“We should go there. They will need more help.”
Strykar turned to her. “We can’t be everywhere at once. They’ll have to fend off the attack on their own. Poule will keep his head. We’ve got to destroy that siege gun or it won’t matter in another hour.”
Demerise adjusted her slipping black mask. “Your decision, Messere Strykar. But I can send Bero and six of my men to help them. If the enemy gets up onto the parapets it might make a difference.”
Strykar nodded, placing a bear’s paw of a hand upon her forearm. “Very well. Come back and join me here at the gate. I’ll get the pitch and tow ready for the archers.”
Bero gave her a look of reluctant acceptance when she gave him the order. But he whistled to the others and they made their way west along the wall, their green and brown doublets, hose, and cloaks in sharp contrast to the armoured militia and white tabards of the fighting monks. Strykar gathered a dozen longbowmen (the crossbowmen were to pin down the gun crew) and set about preparing pitch-soaked tow braids to secure below their arrowheads. But he doubted there was a marksman among them. He paused amid the commotion on the parapet to take another look below. They were stopped at a hundred yards, just within range of the gates. The whole situation was very unlike the Blue Boar. Starting an assault on the first day of a siege was impetuous. It even spoke of desperation. Aretini ought to know better, so what was he trying to do?
He hurriedly tied a long, braided piece of flax around a shaft and handed it up to a waiting bowman. “Show the others. And remember, you’ll have to aim up and drop it behind the screens!” The bowman nodded sheepishly, knowing that before today he had only ever shot at a straw target at the butts—straight on. He dutifully squatted down and with shaking fingers copied Strykar’s technique. Soon half a dozen of the archers were on their knees like weaverfolk, hurriedly making their fire arrows. When he had them assembled, several arrows each, he yelled to the crossbowmen to ready themselves on the parapet. Before he could put the longbowmen in place, ready to set their arrows alight, a tremendous muffled explosion sounded, followed instantaneously by the sound of smashing wood beneath them. Frantic shouts rose from the gatehouse below. Strykar didn’t know if the gates were still on their hinges but he wasted no time.
“You four, up you go!” The bowmen dipped their nocked arrows into a brazier, setting off the black liquid into a beautiful orange and blue flame. “Shoot!” The shafts arced upward and then down. Strykar poked his head between the merlons and watched as they sailed. And fell short. He mumbled a curse. A large wooden shutter, probably ripped from a house in the nearest village, was mounted on the front of the cannon’s cart to shield it. It had slammed down again as its crew hastened to reload. That gave them another couple of minutes at most. “The rest of you, stand ready! Judge your distance! We won’t get many more chances.”
Demerise had by now returned, bearing her slung bow in her hand. “What can I do?”
“How good are you at dropping an arrow down behind a barricade?”
She scowled back. “I shoot game, straight through the heart. I’m not a soldier.”
Strykar rolled his eyes. “Alright then, pretend it’s a stag hiding behind a boulder.”
The fire arrows sailed again from the top of the barbican, this time several landing beyond the gun, a few perhaps among the enemy position. Strykar handed Demerise a tow-wrapped arrow, dripping pitch. She looked at it dubiously. “You don’t know how an arrow flies, do you?” She pulled one of her own from her quiver. “It must be clean, clean like a diving hawk.” She moved to the parapet and dipped only the barbed iron head into the pitch bucket. Strykar’s brow furrowed as he watched her take her position, bow not yet drawn, her eyes looking out towards the gun emplacement. One of the other bowman shouted for Strykar. The wooden shutter was opening again. Strykar put his hand on the ledge and saw the gun crew behind it, one man placing his smouldering linstock on the touchhole. There was a flash and the detonation. This time the sound of splintering wood was joined by the tinkling of falling stone as the gatehouse itself was struck by the massive stone shot, the size of a man’s head.
But Demerise had loosed her arrow at the same time. Strykar saw the cannonier stagger back, shot through. He also saw little wooden barrels and a bucket—gunpowder—sitting next to the gun cart. Then the shutter came down again, bouncing on its frame. He looked up at Demerise who was giving him a half-smile from the unmasked side of her face.
