by Candy Rae
CHAPTER 23 (Northern Continent)
From the parapet walls of the settlement Stuart MacIntosh watched, his binoculars glued to his face.
“They seem to have beaten off the first charge,” he announced.
“Hope we can be so lucky,” said one of the crossbowmen on the parapet beside him. “The convicts are surrounding the walls and setting up the catapults. They’re lighting fires too.”
Stuart swung his binoculars round. The man was right. They would be surrounded soon and then it would start.
The Lind stationed on the west, north and east walls reported to Matvei that a thin line of men was forming up just out of the range of arrowshot. They were not outside the range of the crossbows. Stuart surmised that Murdoch had not considered the possibility that the Argyll passengers and crew could make such weapons. There was also an arrow contrap embedded into the ground behind the closed gates. When it fired it would do a lot of damage. The reports from Tara and Kolyei from the hill had mentioned to Matvei the effectiveness of the weapon. Arthur Knott had smiled grimly and wished aloud that there had been time to manufacture more.
“Most of the convict army is, as expected, congregating in front of the southern gates,” shouted Stuart’s new number two (Robert Lutterell had resigned this post to take charge of the field infantry). The rugged, down-to-earth farmer of middling years who had accepted the post had his head well screwed on. He knew what he was about. “The main attack will come from there. Not yet though. They’ll want to soften us up a bit first before they send their men in.”
“Are the fire parties ready?” asked Stuart. “If they do use fireballs we’ll be so busy putting out fires we’ll have no-one to man the walls.”
“That’s what they will be hoping for and they’ll be watching out for signs. We know the gate area is the weakest point. The ditch is not so wide or as deep there. They’ll try to bridge it then batter down the gates,” said the man.
“Don’t think we’ll bring any reinforcements up to the parapet yet. Leave them at the second line of defence on the other side of the river,” ordered Stuart. “If they do break through the gates these river barriers are our only hope.”
They heard the blast of a horn, long and clear. The defenders spied a flurry of movement round the enemy catapults, as the rods were winched back to their fullest extent and they watched as smoking bundles were placed in the cradles. The catapult operators let go of the levers. The bundles soared high in the air and towards the settlement. Most fell short but a few descended on the walls. The convicts manning the catapults could be seen making adjustments to the trajectory mechanisms.
The majority of the second wave fell inside the walls. Murdoch did intend to set fire to the wooden buildings inside the settlement.
Those stationed on the parapets would hear the sounds of whistle blasts as the fire parties located the burning areas and proceeded to extinguish the flames before the fires could take hold.
The catapults were winched up again and a third salvo was let loose, then a fourth. Some defenders looked nervously to their rear.
Despite the best efforts of the fire parties, some fires began to grow as they fed greedily on buildings and other combustibles. The smoke emanating from the fires did not dissipate; there was not enough wind to make that much difference. Some of the defenders began to cough as the smoke reached them.
“They’re moving.” Murdoch had decided that it was time for his main assault on the gates. He ordered the regiments forward and Stuart watched as they began to march towards them.
There was a shaft of blue-white light and the torso of one of the defenders fell off the parapet and on to the ground, his severed arm thumping down beside the twitching body a second later.
“Laser-rifles!” screamed someone and everyone ducked their heads. “Where did they get those?”
“Can’t have many,” shouted another, “but if they do we’ll all be dead soon.”
To their immense relief, although the laser fire continued it did so only sporadically.
It was what were becoming known as the regular regiments who were spearheading the assault. Baker, Cracov and Smith’s regiments were in the front, closely followed by van Buren, Gardiner and Duchesne’s. The men carried bridging planks with which they intended to cross the ditch and also the large hardwood battering rams, hewn from the southern woodlands and towed over to the north by a group of disgruntled Larg who did not understand the need for such accoutrements to go to war. Were not tooth and claw enough?
The regiments marched forward to the beat of a drum. There was the occasional blast of laser fire but Murdoch had only three rifles which Brentwood had taken from Peter Howard’s away-team (the ones captured at Fort had proved to be beyond repair) and these were not enough to make a difference. They did inflict casualties, but the majority of their targets were hidden behind the fire-resistant walls that the blasts were unable to penetrate. Their power would not last long.
The crossbowmen were congregated behind the southern parapet, weapons primed and ready to fire. Every bolt would have to count as it took an experienced crossbowman at least three minutes to reload the weapon. Stuart waited for the enemy to come within range of both the crossbows and Arthur’s contrap.
“Ready.”
Here we go. Stuart raised his right hand into the air.
The men settled the crossbows on their shoulders. Arthur Knott readied his contrap.
Stuart brought his hand down.
The lethal little bolts whirred towards the approaching regiments and the defenders watched as they hit the front ranks. The arrows arched higher than the bolts and rained down on the regiments to the rear of the first three. Men fell to the ground but the advance did not falter. Their comrades stepped over them and continued their measured tramp.
Individual arrows continued to fall but there was a problem with the mechanism of the contrap and Arthur Knott could not decrease the range, neither could he fire. Stuart could see him struggling with it and the man glanced up at Stuart, despair on his face. With inanimate stubbornness the loaded arrows remained in their cradle.
Before the crossbows could be reloaded the attackers would be at the ditch. Kath could see scaling ladders being readied. These men might not need to wait for the planks to be set in place if they could tip enough ladders against the walls to allow enough of them to climb up and over.
Occasionally, the sharp blast of a rifle shot through the air and hit any defender unlucky enough to be in its line of fire. The force of these individual blasts could cut a man in two with ease and some areas of the parapet were covered with sticky warm blood.
Jean Farquharson watched mesmerised as to her left a blast found its target. The woman so hit fell to the ground. Great spurts of arterial blood splashed out from her neck and over the ground as her heart continued to pump. Jean knelt down beside her, applied pressure to the severed artery and called for a medic, any medic, however inexperienced. The young lad who appeared could do nothing. A minute or so later the woman died in Jean’s arms.
The crossbows fired another irregular volley as the attackers reached the ditch and began to lay the bridging planks. The defenders drew their swords and closed up against the parapet. It would be cold ‘steel’ from now on.
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