The Rawn Chronicles Book Four: The Dragon and the Daemon (The Rawn Chronicles Series 4)

by P D Ceanneir

  ‘Queen Bronwyn...’ he faltered as he spoke. Furran took over for him.

  ‘She was captured before we could find safety in an old fort. I’m sorry to say that the queen was executed in front of our very eyes by Prince Creed himself.’

  Bleudwed sobbed and shook her head in disbelief; all the others remained silent, lost within their own thoughts. One of the soldiers at the dyke informed them that the enemy were making a move. The moment of sadness remained, but the business of battle took primacy over all emotions.

  ‘Magnus take half of your Legion and man the east wall, Felcon and Mactan, go to the west,’ said the king. ‘Furran, hold the remaining Legion and your own companies here in the courtyard in case they should pass the defenders at the dyke. You should be able to hold them here. Where is Powyss?’

  ‘Still at the dam, or what’s left of it, sire,’ said Sir Colby behind Little Kith.

  Havoc nodded. ‘The rest of you with me at the front.’ Everyone now had their orders and the group split away from the king to rush towards their positions and Havoc found himself alone with the countess who wept quietly into a lavender scented silk handkerchief embroidered with her family coat-of-arms.

  ‘Oh good gods, Bronwyn,’ she whispered. Havoc pulled her into a hug and she wept some more. He said nothing, he could not trust himself to speak, and he brushed Bleudwed’s blonde hair away from her eyes.

  ‘I want you to stay in the cave and stay safe,’ he said.

  ‘I can fight you know,’ she said, as she rubbed her red eyes. ‘I want to fight.’ She wanted to tell him about the dream, but decided to wait for a better moment.

  ‘I lost Bronwyn, I don’t want to lose you,’ he said.

  ‘I’m not going to give them the chance!’ she said this with a growl, the venom in her voice made him almost believe her.

  ‘Stick with Little Kith then,’ he finally said after a few seconds then turned away to climb the dyke to view the battlefield.

  Down on the new flood plain, the army of Prince Creed had been lucky enough to find a large expanse of dry land directly in front of the castle slope. Unfortunately, the water from the lake behind them was spreading outward in an arc cutting off any hope of retreat to the east. Moving to the west held other dangers in the long bog land of the Dragorsloth, which stretched for miles westward in a series of saturated marshlands scarred with thousands of tiny rivulets that spread outwards into a network of black veins. This was not a place to traverse without a guide to help take men over the tidemark paths. However, the water had lost its momentum now and had become a long and wide river of its own. Eventually the waters would flow into the Furran River and so drain away from the surrounding marshland, but that was not going to happen for a while.

  Prince Creed did not intend to leave anyway. He formed his Wyani Legions into a long line, three deep, and sent them into a frontal assault up the slope. The Wyani soldiers held their large round shields to their sides and hefted their spears onto their shoulders as they marched in their half-armour and the distinctive livery of light blue with the carapace of silver over their chests. They clanked and panted as they jogged up the slope. The long shadows that stretched over the ground from the last rays of the sun made it look as if more of them were charging the hill. Powyss was right about the ruined walls slowing them down. Most of them had to climb or move around these obstacles and reform again. As a result, their original formation became ragged.

  Havoc looked up towards Whyteman and his archers, who had taken a better viewing position high above the cave mouth, and raised his arm. Whyteman saw the signal and ordered his Eternals to notch arrows to their bows. The two thousand Falesti archers, crammed together in a line along the broken walls one behind the other, all reached for a swan-feathered arrow in their quivers and notched it to their strings. The Falesti long bow was as tall as the average person, the fashioning of which traditionally held as a secret passed down from father to son. Accurate at long range and certainly deadly at short, the archers strained to pull the one hundred and sixty pound draw, aimed at their targets, and inched upward several hand spans to get the distance and loft just right.

