Death's Chosen (First Cohort Book 3)

by M. R. Anthony

  I squeezed my way through our own front lines until I was several rows back. Sinnar, Craddock and Haster did the same. I ached to be at the front and it wasn’t even pointless bravado. I knew I’d be failing my men if I allowed myself to get killed in the first ten minutes of fighting.

  “You forgot to do a speech, Captain,” said Grids.

  “You know we value your fancy words before someone tries to shove a sword into us,” said Weevil.

  “How’s about I shove a sword into you instead, Weevil?” I asked.

  “This is too nice a bridge for arguments,” called Beamer. He was a few feet to the other side.

  Haster’s men were spread amongst us. I knew only a handful of their names. One or two of them grinned at the words I exchanged with the men. They’d been here many times before, the same way we had.

  “Some of your men say you’re good with a sword, Captain,” said one of Haster’s. I vaguely remembered his name was Scots.

  “Oh, they’ll say anything,” I said with a wink. “It’s the ones in front of us we have to watch out for. Old Beamer here can beat off ten men with his walking stick.”

  I received a couple of earthy responses and chuckled to myself. These were the moments I lived for. Some men hated them – the quiet before the killing began. Most soldiers I spoke with liked to get started as soon as possible, as if each moment remaining was somehow less precious because they might soon die. For me, the camaraderie was one of the many feelings that made it all worthwhile.

  I heard more orders shouted and the sound of thousands of boots stamped in unison as the enemy advanced. They were fifty yards from us, their swords and shields reflecting the bright light of the morning sun, their pennants fluttering in the constant breeze. Their helmets covered little of their faces and I got my first glimpse of who we faced. It was a mixture of young and old, the veterans lined up with the teenagers to bolster them with tales of courage and bravery. The old men would have cursed this day when they found where they’d been placed. They’d be dead soon, their last thoughts being of their mothers and happier times when they were children. I’d never had empathy for my enemy in the past. Now it was a constant companion – filling my head with sorrow at what I had to do to them. It wouldn’t weaken my resolve. I already carried the burden of so many dead that a few more on top wouldn’t matter. At least, that’s what I kept telling myself. In reality, each new man I killed felt heavier than the last.

  Their infantry were funnelled into the gateway and they came at us faster, like water flows more quickly though a narrow gully. They gave a stuttering roar. The sound echoed against the walls and ceiling of the tunnel and when it reached my ears, it was strangely muffled, as though the stone had absorbed much of the sound. Our front two ranks lowered their spears and as one, they stepped forward to meet the coming infantry emerging from the gateway tunnel. Shouts became screams when metal punctured metal, inflicting fatal and agonising wounds upon the flesh of men whom in other circumstances we might have called friends. Men died and more came to replace them, pushed from behind and onto the eager tips of our bloodied spears. I saw and heard wooden shafts snap under the weight. We passed new spears forward to replace them and the killing continued, with their infantry still unable to land a blow on us.

  Shouted commands joined the cacophony as my lieutenants gave orders and exhorted our front ranks to greater efforts. There’d been a time when I was incapable of leaving even the smallest of details to anyone else. Now, I trusted each man in the Cohort as much as I trusted myself. There’d come a point when I’d need to add my voice to the others, but that time wasn’t yet. Instead, I stood and watched, calm amongst a sea of calm. Haster’s men had impressed me already with their stoic presence and their acceptance that while they were not assailed for the moment, their time to fight would inevitably come.

  There weren’t many pieces to this battlefield. My brain slotted them into place and worked out how one might influence the other. I saw it all clearly and felt the enemy’s initial surge slow as the mounting bodies fouled their footsteps and the fear of their front men spread towards those behind. Above me, I saw faces of men appear behind the windows of the central tower. They weren’t archers – not yet. It would take them some time to get bowmen through the scrum. Those same bowmen fired at us from the safety of the chasm’s edge. Arrows fell onto our right flank, sparse and sporadic. If any of them hit home, it wasn’t anything to be concerned about.

