The Long War 02 - The Dark Blood (51 page)

‘They’re committing everyone, lads,’ shouted Johan Long Shadow, moving down to join his men. ‘That’s the best part of six thousand men.’

It was a desperate gambit on the part of the king and his clerics, and it looked as if it would be their last attack of the night. Even with the narrow breach and the Ranen meat-grinder, the difference in numbers was overwhelming. The Ranen had been whittled down throughout the night and, although they had lost far fewer men than the Ro, their losses had more of an impact. Even more worryingly, in the distance, just as the first shards of blue appeared on the horizon, the trebuchets were being moved up. The giant engines of war had been silent since the breach had been opened. They rumbled across the grassy plain, manoeuvred into position by teams of engineers, with carts behind them full of large stones.

The Free Company men had noticed the trebuchets. Mathias Flame Tooth, axe-master of South Warden, stood before his men and motioned them to form up on the right of the breach. ‘They won’t shell us with their own men in here... nothing’s changed, lads. We still fight, we still kill, and we still defend this ground,’ he shouted.

Lanry glanced behind him at the central mount of South Warden and saw clustered women and children peering out from the Ranen assembly. It was central and solidly built, making it the logical place of refuge for those who could not fight. However, as the trebuchets inched ever closer behind the advancing yeomanry, Rowanoco’s Stone looked dangerously isolated.

Below him, the defenders were forming up in their flanking positions. The approaching army of Ro had spearmen at the front, with crossbows positioned between them. The Purple clerics giving the orders were keeping them in tightly organized ranks and the advance had a much more determined feel than the previous assaults.

‘Hold your ground, lads,’ said Long Shadow. The captain of Scarlet Company was no longer standing in plain sight. Instead he’d pulled his force to the right and now stood next to his axe-master and opposite Captain Horrock. ‘This is it. We hold this one last time, and then we can get drunk.’ The words were loud, but Lanry could detect concern in Long Shadow’s voice, as if he doubted what he was saying.

Hasim, the most pragmatic of the defenders, glanced up at Lanry and shrugged, as if to say
we’re in trouble
.

The column reached the outer walls and stopped, not pushing into the narrow breach as before. The spearmen levelled their weapons and held the ground firmly as hundreds of crossbows were levelled across the killing ground. The defenders were all behind cover and did not present a target for the yeomanry, but the measured nature of this final assault had thrown the Ranen off their strategy.

‘Men of Ranen,’ shouted a cleric from the rear of the column. ‘I am Brother Jakan of the Purple, commander of the Darkwald yeomanry. I order you to surrender South Warden to your king.’

The defenders looked at each other for a moment before a laugh erupted from Mathias Flame Tooth. The barrel-chested axe-master of South Warden was a good-humoured man at the best of times, but clearly he found the offer of surrender, after so much death, highly amusing. The laugh rippled through the rest of the Free Company men.

‘There will be no mercy shown if you do not lay down your axes,’ shrieked Brother Jakan. ‘This is no longer your land.’

‘Come here and say that,’ growled Long Shadow, resisting the urge to break cover and run at the attackers.

The rumbling sound of the trebuchets ceased and Lanry saw that the engineers had begun loading them with large boulders. They were closer now, though still out of range of South Warden’s catapults. Lanry had a sinking feeling. It looked as if the slingshots would be firing right over the third gate rather than into the existing breach.

‘I am the servant of the One God,’ proclaimed Brother Jakan, ‘and this is your last chance to surrender.’

Long Shadow took a step forward and, though still out of sight, stood within a few feet of the first line of spearmen.

‘I will not surrender. My men will not surrender,’ he said in a controlled shout. ‘Our mothers, our wives, our children, none of them will surrender.’ His voice grew emotional and the defenders were carried along with the passion of his words. ‘We will die on this ground, defending
our
land and
our
people, but we will not surrender!’ His voice cracked and there was a tear in his hard, grey eyes.

There was silence for a moment.

‘So be it,’ replied Jakan. He waved his hand theatrically and the Ro trebuchets sprang into life.

The massive counterweights, hanging between upright wooden beams, were released. Each swing-arm described a wide arc above the machine, dragging with it a long slingshot and flinging a huge boulder high into the twilight sky.

A strangled cry of
no
echoed from Scarlet Company as rocks smashed into the Ranen assembly and caused fissures to appear in Rowanoco’s Stone.