  The Wyani, who were by this time halfway up the slope, only saw the Eternals at the last second before the king dropped his arm and the sky darkened with arrows as they passed over the defenders heads with a loud whoosh. The shafts rattled in the air as they clustered together before falling amongst the enemy. The front row of soldiers spun as the arrows struck, falling backwards down the slope and crashing into the row behind them. The second row fared little better as the barrage of shafts peppered them at the next volley. Some of them raised shields in time, but bodkin-tipped longbow arrows could do serious damage to wooden shields and lightly armoured men at long range, and this close to the Eternals meant that hundreds of the Wyani fell to the ground with several arrows each embedded in their bodies.

  ‘Adjust loft by two spans!’ shouted Whyteman and the Eternals armed and loosed their arrows. This time they found the rear ranks, sending them back down the slope in clumps of flailing dead.

  The enemy increased momentum, the reality of their eventual demise under the hail of arrows fortified their resolve to get into the Raiders beyond the dyke; still over two thirds of their number reached the wall and found a new problem. The leaf covered earthen wall was only three feet at its highest point, but because of the slope they stood on, it reached their heads and the Raiders had the advantage as they jabbed down with their spears with the full weight of their bodies behind it.

  Sir Whyteman shouted a warning to the king from his high vantage point but Havoc had already seen the danger. Prince Creed had sent more men to fortify the Wyani attackers and the Ulundi to the king’s right flank where Little Kith held the rocky west wing of the ruined castle. This side of the slope was steeper and was full of large boulders that jutted out from the ground, if the Ulundi could get past the rocky area then they would be able to attack Havoc’s right flank in numbers. Little Kith had already noticed the enemy movement and he took two hundred of his own Raider company down that side of the hill and into the boulders so they would be the first line of defence.

  The left flank to the east was less of a problem. At ground level, it was flooded and no attack could come from that quarter. However all the enemy needed to do was to reach the dyke wall and inch their way around it towards the Princes Legion who were waiting for them.

  Soon, the battle joined on all sides as the sun slowly slid from the sky.

  Lord Rett hated the Dragorsloth. He had fought in two battles here and tasted defeat in both, this time he was determined to win. He had been busy since leaving the new Rogun king and following his plan. He had augmented his host with a further five thousand more infantry and three thousand Carras Knights, which left the Pander Pass almost defenceless. Now, as they camped in the chill mists of the marsh, the duke waited for the king’s signal.

  The days had been long here, the march torturous, mainly because of the dry areas of the bog that remained was the only part of the landscape suitable to march along with horses and soldiers. This however took them to the scene of the old battlefield. Lord Rett and his men marched in grim silence as they passed the hill with King Hagan’s Cairn on its summit and over the battlefield proper. The earth had reclaimed most of the bones of the long dead, although not all, skulls inside rusty helmets stared after the marching host, grinning at the foolishness of the living. The duke lost count of the amount of times he had to guide his horse around the white cages of sun-bleached ribs that protruded from the ground and stop men from plundering the discarded weapons and armour that lay scattered for miles around.

  However, what really bothered him were the ravens.

  They were everywhere; they flew in from some unknown origin in groups and hopped over the bog land at the flanks of the marching columns watching them with their beady black eyes. It was as if they followed them to a feast where they had no invite.

  The mornings were the w
orst; whenever the men woke, they would find themselves surrounded by ravens. They would huddle together on the tent ropes or cluster on old rotting tree stumps. They regarded the soldiers in silence and fixed them with an all-knowing emotionless stare.

  The evening when one of the duke’s perimeter guards saw the signal from the king was thankfully clear of mist. Though the fog always persisted on the marshy ground, it only floated above the surface a few inches so the men walked through it ankle deep. The duke went with the guard to see the signal for himself. Far away on one of the mountain ridges close to Lake Furran, there was an intermittent flashing, the suns light reflected off the signaller’s mirror.

  ‘I think it’s time to go,’ said Lord Rett to the guard, ‘and get our feet wet with blood instead of marsh water.’

  The sheep path from the horse’s field was narrow, muddy, and led straight to the entrance of the cave, but not before it wound through tightly packed boulders and curved behind the broken wall where the Eternals released their volleys. It also branched off from the horse field and looped around the hill above the cave before dropping steeply downwards towards a wider woodland path that led to Cromme Hold. Powyss and his team used this path as a convenient short cut to the dam every morning. Tia, Kern, Gunach, and a very wet Powyss returned via this route and were eventually greeted by the king when they arrived. Havoc had to shout over the noise of battle below them and asked why the commander was so wet.

