25 For 25

by Various

  Two of them came towards him at a run, firing from the hip, bandoliers jangling about their impossibly broad and deep torsos as they came. They looked like statues come alive, statues carved from dark green boulders cast upon the shore from the furthest depths of the ocean. Tusks like those of the sea-cows that migrated every year from the frozen northern sea jutted from their lower jaws and, even at this distance and in so brief a glance, Brael would swear that he could see the malevolence burning redly in their deep-set eyes.

  Another burst from the engine-driven rifles they carried so casually, when it would take a strong man most of his strength even to lift one, tore the doorway to shreds moments after Brael had disappeared inside.

  The tavern had been ransacked during the evacuation. Pitchers, flagons and jars had been smashed, tables and chairs overturned. A trapdoor behind the bar stood open, and the rich scent of spilt ale rose from the cellar beneath. The landlord clearly had decided that his stock would provide no refreshment to the invaders.

  Fellick preceded Brael through the bar room, moving parallel to the street as quickly as possible. The thunder of the greenskins’ engine-rifles continued to batter their senses and flying splinters slashed and bit at their faces as the rifle shells chewed through the lathe and plaster of the tavern’s frontage. The projectiles burst into the bar and slammed out through the rear wall, their momentum barely impeded by the building’s substance. Supporting uprights and crossbeams were sliced through like saplings cut down by a single axe-stroke. With a chorus of explosive groans, the bar began to collapse in on itself in the wake of the fleeing men.

  Ahead of them was the end wall. To Brael’s relief a door stood in its centre. ‘Hope it’s not a broom cupboard!’ Fellick shouted above the skull-shredding shriek of the greenskins’ weapons. Two more running strides and he hit the door, left shoulder lowered to take the force of the impact.

  The door exploded outwards, spilling Fellick and Brael into a narrow cross-street. A left turn would take them away from the street down which they had been running and along which they knew the invaders were advancing, still spraying the tavern with gunfire and reducing it to little more than kindling. As what remained of the tavern roof fell into the bar with a splintering crash, expelling a cloud of dust and debris out through the end door, Brael and Fellick turned right.

  The two men sprinted from the mouth of the cross-street and across the entire width of the main street before jagging back and forth, anxious to present as difficult a pair of targets as possible to the greenskins, who had ceased firing when the tavern roof fell in. Catching the scent of fermented products, they were about to begin picking through the debris when the humans reappeared.

  Brael and Fellick raced down the street, their paths crossing and re-crossing, past more abandoned shops, an apothecary’s and a butcher/surgeon’s. It was important that the greenskins didn’t lose sight of them for long. Despite the hazards of the debris-strewn street, Brael risked another glance back. Their pursuers had spotted them; already they were bringing their engine-rifles to bear. And behind them, Brael saw three more hulking figures were making their way down from the far end of the street.

  Come one, come all, Brael called to them in his mind as he ran. Ahead, the street opened into the market square. We’ll see our land soaked in your blood before we let it go.

  Grellax belonged to the invaders from the moment their war-party appeared on the horizon. Though little more than a vanguard for the army that was advancing inexorably southwards, burning, looting and pillaging as it came, the sight of the creatures, the roar of their war engines, louder and more terrible than the largest iron caravan, and the reek of oil and smoke that soon reached the town walls caused more than one of Grellax’s defenders to foul themselves in fear. Brael knew how they felt.

  The first time Brael had seen the invaders he had been part of one militia company among many on the flank of the Casperan Combined Companies. He had managed to maintain his self-control until after the battle. The Casperan barons, tutored since childhood in romantic fantasies of war, chose to meet the invaders on a broad plain edged by a low sierra to the west and a wide, fast-flowing river to the east. Stories of war machines that gouted smoke and fired thunder were discounted as the ravings of the mad.

  When the greenskin army came into view, the barons had expected them to stop, perhaps to parley before the battle, as the heroic code demanded. The last thing they expected the invaders to do was to speed up, closing the gap between the armies faster than a gallop, their roaring, wheeled machines pluming black smoke and their engine-driven rifles barking death.

