by David Waine
Callin was impressed. “Are the Draals capable of such subtlety?”
“They are not great tacticians. With the numbers at their disposal, they don’t usually need to be. Don’t take them for fools, though, because they are not.”
Callin took this in, new respect for his foes kindling in his breast. He looked towards the reddening sun. “It will be dark in an hour,” he observed.
Treasor nodded. “That gives us an hour in which to refresh our troops.”
CHAPTER TWENTY
Darkness fell and still the expected attack did not begin. Such a moon as existed disappeared behind a bank of thick cloud. As Callin and his fellow watchers kept their vigil, even the campfires began to die down. Kubelik’s army was bedding down for the night.
“That’s what they want us to think,” hissed Treasor. “Catch us off guard. Expect the attack from the quadrant with the fewest campfires.”
Callin rubbed his bleary eyes and scanned the enemy lines yet again. The flickering orange blobs were dying down all over the field now, but he became aware of a gradual pattern to their extinguishing. Instead of dwindling to dull red glows, a large and increasing area of blackness was opening up in the heart of the enemy’s positions as fires were extinguished suddenly.
“General Treasor!” There was an edge of concern in the guard’s voice. “There is movement ahead in the darkness.”
“Where?” The general was at his side. The soldier pointed directly ahead to the same large black patch that Callin had noticed. Watching carefully, the young Count Vorst also discerned the vague forms of many bodies creeping forwards in silence through the darkness.
“Ring the alarm bell!” cried the general. “Let them know that we are ready for them.”
The sound of the rapidly tolled bell carried across to the Draal ranks. A line of flaming torches lit up on the walls, throwing their flickering red light as far as the oncoming troops, removing the element of surprise. They were now caught between the city and their own forces. The hail of arrows that landed among them brought the first casualties. A forest of blades rose, blood red in the firelight, a howl of defiance from a thousand throats and they surged forward in a reckless charge.
They began to die as soon as they reached the outermost buildings. Instead of charging through empty streets, shutters flew open on all sides, revealing black holes in the walls, and bowstrings spat death upon them from every conceivable direction. Those who survived the initial hail, and advanced further, met with even heavier resistance, many of them falling into the prepared pits and impaling themselves on the stakes hidden within. They threw themselves against walls, tripping over piles of bodies, crouching in the shadows until they could attack the building. They battered doors down only to find the houses empty. House after house was stormed in this way, all to no effect. The mystery bowmen who attacked and slaughtered them without warning had simply melted away into the night. But not completely. No matter how many buildings they took, the screams of newly shot men sounded from a new direction.
What they faced was an elite band of archers, all dressed in black, and masked, who flitted from house to house, loosing shaft after shaft and then slipping away to another building before they could be discovered. There were no more than four hundred of them, split into many small mobile groups; their dusky attire, coupled with the inky darkness, masking their true numbers.
Panic spread among the attackers. Felled in horrible numbers by an unseen foe, they slashed right and left in desperation, frequently meeting nothing other than the flesh of a comrade. As hysteria took control, they were responsible for killing more of each other than the Kingdom’s archers could ever have done.
Rhomic watched all this from the battlements. He could barely see in the flickering gloom. Patiently, he gauged his moment. Callin watched with him, as did Soth, Treasor and Gallen. To Callin’s inexperienced eye, it seemed to be confusion of shadowy bodies and whirling blades in the darkness. He had no way of telling how the struggle ensued.
“How do we know who is winning?” he asked.
“If you can see them, they are the enemy,” replied Gallen. “If they are fighting, they are fighting each other. That is how.”
Callin was witnessing his first lesson in subtle warfare. Make the enemy fight himself.
Rhomic judged that they had gained all the advantage they could. “Sound the recall!” he ordered sharply.
A ghostly, wavering trumpet rang out from a nearby turret. It was an eerie, thin, warbling sound that hung in the air and carried over to the struggling masses in the streets below them. It sounded more than anything like the wailing of a spectral, bereaved mother keening for the loss of her children.
Leaving the Draals to lash out at one another in their distress, they stole away and returned to the postern by shadowy paths, counted through by General Gallen, who sent a satisfied report to the king that all archers had been confirmed home safe.
“Well, at least we have put a dent in their numbers without losing any of our own,” remarked Rhomic with a nod of grim satisfaction. “First blood to us.”
“They are withdrawing, sire,” Callin was still watching the events unfold on the streets beyond the walls.
“Archers!” On Rhomic’s order, several more volleys of arrows showered down on the retreating Draals before they moved beyond range.
“Will they come again?”
Treasor shook his head. “Not tonight, not a massed attack at any rate. They know that we have dealt them a stinging blow without receiving a reply. That will make them more cautious. They do not know what other booby traps we have laid in the city.”
“What other booby traps have we laid?” asked Callin.
“None,” replied Treasor, “but they don’t know that.”
A messenger arrived from the western wall and delivered his lack of news to the king. “No movement on the forest side, Your Majesty.”