  ‘Didn’t realise that the water would rise so bloody quickly,’ mumbled Powyss, ‘if it wasn’t for Kern pulling me out I would have been washed away. How fares things here?’

  ‘We are holding them. Whyteman sent the signal. All we have to do is wait it out.’

  Tia moved out from behind Powyss and put an arm around the king. She whispered in his ear saying how happy she was to see he had returned safe.

  ‘Safe? Aye for now,’ he said. ‘Tia my dear, I need you to go to Little Kith’s units and find the countess. You must protect her with your life.’

  Tia took her arm away and looked into Havoc’s eyes with sadness in her own. She realised that from this point onwards things between them had changed. Whether it was his new royal rank or the presence of Bleudwed, she did not know. Her fondness for the countess had grown, even if she had not received orders from her liege lord she would have protected her and trusted her friendship. She nodded and without a word ran off to carry out his command.

  ‘Gunach, I think Felcon in the front rank could use your axe,’ said the king.

  Gunach unstrapped one of his axes and unsheathed his short sword. ‘Thought you’d never ask,’ he said and barged into the press of soldiers who wisely moved out of his way.

  ‘I think the goat path could be a problem,’ said Powyss, hooking a thumb behind him to the way he had just come. ‘I wouldn’t put it past Creed to figure out a way behind us.’

  Havoc had to agree, ‘take what men you need from Furran’s units.’ Powyss took only two hundred and led them up the narrow path.

  Tia found the countess recklessly enjoying herself.

  Kith had moved his men down from the left flank to a pair of twenty-foot high grey boulders and used his troops to plug the space in between them. The struggling Unduli had no choice but to meet them head on as there was no other route around apart from a vertical climb. Bleudwed had acquired two Spit Guns, along with countless clips of bolts, and was firing indiscriminately into the charging enemy from on top of one of the tall grey boulders. Tia sighed to herself and shook her head, for someone so intelligent the countess could be quite naive. Enemy crossbowmen were firing up at her and miraculously missing. Already, two Raiders were on their knees beside her with arrow shafts protruding from their armour and still they protected her with shields. Tia jumped onto the boulder, a leap of twenty-feet, just in time to use her sword to knock away a bolt that was flying straight at the countess’s head. Bleudwed did not notice, she continued firing at the crossbowmen and was remarkably adept at keeping them from creating chaos amongst Little Kith’s men.

  The battle changed subtly by the minute. The long wall of Raiders rippled and bulged as the pressure from the thousands of Wyani and Gazzen-Sel troops pushed against them. The large square courtyard became slick with blood as it trickled down from the dyke and into the cracks of the flagstones. Occasionally, some of the enemy would punch through the defensive line and then be hacked down by Furran’s men, or by the king himself, as he wandered back and forward along the wall shouting encouragement to the backs of his Raiders. More and more of the enemy entered the press and pushed forwards. It was becoming harder for the Raiders to hold them back from their vantage point on the wall.

  As the sun fell down over the horizon, the fight reached a point where the defensive wall would give way to the enemy. Havoc knew it would happen, felt it in his mind. The mass of Wyani pushed hard and the thin line of Raiders could not hold them for long. The king watched the breaking of the wall in slow motion.

  He saw Magnus strip away men from his Legion and fill in gaps to aid the Raiders. He saw Felcon bat away a Wyani soldier with his shield as he jumped over one of his men. The soldier’s body tipped end over end down the slope. He saw Gunach knock away an enemy shield and plunge down with his axe, blood gushed over his head as he found an artery. He saw a Raider jerk as his spear impaled someone and then someone pulled him downwards; he fell forward into the seething mass of the enemy. The king saw gaps open up as his soldiers died on the wall.

  Havoc turned to Furran, ‘It’s going to be soon, prepare your men.’

  Fighters, soldiers, howled in fear, anger or pain. The battle reached a noise level that screeched beyond imagination, the pressure became a strain that was too much to bear.

