by RW Krpoun
Bachelu, which was not his true name, was a Markan-Ra of the Fourth Degree, a warrior-priest who had come to Ilthan some ten years earlier, pretending to be an Arturian younger son in search of adventure. He had married a local noblewoman and, helped along by two nobles who had become hopelessly compromised by an Evening’s Gate cult which was glad to rent their charges’ influence to the Hand of Chaos, had become an officer in the Ilthanian Army. When he had become a Demi-squadron commander three years earlier, he had worked very carefully to fill his unit with trusted Void-worshippers as his orders had instructed. By the time his division joined the Heartland Army, every officer in his command and all but five of the rank and file were followers of the Dark One or so compromised that they would obey any order he gave; over the last few weeks in the field it had been simple to arrange ‘accidents’ or outside assignments for the five he could not trust.
“Grand Marshal Pecheux requests your demi-squadron be placed under his personal command for a scouting assignment,” his squadron commander informed him as he trotted up. “The commander of the Guards has concurred, so report to the Grand Marshal at once.”
“Yes, sir,” Bachelu saluted and urged his horse to a trot as he returned to his men. So far, his plan was working perfectly.
The Lord Chancellor flinched as signal horn brayed and a Darkhost which had pulled back to reform charged back into the fray, hitting the line of Sagenhoftian troops with a terrible crash. “Can we hold?” he shouted anxiously to Durek.
“I believe so,” the Dwarven Captain assured him. “Our lines are holding up well, and the Grand Marshal has a good grasp of the reserves.” Durek was not nearly as confident as he sounded; the battle was not shaping up as he had expected: the Hand was trying to butt its way through the Heartland’s line by sheer weight of numbers, hardly innovative tactics, and under the circumstances a course which did not look very promising. The Legions were holding like a brick wall, and the Sagenhoftian cohorts were hanging onto the hill, which was the key feature of the Heartland’s line, albeit with difficulty. The polyglot force on the right wing was having a difficult time of it, but frequent charges by the Arturian horse kept the Hand troops at bay. Losses on both sides were mounting, but so far were not excessive, particularly since the Hand had committed all sixty Darkhosts to the front lines. The Hand’s actions seemed too pat, too neat, and that was worrying the Dwarf; he was wondering what sort of twist the Hand was going to add to the fight. “Starr, send runners to each of the platoons, and tell the Serjeants I want to move the Company forward.”
Catching the Lord Chancellor’s worried look, he shrugged. “Just a precaution.” His paymaster did not look convinced.
The officer in charge of the guard posts around the Grand Marshal’s position was well-known to Bachelu, a drinking companion of several years. The Markan-Ra threw him a crisp salute despite the fact that they were of equal rank. “I’ve a message from the Guards commander, there are Eyade massing to our rear between the division and the supply trains; he wants permission to scatter them with a charge.”
His friend waved him through. “You can tell him yourself.” He gestured towards the thundering battle lines. “Quite a show, eh?”
“Indeed.” Bachelu motioned for two of his men to follow, and urged his horse to where Grand Marshal Pecheux sat on his mount at the crest of the hill. Behind him his demi-squadron moved further up the slope and to left the left, apparently to avoid blocking the path for the messengers who were coming and going through the guard-line.
Ignoring the staff officers poring over reports and maps and the galloping messengers on his way to the crest, Bachelu reined in just outside the group of couriers and staff officers that surrounded the Grand Marshal and waited patiently to be summoned, glancing once at his command, which was now sixty yards away in a ragged line at the left edge of the hill’s crest directly behind the center of the left-most Sagenhoftian cohort.
After several minutes the Grand Marshal caught sight of him and waved him forward; trailed by his two men, Bachelu rode to the commander’s side and saluted. “What is it, man, be quick?” Grand Marshal Pecheux’s pale eyes flashed with excitement and his face was flushed from brandy and good humor. “The Hand is battering itself to pieces on our line, and the day is nearly won.”
