by Simon Brown
As soon as the enemy cavalry had been cleared away, Akota reformed her banner. She waited until she saw Lynan and his Red Hands appear at the northern end of the road and gave the signal to charge. They stormed around the bend in the road and found the Amanite light infantry had formed a defensive line across their path. Without hesitation the column split in two, one heading east around the Amanites, the other heading west. As they passed the enemy, the Chetts, directing their horses with their knees, loosed a salvo, reloaded, loosed again, and by then were parallel with the foot archers, still disorganised, and shot another two salvos. The foot archers scattered, causing chaos among the Amanites in front of them and the heavy infantry, still entangled with their lines, behind them. Amid the panic the Chetts dropped more and more arrows, and to the enemy it was like a dark rain of death.
Then the Chett horse archers had passed on, continuing down either side of the road, shooting salvos into the regiments behind, and those in the van thought that for the moment it was over and they could reorganise their lines and perhaps even counterattack, but before their officers could rally them the Red Hands appeared, led by a screaming, pale-faced madman who could only be Prince Lynan. At first the surviving Amanites thought the banner would course around them and shoot their arrows, but then they noticed these Chetts were holding sabres, not bows. Before they could tighten their lines and raise their spears, the Red Hands ploughed into them like a pike slashing into a school of fish.
Lynan would not let any rider pass him. He came around the bend at full gallop, his sabre ready, chose his target and dug the spurs into his mare's flank. The horse seemed to leap into the enemy. Lynan's sabre swung down to his right, slicing open a head, then caught another skull on the upswing. He brought the sword down on the other side, cutting off an ear, brought it up and down again on the right. He tore through the first line, then the second, slashing in wide arcs, scattering the enemy before him, and then was upon the archers. Here he went for arms and hands and eyes, and instead of charging through he wheeled around to ride along the line the archers had tried to form, then pulled back and wheeled around again. To the archers it was like being attacked by a windmill with a steel blade instead of sails, and they dropped their weapons and fled. But by then the rest of the Red Hands were among them, and no matter which way they ran there seemed to be Chetts waiting for them, their terrible swords lopping off heads and limbs. The air around them was wet with a bloody mist and they gagged on the smell of it.
By now some of the more experienced officers among the enemy had organised some of the heavy infantry companies well enough to offer some resistance. Chett arrows had little effect on their armour and shields, and when their lines were properly formed there was little the Red Hands could do to get at them.
Lynan saw it was time to go. He ordered the retreat, and as the order was passed along, the Chetts broke contact with the enemy and rode hard for the north, back the way they had come. Behind them they left most of the enemy milling in confusion, their vanguard utterly destroyed.
Dejanus was ready to flee south and desert his Great Army, but Savis pointed out that meant they would have only their small escort of cavalry; he controlled his fear and decided to stay with the column.
'We march south immediately,' he ordered. 'Everyone about face. Back to the camp. At least there we can defend ourselves properly. And I can demand Chancellor Gravespear send us more regiments. We are outnumbered already!'
The rest of the army did not need much convincing. Although still largely intact, word had spread through the column about what had happened to the van, and no one wanted to share its fate. The light cavalry that had been protecting the army's flank now took the new vanguard and led the way back south, followed by the regiments in reverse order from their march north. By early afternoon they were in sight of the camp, and were heartened to see their reserve of Storian cavalry riding up the road to greet them. Then, with horror, they watched as the Storians lowered their lances and charged.
Lynan had waited patiently for this moment. So far he had used only a handful of his banners, but now it was time to unleash his whole force. The Great Army was demoralised and unsure of who was ally and who was enemy. Lynan gave the signal and, led again by Akota, the horse archers poured over crest and out of forest to bear down on the enemy column, but this time she led fifteen banners instead of just her own. Like a dark tide they flooded around the column, shooting salvo after salvo of arrows into the densely packed infantry. Fire arrows slammed into the supply wagons, sending black plumes of smoke into the air. As if that was not enough, Terin's lancers, dressed as Storians, had swept away the Great Army's last vestiges of cavalry and then driven into the heavy infantry before they could set their lines. The lancers drove through the centre of the column like a chisel through a block of mealy wood, splitting it into two. The final blow came when the Red Hands charged from the east, hacking and slashing their way through all opposition, and from the west charged Ager's Ocean Clan, doing the same on the other side of the road.
As before, Lynan led the charge of the Red Hands. His sabre was red to the hilt with gore and the enemy reeled back from him, terrified of him. One soldier managed to stick a spear into his horse before being ridden down, and the mare sank to the ground. Lynan loosed his feet from the stirrups and jumped off. Within seconds Red Hands had surrounded him, one offering him her horse. He mounted and charged into the enemy again, his sabre whistling through the air. It took the Red Hands a long time to hack their way from one of the columns to the other. No one asked for mercy, and no mercy was given. Eventually Lynan had to stop, overtaken by exhaustion. His sword arm refused to lift any more and his borrowed horse could go no further. He slid out of the saddle, put the point of his sabre in the ground and rested on the hilt. A short while later he was joined by Gudon and Ager. The three embraced quickly. Before them the Chett horse archers were still sending their short black shafts into the enemy, but then had to dismount and scrounge among the dead for more arrows. To the west the sun was only a hand's breadth from the horizon, making the whole world look as bloody as the battlefield.