  Without warning, their infantry fell back. I got the impression it was only half controlled, since a number of their men left themselves exposed to attacks from behind. I don’t know if they expected mercy; certainly, they received none and we took full advantage of the chance to increase their casualties. Some men feel as if they’re breaking an unwritten code when it comes to striking another in the back. It’s a nonsense that I’ve never worried about – as soon as the fighting begins, you must take every opportunity you can to win. Fear was one of our greatest weapons and anything we could do to spread it would help us towards victory.

  There was a lull for an hour or so. They sent sullen men forward to pull away the bodies of their fallen. The enemy gave little respect to the dead and tipped them over the walls on the south side of the bridge. I saw a glimpse of the ruthless nature of their commander when their injured - at least those who couldn’t walk - followed the dead over the edge and into the chasm. I tried to ignore the screams of the betrayed. We didn’t allow the body clearers to come too close, since I wanted them to have a carpet of their own dead to stand on as they fought. When they tried their luck, we advanced and drove them away.

  We’d suffered losses of two – both Haster’s men. They’d fought well and one had died when he’d stumbled at the wrong time. The other showed no sign of injury at all. We brought them through the ranks and had them laid on the northern field. Neither Haster nor I would tolerate our men being forgotten after their deaths. I had the front four ranks swapped over – it was only fair that everyone was given a chance to earn tales of his own to tell. I stayed a few rows back. The shame I used to feel for doing so was no longer an affliction. Many of our spears were broken and I was glad that Haster had thought to bring all of their spares out of the tower. The new ones were passed forward to replace the old and soon we were back to exactly where we’d started, except that many of Callian’s infantry had been killed. A drop in the mighty ocean, but a start nonetheless.

  Their archers arrived, having struggled through the massed ranks of infantry on the bridge. We jeered them as they slunk into the tower, though we made no efforts to stop them. Most infantry hate cavalrymen, yet only have a moderate dislike for archers. They might get you from afar, but once you were amongst them, they died quickly. I guess it was a case of honours even. We passed instructions around to keep shields raised at all times. Luckily for us, the angle was too tight for their archers to pepper our front ranks, though that would change if we lost ground. They started at once, sending iron-tipped arrows into our ranks, hoping they’d manage to get one through the gaps around our shields.

  Beamer and Weevil had gone – away to the front rows along with the man I knew as Scots. Those around me now had been there for the first attacks. I asked a few of their names and found I was with Luder, Smath and Flood. They had one or two nicks and scratches on their armour and their skin, but they retained the looks of utmost concentration that was the sign of a true infantryman.

  “What are they?” I asked.

  “A few veterans, Captain,” said Luder. “Young ones as well – full of anger and they don’t want to fail.”

  “They fight well,” added Flood. “I thought they’d break sooner than they did. How long did they last?”

  Time lost meaning in the fighting. “An hour,” I said. “Next time it’ll be two hours, and the time after that they won’t stop.”

  “Good job I never need to take a crap until it’s evening,” said another cheerfully.

  I laughed – wherever the Cohort w
ent, whoever we fought with, the humour was always the same. I’d never worked out if it came as a result of fear or if it was a way to stave it off. I supposed that the answer was unimportant.

  Their front ranks reformed and I could tell they’d pushed their proven men to the fore. They’d given the boys a chance and they’d failed - it had been inevitable and a good commander would have known that. Those boys would never become the men they could have been. Strand after strand cut away, to drift and die.

  Onwards they came, this time with their shields tightly locked and their shoulders bunched close together. Many of them died, but others pulled away our spears, or broke the shafts with their swords. We held them away for a while until it became too hazardous to pass forward replacement spears. They crashed against our line and I felt the shiver run through our ranks as they pressed their weight against us. We steeled ourselves, using our shields and our strength to support the men in front of us so that they could take heart from our presence and know that we were there. The enemy shouts rose in volume to match our own as they tried to wash away our determination with the power of their voices. We knew the tactic since we used it ourselves. Instead of quailing in fear, we rose to meet their challenge, anger in our faces.

