Kingshelm (Renegade Druid Cycle Book 1)

by George Hatt

  Of the several possible explanations to the mystery at hand, Marek reckoned two were most likely, and both would find their ultimate resolution with the singing of steel. The free companies could have left their posts—mutinied, turned coat or simply deserted—in which case Marek would need to crush the traitors before they could be turned against him.

  The second, more troubling possibility was that Rufus and his sellswords ran into the maw of an opposing force sent to outflank the invaders and were defeated. In that case, Marek would attack the counterattackers and either destroy them outright or harass them until he could bring the rest of his army to bear and finish the job.

  And then a half-dozen riders approaching from a fortified village in a shallow valley appeared before Marek as he and his men crested a ridge in the rolling plains. The riders were haphazardly armed and carried a white flag of truce.

  Marek halted his force and approached them with his squire and four other riders.

  “Hail, Lord Marek of Relfast!” the lead rider said as the two groups converged in the plain. “The people of Berengal offer you greetings and friendship.”

  Marek regarded the six riders in silence, studying their arms, armor and mannerisms. The lead rider was clad in a maille hauberk, a dented breastplate and simple steel cap. The others’ combined armor barely surpassed what the leader wore, but what they lacked in equipment they made up for in stern countenance. Marek cocked his head, nodded and smiled. “Your wisdom has led you to surrender before I take your people by force and set fire to your town?”

  “No, my lord,” the leader said. “We come to pledge our loyalty to your graceful self and to the Dominion of Relfast. Would you burn your own town?”

  “And if I refuse?”

  “Then we will die together, and Berengal will have been the shortest-lived freehold of all history,” the leader said. “I am Captain Basilio Sarnan, master of the assembled militias of Berengal. You should at least know this much about me before you waste your men’s lives attacking an ally.”

  “And why should you join me, a man who has butchered his way through your dominion?”

  “Our nobles cower in the safety of Oak Ridge while we commoners fend for ourselves,” Basilio said. “You are here, and they are not. And when the war is over, it will not matter a sheep’s cunt whose banners fly over our village. We will toil and tithe and pay our taxes to whomever sits in the castle, just as we have since Mahurin lit the sun. But our loyalty, now, that is a different matter. That goes to those who defend us.”

  Marek kept his face passive, almost stony, and with pure will kept it from betraying the plan quickly forming in his mind. “Spoken like a member of the noblesse. But what security can you offer me as a token of your sincere goodwill?”

  “Information,” Basilio said. “Your mercenaries ran headlong into the Black Swan Company three days ago, and the survivors have scattered like a covey of quail. The Swans will let the rest of your army pass them as it drives toward Oak Ridge, then hit you from behind.”

  “And you know this how?”

  “They intend to resupply in Berengal,” the captain said. “They should arrive tomorrow or the next day.”

  “How many are you?” Marek asked.

  “Fifteen hundred,” Basilio said.

  Marek took a banner from one of his riders and walked his horse toward Basilio. “Can you hold Berengal long enough for the rest of my army to arrive?”

  Basilio tossed the white flag to the ground and took the banner of Relfast from Marek. “We shall, lord.”

  “My men will camp outside of Berengal so as to not to deprive yours of their billets,” Marek said. And so your men can’t knife mine as they sleep, if this is all a ruse.

  “Very good, my lord,” Basilio replied. “My lieutenants and I will meet you in your command post when it is established. Until then, we will await your word.”

  Basilio and his men turned their mounts and rode for the town, and Marek led his followers back to the detachment. He chose four of his quickest riders to summon the rest of the army, then gave the order to set up camp behind the town.

  That leaves me 596, he thought. And perhaps 1,500 infantry, if the people of Berengal aren’t trying to fuck me.

  “Lord Marek?” his squire asked.

  “Yes?”

  “Why don’t we leave a part of our force with Berengal to lead the defense and take the rest back to the main body of the army?” It was a genuine question, Marek knew, for his squire wished to emulate what he believed to be his lord’s military genius.

