Exhorting his men to ignore all enemies save the commander, Boman gave the order to loose missiles.
The storm of arrows that assailed the big general was vicious and concentrated. The lashers behind him had moved up the slope and away from him in order to give chase to the horses, having interpreted the cavalry as being their commander's main focus. Consequently, he was left utterly alone as the target of the deadly flight. Having had time to take aim, the Duridians made them count. Many thudded deep into his torso and arms and legs, but in his fury, protected by his awesome strength, the general endured the onslaught, breaking the arrows off or tearing them loose and angrily turning those lashers near him to face Boman’s archers.
The commander had sustained injury and was bleeding profusely from wounds on his arms and legs. But the huge lasher’s head seemed invulnerable because of his helmet and the fact that his eyes were protected by a grilled eye-guard. This particular part of his helmet was composed of several horizontal bands of thick, stout wire off which the missiles of the Duridians, with their four-sided tips, clanged and careened, causing no damage to the most vital area of the lasher’s head.
Boman, grasping this fact, and seeing that time was running out as the commander succeeded in bringing more of his troops into position to advance on the Duridian line, gave the order, “Remove the center blade from your tips!”
Men near him gazed back in confusion, but there was no time to explain.
“Do it!” He yelled. “Make your arrow tips two-sided. Quickly now!”
The men in the front ranks knelt down and quickly slid the center blades from the tips of their missiles, rendering the normally four-sided points two-sided.
Boman waved his sword impatiently. “Alright, boys – get up, get up, now! Aim at his head. Ignore everything and everyone else.” He pointed his sword at the lasher commander. “Send everything we’ve got at that big bastard’s head. Now – loose!”
A thick wave of arrows sailed toward the lasher commander, every one of them aimed at his head. He deflected many, many missed, and dozens clanged off and fell harmlessly, having caught the eye-guard at the wrong angle. But three slid through, found his exposed eye-sockets and bit deep, imbedding themselves into the softer, mortally vulnerable tissue beyond.
The massive lasher let out a blood-chilling bellow of pain and rage that resounded over the field like thunder and then trailed off even as he feebly tried to dislodge the fatal bolts. Then his arms dropped and he stumbled. The great horned head inclined forward, followed by his immense muscular mass and then, like a massive tree felled by the ax, he dropped with a thud onto the grassy prairie.
Vulgur was dead.
25.
Finding himself abruptly unmolested, Aram sheathed the sword, dropped to the ground and lifted Thaniel's head.
“Thaniel! Speak to me!”
There was only silence.
Aram looked up. All around him were the mounded masses of lasher bodies, blocking his view of anything beyond them. Standing, he saw Findaen's relieved face appear at the top of the bank.
“Lord Aram! Thank the Maker!”
“Get Bertrain up here, and find Mallet!” Aram roared.
Findaen's face lost its smile of relief and his eyes went wide. “At once, my lord.”
Kneeling down once more, Aram lifted Thaniel's head clear of the muddy, bloody stream and placed it upon his knee. Using his last remaining bits of strength he reached out into the pain-ridden darkness of Thaniel's thoughts, pleading with the great horse to give him an answer, but there was only muddled, weak, and confused silence.
“Speak to me, Thaniel, please speak to me.”
It seemed an eternity before Bertrain's face appeared over the piled bodies.
“I'm here, Lord Aram.”
“Your wagon?”
“At the edge of the bank.”
“Find Mallet.”
The big man arrived, peering over the mounded lashers at Thaniel's head resting on Aram's knee. Immediately, Mallet began shoving the ghastly debris from the battle aside, yelling as he did so. “Find me Elvard and Handren, and any other large man – now!”
Thom Sota's face, streaked with dirt and blood, looked down at him over the gory mess. “How may I help, Lord Aram?”
“We need to get this horse into the surgeon's wagon.”
Thom nodded and began helping Mallet rid the bankside area of fallen lashers. Within minutes, they had made a clear path as six other large men, including Dane Sekish, appeared on top of the bank. Bertrain was at Thaniel's head. Having removed the horse’s headgear, he was intent on clearing his mouth of mud and debris and listening as best he could through the horse's chest armor.
“Can we move him?” Aram asked
Bertrain nodded grimly. “I think we'd better.”
Aram stood.
“Help me get him into the wagon.” He said to the young men.
Abruptly, Thaniel lifted his head, opened his eyes which were dull and clouded by pain, snorted and thrashed with his legs. “Lord Aram!” The horse's voice was thin and harsh. “Are you safe?”
Aram felt his eyes moisten. “Yes, my friend, I am safe – can you get up?”
“With help, I think I can.”
Aram stood, moving away from the horse's legs and around to the other side. “Help us here!” He shouted at those nearby. “We need to get him up!”
Others came to help, the smaller men among them giving way to their larger, stronger companions. Straining and pushing, and aided by one mighty lunge on Thaniel's part, they got the big horse onto his feet, where he stood trembling with his chest heaving and his head down. With four large strong men helping on either side of him, and the horse concentrating upon each step, they moved Thaniel carefully through the water and up onto the far bank. Dane showed up with planks he had stripped from the sides of another wagon.
