Fortunately (or otherwise, as the case may be and ofttimes is) almost all of the “soldiers” of these independent settlements are part-time soldiers who normally make their livelihoods as farmers, husbandmen, tradesmen, craftsmen, or otherwise. Naturally, that means most are not the match of the well-trained and effective soldiers maintained by the city states of the Princedons or, indeed, any other proper state in the known world. The great majority of the defensive forces, however, do possess a cadre of experienced soldiers who have training and experience in the army of one or another of the Princedon city states or, with surprising frequency, a proper nation state from elsewhere in the known world. These cadres most generally consist of one or two officers and anywhere from one sergeant to three or four sergeants, though a few have no more than one properly trained and experienced sergeant as their cadre.
[Note, please, that the author wishes to imply no offense to sergeants in that last statement. Any more than the most cursory study of military matters and the history of warfare is sufficient to convince all but the most aristocratic that the fighting ability of any armed force relies more on its sergeants than on its officers. Whilst officers make strategy, draw plans, and provide for the arming, uniforming, supplying, and provisioning of armies, it is the sergeants who do the training and enforce discipline, without both of which no army can win any battle. (Note: The Jokapcul appear to be the sole exception to this rule. In the Jokapcul army, sergeants appear to be simply relayers of officers’ orders.)]
There is, however, an ameliorating factor in the disunity of the Princedons. To wit, language. The city state of Penston, on the seaside of the root of the peninsula, some hundred miles east of Zobra City, speaks a dialect of Zobran. As one travels eastward from there, the language deviates more and more from its Zobran root until by the time one reaches Harfort, at the easternmost tip of the peninsula, the local tongue is hardly recognizable as being related to Zobran. The matter worsens along the gulf coast. As the natal Zobran influence of the local tongues lessens, the tongues are increasingly affected by the guttural language of the little-known denizens of the Low Desert to the north of the gulf, until at Dartsmutt, at the gulf-side root of the peninsula, the local tongue is almost a dialect of the little-known language of the Low Desert. (Some scholars, however, argue that the tongue spoken by the Low Desert nomads is, in fact, a dialect of the tongue spoken in Dartsmutt.) Inland, close to the spinal mountains, the local tongues follow a similar pattern, though they are frequently little related to their geographically nearest coastal neighbors. The local tongues drift as they move from coast to spine, so that in the middle they are mixes of the tongues spoken at the extremes. Thusly, communication between city states is difficult at best, and often problematic.
In these days, any paper on Nunimar requires a note on the practice of magic. The magics practiced in the interior of the Princedons are most commonly those practiced by healing witches and other healing practitioners. Magicians who control demon weapons, such as are said to be used by the nation states of southern Nunimar west of the Princedons, and to greater effect by the ravening Jokapcul from the Far West, are largely unknown in the Princedons, or if not unknown, in the main are unused; similarly, guardian demons are in minimal use, if used at all. Healing demons such as aralez and land trows are the only demons known to be in use.
In conclusion, the Princedons are an agglomeration of loosely affiliated but potentially wealthy city states that need merely to become affiliated less loosely and to clear out their native brigands in order to join the first rank of the known world’s nation states.
—Correspondence; Not for Publication—
From the Editor
The Proceedings of the Association of
Anthropological Scholars of Obscure Cultures
Scholar Mu’sk,
It aggrieves me to see yet another paper from you written in a style so totally inappropriate for publication in a learned journal such as The Proceedings. As I have on innumerable occasions in the past when you have submitted such inappropriately worded papers, I struggled with the jury to get this paper past the peer review process to acceptance. You are, when all is taken into proper consideration, a preeminent scholar in Far Western Studies, and held in general high esteem. In selecting this paper for publication, however, I had to go considerably beyond what is considered proper editorial influence. So far beyond, that my position as editor of this scholarly journal has been threatened.
I am required, albeit reluctantly and with less than full enthusiasm, to inform you that should you submit another paper written in anything other than a proper scholarly style, I shall be compelled to return it to you forthwith without submitting it to peer review.