  Brael, along with most of his company, broke and ran before the invaders reached their lines. They left twenty men lying dead on the field, holes punched in their bodies by the greenskins’ weapons, fired from impossible distances. His company only stopped running when they had reached the cover of the woods that hugged the riverbank. Then his self-control deserted him and he vomited uncontrollably into the bright, clear water.

  Brael learnt a valuable lesson that day – a year ago, by the time he arrived at Grellax: do not engage the invaders in a pitched battle on open ground. If only the barons had learnt the same lesson.

  The smaller war engines attacked Grellax first, racing in on two or three fat wheels, trailing clouds of smoke and oil. Machine-rifles chattered and coughed from fixed mounts on the engines’ bodywork or from separate gunners’ stations behind the rider or in sidecars. A few of the attackers tossed explosive charges at the old town walls, hastily patched up in anticipation of the attack and manned mainly by Grellaxians who were too old or too stupid to leave, bolstered by a smattering of more experienced fighters. The shells from the invaders weapons did enough damage, punching through ancient stonework and shredding the bodies sheltering behind it; the explosives tore holes in the fortifications large enough to drive bull-carts through, two abreast.

  The foot soldiers ran forward as the war engines retreated, some of them spraying the walls with gunfire from the machine-rifles they carried, which were not very much smaller or lighter than those that were mounted on the two and three-wheelers. The defenders could only reply with a handful of blackpowder muskets, whose lead balls ricocheted from the plates of metal hung on the attackers’ monstrous green bodies. The pair of aged cannon which had stood in the town’s main square for generations did more damage, until first one then the other exploded, either due to a fault line in the aged muzzle cracking under the sudden strain or because of inexpert packing by the terrified crew. No one knew or cared. By that point, most of the defenders had fled the walls to begin the ugly process of fighting through the streets, doing their best to delay the inevitable. Grellax would fall. It was just a matter of time.

  Brael and Fellick raced across the market square, one of several dotted around Grellax, lined by the houses of the more prosperous merchants. At each corner of the three avenues that led into the square were shops and teahouses, that had once sold pastries and other delicacies. Now the grand front doors hung open, scraps of finery dangled from open windows and littered the square – luxuries dropped and forgotten in the hurry to be gone.

  ‘Five!’ Brael shouted, apparently to no one, to the open doors and the empty houses. ‘Wait till they’re clear of the street!’

  Brael ducked behind an upturned farm cart next to the ornate fountain in the centre of the square. Already crouching behind the cart and below the lip of the fountain were several of his men. Two of them – Costes and Perror – had been in the first unit of scratch militia Brael had joined, when the caravans of refugees from the north had begun arriving, adding credence to what had been considered ‘only stories.’ He knew that Perror in particular was responsible for some of the stories that had begun to circulate about him, but he meant no harm and no one could argue that he wasn’t a good man in a fight.

  Costes handed Brael a loaded rifle, the pouches containing the musket balls and what remained of his ration of blackpowder. Brael had not wan
ted to risk the loss of his rifle, should the greenskins have brought him down before he and Fellick had drawn them to the square. Fellick, however, had not let his rifle out of his sight since the war began and had become superstitiously possessive of the weapon. He was convinced that the one sure way to guarantee that the greenskins would have his head would be for him not to take his rifle with him, despite its weight and unwieldy length.

  Fellick angled his run towards one of the buildings that edged the square. Brael made a wager with himself that it would turn out to be another tavern. Until the invaders came, Fellick once told him, his life had consisted of two things: beer and butchery. He had worked in the slaughterhouses that supplied meat to the noble houses of Primax. These houses had supplied many of the generals and field commanders of the armies whose retreat Brael’s men had been assigned to defend and about whose competence and courage Fellick had strong, uncomplimentary opinions.

  As Fellick disappeared through the building’s front door, a muzzle appeared above the stone window ledge next to it.

