The Great Betrayal (46 page)

‘Either that or the blind buggers are just lucky, eh?’ Nadri felt rough hands drag him to his feet and saw a grizzled-looking dwarf facing him. ‘Up yer get, lad. More killing to be done.’

Still dazed, Nadri grabbed a shield, not caring if it was his own, and saw the knights had broken off their attack and were retreating towards the city gates. A host of spearmen, out of range of the war machines and thus far unscathed, parted to let them through. Then they closed ranks and lowered their pikes at the badly bloodied dwarfs.

‘See,’ said the old-timer, hawking up a gob of pipeweed he’d been chewing. ‘Plenty more.’

Nadri eyed the determined elven phalanx even as the dwarfs drew back into formation, raising shields as the arrow storm began anew, and groaned.

His retinue of
hearthguard just below, Snorri surveyed the battle from a grassy tor through the spyglass. This was but an opening skirmish and though he had wanted badly to lead it, knew his place as army general was here.

Brynnoth was ever wrathful and had insisted on leading the first attack. Though brave, the clans of Barak Varr were being hammered by the elves. During the skirmish, arrows had killed a great many dwarfs and left countless more for the ministrations of the priestesses of Valaya. Even as the battle raged, the dour warrior maidens roamed the field, dragging back the wounded or silencing those beyond help. Since the initial charge and subsequent breaking of the high-helmed cavalry, the dwarf front line had advanced considerably. Met by a thick wall of heavy-armoured spearmen, their march had now halted. Though difficult to ascertain through the spyglass, it looked like the two forces were at an impasse. From a brutal opening skirmish with a splintered cavalry force, the dwarfs now faced a determined grind.

Snorri smiled despite the grimness of the vista. Dwarfs knew how to fight battles of attrition. Even with their spears and high shields, the elves would soon learn the folly of these tactics. Unwilling to loose directly into the fighting ranks, the elven archers unleashed volleys of arrows in the air and the prince of Everpeak watched their deadly trajectory until they fell amongst the rear ranks. Pushing hard against the backs of their fellow clanners in order to roll the elven line, many dwarfs had their shields front and were struck down. Several ranks lay dead before a proper defence stalled further casualties. Quarrellers attempted to reply in kind, but the dwarf crossbowmen had neither the range nor the accuracy to be effective.

Panning the lens across the melee Snorri found Brynnoth, or at least several of his royal hearthguard, the Sea Wardens, battling furiously in the centre. The king would be amongst them, at their heart, and strong as he was the elves were showing no signs of capitulation. Several large cohorts, including those from Everpeak, were ready as reinforcement. With almost a third of his army committed already, Snorri was reluctant to feed any more into the grind.

He considered employing the war machines to thin the elven ranks, but the proximity of dwarf warriors made it too risky. Without the need to punish the knights, they were standing dormant so Snorri gave the signal for them to be brought forwards and batter the walls instead.

A drum beat was followed by the raising of banners down the line until the message from the prince was conveyed to Ironhandson and his throwers. A few moments later and a cascade of bolts and boulders assailed Tor Alessi’s walls.

Snorri followed their descent through the spyglass, grumbling in dismay as an arc of lightning tore one stone from the sky, disintegrating the missile in a shower of debris. Several more went the same way as the elves revealed their mages, casting fire and ice from their fingertips to blunt the dwarf barrage. A few missiles struck but the damage they caused was negligible to a city that size. Bolts from the ballistae were snatched out of the very air by flocks of the great eagles, the massive birds of prey snapping them in their vice-like claws before diving down onto the machineries themselves.

Engulfed by a swarm of flapping feathers and flashing silver beaks, dozens of dwarf crewmen and engineers lay dead before Ironhandson restored order with his rangers and saw the beasts off.

‘It is harder than I thought,’ Snorri confessed under his breath.

‘We knew the elgi were tough, cousin, but we are tougher,’ Morgrim reassured him.

‘Do you think this is their entire force?’

Morgrim frowned, watching the battle from afar without the benefit of the spyglass, and shook his head.

‘The city will harbour a second army, I am sure.’

‘We have to crack the gates anyway,’ suggested Drogor, his grip tight on the banner where it snapped in the breeze. ‘A stern push would sweep this force away and let us bring the fight to the walls.’

‘Lay siege?’ asked Snorri, looking askance at the Karak Zorn dwarf.