“Thank you,” returned Rhomic and sent the man back to his post. “Either they have no troops in the forest or they are keeping very quiet.”
“My guess is that they are not there,” put in Soth. “They can’t manoeuvre their heavy machinery through the forest without clearing it first, so they leave it alone.”
Rhomic was thoughtful. “Yet we must keep an eye on the forest. They may have some devilry brewing in there. It would stretch our resources to keep a fruitless watch on an empty wood, while they have thousands to spare.”
“I suggest, sire, that our best chance lies in the mobility of our forces within these walls,” remarked Treasor. “We cannot fight two sides at once.”
The king nodded. “Stand down the bulk of the troops on the west wall. Leave only a skeleton guard and relieve them at the earliest opportunity. Aha! I thought so.”
The rumbling sound from the city wall reached all their ears immediately. Heavy machinery was being moved up to the perimeter of the city. Small fires kindled, twinkling in the darkness.
“They will bombard us?” asked Callin.
“Not us. The city,” replied Treasor. “They will burn it to the ground to remove any more surprises from their path.”
As he spoke, the first flaming missile shot from a catapult and landed in the main marketplace, setting fire to several buildings. Dozens more followed in its wake. Within minutes, the city was in flames, huge flames leaping the full height of the castle walls. The air was thick with smoke and the crackle of combustion.
“Stand down the bulk of the men on this wall as well,” ordered Rhomic. “We may as well rest while we can.”
“We will yield them the city?” asked Callin, incredulous.
“We cannot save it,” replied Rhomic phlegmatically, “and they cannot attack us through the flames. They must wait, as must we. Alert the fire crews in case any of their missiles come over the walls.”
*
In the commanders’ tent to the rear of the Draal army, a serious rift was developing.
“When will you listen to my counsel
, Your Highness?” Trulik was furious.
“When you give me some counsel worth listening to!” responded Kubelik, equally furious. “At least I have waged war against these peasants. War and glory! You would have us sit and wait until we trip over our beards.”
“And what have you achieved?” roared Trulik, “Hundreds of our best assault troops cut down without any reply and a lot of empty buildings destroyed!”
“If they are razed to the ground, they cannot hide archers in them,” countered Kubelik.
“No,” replied the general with feigned patience, “and neither can we. Do you suppose they will clear the rubble for us? We can’t move our siege towers to the walls across heaps of collapsed stone. They will fall over. They could not fight us that way by day and we could have occupied the buildings ourselves to give our assault troops invaluable cover. In your zeal, oh mighty one, you have provided them with a new defensive wall. Now we will have to send men in to clear the field before we can advance — and I am sure that Rhomic will just stand by and watch us, won’t he?”
“Casualties are inevitable in any military engagement,” replied Kubelik coolly, pouring himself a goblet of wine.
“Agreed,” said Trulik, “and it is the commander’s task to ensure that his own casualties are minimised while exacting the maximum number from his foes. Every life of his own forces that he saves tilts the balance his way as much as every enemy life that he takes.”
“We will soon take lives enough,” slurred Kubelik through his wine.
“But not before they have taken more of ours, thanks to your recklessness. Under your command our army grows smaller every day. One day it could be smaller than theirs. Have you considered that?”
*
Callin woke with a start. His sleep had been fitful and all too brief, fuelled by visions of his dead family. The world was grey with the broadening dawn. A fine drizzle had started and there was a bite in the air that had not been there the day before. It was now November, of course, and winter was closing in quickly. The cloud cover seemed to press right down to the uppermost turrets of Castle Brond itself.
He stretched stiffly, the dread images of his father’s and brothers’ dead faces fading, and heaved himself from his straw billet. All seemed reasonably quiet. No fighting going on at the moment then. Perhaps he would have time for breakfast. He stared gloomily around the rude stable in which he was lodged, his own comfortable quarters being too far from his appointed position on the wall for him to be lodged there while hostilities continued. Selfishly he cursed the butcher and his family who now occupied his quarters, but then he remembered that the Draals had burnt that man’s home the previous night.
A smart captain approached him and saluted. “Count Vorst, the king requests your attendance at breakfast in the council chamber.”
Minutes later, Callin presented himself as requested. He had tidied his appearance as best he could, pulling bits of straw out of his hair and from his clothes, but in great need of a wash and change of clothes. It came, therefore, as a relief to discover that everyone else — monarch included — looked no better.
“Good morning, Count Vorst,” grunted the king. Please join us. There is food on the side table. Do not stand on ceremony. There is much to do.”
For a man who had received the most devastating news of his life less than two days previously, Rhomic seemed remarkably composed.
“Gentlemen,” began the king, wiping his mouth, “for the moment all is quiet. Kubelik and Trulik received a mauling last night, while we lost property only. They now have their engineers clearing up their own mess. We have archers stationed to complicate their task, but they will complete it eventually.” Glancing out of the window, he noted that the drizzle had now developed into steady rain. “The weather will hamper their progress. The harder it rains, the more likely their heavy machinery will become bogged down. Therefore, while we will maintain all vigilance, and do them damage wherever possible, I believe that we can gain some much needed rest today.”