They were joined by Korigan.
'What remains of the enemy is mainly heavy infantry,' she told them. 'They have gathered together and formed a square, showing little except their shields and helmets. Our arrows find a mark occasionally, but we are running out and the enemy is not inclined to return them, and Terin's lancers cannot charge their wall of spears. Should we let them go? Wait until they drop from thirst and hunger? Or ask them to surrender?'
Lynan shook his head. 'We can't spare the time to wait for thirst and hunger to do our work for us. Who looks after them if they surrender? And if we let them go, they will reinforce Kendra.'
'Then what can we do?' Korigan asked.
Lynan and Ager exchanged weary glances. 'Only one thing to do,' Ager said.
'And there are only two banners who can do it. Your clan and my Red Hands.'
Korigan looked at them, puzzled. 'What are you planning?'
Lynan stood straight, leaving his sabre in the ground, and drew his short sword from its sheath. 'Find Terin for me.'
'What now?' one officer asked, voicing the question in everyone else's head. There were three of them in the centre of the square, the last officers left alive. 'We can't stay here. They'll just surround us, continue to pepper us with arrows, and wait until we are dying of thirst.'
'We can try moving,' another officer said. 'If we do it slowly we should be able to maintain the square.'
'And go where?'
The officer shrugged. 'Well, Kendra.'
'It'd take us a year!'
'There's only one thing for it,' the third said. 'We wait for nightfall and make a run for it.'
'They'll be waiting for that.'
'Didn't say they wouldn't be, but there ain't nothing else to do, and some of us will make it.'
'Something's happening to the north,' someone from the square said.
All three officers looked that way.
'I don't believe it. I thought Chetts never fought on foot.'
'And what's that they're holding?'
'Fuck, they're carrying short swords. Who'd have thought, eh?'
'What are we gonna do now?' asked the first officer, his voice rising with panic.
'Stay calm, first off.'
'Charge them?' suggested the second officer.
'Look west, against the sun,' the third officer said. 'There's the bloody Chett lancers. We deploy to charge their foot, they attack our flank and roll us up all the way to the Sea Between.'
'There must be something we can do.'
'Fight and die,' the third officer said, leaving to join his company. 'Fight and die.'
Lynan let Ager plan and lead the attack. He deployed his clan and the Red Hands into troops, and set the troops along an oblique line. When he was happy with the deployment he raised and lowered his sword. The line started to move. At first they kept good formation, but unused to walking for any distance, let alone marching, the line soon became ragged, but the oblique angle largely remained. Ager was in the lead troop, Lynan in the middle one and Gudon in the last, and their commands and firmness helped stop the attack from degenerating into a wild charge. When he was only thirty paces from the enemy square, Ager raised his sword again and picked up the pace. It was impossible for him with his crookback to actually run, but by the time his troop was ten paces from the enemy he could let them go and they slammed into the shield wall, ducking under spears, tearing away shields and jabbing at faces with their short swords. The second line of spearmen jabbed at the Chetts, finding unprotected heads and necks, but not quickly enough to stop the wall from shuddering under the assault. More spearmen joined the press, too far back to use their weapons effectively, but able to lend their actual weight to the line in front.
Then the second troop of Chetts hit. As with the first troop, the wall actually seemed to ripple with the impact and started to give way, but extra spearmen rushed to give their support and the square held.
Then the third troop threw themselves against the enemy, and the fourth and the fifth. The wall was starting to buckle, and the Chetts were clambering over the dead, grabbing spears by their shafts, pulling them out of the hands of the enemy and stabbing and cutting with their swords. Spearmen fell back moaning, hands over their faces, blinded, mutilated, bloody and dying. More Chetts hit the square, and then it was Lynan's turn with the first troop of Red Hands. They rent the air with the war cry of the White Wolf and leaped between the spears of the enemy, falling on the shields that blocked their way. Lynan thrust at any face under a helmet, and used his free hand to grab at spear shafts and shields. The swaying line of heavy infantry would start to buckle and then straighten as fresh soldiers joined the ranks.
A spearman jabbed at Lynan's face. Lynan ducked and stabbed in return but hit only air. The spearman jabbed again and Lynan automatically ducked a second time; but the spearman let the spear slide through his hand so it became unbalanced; the spear's head dipped and the soldier tightened his grip and thrust down with all his strength.