‘No, forge a hammer and break down the gates. Once inside the elgi’s resolve will waver.’

Snorri rubbed his bearded chin. The entire throng on the field was engaged. Two thick lines of infantry cut and hewed at one another with neither willing to yield. The arrows levelled the scales for the elves, preventing the dwarf line from a concerted push, but the clans were gaining ground on the walls.

‘It’s not a bad idea.’

Morgrim disagreed. ‘Patience is more prudent, Snorri. We grind the elves down, then retreat to our lines and lay siege.’

‘I want this over quickly. No elgi rabble is going to defy me.’

Drogor said, ‘Perhaps Morgrim is right. Hurt the elgi at the gates, sound a retreat and surround them.’

Morgrim was nodding, surprised that his old friend was agreeing with him.

‘Besides,’ added Drogor. ‘It’s likely your father will have arrived by then with the army from Karaz-a-Karak. There would be no shame in leaning on his larger throng.’

His mood souring swiftly, Morgrim tried to intercede. ‘That is not what I meant, cousin–’

‘Enough!’ The spyglass snapped shut, revealing the anger-reddened features of the prince. ‘I will not have my father come here and see this place intact. It will be rubble by the time he reaches the field.’ Snorri donned his war helm, the feathered wings fluttering in the breeze. He spoke at Morgrim, glaring around the nose guard. ‘I’m ordering the reinforcements in. Sound the clarion. I’ll lead them myself.’

Shield forwards, shoulder
locked, Nadri was pinned. He found himself in the third rank of the Copperfists, pushing hard against the wall of elven spears. In such tight confines, there was no room for axe work, save for those chopping frantically at the front. Several dwarfs had already fallen to spear thrusts, their anger blunted on high shields over which almond-shaped eyes glared with contempt.

Unlike the fight against the knights, which was a maddened frenzy of plunging lances and flailing horses as the cavalry sought to rip the dwarfs open, this was a strength-sapping grind. Heave and push. Heave and push. Dwarf and elf shoved against one another, pressing with all the weight of their formations until one bent and broke.

So far, the contest was evenly matched.

Impossible to tell for sure, but Nadri felt like it was the same across the line. One shield wall had met another, though the elven forest of spears was making hard work of it for the dwarfs. As warriors died on both sides, those behind filled their place. From the front rank, which was brutal even from his position two rows behind, Nadri heard a grunt. Another dwarf had fallen, arterial crimson jetting from his neck and blinding the one behind him who also died to a quick thrust from the white-haired champion leading the cohort of spears.

Suddenly and without realising, Nadri was at the front. A jabbing spear was turned aside by an instinctive parry with his axe haft. A sword blow fell against his shield and stung his shoulder with the impact. He roared, invoking Grungni and Grimnir, thrashed out with his axe. Scale mail parted, shearing off like autumn leaves, and a spearman crumpled trying to hold in his guts. As another warrior took the elf’s place, the champion was pushed closer. His sword flashed, an eldritch blade that bore glowing elven runes of power.

Nadri met the attack with his shield and his defence was almost cloven in half.

Spitting some curse in elvish, the white-haired champion swung again. This time Nadri ducked and the rune sword shaved off the sea dragon device on his helmet.

Like his kin, the elf was dressed in blue-grey robes, his armour like polished azure, only metal and much more unyielding. He wore a conical helm, a star-pattern emblazoned on its nose guard, with a shock of horsehair protruding from the tip.

‘Uzkul elgi!’

A shout came from further down the line, a few places to Nadri’s right. Whilst the other dwarfs fought, their champion, Vrekki Helbeard, stepped forwards. He was pointing at the white-haired elf with the spiked tip of his mattock. The weapon was dark with blood.

Nadri felt a hand grip his shoulder and then heard the gravel voice of Werigg Gunnson in his ear.

‘Let him through, lad,’ he said. ‘Helbeard challenges the elgi.’

‘How, in this?’ asked Nadri, fending off another thrust that nearly took off his ear.

As the challenge was met, the pressure on the dwarfs leavened. Vrekki shouldered up the line and was standing alongside Nadri, the elf champion facing him.

The fighting hadn’t ceased, it merely allowed for the passage of the two warriors so they might meet in combat. No order was given to let through, it was merely
understood
. Vrekki threw the first blow, taking a chunk from the elf’s shield, and the crushing pressure of the grind returned in earnest.