A militiaman with bulging eyes reached them, sputtering and gesticulating like a mad fool. “There’s a hole big enough in the gate to crawl through! The second shot has struck the arch and broke one of the hinges!”
“Shore it up then!” barked Strykar. He moved next to Demerise, seizing her shoulder and leaning his face close to hers. “When that shutter opens again, look for the little barrels. Put your arrow into those!” She nodded, understanding his meaning and pulled out another of her long white-fletched shafts. She dipped it into the pitch and twirled it, the sticky liquid covering the vicious barbed head and dripping like adder venom. She nocked it and stood ready, one booted foot on the step up to the parapet and the other on the ledge between the merlons. Strykar took a position in the next embrasure, watching, biting his thick lower lip. A volley of crossbow bolts came flying past, clattering and bouncing off the parapets but he didn’t move, his eyes fastened tightly on the gun cart. Then it opened.
“Demerise!”
She dipped the arrow into the brazier next to her, setting it alight. Her well-muscled arm drew the creaking bow back, back until the string touched her ear. And she loosed. Strykar could not see the arrow fly, but he saw the barrels rock and a white wisp of smoke. The gunner was about to touch his sparking linstock to the cannon when Demerise managed a second shot just as he leaned over the gun. Strykar saw a white cloud puff out, a yellow flash, and then an explosion that blew the gun and its crew to pieces, the detonation reverberating off the walls around them.
Straight through the heart.
THE TEMPLAR BESIDE Acquel leaned over to fire his crossbow and then his head had snapped back. Acquel could see the fletched end of the quarrel protruding from the monk’s chin like a grotesque beard. The man had slumped to the walkway, stone dead. Other Templars were scrambling to load and fire their bows over the edge and one of the two hackbut men awkwardly brought his hand-cannon to bear while his comrade lit the touchhole. A whoosh and crack and the gun fired off the wall.
A loud clack of wood on stone brought Acquel around. He saw the top of a scaling ladder, still vibrating, on the embrasure next to where he stood. He made a dash for the forked stick that was nearby and with the help of a militiaman, angled the ten-foot branch so they could engage the fork against the ladder. They grunted and shoved, pushing it off the wall and running the stick outwards. The ladder tipped sideways and fell. But others were slamming onto the battlements to take its place. And while Acquel and his comrade pushed them back, the others kept up their firing of bow, gun and petard. He had no time to think or to plan. He just kept moving. He turned to see a dazed Templar stumbling towards him. Behind him were other men, half-obscured. As his eyes fell lower, he saw the protruding spearhead in the monk’s side, having pierced the leather gambeson. The monk dropped to his knees and Acquel found himself face to face with a mercenary of the Blue Boar. The soldier calmly and quickly extracted his short spear and hefted it to thrust at him. Acquel heard something whistle past his ear and saw an arrow take the mercenary square in the face, dropping him like a hammered ox in a butcher’s yard. Acquel looked over his shoulder to see one of the huntress’s men reaching for another arrow. He quickly bent down and seized the spear as other mercenaries came towards him, advancing quickly along the walkway. Sadly, it was not a weapon that Poule had yet taught him how to use.
Two militiamen bearing glaives joined him, flanking him. They now blocked the walkway, the rondelieri of the Blue Boar inching forward, shields and swords raised. Acquel counted six and further behind
he could see a confused tangle of white tabards and armoured heads and limbs. And then the rondelieri were on them, their shields held high as they delivered lightning fast wrist snaps with their side-swords. Acquel thrust out repeatedly with the spear while the militiamen held their glaives straight out and thrust to strike the faces of the mercenaries. Acquel was aware of someone standing behind him and then again he heard the twang of a bow. The arrow caught one of the enemy in the throat and the man froze, clutching at his neck, retching and coughing. One of the militiamen timed his thrust and struck the man’s comrade in the face, a splatter of bright blood pouring forth. The Blue Boar wavered and then an arrow took down another. The remainder started retreating only to bump into more Templars, Lieutenant Poule at their head. With a cry on his lips Poule rammed into the lot and the monks behind piled on. The mercenaries, cut off from further aid, were overwhelmed, bludgeoned and stabbed until there were a heap of corpses along the walkway of the parapets. Bright blood was already beginning to run out in small rivulets among the stones, with its peculiar metallic odour.
