The giant moved his arm to shield his leg, but the leg wasn't Darras' target. At the last instant, Darras made a sudden turn into the giant. He hadn’t been champion jouster of the country for nothing; that move had fooled smarter knights than Monotauk. The club stroke missed. Darras’ lance dipped for a minute, but then swung up suddenly, as Darras swerved in under the giant’s blow. The lance went straight though the heart of the giant. The lance shattered on impact, but the point went clear though. Monotauk staggered for a moment, then fell over with a mighty crash. A great cheer went up from all the archers, seeing the giant fall dead.
Darras drew his sword and waved it in the air at the approaching bogies.
“Come on! Who’s next! Who’s for jousting? Who is for fighting?” he shouted.
Apparently no one, was the answer. To be sure, no one had been too keen on being close to Monotauk when he was alive. That something more dangerous than Monotauk was there didn’t exactly make it the preferred spot on the battlefield. The remaining bogies split, with a group charging a small hill where the gnome slingers were working. The rest swung around to follow the chief into the hole opening up in the Steward’s center.
Darras signaled the Rangers and they rode to the relief of the gnomes on their hill. Between the arrows and slings the bogies had little luck at that end.
Back in her lair, the queen studied the lines though her scrying pool. “Bugger it, we’ve lost Monotauk! Still, not too bad,” she said out loud to Iago. “The bogey chief has reached the archers and it looks like those militiamen are turning tail and running. A lot better that Agincourt.”
“Er, about those militia men, don’t you mean Cowpens?” Iago said.
The queen ignored him, continuing to study the situation. “I didn’t expect the spiders to be so useless, but at least they absorbed some arrows. My goblins are intact. With the hole the bogies have made in the center they’ll be able to roll up the flanks of the enemy’s lines. They’ll make short work of the archers now. Although their wizard is going to be trouble, he can’t stop us by himself.”
Iago cleared his throat. “You know his real name is Tiberius Fuller, right. Son of Julian Fuller.”
The queen ignored him. “His mother’s a whore; who can say who his father is. Spare me the trivia lessons, I’m busy.”
“Just don’t say I didn’t warn you. I can help more if I’m in on the planning stages. Darras did pretty well on those tactics exams, too. You remember he’s military academy before the whole jousting tour thing, right? Top of his class.”
“I didn’t expect he’d kill Monotauk, that’s for sure,” the queen said, still ignoring Iago. “I hope Squamata has sense to fill that hole.”
“You did summon me for advice, right? I really could have told you more about his dad if I’d got into the discussion a bit earlier,” Iago said.
“Bugger his father; quit bothering me! Can’t you see that I’m busy?”
“Fire-Axe Fuller THE WITCH SLAYER!!!” the imp shouted at last.
Something about the way those words were shouted out finally penetrated into the skull of the goblin queen. Her impish assistant might be trying to tell her something important after all. Actually, she suddenly had a sense that what he was trying to tell her was in fact of the greatest importance to a witch like herself.
She stopped and without saying a word, quietly turned and gave the imp her full attention, only raising a single grey eyebrow as a signal that she was now listening.
The imp breathed a sigh of relief and started letting the words out. “Daddy wasn’t a wizard or even a particularly notable warrior, but he still killed a witch at least as good as you. Aren’t you even a little bit interested in how he did that, or if the little bastard might be just a bit of a chip off the old block that way?”
The queen snarled at him. “Julian Fuller was a cowardly general. He got other people to kill them.”
“Right. A treacherous sneaky general who outmaneuvered his opponents, making them think they had the upper hand when they didn’t.”
The queen had his full attention now. She suddenly stiffened and looked him square in the eye. Her voice was quiet and dangerous. “Spit it out. What are you trying to say!”
“Quit focusing on their front lines! Those archers in the center aren’t running! It’s a trick. Forget Agincourt, think the battle of Cowpens. Darras has. He studied it at the academy. Fire Axe Fuller’s son didn’t show up to a battle with some ragtag group of militia men. You are facing three full legions of professional soldiers.”