Munch, kindly forgive the tone of the preceding paragraphs. Our friendship and mutual respect have entirely too long a history for me to speak, or write I should say, to you with such disrespect. But I am under a great deal of pressure to raise the tone of The Proceedings to the highest levels of scholarship. To that end, I cannot accept another paper from you written in the popular style you have recently adopted in many of your papers; to do so could well cost me my position as editor.
In friendship,
Klules
II
THE TOWN
CHAPTER
SEVEN
They progressed only a few miles from the bivouac before the character of the land and the life it nourished began to change. From an imperceptible downward slope, the ground began to ripple easily upward toward the spine of the peninsula, and a rocky substrate broke the surface in places. The canopy trees thinned out to competition from shorter trees whose major branches sprouted lower on their trunks, whose boles split and split again until the leaves formed a bloomlike ball. Direct sunlight reached the ground, allowing an undergrowth of bushes, weeds, and flowers. Animate life changed along with the landscape. Butterflies displaced many of the salt-lickers and bloodsuckers under the canopy. There were more bees than before. Tracks of wild goat mixed in with those of deer. Rabbits scampered from the approaching men, foxes peered at them from behind screens of grass. Ground birds hunkered under brambles. Somewhere an elk bugled and was answered.
Following the changing lay of the land, the road wound about more than before, went around rather than over the higher or steeper groundswells. In places the roadway had been cut into a rise rather than climb over its top. On the approach to one such cut, Haft began hearing the muted clops of walking horses, the tree dulled jangle of tackle. The sounds echoed in the trees, making it difficult to tell their direction. He whistled to get Birdwhistle’s attention, then angled toward the road. When he reached it he listened. The sounds came from the front, ahead of them. He signaled Birdwhistle, then darted across the road where he found Archer coming his way. Unlike Spinner, Haft had no questions or qualms about his right to command.
“Horsemen,” Archer said. “They came across our front and turned onto the road.”
“How many? Who are they? Jokapcul?”
Archer shook his head. “We weren’t close enough to see. It sounded like a squad. They didn’t talk, so we heard no language.”
Haft thought for a moment. They needed to know the identity of those people; they also needed to remain unseen until they found out. “Could you tell how fast are they going?”
“A slow walk.”
“All right. Maintain contact, but keep your distance. Don’t let them see you. Send Hunter back to tell Fletcher to close up with us.”
Archer nodded. “Right.” He turned into the forest to find Hunter.
Haft dashed back across the road and looked for Birdwhistle. He saw him not far away and headed for him, then spun toward a shadow that darted through the trees ahead of him. He whistled to alert Birdwhistle, and lowered himself to a knee with his crossbow at his shoulder, sighting along it toward where he saw the fleeting shadow.
A shape leaped out of the shadows and bounded toward him, it twisted in time to evade the quarrel he fired
at it and was on him, grinning jaws clamped on his right sleeve, before he could draw his axe. It was Wolf.
Haft jerked his sleeve from the animal’s mouth and glared at him as he rearmed his crossbow. “One of these days, Wolf,” he snarled, “you’re going to do that but I’ll be faster. That’ll end your games.”
He half expected Wolf to snort and vigorously shake his head as he usually did when Haft made such remarks, but the wolf didn’t. Instead, he looked at Haft expectantly.
Haft looked toward Birdwhistle. The scout was watching them intently and angling closer. He signaled him and Birdwhistle came straight over.
“A squad crossed Archer and Hunter’s front,” he said when the Zobran reached him. “They weren’t close enough to see who they were. I sent Hunter back to bring Fletcher and his men up. Now I want to find out who those people are.” He looked in the direction from which Wolf had come and saw the ground rise in a nubbin of hill. “They’re beyond that rise somewhere.”
When he said that, Wolf grabbed his left sleeve and pulled hard enough that Haft had a choice of going with him or being pulled off his feet.
“Whoa, what are you doing?” he growled.