“There is a difficulty forming, sir,” Bachelu leaned forward to narrow the gap between the two men, and the Grand Marshal did likewise to hear better. “The day belongs to the Hand of Chaos.” Slipping the spike-bladed dagger from its hidden sheath on the high front horn of his war saddle, the Hand agent stabbed the Grand Marshal in the throat, leaving the venom-coated blade in place as he shoved the stunned and bleeding man from his horse and drew his sword.
On either side his men drew axes from their saddles and laid about them, driving the aghast staff officers and waiting messengers back as Bachelu leapt from his saddle, stabbing the Grand Marshal’s personal standard bearer in the thigh. The two men expected the demi-squadron to charge, breaking through the Grand Marshal’s guards to rescue them, whereupon the entire unit would cut its way to freedom, but instead they saw the demi-squadron level their lances and charge directly into the backs of the hard-pressed cohort on the slopes below them. Bachelu paid his unit no heed, however; plucking a ball of colored glass the size of a sling bullet from his pouch, he smashed it onto the ground, leaping into the thin plumes of smoke the device produced and vanishing, Gated to safety by the enchanted device.
“What is going on?” the Lord Chancellor asked, staring at the hill’s crest. “Grand Marshal Pecheux appears to be down, and there is fighting going on up there.”
“More than just there,” Durek spat, watching as the line of Ilthanian cavalry slammed into the rear of the Sagenhoftian infantry, blasting a wide hole in their line. The Direbreed facing the charge fell back a few paces to allow the horsemen to continue unmolested down the hill, then surged into the gap in the lines. “The line is breached, the Grand Marshal is down and cannot command the reserves, and his deputy is with his cavalry behind the Legions. Sir, we had best withdraw.”
“Not...not yet,” the Lord Chancellor looked about wildly. “Those were our horsemen, there must be some mistake.”
“Treachery,” the Dwarf hefted his crossbow and watched as the commander of the Grand Marshal’s guards led his troops and every surviving staff officer in a valiant effort to close the gap, followed shortly by sixty Sagenhoftian Lifeguards led by the Duke himself. The fighting in the gap was bitter and desperate, as the twisted Direbreed fought to drive through and flank the lines to either side, while the defenders sought to close the hole. The gap was barely closed when Bachelu’s demi-squadron, now displaying the Hand’s inverted triangle enclosing a seven-clawed hand on their lance pennants and on gray surcoats, charged through the Direbreed’s ranks and plowed into Sagenhoft troops thirty yards to the west of the newly-closed gap, the sheer weight of men in full chainmail riding heavy war horses smashing the line apart again.
With every man in the three cohorts having been committed before the Grand Marshal was slain, and no further reserves to hand, the fate of the hill was in extreme danger; the remaining uncommitted Lifeguards, true to their orders, formed a circle around the Duke’s household and began to withdraw down the hill as the turncoat horsemen (such as survived the second change) thundered past and the Direbreed began to pour through the new breach.
“BADGERS!” Durek roared, thumping Dayyan Reinert on the back to alert the standard bearer. “Advance for The Eight and Fuar!”
Howling war cries in various languages, letting fly with whatever missile weapons they had to hand, the Phantom Badgers charged the breach and slammed into the Direbreed pouring through.
Janna had dropped two turncoat horsemen with her long bow, which was one of the few missile weapons that could penetrate the double-mail hauberks the traitors wore and was trying to get a shot at a third when Durek’s shout reached her. Releasing the arrow blindly into the mass of Direbreed pouri
ng through the rent in the Sagenhoft lines, she half-turned to throw her bow to Picken, who was with Axel, Henri, Doctor Kuhler, and Bridget behind the Company, drawing Rosemist as she and the rest of the Company charged.
The Direbreed they faced were man-shaped, standing around five feet six inches tall, covered in short, coarse fur that was marked and patterned in wild swirls, splotches, and spots of varying dull colors. Their host-creature’s ancestry could be seem in their warped faces and general shapes, with the addition of backward-bending goat’s legs here or a ram’s horns on another. No two Direbreed looked alike, yet all shared the predatory twist to their host-creature’s facial features and the faint glow in their otherwise dead eyes, a glow that screamed their other-worldliness, and their slavering hatred for all living things. The Direbreed wore no clothing save a harness for supporting their weapons and equipment, and occasional bits of armor; they were armed with melee weapons, usually impact arms such as maces, mauls, or axes. Knowing that the weapons their foes bore could only inflict a temporary ‘death’ upon them, the Direbreed were fearless and merciless, asking no quarter and giving none.