“WHAT!!!!!!! Where?! How?!” she sputtered. “That can’t be. I was watching the road!” The image from the crystal went wild as she tried to frantically swing it all over the battlefield.
∴
Captain Stephan had waited impatiently behind the trees on the Steward’s right flank. It had taken some thinking but he’d decided he liked Lord Brandon’s plan after all. He was a gambler at heart and it wasn’t like him to step away from the table without rolling the dice. Like the other professional troops that had answered the call, they had been placed behind the front ranks to lure the queen’s army into attacking.
“I hope those damn archers don’t kill them all before we get to see some action,” he said to Gregory. “I want this trip to be worth something.”
“He’s deployed pretty wide for that,” Gregory said. “Brandon should have pulled up a bit; he would have done better to hold the pass north of the town. The archers would have a field day there.”
“I don’t know,” Stephan replied. “I don’t trust those spiders. I wouldn’t want them flanking my archers through the woods. Besides, he has us. This is better ground for cavalry. I just hope he hasn’t forgotten…”
They heard a distinctive bugle call. “That’s our song! Forward lads!” The cataphract of the Third started forward at a trot. Rounding the woods they had been concealed behind, Stephan got his first look over the battlefield. It looked like the trap was working. The archers were retreating in the center according to plan. His men would now swing around behind the goblin army and close the trap.
The bogey chief offered a howl of triumph up to the moon as he stood on the spot where the cursed archers had stood moments before. He turned back towards his comrades. “Onward to victory!” he yelled.
But no sooner had he turned than he heard a strange sound. Bagpipes. Bagpipes? He looked back towards the town. The archers were running but like a curtain parting they now showed something behind them, something between the bogies and the town. Spearpoints?! The chief looked and that was all he could see. He stood stunned by the sight for a moment. Then it sunk in. That was a professional pike formation. Nothing else could be that densely packed together. Highly trained well armored professional soldiers armed with pikes, each 18 foot long, and trained to use them together in formation as a solid wall of spears. They were heading his way. Those archers weren’t running; they were repositioning.
The chief glanced backwards for a moment. The goblin army was closing in behind him. They’d kill him as a deserter going that way. There was no escape. Well, it was a good day to die. He turned back towards the approaching wall of spears, gave a defiant growl, and then charged forward into the wall of death.
Carack was in the front rank of goblins. Up to now it had been a good battle. The plan had been to use the bogies to screen the goblins and soak up arrows as the goblins charged towards the ranks of assembled archers. So far it was working; the bogies had taken a terrible beating form the longbow shafts, but they had enabled the goblins to close the ranks. His men would take a few shafts, but they should be able to close the remaining distance. The one distraction was that something had happened to Monotauk. Probably that damned wizard. He couldn’t think of what else the enemy could have that would stop a full blown giant.
No matter, he urged his men forwards, into the hole the bogies had broken in the Steward’s center. Odd that the bogies ahead seemed to have stopped. Suddenly there was a shout.
Carack glanced behind him and saw his worst nightmare, a full legion of the Steward’s cavalry behind his army. Worried, he glanced around to the front and saw his fears confirmed. There were more professional troops hidden behind the archers. A formation of professional swordsmen was ahead of him, on his right. They were advancing through the gap between the trees and the town ridge. With cavalry behind him, pikes dead ahead, and swordsmen sweeping around to his right he was caught between the anvil and the hammer.
“Form up! Tight formation, it’s a trap!”
General Squamata looked over the situation with his spyglasses. The archers had fallen back to reveal a full legion of professional pikemen defending the town and now advancing from the front. Another legion of cavalry was now hitting his rear, and that looked like more swordsmen showing up at the front, too.
“Blast and damnation! Doesn’t that bitch of a queen know we’re supposed to have numbers on OUR side?! Is the entire army of the Steward here?!”
He turned to the jacks and his bodyguard. “Stop that cavalry charge at all costs! If they aren’t stopped they’ll hit the army in the rear and none of us will get out of here alive! Where the hell is Sandager? Time he earned his pay.”