“Can you walk up this?” He asked Thaniel.
Thaniel raised his head a little and looked. “Yes,” he replied.
Straining and heaving, they helped him up the planks, step by painful step, and at last had Thaniel standing in the bed of the wagon.
“He can't stand,” Bertrain stated. “It will make the wagon too unstable.”
“Can you lower yourself onto your hooves?” Aram asked.
Without speaking, Thaniel abruptly folded his armored legs under him and thudded onto the wagon bed. His head remained up but his eyes were now closed.
Bertrain was still by Thaniel's head. Aram looked at him. “How bad?”
“Bad enough,” the surgeon replied. “I need his body armor removed.”
Nodding, Aram knelt and, drawing a dagger, began cutting the leather stays, pulling at the huge overlapping pieces of armor, trying to slide them off the horse's massive frame while doing no further damage to his endangered friend. Findaen hopped up into the wagon. “Help us here, Mallet.”
By the time the horse's armor was removed, the wagon bed was slick with his blood. White-faced, Aram stared aghast at the thickening pool and then looked at Bertrain.
The surgeon's face told him nothing as he answered Aram's questioning look. “He's bleeding, Lord Aram, which means that his heart is still beating strongly.”
“Help him,” Aram pleaded.
“I'll do what I can.” Bertrain eyed Aram all over, noting that his black armor had taken on a brownish cast that was streaked with fresh rivulets of red. “Get into one of the surgeon wagons yourself, Lord Aram.”
“Forget me,” Aram's voice was low and harsh, though weak. “See to him.”
He looked up and spied the driver, sitting in the seat, watching the events in the wagon's bed. “Go. Now.”
The wagon moved with a jerk and Aram spilled out onto the ground. Getting to his feet, he found another surgeon standing nearby, staring at him. Aram punched his hand toward the retreating wagon. “Help Bertrain.”
“Lord Aram, you –“
“Forget me,” Aram ordered. “See to Thaniel.”
/>
Stumbling, forgetting for the moment that he yet stood on an active field of battle, he took off after the wagon heading rapidly toward the southeast and the gap. Abruptly, the day, which had grown much darker and was increasingly troubled by thunder, went utterly black.
26 .
Findaen saw Aram fall. “Mallet!”
The big man came running.
“Help me get Lord Aram into a wagon.”
They loaded Aram into a wagon where three surgeons were seeing to several other wounded men. Though there was yet room; upon seeing that Lord Aram had been given into his care, the surgeon, a man named Raulin from Lamont that had been placed second in command behind Bertrain, immediately turned and called to the driver, “Go!”
As the wagon bumped away over the rolling grass lands toward the road, Findaen turned to look at the battlefield. The enemy had retreated only as far as the rise opposite where they had turned and re-formed. Facing them were Nikolus, Jared, and the rest of the cavalry who had lined up on the level just beyond the stream. Behind them, on the near side, Boman was engaged in hurriedly re-forming his line so that it was oriented back toward the north, ready to receive the enemy if they came again. At the same time, some of his men were moving along the lines busily removing their own dead, which were mercifully few, and the wounded which numbered many more.
To Boman's left were the men of Derosa, and to their left was a gap. In the gap between the end of the Derosan line and that of Lamont, which even now Edwar was working to re-form and move eastward, there was an immense pile of lasher bodies visible as hideous mounds of malformed and riven flesh and bone rising above the bank of the stream.
There were dead and wounded among Edwar's troops as well, substantially more, it appeared, than there were among Boman's. Recognizing this, Findaen turned to hurry the remaining surgeon wagons forward.
The enemy showed no sign of renewing the assault even though Lamont was for the moment in complete disarray and Duridia only slightly better formed. Only Donnick's small force from Derosa in the center had regrouped and showed a solid front facing north.
There were many dead and wounded of the enemy, too. Some of the wounded lashers and gray men that were still to one extent or another ambulatory were crawling or hobbling up the slope toward their companions. A few of the lashers separated themselves from the line atop the rise and went down the slope as their wounded drew near. Those who were upright and passed some form of inspection were aided back into the lines, while others, in worse shape, were halted on the slope. After another cursory inspection, and to the horror of those watching, most of these were simply dispatched with a sword stroke.
The immense remains of the enemy commander, however, were carefully retrieved and conveyed away from the field.
While all this occurred, the re-formed enemy lines simply stayed put, facing south from atop the crest of the rise.
At last the lines of the allies were solidly closed up as well and facing north, though dead and wounded were still being removed. Across the stream, the cavalry sat and watched their opponents. Among the men on the line, there were many who upon discovering that some friend or relative had been killed or severely wounded, begged their commanders to continue the fight. After all, the enemy had run from the field, why not give chase and finish the job? But Edwar, Boman, Donnick, and Findaen, conferring in a group behind the center, were uncertain.
Lord Aram had gone from the field, severely wounded, taking his vital experience and his unknown intentions with him. Not only was there a question of who was in command in his absence, there were also strong doubts as to the wisdom of abandoning their defensive posture for the expedient of attacking the still much larger force of the enemy on open ground. Finally, on Findaen's suggestion, they decided to defer to Donnick, who had commanded troops in lines of battle twice now. After but a moment's consideration, the older man made a firm decision.