  ‘They’re here!’ Perror hissed.

  Brael peered around the side of the cart. The first pair of their pursuers had come to a stop a few paces inside the square. Warily, they scanned the apparently deserted area, sweeping their machine-rifles in slow arcs. Brael offered a silent prayer to gods he had long ceased to believe in that the greenskins would not notice the rifle barrel pointing at them from across the square.

  ‘Come on, where are the others?’ Brael shot a look at Berek, the skinny Casperan who was crouching between Perror and Costes. ‘You said there were five,’ Berek whispered, struck by Brael’s gaze. Costes punched his shoulder and, when Berek turned to protest, placed a finger against his lips.

  Perror, who was peering through the gap between the overturned cart and the lip of the fountain, pointed in the direction of the greenskins, then splayed his hand, palm outwards. Five.

  ‘Fuses!’ Brael shouted after a glance around the cart confirmed Perror’s report. Before pulling his head back behind the cart, he saw the muzzles of five machine-rifles swing in his direction.

  The cart disintegrated under the fusillade. Brael was already on his feet, running behind Perror, Costes and the others, hoping to draw the greenskins’ fire past them as he ran for the far corner of the square. To the invaders he looked like merely another fleeing human.

  Once the arc of fire had passed over their heads, decapitating the ornate stone fountain in the process, Brael’s men brought their weapons to bear over the lip of the fountain bowl and let fly. Two of the musket balls panged harmlessly off the greenskins’ armour. A third hit one of the invaders just beneath its drooping dog-like ear.

  Releasing the trigger of its machine-rifle, the creature swatted at the stinging impact of the musket ball. Seeing on its fingers the ichor that began to run from the wound more and more freely, it bellowed its outrage and adjusted the direction of its fire.

  The men were on the move before the greenskin’s renewed cannonade smashed chunks from the fountain’s stonework and then raced across the cobbles after them.

  ‘Split up!’ Perror yelled, then turned sharply away from the others, who also made sudden turns to the left or right. Berek seemed to trip, then make an ungainly jump to his right before landing heavily on the cobbles, his back an exploded ruin.

  Musket fire was coming from windows and doors around three of the four sides of the square. The greenskins returned fire, hammering lumps of masonry from the buildings. Though it was probably due to the way the tusks jutted from their lower jaw, lifting the corners of their thick upper lips, Brael thought that they seemed to be almost smiling, enjoying his men’s futile attempts to harm them.

  Brael took a shot from his new position at the corner of what had once been a shop selling sweet breads and pastries, then ducked back to reload. His fingers dug into the small leather pouch that contained the musket balls. Selecting one, he unconsciously noted that only two remained. In his blackpowder pouch there was enough left for three shots at most.

  ‘Fuses!’ he shouted as he reloaded, tapping the ball down and priming the pan with as few grains of the precious powder as he could get away with. Most of the unit’s powder reserve had gone towards the charges Kobar had assembled and set in the buildings on the far side of the square.

  ‘Kobar, answer me!’ he shouted again. The former quarryman from the north should have retired to cover by now and the twisted fuses should be burning towards the charges. ‘The fuses! Did you set the–’

  A cannonade of muffled explosions echoed across the square. Compared to the raw, hateful cacophony of the greenskins’ machine-rifles, they sounded pathetic. Then came a growing rumble, the grinding of masonry in motion.

  Brael risked a look around the corner. The buildings to either side of the street down which he and Fellick had led the invaders were falling, sliding down to earth and throwing out stray chunks of their substance as they fell. All but one of the greenskins was already lost in the plume of dust and debris. There was no time to lose.

  ‘Go!’ he bellowed, racing from cover. He left his rifle where he had sheltered and, as he ran, he unhooked the oversized meat cleaver that hung at his belt – a greenskin trophy of the retreat from Erewell. Without having to check, he knew that the rest of the men had also broken cover and were closing on the lone greenskin.