  Nevertheless, the wall of the defenders did not break.

  Because their king ordered them to step back and, as one disciplined unit, they did.

  The enemy mounted the dyke in disbelief and flooded over it in their thousands, cheering in victory. That was when they found Major Furran and two thousand fresh Raiders in their path with Spit Guns pointed at them from the higher ledge.

  The king gave the order to fire. The enemy’s front rank fell screaming under the barrage of wolfram tipped bolts, their bodies jerked this way and that as numerous arrows pierced their armour and ripped through their flesh and organs.

  Havoc unsheathed SinDex. ‘Hit them hard!’ he shouted and everyone ran with him as they forced the enemy back over the dyke, the crush of men pushed the king forward and he stumbled over the piles of fallen. Suddenly the press of bodies muffled the sounds of the battle itself. Havoc stabbed and hacked with his sword, he noticed Hexor and Gunach next to him screaming at their men to form a line next to their king. The time of battle ebbed and flowed, minutes that felt like hours ticked by, darkness was complete by the time the Raiders were back defending the dyke. Then the pressure eased as the enemy retreated down the slope.

  Havoc and his army were too tired to cheer. They just stood there on the wall panting and caked in blood.

  Prince Creed did not give up his fight. While Havoc ordered many torches placed along the defences, the Unduli charged up the slope. Because of the darkness, it was too treacherous to attack the flanks now so a direct assault was his only option.

  The rotund engineer, Kern saved the day; he only had two Krump Pots left and attached a five-second fuse onto both of them, lit them, hurled them down the slope at the charging enemy.

  The dull boom echoed off the mountains, the bright flash of the explosion revealed at least a dozen men flying through the air in more than one piece.

  Creed did not send anyone else for the rest of the night. Now the king’s army could cheer and Havoc hoped that his half-brother would not realize that they were out of explosives and almost out of arrows.

  The breaking of dawn brought a new peril, this time not for Havoc, but for Prince Creed. The Red Duke and the Rogun army had arrived.

  They had marched all night and appeared
from the early morning mist like Marshwraiths. The cavalry’s scarlet surcoat over their silver chest plates showed up clearly through the thinning fog. Each of the Rogun spearmen carried their billhooks at an angle as they marched through the shallow water of the damp ground. Havoc could see the Carras Knights on horseback looking for dry ground to cross over to Creed’s army. Lord Rett had cleverly ordered the Horsed Archers to dismount and filter around to the enemy flanks on foot while the Rogun Infantry advanced.

  Creed had been organising his host for another attack on Cromme Castle, but when his scouts returned with the news of the oncoming Rogun army, this forced him to swing his entire host around to meet them.

  Now, with the Rogun infantry spearmen marching in a long thick line towards his area of drier ground, Creed unleashed his Unduli first and the screaming horde rushed forward. They lobbed spears at the Roguns, scoring hits, and then they unsheathed swords to hack through the hedge of ash shafts to get to the soldiers. The Rogun archers toppled their ranks as they shot arrows into their lines from far away on the marshy banks of the river and the Unduli crossbowmen counter-attacked. Later in the fight, the Carras Knights found a way over to the drier ground of the battlefield and cut deep red gashes into the ranks of the Gazzen-Sel Regiments as they charged in from the north. Prince Creed had nowhere to turn; to his rear and left was floodwater, the slope of Cromme Castle on his right and a revenge hungry Red Duke to his front.

  Havoc and his Raiders watched all of this unfold from the dyke. At the point when the silver-clad Carras Knights found a way over the wet ground and attacked, all eyes turned to the king with hope in their eyes. Havoc nodded and knew this was as good a moment to finish this battle.

  ‘Major Furran, General Advance. Go to the good Duke’s aid if you please,’ he said.

  ‘Yes sir, it will be an honour,’ Furran replied in a posh voice, and then changed to his normal accent to shout towards the Raiders watching the scene below. ‘Right, you shower of shits! Let’s show those bastards how to win a fight.’ The soldiers cheered and laughed as they ran down the slope, carefully dodging the ruined walls and forming up again to hit the Wyani troops that had to turn to meet them full on.