The army would hold until the further intent of the enemy was discerned.
After the better part of an hour, when neither side had made a move toward the other, the dark line of lashers and gray men began to fade away, forming into columns that began moving down off the rolling hill out of sight to the north. A large cadre of the biggest lashers remained atop the rise to cover what was obviously a retreat from the field.
Not being privy to the discussions that had gone on behind them, Nikolus and Jared discussed with Ruben and Varen the wisdom of assaulting the enemy while they were in the process of pulling back. In the end, however, even Jared, whose fierce blood was up at the knowledge of the severe injuries to his cousin and to Aram, decided against it. Lord Aram, with his experienced and pragmatic mind, was not with them. Indeed his fate was uncertain and unknown, and there was great anxiety in that quarter. Neither the horses nor the cavalry captains felt like assuming the responsibility for continuing the battle if the enemy appeared willing to go.
As the last of the enemy disappeared from view, followed by the rear guard, and after Nikolus and Jared had followed them for some distance to make sure that there was no subterfuge involved, Findaen, Donnick, Edwar, and Boman met again to discuss retiring from the field.
By this time, all their dead had been loaded into wagons and their wounded were even now being transported through the gap leading to the south. There were still some badly wounded enemy troops lying about here and there on both sides of the stream, writhing in torment. Since all of the allied surgeons were engaged and leaving the field with full wagons, it was decided to abandon the enemy wounded in case their companions might wish to return and dispose of them as they would. To Findaen, this decision seemed the very depths of heartlessness, but he could think of nothing better. He certainly could not imagine following the cruel example of the enemy commanders in putting a wounded creature to death. But he could think of nothing to do to aid them, either. There were no surgeons to attend them, and no one left on the field had any understanding of a gray man's anatomy.
So, as soon as the last of the wounded were gone from the field, and being transported through the gap followed by the wagons filled with the dead, Donnick, Edwar, Boman, and Findaen began an orderly withdrawal from the field. Nikolus and Jared, with the rest of the cavalry, it was decided, would continue to monitor the enemy's retreat, while the army settled back into its camp. After dispatching a hundred troops to accompany the surgeon's wagons, the captains moved the rest of the army back into the trees to prepare to spend the night and begin the march back toward Derosa on the morrow.
That which eventually became known as The Battle of Bloody Stream had come to an end.
27 .
Atop the wooded hills to the south of the battlefield, Marcus watched the wagons roll below him and away to the right and disappear into the gap. He turned and looked at Kitchell with a grim expression.
“So, this is what war looks like.”
Kitchell nodded in reply, his features drawn and made very pale by that which he'd just witnessed. “Apparently,” he answered quietly, “and something decidedly to be avoided unless absolutely necessary.”
“I think we are at a time when it is become necessary,” Marcus responded.
Kitchell simply nodded as he looked back to the north. “What was that strange white fire that we saw during the fight at the center, I wonder?”
“I don't know,” Marcus admitted, “but as I told you, there is something fierce and very ancient about Lord Aram, as if he is accompanied by unknown powers. The strange white fire arose from where he fought.”
“Did he survive, you think?”
Marcus drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly as he glanced up at the heavy dark thunderclouds beginning to overspread the sky. “I pray the Maker that he did and will recover from whatever wounds he received. I begin to believe that he is our best hope on all fronts.”
Once again, Kitchell returned his acknowledgement with a silent nod. For the next hour, as the gathering storm swallowed the sun, they watched as the two armies
faced each other, unmoving, until finally the larger army began to dissolve its lines into columns and tramp away along the road leading north. The allied army broke from the field shortly after and the men filed back into their campsites down the slope among the trees.
Marcus pointed. “Look! - Here comes Thom. Let’s hear what he can tell us.”
The two men waited while Thom climbed the slope and came near. The tall man's face was streaked with dirt and sweat and blood, some of it his. There were cuts on his forearms and a gash above his right eye.
“Are you alright, Thom?” Marcus asked anxiously.
Thom nodded and smiled a grim smile. “I'm good. Better than those that met my sword today,” he replied, and then he held up his blade which had assumed the color of rust with dried and drying blood. “This is a fine weapon that Lord Aram gave me.”
“How is Lord Aram?”
Thom shook his head. “He's hurt badly. But he seemed more anxious about the horse than himself.”
“So he was talking?” Asked Kitchell.
“At first, but I think he was unconscious when they took him away.”
“Will he survive?”
“I don't know – I think so,” Thom answered. “He's a very strong and tough man by all appearances. And the surgeons seemed capable enough.” Then he hesitated for a moment, considering. “I didn't look close at his wounds though, so I don't know how he'll fare for sure.”
Kitchell nodded toward the distant creek bed. “That big beast that they slew out there – he was the commander?”
“Yes.” Thom grinned savagely as he gazed northward. “I'll tell you, these eastern folk can fight.” He turned and looked at Marcus with a hard bright light in his eyes. “I'm going to join them, Your Highness. I’m going to go get Kay and then head east. I want to be on the right and proper right side of things from now on.”
Kelven's Riddle Book Four Page 19