Acquel looked at the gasping militiaman next to him and realized he was old enough to be his grandfather. The man looked up at him shaking his head in both relief and not a little disbelief. “Never thought I’d live so long... fighting at my age, and alongside a holy father of the Temple!” Acquel managed a smile for him, his heart still pounding. He had a strange, familiar feeling in his breast, the same sensation he used to feel when brawling as a youth on the streets below them, knives and clubs their usual weapons. Yet this time there were no watchmen to separate the gangs and send them packing into the alleys.
“A piss-poor assault!” laughed Poule, a slight wheeze in his voice. “Would have expected better of the Boar.” He stepped over a mercenary and joined Acquel, after quickly poking his head between two merlons to see what the enemy was up to.
Acquel wiped his face with the back of his gauntlet and surveyed the dead. “We beat them back,” he said, softly. “By Elded’s grace, we did it.”
“They were only testing our defences, brother monk. Don’t begin the revels just yet.” Acquel suddenly remembered the huntsman who had helped even the odds with his deadly accurate aim. He looked up and saw him standing a few yards down the walkway.
“Huntsman! I give you thanks!” he shouted. The man looked at him without expression but raised his bow in acknowledgement. “Funny lot, aren’t they?” mumbled Poule.
“Maybe they just don’t like killing men,” replied Acquel as his eyes fell back to their own handiwork sprawled on the cobbled walkway.
“And how about you, holy man?” asked Poule, his sweating face serious for once.
“It’s getting easier... particularly when they’re trying to kill you.”
Poule nodded. “Aye, that’s the good and the bad of it, brother monk.”
“I know they’ll come again. This siege has barely begun. But where are the griffons?”
Poule stooped to wipe his sword on the tabard of a boarsman. “Oh, I reckon they have something special planned for us before long. And thinking how Strykar fared against them, I’m not sure I want to see it for myself.”
THE LUXURIOUS FIELD tent of the Duke of Torinia sat upon a hill south of Livorna, lit by lamp, candelabra, and brazier. Its walls of red and gold damask billowed almost rhythmically as if it was some great living creature drawing breath. Ursino sat in his carved chair, balancing his wine goblet on the arm as he listened to his commanders plead, argue and cajole. His cheek had developed a twitch from clenching his jaw the past two days, annoyance steadily rising with every failed sortie against the walls.
Coronel Aretini, arrayed with the other mercenary commanders, as well as Ursino’s own captain of the ducal guard, took a step closer to the chair that was all but a throne in name. “Your Grace, I’ve lost sixty men in the past five days. Michelotto here has lost at least that number. I will not speak for the good Count of Naplona—”
“Forty-one killed at the wall,” answered Federigo, the irritation in his voice clear to all.
Aretini gestured with open palms towards the count. “And for what? For what? Without machines or more siege guns, we cannot get over the walls. It is a waste of my men. A slow bleed.” He was feeling confident as he eyed his employer—and possible future king. He knew that it was the Blue Boar and the White Company that held the winning hand, not the Duke, even if he was the one who paid the gold. The Count of Naplona too was expecting reward for service. Nothing was free when it came to war. Without the companies, Ursino had only a palace guard to fight his battles. And that was never going to get him far. “I had expected more in the way of help from the canoness. As promised.”
There were nods all around. Lucinda della Rovera stood at the left side of the Duke, hands clasped at her waist. She had been waiting for that moment, waiting in certain knowledge that the mercenaries would call her out. She saw how Ursino slightly turned his head towards her at Aretini’s cutting words. Perhaps he too, was starting to doubt. Doubting her help, maybe his love too. How could she tell him that she barely controlled the beasts that had been given over to her? The griffons could scatter men like frightened rats, render them to pieces as a lion does a lamb, but they could not climb the walls nor batter down thick oak doors and an iron portcullis. She was running out of time.