Through the frenzy, Nadri caught slashes of their duel, although to refer to it thus would not be accurate. Vrekki fought two-handed, using the thick haft of his mattock to parry. Like the elf, he had runes too, and they flashed along the shaft of his weapon and the talisman he wore around his neck.

To Nadri it seemed like many minutes but it was over in seconds.

Vrekki battered the white-haired champion hard, hurling blow upon blow against his shield. It looked like he was winning, until having soaked up all the punishment he was willing to, the elf thrust from beneath the guard of his shield and pierced poor Vrekki’s heart. The champion died instantly, his mouth formed into an inchoate curse.

With their thane’s death, Nadri felt the Copperfists falter. A ripple, almost impossible to discern, fed down their ranks. The elves felt it too and pushed. Two spears came Nadri’s way at once. He parried one, but the other pierced his chest, just below the shoulder, and he cried out. The white-haired champion had discarded his shield and fought only with his sword. Pinioned and in agony, Nadri was an easy kill. But before the deathblow came, he flung his axe. It turned one and a half times in the air then embedded itself in the elf’s face, splitting his nose in two and carving into his skull like an egg.

He fell, brutally, and the momentum shifted again.

There was a cheer of ‘Khazuk!’ of which Nadri was only vaguely aware, before the push came again. It pressed him into the spear that was pinning him and he roared in pain and anger. Unarmed, there was little he could do but hold up his shield and pray to Valaya it would be enough. At either side, though he couldn’t move to look properly, he felt his fellow clanners hacking with their blades.

‘Take it, lad!’ Werigg bellowed from behind, a hammer slipped into Nadri’s grasp which he used to smash the spear haft jutting from his chest. The immense pressure of the other dwarf’s considerable bulk levelled against his back followed swiftly after as Werigg got his head down and pushed.

The elves were reeling, on their heels and close to capitulation. Like a ship, the dwarfs its starboard, the elves port, the line pitched and yawed as both sides fought for supremacy. More tenacious than they had any right to be, the elves held on.

‘Khazuk!’ the Copperfists yelled, but still could find no breach in their enemy’s resolve.

A foot… two… then three, the dwarfs gained ground by bloody increments but the elves would not yield.

Amazed he was still alive, Nadri forgot the pain from his chest and bludgeoned spearmen with his borrowed hammer.

‘Uzkul!’ he cried as a splash of crimson lined his face like a baptism, echoing Vrekki, honouring the thane’s sacrifice. It was madness, a terrible churn of bodies and blades without end. He wondered briefly if the halls of Grimnir were steeped in such carnage.

A horn rang out, so deep and sonorous as to only be dwarfen, dragging Nadri from his dark reverie.

The elf line
trembled, just the lightest tremor at first but then building to a destructive quake. Like a tree hewn at the root and felled by its own weight, the spearmen buckled. It was as if they bent at the middle and were funnelling into the hole where Snorri had forced his wedge of gromril.

Hearthguard were tough, implacable warriors and Snorri had rammed a cohort of a hundred right down the throat of the elven infantry. To see them broken so utterly by the prince’s charge stirred Morgrim’s blood, but it was also reckless.

‘You did this,’ he said, a grimace revealing his displeasure.

‘I did nothing but agree with you, old friend,’ said Drogor with a plaintive tone, though his eyes flashed eagerly to see such carnage wrought upon the elves.

‘He has overstretched and left himself vulnerable.’

Drogor appeared nonplussed, gesturing to the elf ranks.

‘The elgi are in flight, I can see no danger. Your cousin has done what Brynnoth could not, and broken their ranks.’

‘Aye,’ snapped Morgrim, ‘and he will not stop until he’s reached the walls and torn apart the gate. That, or until he’s dead. You goaded him.’ He was nodding, a distasteful sneer on his face. ‘You drew him into this fight by mentioning his father.’ Morgrim turned to the other dwarf, the rows of silent hearthguard Snorri had left behind unmoving like statues behind them. ‘Why?’

‘Snorri, our prince, will do what he wants. It was he who brought an army to these gates, who forged the will of no less than four kings into a throng capable of challenging the elgi in their greatest citadel. Do you really think I, a lowly treasure hunter from the Southlands, could do
anything
to affect the mind of a dwarf capable of that?’