Such an outcome w as unlikely this day though, Calard judged. Nothing he had heard about the Norscans made him think that the notion of turning tail and fleeing in the face of their enemies would even cross their barbarian minds.
The snow muffled the sound of the thundering hooves, and again Calard thought he heard the sound of w olves howling, though it was impossible to pinpoint w here the sound w as coming from.
A regiment of knights errant out to the right, impetuous and hungry for glory, low ered their lances and kicked their steeds into a gallop, breaking ranks and pushing ahead of the battle line. Calard knew instinctively that they had launched the charge too early, and that their steeds w ould be struggling by the time they struck home.
For many of those young knights, some of w hom might have been as young as fifteen, this w ould be their first and last taste of battle. Every battle w as dangerous, of course
- even tourneys had no small amount of risk involved - but it w as a knight's first foray into battle that w as so often his last.
It w as the w ay of battle, Gunthar had taught him. The first to die in any battle w ere the most inexperienced, the weakest, the poorest warriors, the unlucky, those too young to be fighting, or those too old and slow . Most of these died in the first clash, and it w as then that the real fighting would begin. This factor w as even more emphasised in a siege, Gunthar had told him. In the first days of a siege, the weak w ere picked off one by one until only the most veteran, hardened warriors were left on either side. It was brutal and it w as savage, and many good men w ere lost in the opening skirmishes, but it w as the w ay of things, in the same w ay that the w olf picked off the w eakest in the herd, and the runt of the litter invariably died w hen the hardship of w inter descended.
Calard could see the enemy moving now, could hear their drums pounding out a savage rhythm as they began loping through the knee-high snow tow ards the wall of knights bearing down on them.
Glancing out along the line to the right, he could see barbarous, lightly armoured horsemen bearing dow n on the yeomen riders out there, who were firing their bow s from the saddle.
Clouds of arrow s fired by the foot archers further back darkened the sky, arcing over the knights' heads before descending into the enemy ranks that w ere now running full pelt tow ards the knights, screaming war cries that could be heard only vaguely, as if they w ere coming from a great distance. The depth of the enemy ranks could still not be gauged due to the gusting snow s, but Calard saw hundreds of men stumble and fall as the arrow s slammed dow n amongst them, driving through furs into heathen flesh and muscle, punching through horned iron helmets to pierce skulls.
Shields were lifted up high as hundreds more arrow s sliced down through the gale, but it did not slow the Norscans.
From amongst the barbarian lines, black iron chains were released, and hundreds of shaggy-furred hounds w ere set loose. Slavering and howling, they bounded ahead of the Norscans, kicking up clouds of snow powder in their eagerness to close the distance. They were immense beasts, and many of them bore the mark of mutation and corruption. Some had boar-like tusks curling from their maw s, while others had tw o heads or serpentine tails that ended in snapping snake heads.
They bounded through the snow towards the impetuous knights errant out in front, Norscan hound and Bretonnian knight hurtling tow ards each other at full speed. One w arhound, a massive beast w ith hindquarters striped in alternating bands of orange and black, leapt into the air and ripped the first knight from the saddle, massive jaws clamped around his head. Then the rest of the knights and hounds struck each other, coming together w ith colossal force.
A dozen monstrous hounds w ere skewered on lances, and several more were bow led over by the flailing hooves of the mighty destriers, bones shattered. Young knights w ere dragged dow n into the snow, yanked from their saddles as jaw s locked around legs and torsos, w renching plate mail out of shape. Calard saw a destrier stumble and fall, screaming horribly as a w arhound bore it to the ground, jaw s gripping its neck, and the unfortunate knight in the saddle of the mauled horse was ripped apart as three snarling hounds leapt upon him.
The knights errant charge had completely stalled now, their impetus lost, and those young knights still in the saddle were slashing down at the hounds with swords and lance-butts. One of the beasts w as struck in the spine, and its hind legs gave way beneath it. Still snarling and snapping the beast w as killed as hooves caved in its skull.