*
All day the Draal engineers toiled in the rain, mud and Kingdom arrows, to clear the mess their supreme commander had caused the previous night. Kubelik, anxious to repair his reckless actions, had risen early to send them in, but had neglected to provide them with shield and archer support, so Gallen promptly decimated them from the battlements. Their return roused Trulik from his cot. Furious with his commander for yet another rash, ill-considered move, he sent them back in with the proper support.
From then on they were more successful. The wall of shields took the brunt of Gallen’s arrows, while their own archers provided such a furious response that the fire from the walls was quickly reduced to a trickle, most of Gallen’s archers being forced to take shelter behind their embrasures to avoid being hit themselves. Ferian soon had his first patients admitted to his makeshift hospital and the burial details were given their initial tasks.
Because they were shooting at high walls, many of the Draal arrows sailed clear over the crenellations and struck, usually harmlessly, in the bailey beyond. From her vantage point in Mussa’s cottage, Lissian Dumarrick watched the sporadic fall of deadly missiles and counted the gaps between their falls. It was obvious, even to her, that major action was not to be joined just yet. When that happened, it would be so furious that she would not have time to think. The two families who shared the cottage with her looked on fearfully. As an aristocrat, she ignored them completely and kept her watch at the window. She waited for the gap while the Draal archers replenished their quivers yet again. Then she darted out and gathered up all the stray arrows she could lay her hands on, before rushing back to examine her spoils before the next hail landed. Four times she repeated this exercise as the day progressed. Many of her finds were damaged: cracked shafts, blunted points, split fletching, but she did glean over fifty undamaged weapons, seven of them mail-piercing bodkin arrows. With a grunt of satisfaction, she stuffed these into her quiver.
It was only then that she noticed the two families staring at her in awestruck wonder.
“What are you looking at?” she hissed.
*
Morning dragged into afternoon and the rain increased in intensity, slowing down the clearing work even more. The hails of arrows were now sporadic. As darkness began to descend, the shooting stopped altogether.
Summoned back to his post, Callin saw that the sinking sun now shone bleakly through a small break in the cloud to illuminate a changed scene. The ruins of Brond had been tidied into massive heaps of stone with clearly identifiable pathways between them. They would be the routes by which the siege towers and catapults would come, bringing the infantry in their wake. The widest passage of all led straight to the barbican. No siege tower would be used there. Instead a massive battering ram would be hurled against the main gate, with cavalry support to flood the outer bailey and cut off the troops on the walls. This was a common enough strategy and both barbican and bailey were constructed to offer maximum resistance. The possession of either would mean massive casualties for the attacking forces and, even if they did capture them, they would still not have breeched the castle’s principal defences.
The clouds covered the sun once more, plunging the whole valley into miserable gloom. Lightning flickered on the horizon. Glancing around, he noted the defending troops massing for the expected assault, their reserves held well back from the action and the access to the hospital and the fire crews kept determinedly open.
A distant rumbling attracted his attention back forwards. It was only far off thunder, following the lightning he had witnessed moments before. Thunder and lightning in November? He could not recall the last time he had experienced that. Thunderstorms were something he associated with high summer. Then another, closer, more insistent rumbling fell upon his ears.
Bridges had been thrown down across the perimeter ditch and catapults were being moved up to advanced positions from where they could hurl rocks at Castle Brond’s walls. Trulik must be mastermind
ing this operation because they were properly supported by archer cover.
Rhomic gave the command and the Kingdom’s own archers promptly went into action, showering the oncoming machines and slowing their progress.
The Draal war machine was better prepared this time, however, and their giant catapults ground on over the bridges and down the passages cleared between the heaps of stone. Each stopped amid its own shield wall to protect its crews, while the accompanying archers took cover in the heaps of stones. Callin watched as the buckets were hauled down, straining at their tethers, and loaded with rocks.
The bombardment began. At first showers of smaller stones catapulted over the walls, stones small enough to be thrown high but large enough to take a head off. Along with his fellow guards, Callin ducked and pressed himself to the wall. Behind him he could hear occasional screams as stones struck home. Then the first salvo was over. Instantly archers leapt to their positions and loosed a volley of burning shafts straight at the machines. They caused some damage within the Draal ranks but paid for it with damage to their own as the rock salvo was followed by a hail of Draal arrows from the rubble piles.
So it went on, salvo of small stones followed by hails of arrows from each side, followed by more salvoes, for what seemed an eternity. Then the first big rock struck.
Callin felt the crash. It shook him back from the wall. It shook his companions back as well, and one of them received a black-fletched arrow in his throat. Then another crash. Then another. Each set the wall shaking. The walls of Brond Castle were unusually high — they had to be because it had no moat — but they would not withstand this bombardment for long. Callin peered out through the nearest arrow slit. By the light of burning torches and thatches, he could see the massive siege towers being moved up beyond the catapults and he could sense the dread weight of men queuing up behind them to scale the walls of Rhomic’s stronghold and reduce it to nothing.