“Ulgh,” Wolf growled deep in his throat, and jerked Haft’s sleeve again.
“I think he wants to show you something,” Birdwhistle said softly.
“Nonsense!” Haft snapped. “Let go,” he ordered Wolf. The wolf let go, but kept looking at him expectantly.
“I had a dog acted like that once. Let’s see what he wants. Maybe he saw them and wants to show us.”
“Ulgh,” Wolf said, and bobbed his head up and down.
Grumbling quietly, Haft let Wolf lead him. Wolf kept his head and shoulders low. Without conscious thought, Haft followed his example. They ran at an angle away from the road, around the rising ground. The sound of the horses dimmed almost to inaudibility.
A streambed with a mere trickle of water in its bottom cut through the forest floor and meandered toward the farther end of the high ground. It was deep enough for them to stand slightly crouched and not be seen. Wolf led them into it and followed the watercourse for a short distance, closer to the rise, before he stopped and looked at Haft. They could again hear the clopping and jangling of the horses. The wolf bellied down and began to climb the bank. Haft started to stretch fully erect to look over the top of the bank, but Wolf grabbed his sleeve and pulled him back down.
Haft looked at him oddly for a couple of seconds, then said softly, “All right, I’ll do it your way.”
Wolf immediately let go.
Crouched below the lip of the streambed, Haft leaned onto it and slithered up its side until he could peer over the top. He dropped right back down.
“Bandits,” he whispered to Birdwhistle. The armed men he saw lying in watch over the road in his quick look probably weren’t soldiers; they weren’t dressed uniformly, nor did they carry the same arms. More carefully than before, he looked over the bank again. A dozen or more men lay on the slope of the rise where they couldn’t be seen from the road. They weren’t lying relaxed; they were alert and armed with a variety of short bows and swords, positioned to jump to their feet and rain arrows down onto the road from their higher vantage. The horses on the road were closer now, nearing the ambush’s killing zone. He twisted to his right at another sound and brought his crossbow to bear. He let go of the trigger just in time to avoid shooting the Skragland Borderer named Kovasch. Meszaros was right behind him.
Haft resisted the impulse to snap at them for sneaking up on him. “Bandits,” he said softly.
Kovasch nodded. He and Meszaros stayed hunched below the top of the bank and waited for instructions.
Haft rose back up. What should they do? He didn’t know who the horsemen were. If they were Jokapcul, he should leave the ambush alone and let the bandits kill the enemy. But what if they weren’t? They hadn’t seen any sign of Jokapcul in several days; there was an excellent chance the company was still ahead of the invaders—especially inland on the peninsula. It was more likely the horsemen were refugees, in which case they should help them. But how? Four men and a wolf. What could they do against the dozen ambushers he could see? Worse, how many more bandits were there that he couldn’t see? The best he could hope for if he simply called out a warning was the bandits would run and all of them would get away. Even that best wasn’t very good—the bandits would all be free to attack them or other travelers another time. Yet the odds were too great for him and his few men and the wolf to attack directly.
He heard the horses almost directly to his front now and saw the bandits ready themselves, the ambush was about to be sprung. He had to do something. A passage from Lord Gunny Says came to his mind; When you are in doubt as to the best course of action, choose one and follow it decisively. Inactivity when action is required is the worst enemy of the warrior. Any action, taken decisively, is better than no action.
He made a decision and dropped back down.
“There’s at least a dozen of them,” he said. “There might be more I can’t see. We need to even the odds right away.” He took inventory of his men’s weapons as he talked. Birdwhistle and Meszaros carried short bows, only Kovasch had the more powerful, more accurate longbow. It didn’t matter, they were close enough the short bows could hardly miss. “Wolf, go that way,” he pointed along the streambed. “When you reach the far side of the ambush, attack the man at that end.” He felt stupid giving the wolf instructions, but sometimes—usually, though he didn’t like to admit it—the beast seemed to understand.
Wolf gave Haft a look that, had he been a man, Haft would have interpreted it as, “Are you crazy? And what are you going to be doing while I run the suicide mission?”