Lanry stood aghast. Those that huddled within the stone building tried to avoid the falling masonry and flee the crumbling structure, but more boulders followed. By the time the first volley had ceased, the sounds of dying women and children echoed from the centre of South Warden. The men holding the inner wall rushed up the raised ground to assist the wounded, but many were hit by pieces of the outer stone wall. The sacred building was gradually collapsing to the ground.

Glancing back at the breach, Lanry observed astonished faces and indescribable rage amongst the Ranen. Some of the men were wrestling with battle fervour. Johan Long Shadow shook with righteous anger. The men of Darkwald didn’t react; nor did Brother Jakan. They simply held their ground at the entrance, keeping their spears levelled and crossbows ready. Then a guttural roar erupted from several men of Scarlet as the battle rage of Rowanoco took over.

‘Hold your ground,’ shouted Mathias Flame Tooth. The axe-master of South Warden tried to hold them back, but to no avail, as half a dozen men went berserk and charged the line of Ro spears.

‘Don’t die like this,’ roared Horrock, trying to wrestle a frenzied Haffen Red Face to the ground. Other men of both companies began frothing at the mouth as they saw wives, sons and daughters trying to pull their crushed and bloodied bodies from the wreck of the assembly.

The scene grew chaotic. More and more of the defenders succumbed to unthinking rage. They ran from their defensive positions and into the breach to be cut down by a blanket of crossbow bolts or skewered on the end of long spears. Lanry saw a man of Wraith impaled on a spear and scarcely seeming to notice. He pushed forward, driving the wooden haft through his body until he hung limply within a few inches of the spearman.

‘Hold,’ shouted Al-Hasim, one of the few men not possessed by battle fervour. Several others shouted
hold
, including Horrock, Mathias and Lanry, who was waving his arms and trying to attract Al-Hasim’s attention. The Brown cleric could think of nothing but getting these men to fall back. Then his eyes were drawn to the shaking form of Johan Long Shadow.

With a deafening roar the captain of Scarlet Company reared up. His eyes had gone black and his teeth were gritted in an animal expression. All pretence at defending the breach was gone as the leader of South Warden entered the battle rage of Rowanoco and charged the line of spears. With no further need to restrain their men, Mathias and Horrock ceased trying to hold the breach and let their warriors fly into a berserk rage and join their captain in an out and out attack.

Long Shadow wrenched a spear from a man’s grasp and threw him roughly into another one of the yeomanry, before splitting a man in two with his axe and trying to push forward into the bulk of the attackers. He received crossbow bolts in his leg, shoulder and neck, but none slowed him down.

The men of Ro were stunned by the suicidal ferocity of the Free Company men, but they were still vastly the greater force. A few men brutally hacked apart by rage-infused berserkers did not make much of a dent in the attacking army.

The battle had changed completely. The Ranen no longer attempted to hold the breach and the Ro no longer attempted to storm it. All the yeomanry had to do was hold their spears level and rapidly reload their crossbows as more and more defenders fell. Horrock, Mathias and Al-Hasim were still thinking clearly, but they had little choice but to join the others in attacking the yeomanry.

‘Kill them all,’ ordered Brother Jakan from the rear. ‘Show no mercy, for you shall receive none.’ The Purple cleric drew his longsword and ordered the other twenty or so clerics of nobility to do the same. Lanry followed their movements as they made their way through the yeomanry to the front line.

Al-Hasim darted forward through the killing ground, avoiding two crossbows and trying to reach Long Shadow, who was completely surrounded. Haffen Red Face was swinging his axe in wild but powerful arcs, killing and maiming men as he drew further and further away from the rest of Wraith Company. Horrock was trying to reach his friend, but had his hands full with massed spearmen keeping him at bay. Lanry could no longer see how these brave men could survive.

Haffen was the first to die. Lanry gasped as the axe-master of Ro Hail received a crossbow bolt at short range to the left side of his chest. Once he was off-balance, the Ro surrounding him attacked from all sides, stabbing in short thrusts with knives and short swords until a powerful spear thrust pierced his stomach.

‘Haffen!’ roared Horrock with anguish in his voice as he saw his friend die. Other members of Wraith Company cried out in despair at the sight of the warrior sprawled on the ground, in a motionless and bloodied heap.