Ducking a goat-faced Direbreed’s wild mace-swing, Janna punched Rosemist’s point through its scrawny neck and threw her weight on the thrust, feeling the jolt and grating through the steel as the point met and glanced off the beast’s spine and grated along a vertebrae; kicking the creature in the belly, she twisted her blade and wrenched it free, the black steel now slick with the thin brown Direbreed blood.
“Von Sheer!” Maxmillian roared, smashing in a wolf-headed Direbreed’s skull with a full armed swing of his hammer, reflexively catching a sword-swing on his shield. Wrenching his befouled weapon free, the historian retreated a pace in the face of a wildly-swinging Direbreed with a deer’s antlers, the creature’s axe splintering the face of the Badger’s shield; timing his strike, he stepped in and smashed the Direbreed’s left knee into bone chips, following it up with a solid blow to the back of the head as the Direbreed’s leg folded, toppling the surprised child of Chaos to the ground.
Being too lightly armored, even with her enchanted gear, for the front line in a fight such as this, Elonia darted up and down the Badger line, raising her crossbow over the heads or between the fighting mercenaries to pick off individual Direbreed, trying for a standard bearer or Fist-lord when she could spot one. Being less hotly engaged than most, she had a better view of the fight on the hill than her comrades. To the west she saw a trio of staff officers riding pell-mell for the silent block of Sagenhoftian and Kordian cavalry where Grand Marshal Laffery was stationed to advise him that he was now the new commander of the Heartland Army. To the south of the hill the turncoat cavalry had been engaged by several squadrons of the waiting Ilthanian and Lasharian horse, who made short work of the twenty-odd traitors only to be thrown into confusion when they realized that every man wearing the Hand’s colors had been a Ilthanian soldier. Slapping another bolt into her re-cocked crossbow, the Seeress side-hopped down the line, looking for a target.
The hill was still holding, but just barely, Axel saw as he fingered the ornately carved black oak staff and caught his breath: the Duke and his Lifeguards had sealed the gap, although they had been unable to eliminate the bulge driven into the Sagenhoftian lines. The Badgers were closing the second gap with hard fighting, but the Sagenhoftian troops were badly shaken by the sudden turn of events and were giving ground here and there, just a step at a time, but it did not bode well. A cavalry counter-charge would take the pressure off the beleaguered troops and give them a chance to reform, but only the Grand Marshal could commit the reserves, and until Laffery could move up from the wing and assume command no help would be forthcoming. The Sagenhoftian First Cohort was on the left, the Second was in the center, and the Third was on the right; it had been the First which had had two gaps blasted through its ranks, disordering it badly.
The Wizard was breathing hard despite the fact that he was merely standing behind the fighting line plying his Arts; casting spells was more than just the knowledge of how to manipulate and refine raw arcane power into the desired effects by word and gestured symbols, it was also a matter of endurance. A spellcaster drew the arcane energies through his or her own body, a physically exhausting process that could be refined by practice and study, but one which placed a very finite value on the amount of energy a practitioner could manipulate without extended rest. The staff Axel held was a powerful device, one of two captured in the raid on the White Necromancer’s hold some years before. After months of careful study and experimentation with the device, Axel could use the staff as a focus, drawing the power through the staff and not his own body, a process that was still tiring, but much less so than had his own being been the power-focus, allowing him to handle nearly three times the power he normally could have. He and Henri had sat out the initial engagements between the spellcasters on either side, preferring to save their powers in case the Badgers became engaged, so at least both still had their full abilities. Concentrating, Axel gestured with the staff, murmuring words in Latava, the dead language used by all spellcasters to avoid confusion in translation; twenty yards away a half-dozen Direbreed just back from the fighting line collapsed, coated in hoarfrost, their thin blood frozen in their veins. Mopping his brow from the effort, the Wizard concentrated on his Art.
