt a draught as something flew inches past her nose.

‘Get down!’ shouted Sir Norton. He ran and stood in front of her as she crouched down to her knees. Some of the other knights ran off into the trees where shadowy figures could be
seen starting to run from them.

‘Assassins!’ he said as she got up again. ‘An arrow can kill you just as easily as it can kill me. My men will get them, don’t you worry. Are you all right?’

‘A little shaken,’ she said, and she was too – her hands were trembling slightly. ‘It never occurred to me that I would be targeted like that.’

‘You have rattled them.’ He smiled at her, itself a rare occurrence. ‘They never expected you to be here.’

‘Then I had better start doing something,’ she said. She stopped the flame running up and down her staff. ‘A silly vanity. I will not be doing that again.’

She saw the other knights return. None of them had been lost and blood smeared some of their surcoats.

‘Dealt with?’ Sir Norton asked.

‘Yes, sir. They will not be coming back.’

Silently, they resumed their positions surrounding her. She breathed heavily, sensing the responsibility on her shoulders, took one look at the stars and made her next move. Pacing in a small
circle she raised her staff and, facing inwards, recited over and over again:

‘
Emiteverian luda tamrotos melian, emiteverian luda tamrotos melian
.’ At the centre of the circle, out of the air a ball of crackling blue light started to form. She continued
to circle and recite the words as the ball grew larger, first the size of her fist, then the size of her head. The power inside her made her senses tingle; small strands of her hair started to
stand upwards and wave about on their own account.

She knew it was going to happen, but suddenly she felt him inside her head. He was trying to do what she had done earlier – to take the power she was drawing from the other world away from
her to send back into the void. She hardened her will and resisted. He then started drawing on his staff’s power and it grew harder and harder for her to fight him. The ball was half the size
of her now and she judged it to be enough, any more and he would nullify her spell. Before he could drag the power from her she raised both her arms high into the air. The ball – which had
morphed a little and was now cylindrical in shape, sizzling and popping with bolts of blue and white effervescence – followed her arms in an upward trajectory. She held it there as her
opponent made a final attempt to stop her short. He used so much power it almost knocked her off her feet and drew the breath from her body, but still she resisted. Planting her feet into the
ground she fought hard to ignore the alien presence in her mind trying to siphon off her power, twisting all ways in its attempt to wrench the spell from her grasp. But he was failing. Pointing her
staff at the horses, she had just enough inside her to utter a final croak – ‘
Ptaresass!
’ – before slumping to her knees.

The cylinder changed again into a bolt of darkest cerulean, then in a shower of sparks and electricity it crashed into the cavalry on the Arshuman left flank.

‘The girl learns fast,’ said Felmere, impressed despite himself. The two men watched as the spell slammed into the light horse throwing riders from the saddle and
terrifying the horses that started to run in all directions. In vain, the commanders tried to get them reorganised but many of them were as much at the whim of their panicked steeds as the rank and
file.

‘The flank is exposed,’ said Dominic. ‘She didn’t kill that many but they are running all over the place.’

‘Now is our chance! Signal Reynard and the light cavalry to keep the enemy’s right flank busy and you and I shall try the left.’

‘Let’s hurry then,’ said Dominic, pulling down his visor, ‘before they regroup.’

From the perspective of a man in the front lines, little of these developments could be seen. Three times they had closed with the enemy, thrusting their spears at ankles, heads and arms and
three times they had withdrawn with no clear advantage gained. A few men had thrown down their spears, either because they had shivered or because they weren’t comfortable fighting with them,
and had drawn swords, axes or maces to deal closer damage. This threatened the integrity of the shield wall as such men needed to swing their weapons rather than stand or push, but so far the wall
had held. Most of them had grown up with derring-do tales of brave courtly knights and upright soldiers who dispatched their black-hearted enemies with a contemptuous swish of their blade. Nowhere
in these tales did it say how hard it was to kill a man. He could be slashed, stabbed, hacked at; his bones could be crushed by a spiked mace; his blood vessels opened by sword or axe, but his
breath would not stop – he just became more desperate and dangerous. One man who had lost his weapon and whose shield arm was crushed and limp fended off sword thrusts with his bare hands,
eventually grabbing his assailant and turning his own blade against him. They continued to fight, wrestling on the ground, blood soaking their surcoats even when the lines withdrew. No quarter was
asked between enemies who knew each other so well and none was given in return. The front ranks, many carrying wounds ranging from scratches to deep cuts and gashes that were leaking blood, had
been mostly relieved by the rear ranks. The fresh ranks were preparing for their first engagement when the word started to spread:

‘The Arshuman cavalry is routed – they have quit the field!’

The rumour flew around the troops like the fire on Grest Hill and at once the men started to roar. The men of Haslan Falls and Maynard’s who had been hard pressed and were beginning to
quail gained fresh heart. They beat their weapons against their shields, a deafening noise made worse for the Arshumans because the hill threw back an echo of it making it sound as if they were
surrounded. The sense of the battle starting to turn was compounded further as they heard the trumpets of Baron Felmere and the Silver Guard, not from behind the Tanarese lines but to their right.
Being few in number the shock cavalry only deployed when a decisive blow was in the offing. The shields were beaten even harder, and the men invoked the names of Tanaren, Felmere, Mytha and
Artorus. Then the charge sounded perhaps for the final time.

Cheris was feeling smug. It had taken only a few minutes for the queasy feeling to subside and the jelly in her legs to firm up again. She felt tired but strong, and watched
with satisfaction as the Arshuman cavalry was scattered to the four winds and was probably beyond regrouping. She was worried some of them might head her way but saw that a line of crossbowmen had
come across to protect them – they appeared to be having a great time peppering the confused horse with well-placed quarrels. She watched as the lines came together again for another bloody
push and shove, and saw the shock cavalry of the Silver Guard and Baron Felmere himself plough into the unguarded Arshuman flank.

If they thought the unit would crumble, though, they were to be disappointed. This was the first unit, based on the left flank, the Arshuman elite. They buckled heavily as the horse and the
infantry of Maynard and Fenchard engaged them, but they did not give ground and flee. She felt a little helpless – one of her destructive spells could not be targeted while the troops were in
combat for fear of injuring her own men. She had to wait and sit it out.