Knighthood of the Dragon

by Chris Bunch

  Hal had the niggling of another idea for another weapon, couldn't quite get it to appear.

  Maybe it'd come to him during the battle.

  * * * *

  "Here, then, is my plan," Lord Egibi, Commander of the First Army, said, his white mustaches ruffling slightly in the breeze blowing into the room of the manor house serving as First Army headquarters.

  Hal tried to keep his expression neutral, studied the map on the easel.

  "It appears to be the same as other offensives we've tried which have failed," Egibi went on. "A frontal assault, all along the Roche lines, intended to finally drive them from the heights they've held for over a year.

  "But it isn't… quite.

  "First, we won't have the usual buildup from our siege machines, which seems only to give the Roche warning. Instead, chosen units will attack, and the Roche will think it's only a raid in force.

  "Then, as they move forward, there'll be a great spell mounted against the Roche, and the entire front will attack in unison, as part of the second wave.

  "A third element, over here, will be making a flank attack.

  "Your opinion, Lord Kailas?"

  Hal decided to be politic.

  "I'm just a flier, sir. I have no opinion, and wonder only what you intend for my squadron to do."

  "I want no special efforts before the day of attack that might give the Roche warning," Egibi said. "Then, on that day, I want you, in force, over their lines. I want you to have complete control of the air, so the Roche have no warning."

  Hal nodded, thought.

  "I have a better idea, sir."

  Egibi waited.

  "I would like to make reconnaissances, starting today, of all Roche landing fields behind their lines.

  "None of the fliers will have any idea of your grand strategy," Hal continued, thankful that he hadn't used the lesser word tactics. "So, if they're brought down, they'll have nothing to tell their inquisitors.

  "Then, on Attack Day, instead of being over the lines, I'll have my squadron over the Roche fields. With any luck, their fliers won't able to get airborne at all."

  "Hmm. Interesting," Egibi said. "And certainly it's easier to shoot down a duck frowsting about in a marsh than when it gets into the air.

  "Yes. Yes, I like your idea a lot."

  * * * *

  Lord Bab Cantabri stormed into Hal's tent.

  "What do you have to drink?"

  Hal gauged Bab's anger, decided to pour a very strong brandy instead of wine.

  Cantabri shot it down, held out the glass for more.

  "And what put you into such a charming mood?" Hal asked.

  "Have you been briefed by our good lord and master about the upcoming offensive?"

  "I have," Hal said. "The day before yesterday."

  "Did he happen to point out a certain diversionary attack aimed at the Roche right flank?"

  "He did."

  "Did you happen to notice what unit is to make that attack?"

  "Uh-oh," Hal said.

  "Uh-oh is right," Cantabri stormed. "I've spent the last two months carefully building up my stock of killers to be good at everything from creeping through the bushes to swimming across a river and leaving nary a splash.

  "And so, for my sweat and their blood, what do we get? The chance to stand shoulder to shoulder, just like we were basic line animals, and march forward until some numbwit with a spear kills us.

  "What a godsdamned waste."

  "At least you're not part of the frontal assault," Hal said.

  "Big godsdamned deal," Cantabri said. "Don't you think the Roche might just happen to have built up their flanks? And that if they see a bunch of warriors pelting uphill toward them they might be able to fight back?

  "Or, worse, since my men are lightly armed, putting a few companies of heavy cavalry downslope to wipe 'em out?"

  Hal nodded reluctant agreement.

  "The only damned chance that I can think of to help is to get some light cavalry elements on my left flank," Cantabri growled, "and scare the bastards.

  "Not that I think anybody on either side gets scared very easily these days."

  * * * *

  It was nice, this high above the earth, Hal thought, as Storm arced around a towering cumulus cloud, and dove through a tunnel in the next one.

  Behind him, to the west, bigger clouds promising a storm were onrushing.

  But Hal would be finished with his mission before they arrived, although he might get a little wet and blown about going home.