Seeing that the young knights were getting the better of the w arhounds, the rest of the Bretonnian army flowed around the melee, keeping their momentum going as they bore dow n on the Norscans.
They w ere around tw o hundred yards from the barbarians, and horns blared suddenly. As one the wall of Bretonnian knights spurred on their steeds, breaking into a thundering gallop.
Ten-thousand lances lowered, and a roaring cry rose from the lips of the knights.
'For Bastonne!' roared Calard, and dug his spurs into his steed's side once again, urging the stallion on.
His heart w as racing. There was something breathtaking about being part of a massed charge, and it never failed to fill Calard with excitement.
He could see the enemy more clearly now; hulking brutes bedecked in furs and hefting brutal looking axes, blades and spiked maces.
The barbarians' charge faltered, individual w arriors slowing as the wall of knights thundered tow ards them. Calard felt the thrill of victory wash through him. The enemy w ere men after all. They were not daemons or monsters, but merely men -
men that knew fear.
The howls of w olves echoed from the flanks, but Calard ignored the sounds, intent on the enemy in front of him.
The flush of imminent victory spurred the Bretonnians on, and they hurtled towards the Norscans, lances lowered.
The battle w ould not last long at all, thought Calard. Overhead, a sound like thunder shook the heavens.
A DARK RED, spitting light shot up through the blizzard and exploded overhead.
'That's the signal,' snarled Zumarah to his dark kin, his eyes gleaming. He spoke in his native tongue, a guttural language not unlike the sound of gears grinding and rocks being crushed.
The Chaos dw arf gazed adoringly at Ereshkigal-Namtar, his beloved and priceless daemon-construct.
Zumarah had personally overseen its creation in the nightmarish hellforges deep below the scorched surface of Zarr-Naggrand. For over fifty years he had slaved over its construction, barely allowing himself or his slave-crews any rest so consumed was he in his obsessive work. Thousands of slaves had perished during its forging. These ones had their life fluids drained from their bodies, their bones and gristle ground to pow der, and this viscous mix was added to the alloys, tempering them and dyeing the metal of the great beast a ruddy, blood-bronze.
Upon the completion of the physical, inert form of the infernal machine, he had been present for fifty days and fifty nights of ritual and ceremony as great Hashut's high priests infused it w ith the eternal daemon-twins. Ereshkigal and Namtar had been the true names of these malicious daemons of blood, rage and industry, and they had struggled hard against their bindings, screaming and roaring as they strained to break their bonds and rip the high priests, and Zumarah, apart from the inside out.
Nevertheless, their struggles had been in vain, and they had now been caged w ithin his daemon-construct for over a decade.
Its construction w as a thing of beauty, and Zumarah felt a jealous pride as he looked upon Ereshkigal-Namtar's exalted form.
It w as the size of a small house, standing almost fifteen feet tall and some tw enty feet long, and w eighed more than a fully laden Norse dragonship. Indeed, transporting the infernal machine across the seas had not been an easy task, but one that, if the Norscan's w ord could be valued, w ould be w orth his while.
Ereshkigal-Namtar had not accepted its imprisonment, and still it strained against its bonds. Steam rose from its brazen body, and runes that glow ed with heat shim
mered across its form. Ensorcelled chains, each link the size of a man's head, bound the daemon engine, connected to its blood-bronze body and pounded deep into the ground to hold it in place. Chunks of shiny black volcanic rock engraved w ith runes of power were hammered into its sides, and these runes glowed like lava as they exerted their power of containment upon the tw in daemons locked inside the machine.
The bulk of the engine's w eight was borne upon a pair of immense, spiked wheels, each taller than an ogre, and filled with hundreds of intricate, interconnected cogs and w heels that w ere in constant motion. The barrel of the engine's gaping, tooth-filled maw , which was wide enough to sw allow a horse with ease, was rimmed with more runes of binding, and the stink of sulphur, blood and death rose from w ithin.
The brass flanks of the daemon engine rippled with movement as the daemons struggled vainly to escape, and a myriad of gargoyle-like faces pressed forth from w ithin, each one more horrific than the last as they snarled and reached for Zumarah.