  We stood there, locked together. Their numbers tested our fortitude and we didn’t back down. Swords rose and fell in slow motion, the shortest of moments to end a life. Our men died along with theirs – gaps appeared and those behind stepped in to fill them. Sinnar loomed above them all, off to my left. His voice boomed out, defying the noise of thousands to make itself heard. Blood sprayed red into the air, twisting patterns of random beauty, before they fell and mingled with the dirt, the guts and the spittle on the ground. Arrows dropped without cease among us, here and there finding yielding flesh instead of metal bulwark.

  Our front lines compressed and the man in front of me was pushed back with it. I braced and tried to keep him in place. It was no good and my feet slid across the flagstones. The man behind added his weight to mine and together we tried to hold our place. First there was a step, and then another. We didn’t give ground willingly and fought for every inch. We lost a few yards and then the pressure reduced as the enemy’s footing became ever more treacherous with the blood of the fallen.

  We beat them back again. They lasted more than two hours – longer than I’d thought they might. The area between our two front lines had become so fouled with bodies that we’d been throwing those we could over the side walls. There was a period where the fighting almost stopped as we’d disposed of the dead. We could have left them, but I didn’t want the enemy being able to stand atop the pile and attack from on high. It appeared that Flax’s men didn’t want to climb over their own to reach us, so it suited both sides to dispose of those bodies that we could.

  The first flickerings of their uncertainty became known to my battle senses with the failing of their voices. Their shouts changed almost imperceptibly at first, turning from cries of certainty to wavering shouts of fear. Sinnar and Craddock picked up on it too and then the realisation poured into Haster. I joined in the shouts of my lieutenants, our four voices becoming one and driving our men forwards to take back the ground we’d conceded. It happened suddenly, as it usually did. One moment they were at us, the next they were spilling away through the gateway. We hounded them and cut them open, spilling their innards onto the ground for their fellows to slip on later.

  I didn’t get to wield my own sword on that first day. They retreated a way and sent their men to tidy up the mess of bodies and severed limbs. It was late afternoon by the time they’d left the bridge in a suitable state to resume hostilities. Someone blew a horn and they withdrew from the bridge. I was sure we’d not see them again until the morning. They abandoned their bowmen in the tower and left us the only ones on the bridge. It wasn’t like we were going to try and recapture the southern half and expose ourselves to the bulk of their archers.

  We held our places until light faded to such an extent that there was no way fighting could resume. I congratulated the men around me and heard my lieutenants doing the same. Haster’s men had fought well and I shook his hand for his efforts.

  “You never lose it,” he said.

  “Not in three years and not in a hundred,” I told him.

  “What now?” he asked, looking up at the tower. Arrows continued to come through the windows, seemingly more in hope than anything else.

  “Take your men into the north field,” I said. There was no need to tell him that he should stay out of range. “The Cohort won’t need to sleep tonight and we’ll camp close to the tower walls. Their archers won’t be able to hit us.”

  “Fine,” he nodded. “Don’t waste your efforts on those tower doors, though I’m sure you’re obliged to try. You’ll not get through them.”

  Before Haster’s men could depart under the cover of their shields, I set our corporals to the task of adding up our dead. It wasn’t a straightforward task, since many had been thrown over the edge wall into the abyss. We’d lost nearly fifty men, of whom ten were from the First Cohort. Grids was amongst them and I felt his loss most keenly. There were injuries, mostly minor. In fighting like this, you either died or you came out more or less unscathed.

  Before we had a chance to come to terms with our losses, Corporal Knacker came up to me. “More troops coming,” he said. He must have caught my look of shock since he corrected himself at once. “Not onto the bridge, sorry, Captain. They’ve got more infantry coming over the brow of the hill over there.”