  The dragon seemed just as happy to be up here sporting about, no one else in the sky, instead of snarling after enemies as Hal was.

  But as soon as Kailas looked down, he was torn back to reality, seeing the bare bluffs of the Roche front lines below him, so fought over that nothing could grow, and there was nothing but man's dugouts and shattered, torn things that had been trees.

  He was too high to see the rotting bodies underneath them, didn't want to think about how many more the forthcoming offensive would bring.

  Hal prodded Storm on east, and took a map from the pouch clipped to Storm's carapace.

  Little by little his fliers had filled in where the Roche dragon fields were.

  There was only one "hole," a blank spot some three leagues back of the Roche forward positions.

  Two fliers had reported black dragons orbiting that area, and so Hal had decided to take the last and possibly most dangerous reconnaissance himself.

  He was grateful for the spotty cloud cover that let him duck in and out, hopefully not seen by anyone on the ground who might give the alarm about a lone flier, and set a trap for his return.

  By now Kailas was a good judge of distance traveled, and as he came up on three leagues, he began scanning the ground below very carefully.

  His eye was caught by a bit of a blur, as if he'd gotten something in his eye.

  Instead of rubbing it, or looking away, he stared harder into the blur.

  Very suddenly, two black dragons came out of that blur, out of nowhere, taking off.

  The blur was a fairly high-level spell, cast over what must be a dragon field.

  Hal decided he should go lower and make a swift pass over the blur, to see if he could make out any details, hopefully surprising the two Roche dragons below.

  This, he thought, would be a decent way to get killed. He ought to be scooting for home.

  But duty—or maybe his own pride—called.

  He lifted the reins to put Storm into a dive, and two more blacks came out of a cloud at him, less than half a mile away.

  Hal swore.

  Caught, mooning about as if he were on his first combat flight.

  They had a slight height advantage, and were coming in fast, keeping close on each other.

  Experienced fliers.

  Was that Ky Yasin's squadron below, under that spell?

  Later for ponderings.

  Hal yanked Storm's reins, but the dragon needed no guidance. He'd seen the blacks, and was already banking into them, shrilling a challenge.

  Dragon pride was almost as suicidal as man's.

  Hal cursed again, realizing he hadn't readied his crossbow when he crossed the lines into Roche territory, a violation of one of his standing orders.

  He was thinking, as he cocked his crossbow, and made sure the ammunition carrier was locked firmly atop the weapon, that he wasn't fit to fly with his squadron, let alone command it. He'd been too long away from combat, and had let himself get sloppy.

  Hal steered Storm toward the dragon on the right, flying head-on at the monster, fully half again as big as Storm.

  There'd either be a collision, or someone would veer away.

  The Roche flier's wingmate could do nothing except fire his conventional bow at Hal at a distance when they closed. If he tried to do more, there'd be a good likelihood of collision.

  Hal had his crossbow up, aiming.

  The Roche flier saw it, flinched, broke at less than twenty ya
rds, pulled his reins to bank away.

  Hal fired, as the black's wing almost brushed Storm, and his bolt caught the flier in the side.

  He heard the scream as the man contorted, fell from his saddle, spun down toward the ground far below.

  Hal forgot him, working his cocking handle and reloading.

  He pushed his left knee against Storm, and the dragon veered to the side in a flat turn as the dead flier's wingmate brought his dragon around after Hal.

  Now, just ahead, was one of those clouds.

  Hal headed straight for it, the back of his mind wishing that the cloud would be as soft as it looked, a fleecy pillow.

  It wasn't. Suddenly the world was gray, spattering rain, and Hal couldn't see Storm's head. But at least the wind around him wasn't a gale.

  The dragon didn't like clouds any better than any flier did, and blatted a complaint.

  Hal kept his mental image of where he was, where the other Roche flier was, counted four, then pulled Storm into a hard bank to the right and up.

  He held the climbing turn until Storm was almost headed back the way they'd come, then snapped his reins hard.

  He could hear, even if he couldn't see, Storm's wings crack harder, and then they were out of the cloud.