The stony-skinned dwarf laughed at them.
'Ready Ereshkigal-Namtar for firing,' he growled over his shoulder to his two kinsmen.
Belonging of a low er caste level than he, these tw o Chaos dwarfs w ore but simple masks of metal over their faces rather than the tall helmets of the nobility, and heavy aprons of leather, w ith strips of metal woven into them, protected their squat bodies from the heat of their daemon-machine charge. They bow ed their heads to their forgemaster, and moved forw ards to align the cog-runes for firing.
Hellcannon the Norscans had called his beloved daemon engine. Zumarah liked the name. It w as appropriate, and fitted well.
A dozen black orc slaves w ith heads bow ed in dog-like submission squatted near the engine, their powerful bodies covered in scars and burns. As Zumarah's kinsmen aligned the cog-runes, the heat from Ereshkigal-Namtar increased exponentially as its pow er grew, and the black orcs whimpered, turning their heads away. Creatures sorcerously bred for servitude by the high priests of Hashut in ages long past, each of the black orcs w ore a collar of iron around their necks. Thick chains connected each of these collars, and just like the daemon-engine that they tended, the ends of this chain had been hammered into the ground.
Zumarah turned tow ards the battlefield below, and although it was all but completely obscured from view by the roaring blizzard, he knew that his estimations of the distance and trajectory w ere accurate.
He grinned to himself, his eyes blazing w ith hatred and his tusks pressing against the stony flesh of his cheeks as he imagined the carnage about to be unleashed.
'Fire,' he grow led.
THE NORSCANS' ADVANCE had completely stalled, and some of them w ere even now turning around, pushing back against those behind in their panic. They w ere already breaking and running and the Bretonnians were still a little over a hundred yards from their lines. This is going to be an absolute rout, Calard thought.
The entire Norscan centre turned tail and fled in the face of the Bretonnian charge. It w as hard to see exactly w hat w as going on, thanks to the blinding gale of snow and ice particles, but it w as clear that the Norscan centre had almost completely dissolved.
Again he heard roars and howls off to the flanks, and this time he thought he heard something else reach his ears on the wind; men screaming in pain and terror. He glanced to the east, but could see little, though he thought he saw vague shapes, animalistic and furred in the blizzard, and knights turning around in confusion and panic.
The sight was alarming but there w as little that he could do but concentrate on his ow n duty, and he dragged his attention back to the front and centre. Besides, even if the Norscans w ere somehow overwhelming the Bretonnian flanks, their entire centre had been all but routed.
Seeing the enemy running before them, the Bretonnian war horns blared, and the army of Lyonesse sw ept forward into the gap.
The knights at the forefront of the charge caught up w ith the Norscans, many of w hom, seeing that they were about to be overrun, turned and hurled themselves at the knights, swinging their axes murderously. These ones were hacked down where they stood, lances smashing them from their feet and impaling them.
The Bastonnians thundered into the breach in the Norscan line, and Calard lined up a fleeing man with his lance. The man spun towards the charging horsemen, but Calard's lance took him in the chest before he could swing his axe, driving through his ribcage and punching out his back. The lance was wrenched from Calard's hand and he slid the blade of Garamont from its inlaid scabbard, the ancient heirloom gleaming coldly.
More Norscans w ere run down, and Calard struck a blow upon the head of one of the barbarians, cracking the skull.
Calard realised that many of the Norscans had fled not directly away from the Bretonnians, but rather had moved off to the sides, pushing into the ranks of Norscans on the flanks. He turned his head from side to side in concern as he realised that none of the men he had faced appeared to be the heavily armoured Norscan elite that they had expected.
There was something very wrong here, he realised suddenly. His gaze w as drawn upw ards as the shadow y outline of the reportedly haunted, tow ering motte at the end of the valley hove into view.
Abruptly, there came a sound like a mountain falling, and a comet trailing hellish red flames shot up into the air from the top of the steep-sided hillock. It soared up high and Calard follow ed its trajectory skyward, mouth gaping wide in shock and wonder.