Sandager sat on his mount observing the battle. He knew what the banners of the Steward’s Third Calvary looked like.
“We’re ordered to attack, sir. Squamata says stop that cavalry at all costs.”
Sandager just laughed. “I told the damn fool to let me do more scouting.”
“Do we attack, sir?”
“Are you joking? Of course not. We run while we still can. Everyone is to break into groups of no more than ten once we leave the battlefield. Head for the river and under no circumstances bother any civilians till we're over the river. We might all get out of this alive.”
“The queen won’t like that.”
“The queen’s got other things to worry about.”
Squamata watched as the queen’s elite guard formed up in a line against the Stewards’s heavy cavalry. The queen’s fierce jack-o’-lantern warriors moved with great precision and discipline. His own elite troops lined up beside them. It was an impressive military display. It would have been a lot more impressive if they weren’t outnumbered six to one by that approaching cavalry.
Stephan’s troop, reinforced by Darras’ Rangers, lined up in front of the queen’s bodyguard for a moment, fired a volley of arrows into their ranks, and then switched to their swords for the charge. Gregory rode over to Stephan.
“What are those things?” Gregory shouted.
Stephan glanced ahead at a troop of … creatures? Some sort of infantry, but not men. As they closed, he realized he was looking at a troop of jack-o'-lanterns. Probably elite infantry.
“Some witchcraft of the goblin queen,” Stephan said somberly. “Nervous?”
Gregory shook his dark locks. For a moment he looked grim and determined, and then suddenly he broke into a broad gin.
Stephan glanced at him like he'd lost his mind. “What are you smiling about?”
“Of all the horrors she could send against us … jack-o’-lanterns. Stick men with melons stuck on their heads.” Gregory let out a roaring laugh and pointed at the enemy. “We’ve been spending all summer doing nothing but slicing at melons stuck on poles. Now the queen sends melons on poles to attack us!”
Stephan nearly fell off his horse laughing. Every day, the whole summer long, Gregory and Stephan and the rest of Third had practiced their war craft by sticking melons on top of poles and riding past them, slicing at the melons with their swords. The queen couldn’t have picked a more perfect target for his men. Of course the melons didn’t try to hit back, but…
They urged their horses forward and lead the Third Cavalry into the heart of the queen's elite summoned warriors. Their sabers cut into the jack-o’-lanterns and hit those pumpkin heads with amazing precision.
Squamata stood stunned for a moment. Tiberius must have enchanted the blades of the enemy cavalry somehow. It was bad enough that the queen's elite infantry was fighting against cavalry, but those horsemen just never missed a pumpkin head. He watched, amazed, as a jack leapt ten feet into the air to swing a wickedly curved scimitar at the rider. The rider didn't miss a step, making a perfect slash through the flying pumpkin head, beheading it and sending it crashing down to earth. To add insult to injury, a few paces later he struck down another jack with the backhand. It was like the wizard had specially trained a unit of cavalry by nothing all summer but practice killing jack-o’-lanterns.
Squamata’s elite bodyguard didn’t do much better. There were just too many riders and too few goblins to stop them. They barely slowed down the charge of the Third. Stephan signaled his men to regroup, and then the men turned towards the rear of the goblin main army.
Carack and his men were now fighting desperately. Most of the bogies were dead and the goblins were now hard pressed with attacks on their right by imperial pikemen and on the left by the Steward’s legionary swordsmen. The Steward’s professional troops fought in tight formations that put two men against one goblin. Tiberius, Lord Brandon, and the archers were pouring a murderous arrow fire into the goblins from their right rear. Carack was trying to maintain some order, but then he heard the bugles. A moment later it was no longer Carack’s concern as Gregory’s lance hit him square in the chest.
Squamata knew the situation was hopeless. “Back to the caves. Order a general retreat. Everyone for himself!” He looked back in disgust. Sandager hadn’t waited for orders; he and his mercenaries were already bugging out.