  Just below, and to one side, as he'd hoped, was the other flier, pulling his own dragon into a bank, unwilling to follow Hal into the cloud.

  He heard the sound of Storm's wings, looked up and saw the dragon, just as Hal fired. The bolt took him in the neck, and he flopped forward on his mount.

  Hal turned Storm again.

  Somewhere, coming up fast, would be the other two dragons, who surely would have seen Hal.

  He gigged Storm again, and they went back, fast, the way they'd come.

  Behind him, still below, were the other two Roche dragons.

  There was a solid bank of clouds ahead.

  Hal thought about turning back, and attacking the other two black dragons, held back his bloodlust.

  He'd been lucky once.

  He knew too many soldiers who had counted on their luck one too many times.

  Storm dove into the cloud, and this one was the other's big brother.

  The dragon was caught, lifted a thousand feet, then driven back down by the wind, while rain spattered Hal's face, feeling like rocks.

  They were on their side, Storm frantically trying to control himself, and then they were out of the cloud, under it, the world around them gray with rain.

  The ground was less than a hundred feet below them, and there was no sign of life as the storm hammered the earth.

  Hal went for the lines, climbing to about three hundred feet as he crossed them.

  To his right, a catapult spat a long bolt up, missed him by yards, and Hal was safe, on his own side of the lines.

  He had seen enough to fill in that last blank on his map.

  Now to plan the squadron's doings on Attack Day.

  * * * *

  He saw Sir Thom Lowess at Egibi's headquarters, looking innocent, and knew the day for the offensive would be very soon.

  22

  Hal blew one note on his trumpet, kicked Storm, and dove for the still-nighted earth below, out of the glow of the rising sun's arc.

  Four dragons were V'ed behind him, all armed with the firedarts, and extra magazines for their crossbows.

  Below them was that blur that marked a hidden airfield, that Hal hoped was Ky Yasin's base.

  Out of sight, other elements of his squadron were attacking other dragon bases.

  Hal pulled up into a more gentle dive. He wasn't sure whether he had enough height to dive through the blur and still be off the ground but looking at the trees on either side, he thought he had fighting room.

  He felt a strange quiver in his mind as they "struck" the blur, and he felt Storm shake.

  Then they were in the open, about a hundred feet over a large patch of cleared forest. Below were the huge canvas domes that were dragon shelters, and, along one side of the field, tents of various sizes that marked the fliers' quarters and ground sections.

  "First the dragons," Hal had ordered, feeling his stomach coil within him in self-disgust. "Get fires going in their shelters, and that'll slow them down a bit."

  His fliers obeyed, and the firedarts spun downward, punching through the thick canvas and padding. White smoke curled up.

  Hal brought Storm up and around, barely twenty-five feet over the ground.

  He saw running men, headed for catapults at each corner of the field, paid them no mind. They wouldn't have time to load their weapons, let alone shoot them.

  Hal went down the neat line of tents, dropping firedarts as he flew. He deliberately chose the smaller ones, thinking those were the most likely to be fliers' quarters. He realized he'd always rather kill a man than a dragon.

  Again, he pulled Storm up, looked back, seeing his four fliers seeding the field with more fire.

  One, then two of the dragon shelters gouted flames, and Hal heard the dying screams of dragons inside.

  He wanted to vomit, fought control, blew a signal on his trumpet, and his four flightmates climbed away from the sea of flame below.

  Hal still didn't know if this was Ky Yasin's squadron. He reluctantly decided it probably wasn't, since the base wasn't big enough for a full squadron. But perhaps it held a flight or two of Yasin's since, after all, the dragons were black, and, as far as he knew, hoped, Yasin was the only Roche with the blacks.

  There was another base about four leagues distant, and Hal steered his dragon toward it, to give that attacking flight support.

  * * * *

  It was two hours before Hal was able to signal his formations to return to their base for a new assignment. They'd done an excellent job of bashing the Roche fliers before they could get in the air.