Al-Hasim had glanced back to see Red Face fall and had almost lost his head to a spearman. With no time for grief, he continued his attempt to rescue Long Shadow, who was now far in front of the other defenders and staying alive through sheer force of will. Hasim ducked under a spear and sliced a man across the throat. He dived forward, barrelling two Ro to the floor and skewering another as he stood up. The Karesian was faster than the Ranen and was not hampered by uncontrollable rage. He reached Long Shadow and stood back to back with the captain of Scarlet Company.

‘We need to get the fuck out of here,’ he shouted over the sounds of combat.

‘Death first,’ was the growled response from Johan.

‘Forward,’ commanded Jakan from somewhere within the mass of soldiers.

The defenders of South Warden were isolated now into small pockets of resistance. Even if they did manage to fall back, there would no longer be enough of them to hold the breach. Haffen was dead, Long Shadow was surrounded, and the Darkwald yeomanry were levelling their spears and pushing towards the third gate, flooding round the sides of the Ranen and claiming the ground.

Several hundred Ranen had died within minutes and now Lanry saw the Purple clerics reach the front of the lines. As ferocious as the Ranen were, they were no match for the skilful nobles of the One. Mathias Flame Tooth and Horrock Green Blade moved to intercept them, but the outcome did not seem in doubt. Neither of the Ranen warriors was enraged as they coldly tried to hold the third gate, with only a handful of men to support them.

Brother Jakan led the clerics and he didn’t hesitate for a second as he engaged Horrock, starting with a powerful combination of overhead blows that forced the exhausted captain backwards. Flame Tooth tackled a second cleric to the ground, but was quickly swarmed by yeomanry and relieved of his axe. The axe-master of South Warden shouted insults at the men who grabbed him, but Lanry lost sight of the barrel-chested warrior amidst the kicks and punches of the swarming men of Darkwald.

Horrock was outmatched and, despite the conviction in his eyes, was too weak and tired to put up much of a fight against Jakan. The Purple cleric delivered a feint to the captain’s side that allowed him to follow up with a blow from his shield, dazing Horrock. Then Jakan delivered a powerful cut that sliced open the Ranen’s stomach and sent him flying back to land in a bloody heap against the third gate of South Warden. He was alive, but had no fight left in him and looked skywards, panting heavily.

Back at the front, Lanry saw Long Shadow and Al-Hasim still fighting a lone battle. Johan had three crossbow bolts protruding from his body, but even the one through the side of his neck seemed not to register on his face.

‘Surrender!’ shouted Lanry in a quivering voice. ‘There’ll be another day, another fight... don’t die here.’

If he heard the words, Al-Hasim showed no sign of recognition as he took a heavy mace blow to the back and a crossbow bolt thudded into his chest. Long Shadow wrapped an arm round the staggering Karesian and tried his best to keep the enemies at bay, but he was a lone figure now among the enemy soldiers.

Brother Jakan and his clerics killed the few remaining Ranen guarding the third gate. Then he turned to issue a command to his men. ‘Stand to, I want him alive.’

The men surrounding Long Shadow and Hasim backed off and encircled the two men. The yeomanry lowered their spears and took aim with crossbows, but did not attack. Johan was no longer enraged and his black eyes had turned back to grey. He stood protectively over the unconscious body of Al-Hasim and made no effort to attack. The pain from his wounded neck seemed suddenly to register and he grasped at the protruding shaft.

With the battle over, all Lanry could hear was the muted groans of dying men. He was breathing heavily. From his position on the third wall, he could hear the gate below being battered down by the thousands of yeomanry, who then flooded into the undefended city. A horn was blown from the rear of the column to signal to the king that South Warden was taken.

Brother Jakan sheathed his sword and stepped over to where Long Shadow and the dying Karesian stood. They were penned in, with no chance of escape. Lanry had lost sight of Mathias Flame Tooth, but couldn’t imagine that the axe-master had survived.

‘Throw down your axe,’ said Jakan in an imperious voice. ‘You are beaten.’

Johan Long Shadow, captain of Scarlet Company, made sure that Al-Hasim was placed carefully on the bloody ground before he stood to face the Purple cleric. He winced in pain, but otherwise remained stoic, as he reached up and grasped the shaft of the bolt in his neck. With a defiant growl, and maintaining eye-contact with Jakan, the Ranen warrior pulled the bolt free, causing a sudden rush of blood to flow down his battered leather armour. To Lanry’s eyes, the wound was obviously fatal and the captain’s rage had been the only thing keeping him alive.