  I went as close as I dared in order to look. Sure enough, rank after rank of infantry trooped onto the slope and positioned themselves on the right-hand flank.

  “Another twenty thousand,” I said.

  “That’s what I make it,” said Sinnar, who’d arrived to join me.

  “They’ve got sorcerers with them.” I turned to see Ploster was there. I hadn’t spoken to him at all during the day.

  “Anything we should be worried about?” I asked him.

  “They’re powerful,” he said. “We’ll find out what they’ve got tomorrow.”

  I swore – as if it wasn’t already bad enough. Now we’d be facing magic as well as another twenty thousand infantry.

  19

  We spent the night at the base of the central tower. Our shields were close by and our swords rarely left our hands. The soldiers talked as if nothing was amiss, whilst I had to keep my voice low in case the archers overheard anything important. I sat with my lieutenants and Ploster as we considered the best way to proceed.

  “Callian’s sent over sixty-five thousand of her troops to the north,” said Haster. “That must be a big chunk of what she’s got.”

  “Her duchy is rich and populous. I’ll wager her total numbers are several times that,” said Ploster.

  “There are twenty-five thousand of Cranmar’s men coming this way. They’ll be slaughtered by Callian’s army.”

  “Sixty-five thousand is strong enough to be an invasion force,” said Sinnar.

  “There’s nothing much worth having out here,” said Haster. “Small towns, big towns. Nothing strategic and nothing worth the effort to hold – at least not when the early plays of war are being made. Tibulon would be the only logical target and she could reach it by crossing her borders six hundred miles to the east. There’s no need to come this way.”

  “Unless this bridge is the only thing she’s interested in,” said Ploster.

  “It’s just a bridge. An important one, but I wouldn’t have thought it important enough that you’d send so many men to take it,” Haster replied.

  Without answers, we talked about what we planned for the next day. In reality, we had little choice in the matter. Only a few spears remained and when they’d been destroyed, we’d spend the rest of the day toe-to-toe with Flax’s infantry.

  The following morning was colder than the previous and the wind took on a biting edge. I didn’t feel it, except to note that it was there. Has
ter’s men joined us early and the arrows came at us from both the middle and the north towers. We arranged our men with new faces at the front and gave yesterday’s survivors a place in the middle. They’d earned it.

  Lord Flax let us wait for an hour before he ordered his men forward. It was a good tactic, since most soldiers found it difficult to maintain a state of readiness for long. After a time, the adrenaline seeps away, leaving him weakened. We combatted it by laughing and joking amongst ourselves, to keep our spirits high. When they did come, I could see that they’d sent the previous evening’s new arrivals. My hopes that these would be inexperienced troops were quickly dashed. These men had fine armour that covered almost all of their flesh and their swords looked keen.

  First blood fell to us. They stopped and their lines parted to allow a man through. He was scrawny and hunched, with a motley collection of clothes and a hood that covered his face. I didn’t know if sorcerers were almost uniformly ugly and preferred to keep themselves hidden, or if there was a different reason that most of them did so. Our own lines parted and two arrows shot through the gateway tunnel, fired with a flat trajectory. One arrow took the sorcerer in his throat and the other struck him in the chest. Without a sound, he keeled over dead. We cheered and we cheered, with men reaching across to clap Shooter and Eagle on their backs and congratulate them for their skills. They slung their bows and I sent them towards the middle again. That particular surprise was spent and I doubted that the next sorcerer would show himself so eagerly.

  The infantry didn’t wait and marched onwards. I caught the arrogance in their stride and in their eyes. They were cruel men, who thought they were the best.

  “Look at these cocky bastards,” laughed Sinnar loudly enough for the enemy to hear. “They think they know how to fight.”

  “Let them feel Haster’s fury,” I yelled. “And let them taste the First Cohort’s steel!”