  Hal could only see a half dozen or so dragons in the air as they closed on the front lines, promptly forgot about them.

  Below him, the battle raged.

  He had no idea how many waves Egibi had sent up the bluffs from the Deraine positions below it.

  There was a thin line of soldiery, fighting about halfway up the bluff.

  Behind them was a thick spray of wounded and dead.

  It looked to be even worse than Hal had worried it would be.

  He looked to the flank, to see if he could see how Cantabri and his Raiding Squadron was doing, saw nothing, didn't know what to make of it.

  He had his own task.

  They closed on their base, landed. Fliers piled off their mounts, all achatter about how they'd leveled the Roche before they knew what was happening.

  Hal had accomplished his mission without casualties.

  There were men feeding, watering the dragons, rearming them with more crossbow trays, more firedarts.

  Other victuallers tried to get the fliers to slow down, drink a glass of wine or beer, eat a high-piled beef sandwich.

  But most of them had no appetite, the blood rush of battle humming in their veins.

  Hal called them together.

  "We did well," he said. "Now, we're going to do better." He pointed to three fliers, including Danikel and Alcmaen, then at Cabet, a man he knew wouldn't get excited or lose track of his orders.

  "You four, go high. If any of the Roche fliers get over being hammered, and attack any one of us, take them out."

  Danikel nodded dreamily, and Alcmaen grinned, and the four sprinted for their dragons.

  "The rest of you, split into pairs. I want you combing the battlefield. You see any Roche banners, anything that looks like commanders or even officers—kill them. Use darts when you can, and try to stay out of range of their catapults.

  "When you run out of firedarts, use your crossbows.

  "I don't know how we're doing, but maybe we can give the men on the ground some help.

  "Get gone."

  Minutes later, Hal was back over the bluffs. He was wondering a bit about this squadron of his. Here he'd put together, with a lo
t of grief and pain, this great formation, and so far he hadn't fought it as a whole, dribbling it away in sections and pairs.

  He'd have to consider that, after the battle.

  Assuming he survived.

  He came in low, against his own orders, toward the bluffs. It was warm enough for an updraft, and he let Storm ride it toward the top.

  He glanced over at the flank, and finally saw movement.

  Hal guessed Lord Bab had waited until everyone was fully engaged, then sent his Raiding Squadron into battle.

  The Deraine infantry was creeping forward slowly, using ravines, ditches, tree stumps for cover. On this steep ground, there was no way they could bring mantlets or carry shields.

  Hal saw a cluster of banners ahead, and pulled firedarts from their canvas bags on either side of Storm's neck, cast them down, didn't look to see what happened.

  Ahead was a knot of riders, and they, too, got darts.

  Then he crested the bluff, saw a catapult aimed at him, and pulled Storm away, as the gunner lifted the firing lever. The weapon had evidently seen hard usage, for the right prod snapped, and the bow rope whipped back, and cut the gunner almost in half.

  Hal saw a man on a horse who looked noble, dropped him with a crossbow bolt, then was over the Roche right flank.

  Cantabri's raiders were moving forward not in line, as infantry was trained to attack as if they were on the parade ground, but moving in bounds or slow crawls toward the enemy above them, one soldier covering his mate, one section covering another, one company giving fire support to another.

  Hal turned Storm, scattered firedarts over the Roche line, heard screams and saw Roche soldiers start falling back.

  Horns blasted below him as Cantabri sent his reserves in, and Hal flew along the line. He reached for more darts, but his bags were empty.

  He felt pain, saw an arrow stub buried in his lower arm, the bloody head sticking out. He hadn't noticed when he'd been hit.

  Hal took Storm up to a thousand feet, braced himself, and snapped the arrowhead off, and yanked the shaft free.

  He was bleeding, used his dagger to cut off a bit of his breeches, and tied off the wound, still not feeling much pain.

  He looked over the field, saw his dragons, and other Deraine flights, rising and falling, like carrion crows, diving down for prey.