  Marek grunted magnanimously and smiled. “We want to show both our new allies and the Black Swan Company that we are serious about fighting the Swans here at Berengal.”

  “And if it’s a trap?”

  “Dear cousin,” Marek said, “That is for me to worry about, not you. Your task is but to watch me and learn.”

  And run like hell if your suspicions are correct.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  Barryn

  There would be no rest, no resupply, in Berengal tonight.

  Word had filtered back to the marching infantry that the Black Swan Company’s mounted vanguard had been attacked by Lord Marek’s riders as they approached the town, the banners of Relfast flying over its newly constructed trenches and wooden palisades.

  The midday rest was tense, and the meal hurried, but the sergeants and corporals insisted their men take advantage of the pause to take care of their physical needs and prepare their equipment.

  “The Old Man is having us attack the town this afternoon,” Corporal Jarvik told the squad as they ate their midday meal of biscuits, sausage and dried fruit. “The militias have turned coat and are holed up in Berengal. We’ll hit them fast and hard, then get back on the march as quickly as we can.”

  “Can’t say I blame them, Corporal,” Crossbow said. “Their own nobles haven’t done fuck all to defend them from Marek.”

  “That’s true,” Jarvik said. “This will be a nasty fight, boys. The militia will defend their town like howling demons because nobody else will. There’s a good chance we’ll have to root them out house by house.”

  “Can’t we just bypass them?” Barryn asked. “Leave them and their town alone while we continue our march?”

  “And if they don’t stay in their little town? We’d have an enemy force trying to put it up our ass while we try to do the same to Marek’s army,” Jarvik said. “The Captain knows what he’s doing.”

  Barryn let the question go at that. Discussing strategy and tactics was encouraged among the mercenaries because any of them could find himself leading his fellows through the chaos of battle—but the line between discussion and insubordination was distinct and not to be crossed.

  “What’s the plan?” Delton asked.

  “That’s right, you guys have never been on a deliberate assault before,” Jarvik said. “Well, are you in for a treat! The crossbows and scorpions will knock the defenders off the top of the defensive works, while the onagers firebomb the town and hit the gate with solid shot. Once the gate is knocked down, we crossbows will cover the rest of the infantry while they storm the breach. Meanwhile, the cavalry will be defending our flanks.”

  “So we aren’t going in?” Delton asked.

  “Don’t fucking count on it,” Crossbow said. “We’ll fall in with the reserve when the tops of the walls clear out and there’s nothing left for us to shoot at. And you can bet your ass the reserves are going in.”

  “I won’t lie to you men,” Jarvik said. “What we’re about to do is very dangerous and was not part of the original plan. We may very well take some heavy losses on this one, so be ready to fight hard and don’t stop. Our enemies are in there defending their homes, so they sure as the hells won’t give up until they’re dead or we are.”

  “We’ll fuck them up, Corporal,” Crossbow said. The rest of the squad nodded and added their own curse words to the general assent.

  “You damn well better if you wan
t to live to see another week’s pay,” Jarvik said. “And what do we do with the women and children?”

  “We leave them alone,” one of the mercenaries said. “They might be our employers next season.”

  After Chaplain Stefan said a blessing over the company, the platoons deployed just as Jarvik said they would. The Swans’ cavalry skirmished with Marek’s while the mercenaries’ artillery deployed, and all of the crossbowmen were pulled from their platoons and formed into a single unit to concentrate their fire.

  Barryn and Crossbow worked together to set up their pavises under a constant rain of insults, arrows and javelins from the defenders on top of their makeshift defenses.

  The otherwise picturesque town was surrounded by an ugly wall of overturned wagons, dirt, and rubble from houses the defenders broke apart for building material. Bell towers and tiled roofs mingled with roofs of thatch, forming an eclectic patchwork within the confines of the palisade.

  “She’ll go up like a dry haystack,” Crossbow said. “This might be easier than we thought.”

  “Load!” Jarvik shouted, passing on the order rippling down the line of crossbowmen.

  Barryn cranked furiously on the cranequin, then disconnected it from his crossbow and loaded a quarrel. Barryn carelessly allowed the top of his helm poke above the rim of his pavise, and one of the bowmen on the palisade took the shot. An arrow buried itself in his pavise a few inches from the top rim.