  Confused by the sudden acceleration of events, the creature took four or five long heartbeats to realise that he was under direct frontal attack and to decide upon a response. At last it pressed its weapon’s trigger.

  Jarran flew backwards, her body virtually bisected by the burst of gunfire. Those nearest to her hit the dirt. One of them at least still held a rifle. Its ball pinged uselessly off the beast’s breastplate, but it held its attention for long enough for the others to close in.

  The greenskin was looking to its left as Brael closed from the right. He was close enough to see the corded muscles of its neck shift; it was about to turn its head towards him. He cocked his right arm back so far that the heavy cleaver threatened to overbalance him. Then, without slowing his pace, he brought it forward.

  With a sound like an axe head biting into wood, the cleaver slotted through the gap between the beast’s shoulder plate and its bucket-like helmet and bit into the neck. There was no chance of him extracting the blade quickly enough for a second strike, so Brael sprang back, almost stumbling on one of the lumps of masonry that were still falling in the vicinity of the booby-trapped buildings.

  Brael heard a shout. Tylor, who had been with them since Erewell, was charging at the stricken greenskin, pike lowered, the weapon’s heavy metal tip aimed at the creature’s throat.

  The pike-head struck sparks from the rim of the beast’s breastplate before slamming into its throat. Bitter experience had taught the Agrans that the invaders’ skin was as thick and tough as well-tanned leather. To get through it, you needed to strike with the kind of commitment that did not allow for a second chance.

  The head of Tylor’s pike came to a stop when it struck the massive column of bone and gristle that supported the shovel-jawed head. The greenskin fell where it had stood, bellowing its pain and trying to stem the tidal rush of ichor that issued from the wound.

  Still wary of any last reflex-traces of life in the invader’s body, Brael stepped around the out-thrown hand that still grasped the oversized machine-rifle, wrenched free the cleaver and hung it back on his belt. Though blood was still singing in his ears from the explosions and the frontal assault on the greenskin, the sounds of other conflicts reached him.

  The dust had all but settled from the explosions. Two of the greenskins were nowhere to be seen; buried, Brael assumed, beneath the rubble. That was more luck than they could have expected. Of the remaining two, one had been felled in much the same manner as the corpse that lay at Brael’s feet. Fellick, appropriately, was leading the butchery of the still-twitching beast.

  The last of the greenskins still had plenty of
life in it, despite the fact that it was pinned to the ruined wall of a nearby building by two pikes, the head of one jammed into its shoulder, the second through what in a human body would be the lower ribs. While three of Brael’s men and a boy that Brael didn’t recognise applied their weight to the pike staves in order keep the creature pinned, it continued to rage and bellow, make sweeping grabs for its tormentors and then reach out for the machine-rifle it must have dropped when the pike-heads struck home.

  Something began to nag at Brael’s mind as he bent to examine the corpse at his feet. It might have been there for a while, but the noise and confusion of battle had muffled it.

  There. Brael spotted a stubby pistol lodged in one of the wide belts that hung about the creature’s tree-thick waist. It took both hands to cock the hammer action. Brael held it like a sawn-off scattergun as he quickly approached the trapped and raging beast.

  The greenskin was beginning to weaken due to blood-loss and pain, but it was still a long way from being dead. Seeing Brael’s approach, Fellick and several of the others began shouting, drawing the beast’s attention off to its left. Brael stepped up from its right and pressed the gun to its skull, just behind one ear. Without waiting to see how the creature would react, he braced himself against the recoil and pulled the heavy trigger.

  ‘Time to go,’ Brael told Fellick. Most of the men were stripping the green corpses of what little was light enough to be useful: knives as large and long as short swords, hacking weapons like the cleaver Brael wore at his belt, the odd piece of armour or a thick and wide belt made from the skin of an animal that had never walked on Agra.

  Costes and Perror had decided to take one of the machine-rifles with them, along with as many belts of shells as the rest of the unit could carry. They had selected the lightest of the weapons and were busily distributing the ammunition belts to the other men.