“We,” he addressed the men, “will wait for Wolf to attack. The instant he does, we shoot the four men on the right side of their line. With any luck, the rest of them will be so distracted by Wolf’s attack, they won’t notice right away and we can charge and hit them from the rear.”
Wolf nodded, seeming satisfied that he wasn’t being sacrificed, and sprinted up the streambed.
Haft kept giving instructions as he watched Wolf head for his part of the attack. “Kovasch, you’ve got the best bow. Put a couple more arrows into them while the rest of us charge. Questions?”
The three looked at him grimly; they understood the need for this desperate action.
“Let’s get up and get ready. See where you are in our line. Meszaros, you’re on our right side, take the man farthest to the right. Everybody else follow suit. Got it?”
They nodded. Haft slithered back to the bank top. He looked to his sides before drawing his axe and laying it on the ground where he could grab it as soon as he fired; he ignored the bee that briefly crawled on his cheek before buzzing off. The three scouts were readying their bows. Kovasch laid out three extra arrows. Haft aimed his crossbow and waited for Wolf’s assault. Before Wolf reached the end of the ambush line, the people riding on the road fully entered the killing zone. Someone shouted a command and the ambushers rose to their knees and fired arrows. Shouts came from the road, commands and screams.
Without hesitating, Haft fired. He had his axe in his hand and was on his feet racing forward before the quarrel hit its target. Birdwhistle and Meszaros were with him. He heard screaming from the distance, Wolf’s attack on the other end of the line. An arrow from Kovasch’s bow zinged past, rapidly followed by two more. Then they were on the ambushers.
Haft swung his axe in a mighty overhead arc and buried its half-moon blade in the back of a man who was looking toward the commotion to his left. He saw Birdwhistle race past and thrust with his sword to skewer the next man in line. Meszaros was right behind him and chopped through the neck of the next. Haft dashed toward the next ambusher. That man heard the footsteps coming toward him and turned to look, but it was too late, Haft was already on him and his swinging axe clove its way deep from the bandit’s shoulder into his chest before the bandit could reach his feet—
but not before he cried out a warning. Other ambushers looked back and shouted surprise and anger at the attacking quartet. They leaped up to counterattack.
Suddenly, uniformed men rushed up the slope from the road, swords in hand. The newcomers saw Birdwhistle’s uniform and recognized it instantly—its fur and helmet were very similar to their own. They attacked the men Birdwhistle and his three companions were fighting.
Haft was distantly aware that the screams and shouts from the far end of the ambush had lessened. He wondered fleetingly how many men they were attacking; if it was only the dozen or so he’d seen the fight should be over already with the reinforcements they suddenly had. But it wasn’t, there were still too many bandits. Three charging bandits, one armed with a pike, came at him.
Haft swerved to the side, avoiding the thrust of the pike and moved inside the arc of its swing. He swung his axe, chopping into the side of the pikeman. On his backstroke he sunk the spike on the back of the half-moon blade into the shoulder of one of the other attackers, knocking him down screaming. He wanted to look to see how his men were doing, but didn’t have time—each of the two bandits he’d downed was immediately replaced by two more. He backpedaled rapidly to keep them from surrounding him. One of them used his sword to block a swing of the axe, but the blow shattered the blade. The bandit dropped the useless hilt and picked up the pike. He steadied himself and felt the balance of the long weapon, then lunged forward and thrust its point at Haft. Haft barely had time to see the strike coming. He reached out and hooked one of the others with the corner of his axe blade and yanked him into the path of the oncoming pike. The pike’s long, steel point went all the way through the bandit’s body. The mortally wounded man screamed three times—when the axe point hooked him; when the pike’s head burst through the front of his body; when Haft twisted the axe to turn him and throw his body to the ground. The pike tore out of its wielder’s hands, its shaft slammed into the legs of another man and knocked him off his feet.
Demontech: Rally Point: 2 (Demontech Book 2) Page 8