  “Keep your fucking head down, Snowflake!” Crossbow shouted.

  A bugle called the signal to fire at will, and the corporals verbally repeated the order. Instantly, the crossbows and scorpions discharged their quarrels at the men on the palisade, while stone shot bashed into the wooden gate and the newly constructed gatehouse. Clay shot arced over the defensive works trailing dirty lines of smoke and erupted in flames where they landed inside the town.

  Another bugle call sounded moments later, and groups of men hurriedly pushed carts of dirt and rubble toward an area of the shallow moat directly in front of the gate and began filling it in under the cover of their comrades’ fire.

  Barryn ducked low behind his pavise, cranked, loaded, popped up, and fired. Duck, crank, load, up, fire. Again and again and again. His first bolt landed in a post in the wooden palisade, and his second glanced harmlessly off his target’s steel cap. Barryn’s third quarrel disappeared into a man’s throat, and his fourth went harmlessly over the defensive works to join three smoking clay shots as they exploded somewhere in the town.

  Dark smoke billowed up from the growing fires in the town and hung over the battle like a black-winged demon. Barryn could find fewer and fewer targets as the minutes passed. He scanned the top of the parapet to no avail, then heard the murderous cracks of multiple stone balls slamming into the gates. A cry arose among the infantry: “They’re down! We breached the gates!”

  Barryn and Crossbow regained their breath as the infantry surged into the broken gate. The crossbowmen and scorpion crews found nobody to shoot at. Barryn guessed that all of the men on the parapets were dead or had abandoned the palisade to fight the mercenaries pouring into the ruined gate.

  After an hour of listening to the war cries and screams of agony recede gradually into the town, the crossbowmen were ordered to leave their pavises and crossbows and join ranks with the infantrymen held in reserve. In another half-hour, they were marching toward the breach with their swords drawn and their bucklers clenched in their left hands.

  Blessed Ashara, Barryn began to pray, but stopped. Blessed? Is she blessed? Or cursed? Does it matter? She is all I have. Blessed Ashara, you have chosen me from among my kindred. You have chosen this path of bloodshed for me to walk. I have no choice but to accept you. But now I seek your divine power. As I approach you, so too let your glory approach me. Let your radiance engulf me as I march into danger. Let your glory hedge me and my comrades all about. I pray for strength and courage, Blessed Ashara. And if I die this day, Oh Holy One, protect me from the howling darkness of the Abyss and take me unto your rest.

  Barryn and his squad passed over the filled-in trench and marched through the shattered gates. An entire section of the once-quaint town was engulfed in flames; ash and cinders drifted down on the men from above, and broken bodies littered the dirt streets below. Many of the dead wore the uniforms and armor of the Black Swan Company. In that regard, Barryn thought, Corporal Jarvik had been right.

  The reserves split up into groups of four or five squads and, just as Jarvik had predicted, began clearing the town house by house. Two or three squads each went into separate buildings simultaneously while the other two stood guard.

  Barryn’s squad took up position outside of a well-to-do home. He noticed, but did not take the time to fully admire, the flowers and herbs in the window boxes and in overturned flower pots near the door.

  “We do this just like we did the sellswords’ camp,” Jarvik said to Barryn and Delton. “You’re an ox, Delton, so you kick the door. Crossbow, you’re in first, then Snowflake then me. The rest of you secure the outside. Go go go!”

  At Jarvik’s signal, the husky young man kicked the door, and Barryn scrambled in behind Crossbow.

  A wicked clang filled the room, and Barryn just avoided tumbling over Crossbow as he fell backwards and hit the ground, struck in the breastplate by a young woman wielding a pitchfork.

  “Fuck me! I’m hit! I’m hit!” the mercenary screamed and rolled on the floor.

  The woman’s second thrust was aimed at Barryn’s face, but he deflected the blow with his buckler and laid her shoulder open with his fine M’Tarr blade.