Then the roaring comet reached the top of its arc and began to descend tow ards the ground; tow ards the charging Bretonnians.
'Lady protect us,' Calard breathed as the roiling inferno came screaming down tow ards the valley floor, and he heard shouts of panic and fear spread through the ranks.
Calard w as throw n from the saddle as the missile smashed down amongst the knights fifty feet to his left, making the ground shudder beneath the impact, and the sounds of horses and men roaring in agony rose to the heavens, louder even than the screaming w inds. The heatwave of the blast burnt Calard's lungs, and he gasped as, even at this distance, his plate armour heated up to an uncomfortable level.
Those knights closer in to the blast w ere cooked alive inside their armour, their flesh bursting into flames along w ith tabards, banners and horseflesh. A circle over fifty yards in diameter w as scorched into the ground, ice and snow instantly turning to steam. Hundreds died in that first barrage, their flesh igniting beneath the intense heat, their blood boiling within their veins.
Those directly under the impact of the fireball were unrecognisable, nothing more than charred, tw isted corpses that still burned fiercely. So intense were the unnaturally burning, vivid red flames that plate armour ran like quicksilver, dripping onto the ground in flaming, hissing blobs.
Hooves flashed near Calard's head as he pushed himself to his knees, horses screaming and bucking in terror all around. The stink of cooked flesh made him gag, and he staggered unsteadily to his feet as knights fought to regain control over their horses. Spying the precious blade of Garamont on the ground a few feet distant, he leapt for it, uncaring of the danger, and closing his hand around the hilt, he sheathed it.
'Calard!' baw led a voice, and he looked around to see Bertelis. Dodging through the chaos of terrified animals, he reached his brother, grabbed onto his saddle as he caught his breath, standing close so as to lessen the chance of getting trampled or kicked.
'What in the name of the Lady w as that?' Bertelis shouted. Calard merely shook his head in response.
'Sigibold?' he shouted.
'Dead,' replied Bertelis.
Calard spied a horse w ith no rider nearby, its ears flat against its head and its eyes w ide in terror. He lurched towards the beast, making a grab for its reins. Securing them, he sw ung himself up into the saddle. The terrified animal reared, but Calard w ould not be unsaddled again, and the animal quickly began to calm dow n under his firm control. Calard cast a quick glance around him, appraising the situation.
Duke
Adalhard, thankfully, had not been engulfed in the blast, and Calard could see him and the majority of his army of knights still charging up the centre, intent on running down the few fleeing Norscans that could still be seen there. From his position, it w as obvious that the Norscans were merely leading the Bretonnian duke further into their midst. He caught a glimpse of massive warriors bedecked in black iron closing in from the flanks, giants of men with horned helmets and snow-covered furs over their shoulders that were stalking tow ards the Bretonnians in their thousands, encircling them.
The Bretonnians had been duped into charging the centre, Calard realised, which had given w ay before them w ith little resistance. It had been a simple, well executed ploy, and Calard felt despair as he realised that in all likelihood no knights would ride aw ay from this battle alive. Now the hammer blow was about to fall, and the Norscans w ere going to close in on either side, like wolves.
No, Calard corrected, seeing further as the w ind suddenly dropped. The first hammer blow had already fallen.
He saw thousands of corpses strewn across the snow out on the flanks, bodies that had literally been torn apart.
Even as he stared despairingly out tow ards the flanks, he saw figures bursting from snow drifts, powder and snow exploding upwards as they leapt from their concealment and fell upon the knights and peasants out on the army's edge. Calard heard their w ar cries as they laid into the Bretonnian flank, tearing through rank after rank, their axes reaping a bloody toll, hacking men apart w ithout mercy.
'This is a massacre,' said Calard, turning his horse to survey the battlefield all around. The surviving knights of Bastonne were milling around in confusion. No one w as taking command. In every direction Calard saw thousands of Norscans marching through the blizzard tow ards them. In the rear, seeing the enemy closing in, the men-at-arms and peasant bow men took flight, hurling weapons to the ground and quitting the field.
Warhammer - Knight of the Realm Page 13