Ursino leaned forward, the bloodstones in his ducal coronet sparkling in the candlelight. “Are you dictating strategy to me, Coronel? I seem to recall it was your idea to probe the defences by trying to scale the walls.”
Aretini was undeterred. “And we did discover their defences, your Grace. It appears that they are not that untrained in the ways of siege warfare. They have some number of mercenaries in there among them.”
“Then make yourself plain, sir.”
Aretini gave a bow. “Your Grace, the matter is plain. We can sit here for weeks... months perhaps, build towers and trebuchets. Find more cannon and a few master gunners. But we will also pay a price. More sickness and more casualties. And all the while Maresto gains time to prepare an attack on us as we sit here outside these walls.”
Ursino held Aretini with his stony gaze, his reply measured and cold as frost-laced iron. “Do not prevaricate in my presence. If you have a plan to propose then do so.”
Aretini nodded slowly. “Very well, your Grace, for that is what you pay me for. We should decamp and head south. Leave a token force to maintain the siege of Livorna and march to Maresto city and meet Alonso’s armies in the open field. Or”—and he inclined his large bull-like head—“there is one other course we may take.”
Ursino sat back. “Go on, Aretini,” he growled.
“One last sally against the battlements, but led by the griffons. Surely these miraculous creatures show we are favoured of Elded and the Lord?” He looked from the Duke to Lucinda. “Order them to take the gates down or have them fly over the walls. I do not pretend to know of such things... of the ways of these gifts from the Almighty. That is your purview, my lady. If your beasts can break the gates, then we can take the city.”
Ursino reached over and gently grasped Lucinda’s wrist as he turned his head up to her. He had already asked her about using the griffons in such a manner, and she had made excuses, excuses that the creatures should not be wasted but rather saved for the right moment. And she had distracted him with lovemaking, a task easily accomplished. Now, as he looked up at her, all his hopes as transparent as if they had been scrawled in ink onto his square-jawed face, he expected an answer. As did they all.
She took a deep breath and raised her chin. “My lords, you are masters in the ways of war. But not in the ways of signs and portents. That is my domain. And now the moment has come. The beasts of Valdur will stand ready on the morrow to lead your assault, and I will join you.” She glanced down to Ursino. “At dusk, assemble your forces beyond the west gate and await the griffons. I have told them what must be done. If the Divine favours me, then you may win without even losing a man.
And Livorna will surrender to your will.”
Aretini looked to his comrades, rather surprised by the response. But Lucinda could tell by the nods and smiles that she had not yet lost her skills. Nor did she have to enter Aretini’s mind to sway him. But that would have been her next move if doubt and derision had met her words of bravado. He turned back to the canoness and fixed her with a perplexed look. “By the conventions of war that is an unusual time of day to launch a battle.” His face then split into a grin. “But—I must say—not unknown to my experience.”
“And I have my reasons,” returned Lucinda. “Your soldiers will at least appreciate that the enemy will have the setting sun in their eyes when you attack.”
Ursino rose slowly from his seat, the better to show his majesty. “You have heard the words of the canoness. She has earned my faith and trust.” His eyes settled upon each of his commanders in turn. “Now is the time to make ready for the assault. And may God give us victory.” Aretini looked as if he was to make another statement, but his expression faded and he gave a bow before fixing his eyes on Lucinda briefly. The other commanders followed his lead, filing out of the pavilion with courtly bows, whispering to each other.
The Duke handed his goblet to his server and then dismissed him with a gesture. Once they were done, he gave Lucinda a hard, unblinking stare. “You say you love me as I love you. So why is it you lie to me?”
Lucinda moved close to him, her long satin dress rustling. She looked into his eyes. As she did so, she saw his stony expression dissolve and reshape to one of hurt, even loss. “My love for you is unchanged, you know that. But the knowledge I bear is a heavy burden. One I wished to shield you from.”
He gently grasped both her hands, and she studied his aching face, ruggedly handsome, his oiled black locks flowing down to his velvet collar. “Do you think I do not know that you do not always face the light? I am old enough to know that darkness and light are but two sides of the same coin. But now is the time to tell me what it is we have sworn to serve.”
The Witch of Torinia Page 30