  A crossbow quarrel flew at Barryn from somewhere in the room and pierced his breastplate just under the left arm. Lacking another target to lash out against, he brained the woman with his buckler as Jarvik rushed ahead and slew the man who had shot Barryn.

  The rest of the squad ran into the house at Jarvik’s order and finished clearing it while the corporal checked his two stricken men.

  Crossbow stood up and rubbed the three dents and tiny holes in his armor, then swore when he saw Barryn.

  “He’s fine,” Jarvik said as he helped Barryn unbuckle his cuirass and try to extract the quarrel. “It went in at a bad angle and jammed up in the side of his armor. It didn’t break the skin, did it?”

  “No,” Barryn said quietly. His eyes glazed as he surveyed the dead enemies in the room. A woman a few years younger than his mother whose blood was congealing on his sword and buckler. A man on a cot with a bandaged leg—blood dripped and pooled on the floor from a hole in the cot where Jarvik had run him through.

  “Good shit, Snowflake,” Crossbow said, looking down at Barryn’s handiwork. “The bitch nearly got us both.”

  Barryn almost lost his balance. His head was spinning, his vision blurry with tears. Jarvik tugged hard on his armor to dislodge the quarrel, which had pierced both the front and back pieces of Barryn’s cuirass near the side strap under his left arm.

  “Well. That will have to do until we can get your armor fixed,” Jarvik said to Barryn, then clapped him on the shoulder. “Good job. You’re making a hell of a soldier.”

  Barryn nodded, then turned away and vomited.

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  Alcuin

  As evening devoured the fading sun, Alcuin Darkwood and Lieutenant Dzarageth, his cavalry commander, rode through the smoldering ruins of Berengal to inspect his men’s work. This was perhaps the most horrifying and dehumanizing part of the ugly business of war, Alcuin reflected, even more so than the frenzied killing on the battlefield. Now his men had to bind up their wounded, bury their dead and herd the surviving townspeople away from the desolation that was once their homes.

  This was an ugly fight. Many of the civilians took up arms to defend their steads and died brutally in the places where they had once celebrated the holy days and raised their children. The common folk will remember this battle long after the rest of us have forgotten it, Alcuin thought.

  That
wasn’t true, he corrected himself. He and his men would remember the battle all their days. You remember them all, at least in part. War kills the warrior’s soul little by little, but it leaves more than it takes—horrible memories, irrational fears, night sweats. And yet it is still less soul-crushing than honest work, and the pay is far better.

  The captain stopped his horse, and Dzarageth did the same. Infantrymen were clearing the rubble of a burned house from the street leading to the town’s great hall, which the mercenaries were using for their headquarters.

  “You got us into this mess, Lieutenant. Now what?” Alcuin asked.

  Dzarageth opened his mouth to answer, but was interrupted by a messenger riding up from the temple.

  “Report,” Alcuin said.

  “Chaplain Stefan and the town’s priest have finished the Writ of Quiescence, and copies are being drawn up and sealed. We’ll have them out on riders by morning,” the messenger said.

  “And our prisoners?”

  “Lord Rufus is resting comfortably,” the messenger said. “He keeps asking why no word has reached him regarding his ransom. He demands to know, I am asked to inform you. His words, not mine, Cap’n.”

  “No, he’s right,” Alcuin said. “Now that Lord Marek knows where we are, there’s no reason to keep our silence. Tell the Adjutant to draw up standard language declaring our prisoners and stating our intent to return them in exchange for ten gold crowns plus other good and reasonable consideration. What of our other high-value guest?”

  “Captain Basilio is surly and uncooperative, but safe.”

  “Very good,” Alcuin said. “Dismissed.”

  The captain turned again Dzarageth. “Well? Back to my original question. When Marek and his boys charged our vanguard, you could have fended him off and kept him from finding the rest of the Company. Instead, you committed all of our cavalry to the fight and followed Marek to the outskirts of Berengal—giving up any chance that we could just sneak around the town and be on our way. You chose this battle for us, and we won it. We have a fortified town in our possession thanks to you, Lieutenant. Now what do you propose we do with the thing?”