Slamming his axe into a Direbreed’s belly, Durek twisted the weapon and withdrew, disemboweling the creature, finishing the howling beast-man with a savage blow to the head. To his right Dayyan fought determinedly despite a half-dozen minor wounds. Cursing, the Captain hopped back a couple steps to align himself with the Badger on his left and slapped aside a thrusting spear with the haft of his axe, stabbing the wielder in the thigh with the axe’s spiked head. The First Cohort had been fragmented and demoralized by the two gaps blasted through its ranks, and despite the fact that both breaches had been closed they were giving ground all along their remaining line, forcing the Second on their right to back-pedal to maintain their flank.
The First was wavering and giving ground, but it was the Third Cohort where the final breakthrough occurred. Hard-pressed, every man in the cohort committed to the line, the Third was fighting for its life when the Direbreed ranks suddenly opened to allow a Kia (an Eyade troop of around sixty warriors) of Star Lances to charge through, spinning their Dula (pierced clay globes which emit a piercing scream when spun) and howling like madmen. The Star Lance noka was the closest approximation to medium cavalry the Eyade possessed, the society placing more emphasis on the lance than the bow. Weary, battered, and losing confidence, the Third broke under the impact of the horsemen, breaching the line. Instantly the gap grew as the sub-units to either side of the breach began to withdraw in what was not far from panic, pulling back to the crest, and then to the reverse slope of the hill.
As the Third fell back the Second, struggling to keep its line mated to the wavering First on its left found itself flanked on the right by Direbreed and Eyade, immediately formed into a square and began to retreat as well.
The Second Cohort’s defensive maneuver and withdrawal left the already-shaken First Cohort’s right flank completely exposed, and as the Direbreed came pouring through the opening the battered unit simply disintegrated into small bands of men fleeing down the hill. The Lifeguards hastily formed into a circle around their Duke and began an orderly withdrawal, along with what survivors of the Grand Marshal’s guards and staff officers that could reach their line. Within the space of three minutes the Heartland’s line across the hill had collapsed.
Durek plucked a twist of sealed paper from his pouch and flung it at the approaching Direbreed, uttering a single command word; instantly, a score of Direbreed were enveloped in a stinging, swirling sandstorm created by the enchanted device known as a Storm of Disruption. The dust storm lasted only a few seconds, but it helped hold the enemy off while the Badgers and a few Sagenhoftian troops hastily reformed into a circle and began edging down the hill’s back slope. Having ex
pended the only Storm they had left, the Captain resumed using his axe as Axel directed the Company from within the narrow circle of safety; the battle was falling apart, and now all they could do was try to fight their way to safety, wherever that might lie.
A Badger from Gold Platoon staggered back from the line, clutching a gaping wound in his thigh; Bridget grabbed the wounded man and helped him lie down while Henri killed the Direbreed that tried to follow the wounded Badger through the gap with a brilliant beam of light; the Badgers to either side of the wounded man’s position edged closer to one another, and the hole was sealed before any more enemy could react.
Cutting open the man’s trouser leg with a short-bladed knife, Bridget ran a birch rod into and along the gash, murmuring a cant as she did so, her spell causing all dirt and foreign objects within the wound to cling to the rod like bits of iron to a magnet. Discarding the soiled rod, she drew a boiled scalpel from its protective covering of waxed paper and cut a line of runes along either side of the gash, chanting as she did so. The flow of blood slowed, then stopped as the last rune was cut into place. Incising a row of symbols above and below the wound, the advocate placed her hands across the gash, concentrated, and spoke a lengthy incantation. Beneath her hands the gash closed itself, healing cleanly and without a scar. Tucking the bloody scalpel into her medical kit, the lithe priestess gave the Badger a flask of rum. “Take a good swig and get back into the fight; remember, I can’t replace the blood you’ve lost, nor the shock of the wound, so hold back from any fancy maneuvers until your head steadies. See me after the fight and I’ll give you a salve for the cuts I made on your leg.”