Lynan screamed with sudden pain as the spear top lanced through his right side just above his hip. Two
Red Hands grabbed him by his arms and pulled him out of the way. Warriors rushed around him to fill the gap, but many stopped fighting to watch Lynan; they had never seen their invincible leader bleed.
He shifted his sword to his left hand and with his right covered the wound. He stepped back into the line. 'It is nothing!' he shouted. 'Are the Red Hands afraid of a little blood?'
The Red Hands grinned at one another. Lynan was alright. Victory would still be theirs.
The spearmen forming the other three sides of the square, who could not clearly see what was happening but could hear the terrible sounds of battle and the screams of the dying and wounded, involuntarily started to pull closer together. The square started to fall apart, and then the inevitable. One of the last troops to attack found a gap and charged through to assault the spearmen from inside their own formation.
Lynan knew the moment the square collapsed. It happened so quickly, so unexpectedly, that one moment he seemed to be surrounded by enemies, and the next he was standing alone, surrounded by nothing but discarded shields and spears. He told himself to join the pursuit, but he knew Korigan and Terin had been waiting for this moment, and he could feel through the ground the lancers and horse archers moving in for the final kill. He told his feet to move, but his body rebelled. The wound in his side was throbbing and blood had trickled down his leg and into his right boot so his toes squelched in the stuff. He was too exhausted to do anything, even sit. All around him rang the cries of the victorious Chetts and the wailing of the enemy who knew they were about to die.
The Great Army is destroyed, he told himself, and wondered why he felt nothing but shame.
'There was nothing I could do,' Dejanus mumbled to himself. 'I was told it was a Great Army. It was a hollow gourd, an empty promise.'
He sat on the end of the dock, apart from his fellows, the few members of his escort that had managed to escape with him in the first few terrifying moments of the Chett ambush. Now he was back at the small fishing village in southern Chandra where he had arrived what seemed only days before, and was waiting for a boat of any description that might take him back to Kendra. He dared not go overland. The Chetts were everywhere. The only thing Dejanus knew for sure was that the Chetts did not have a navy.
He studied the flagon of cheap red wine the local inn had given him. It was crude stuff, but it was having an effect, so he took another mouthful. Some of the wine dribbled from the corners of his mouth.
Dejanus frowned. He would get back to Kendra and have a few words with Orkid about his so-called Great Army. And maybe he would have a few words with that bitch of a queen, too. They had tried to set him up. They had set him up to die with their Great Army.
He hiccupped.
They will have to make me constable again. Head door-opener. Yes, no Chetts are interested in ambushing head door-openers.
In the darkness he saw the phosphorescent bow wave that meant a ship was coming. He stood up and waited. As the ship got closer he realised it was a small sloop, probably a local trader. That would get him back to Kendra by tomorrow night. If the captain was going that way. He waved to his escort. He would make sure the captain was going that way.
He decided to sit down again. For some reason his legs did not want him to support him.
Yes, tomorrow he would be in Kendra, and he would have a word with Orkid Gravespear. In fact, he would have lots of words with him. Maybe the chancellor would give him a new army. A real one with real soldiers and real supply.
That would be fair. And with a real army behind him, he would never have to be afraid again.
Korigan herself bandaged Lynan. She would let no one else near him. Lynan did his best to stifle his cries, but he had never felt so much pain before. He felt ashamed and apologised to Korigan.
'You do not have to prove yourself to me, Lynan Rosetheme,' she said quietly.
Lynan looked at her then, and realised he had not properly done so since Jenrosa's death. He had avoided her whenever he could. He had treated her cruelly. With a shock he then realised something else, something he should have known all the time.
'Still,' he said, 'I am sorry. You at least deserve more from me.'
She glanced up from her work with the bandage, briefly met his gaze. 'You are my king,' she said. 'I have no right to expect any more than—'
'Stop it,' he said. 'We both know you are more than subject to me.'
'Am I?'
He touched her face, and ignoring the spasm of pain it caused bent over to kiss the top of her head. 'Silona told me it was Jenrosa I loved—' he started.
'Don't!' she interrupted. 'I don't have to know this—'
'Yes, you do,' he said, interrupting in turn. 'And I did love her. She was my friend, and Kumul's
beloved. But Silona lied to me, and I am only now starting to learn just how much. You mean more to me than simple comfort. You are not just my companion. You are not just my lover.'
Korigan met his gaze again, and this time held it. 'Do you love me?' she asked.
Lynan understood her meaning. He nodded. 'Yes.'
CHAPTER 34
Olio and Edaytor were on their way back to the palace after inspecting the first of the new clinics established with the cooperation of the theurgia and the Church. They were deep in conversation, not really aware of the other people on the street and alleys they walked along. In front and behind them walked a small escort of guards, bored and thinking of the beer they would be drinking when off duty. When the rock struck the wall above Olio's head the party stopped, startled by the noise. Edaytor bent over to pick up the rock.
He looked up at Olio in surprise. 'I think someone threw this at you.'