Lord Gillyian and his riders had started out on the left flank of the Stewards. Gillyian had come with a few hundred riders, a token force, but this was a small battle after all. Gillyian’s men rode without the solid saddles the Sons of Adam preferred. But they didn’t go for the lance charge; their weapon was mostly the bow. They’d taken a few shots at the spiders, especially aiming for the ones fleeing into the woods.
Now was their moment. Gillyian’s keen eyes spotted the general retreat order. The Steward’s armies were closing in rapidly, but there was still a gap, a chance for the goblins and their allies to escape. Gillyian’s riders charged forward, cutting off the escape route. A few fresh flares from the magus exploded above them. In the light they could clearly see the goblin skirmishers making for the rear. Gillyian’s riders sent a volley of arrows into them. Goblins who lived through that panicked and ran every way, trying to find a way out of the circling trap.
Squamata paused his chariot. “Damn those elves; we’ve got to go through them if we want to live. Follow me!”
The great goblin general led the way, charging right at the center of the elf riders. Lord Gillyian spotted the goblin captain. Firing an arrow, he saw it bounce off the great goblin’s armor. Time to try something else. The goblin threw a javelin which killed Gillyian’s horse. Gillyian rolled safely to the ground, the goblin’s chariot barreling down upon him. Gillyian gave a word of command to the horses. Wild goblin horses weren’t easily swayed by an Alfaran, but he could confuse them at least. They panicked, reared, and halted in place. The great goblin jumped down from his chariot, drawing his two great cutlasses. Gillyian drew a sword and dagger to meet him. His blades gleamed with a blueish light of their own. Their swords clashed, sending sparks into the darkness. Gillyian gave ground before the furious assault of the goblin chief. Finally, a parry and a riposte gave him a touch as his sword slid under the goblin’s armor and badly cut the goblin’s forearm. The goblin winced in pain, and that gave Gillyian another opportunity. A beat attack made an opening and Gillyian slipped in close, driving his elf knife though the goblin’s armor and up into his breast.
Gillyian pushed the body away from him and looked about for another foe. Riders were charging up to him, but Gillyian saw they wore the white and red of the Stewardship. Gillyian let out a hail, and was greeted in return. Captain Stephan rode up and gr
eeted him.
“No more goblins this way, Captain,” Gillyian said smiling. “Better hurry if you want to bag a few more.”
Stephan gave him a salute with his sword. “Got their general, I see. Good work. Aye, I need a few more scalps. I bagged some of their pumpkins, but I’ve got to make sure I’m ahead of Captain Walker.”
“You’ll have far to go to match his score. He killed their giant,” Gillyian said.
“What? Damn! Are you sure?” said Stephan.
“I’ve good eyes, Captain,” Gillyian laughed.
Stephan looked about, annoyed. “Don’t suppose you see any more giants about?”
Gillyian laughed. “No, but I’ll tell the queen to send more next time. I’m sure she’ll be happy to oblige.”
“Come on men! We’ve got to work hard to even that score. Let’s grab a few tails while the fox hunt is still on.” Stephan put spurs to his horse and his unit followed.
There weren’t many left. The battle was over. It was an incredible slaughter, hardly any of the goblins or bogies had escaped. To Stephan’s annoyance and Darras’ embarrassment, Darras was being hailed by the men as the great hero of the day for killing the giant.
Tiberius was tired. So many deaths around him were draining somehow. He didn’t mind the deaths of the goblins so much. They were unnatural creatures and not meant to be alive. But the bogies and spiders were natural, if unpleasant creatures. Then there had been a few score human mercenaries. On their side, the butcher's bill was quite light, with only nineteen dead and a few hundred wounded. Ti went over to the hospital to help with the healing, but Singh had things well in hand.
There was a lot of commotion still outside. They were burning bodies and dancing around the fires. Everyone was exhausted though. It had been a hard march and hard fighting. Kristine told him to get some sleep and he didn’t argue. Singh had a cot set aside for him, and he was asleep the moment his head hit the canvas.
∴
Path of the Magi (Tales of Tiberius) Page 36
