Gunpowder God

by John F. Carr

  There was a ragged roar in response. The man in the line beside him had overloaded his pan and his arquebus blew up in his face! Something clanged off Darnos’ helmet and bits of flesh splashed onto his face and jack. He used his sleeve to clear his eyes, stole a look at the enemy line which had buckled and was now reforming. He stepped back through the files to let the next rank move forward, then began to reload.

  His shaking was worse than ever and he wasn’t sure whether it was due to hunger or fear. It seemed to take him a quarter candle to fumble his powder horn into position and measure out a load of fireseed. The ramrod almost slipped out of his hand before he finally rammed it and the bullet home. His nerves weren’t helped when the forward rank fired. Then they moved back and his rank moved forward.

  “FIRE!”

  He squeezed the trigger and as he fired the Styphoni returned fire. Most of the enemy were too far back to do much more than fire into the forward trench. The Styphoni lines wavered as men dropped and others screamed in pain. More Order Foot advanced through the breach, replacing the ones who’d fallen. The enemy were moving closer, in between volleys, and some were shooting directly into the trenches. Some of the petty captains used their halberds to try and push back the most forward Styphoni; one of them was gut-shot and fell back into the trench.

  Their return salvos rattled the Order’s first ranks, but there seemed to be no end to them as more and more of the enemy marched through the breach to take the dead and wounded men’s places.

  Still, they were killing and wounding hundreds of the enemy as they fired volley after volley into the Order’s ranks. Hope began to spring up in his chest. Maybe we can stop the Styphoni and drive them back.

  The first artillery piece drawing up through the breach blew out that small flicker of hope like a sudden breeze. The Styphoni artillery carts were moving forward through the defile.

  “Kill the gunners!” their Captain cried out.

  The Order arquebusiers and musketeers formed ranks before the guns, making it almost impossible to hit the artillerymen. Behind the trenches several companies of Agrysi musketeers were firing salvos overhead, ripping through the front of the Styphoni line. Hundreds died before the first salvo thundered forth, knocking the Agrysi rear lines about like a seawall breached by a bad storm.

  Now that the artillery had driven away the Agrysi rear guard, the gunners pulled their carts right up to the trenches.

  Darnos felt something strike his arquebus and knock it out of his hands. His left arm felt numb from his wrist to his shoulder. Another grapeshot hit his back-and-breast, knocking him to the ground. He tried to get up and find another weapon, but everyone around him was either dead or lying wounded. He had a terrible weight on his chest; tried to lift it off but his hand came back covered in blood—then everything went black….

  FIFTEEN

  I

  As the last of the artillery wagons rolled into the breach, Sarmoth heard war cries and the sound of arquebus fire from beyond the break in the wall. The guns roared and the cries of the wounded grew even louder and a cloud of smoke blew back through the gap.

  Longshanks, his oath-brother, rode up beside him. He carried his feathered spear in one hand and a pistol tucked into his white sash. His head was shaved but for a rooster-comb of hair that ran from his forehead to the back of his neck and was braided at the back with hawk feathers, the totem of his tribe.

  “The men are eager, Brother.”

  “Good. We should see action soon.” Sarmoth removed his morion helmet to wipe the sweat off his forehead. The second volley sounded and Steel Hooves shivered, then whinnied. It wouldn’t be long now.

  He signaled Steel Hooves into motion and waved his trumpeter forward, making the sign for “move forward but cautiously.” The trumpet sounded the proper notes.

  The five Blades—each Blade was comprised of ten Points (sixty Knights) and their supporting units, either archers or mounted arquebusiers—started to move toward the breach, with the Brother Knights at the fore. Their helms were closed, lances positioned to the side. The Knights were wearing their black tunics with the Order’s device on the breast; the same insignia was on the front of the black bards covering their mounts’ horse armor.

  His banner bearer was now to his left flank, while Longshanks protected his right. Each Blade had its own banner and they were now moving forward into the breach. As Sarmoth reached the breach, a clash of thunder struck his ears as the lowered guns fired another salvo, into what appeared to be deep trenches, tearing the blackened Agrysi soldiers into chunks and flying pieces of flesh. Several men survived the barrage of gunfire and fired back, only to be shot down by the Order handgunners at the van of the Host. Those who could still walk or crawl retreated behind the ruins on the other side of the avenue.

  There were gunshots from several broken buildings. He quickly ordered several squads of Order Foot to enter them and take out the snipers. Fortunately, the Agrysi didn’t have any of Kalvan’s rifles and their firing was more irritating than deadly. Aiming a smoothbore downslope was always a problem as more often than not the ball and wadding fell out before the trigger was pulled, especially when ramrodded under combat conditions. It took a cool head to pack the ball in tight enough to fire downhill.

  Sarmoth’s own heart was racing and it was all he could do to keep from joining the Order Foot as they advanced to clear the broken buildings of the disorganized Agrysi soldiers. His orders were to let the infantry clear the breach and to enter as soon as the Agrysi had been killed or driven off.

  There was a lot of shooting and cursing, but most of the fighting was obscured by the ruins and fireseed smoke. The Agrysi militia refused to surrender and were dying by the droves. Too many good men are dying this cursed day, he thought. As the Grand Master said, even with Archpriest Roxthar gone his legacy remained behind.

  There were two or three squadrons of cavalry holding the right side of the road behind a blockade of broken wagons, carts, furniture, posts and big stones. He rode over to the artillery officer who was overseeing the battery.

  Sarmoth pointed to the blockade. “Captain, can you clear that obstacle?”

  The officer’s white teeth blazed forth as a smile broke out on his blackened face. “We’ll send those buggers off to Galzar’s Hall. Round shot, By Galzar’s Mace, will make quick work of that junk pile!”

  He turned to his men and had the oxen teams hitched up to the gun carts again. The guns were all six- and eight-pound hooped-iron guns. Two companies of Order Foot followed behind for close support. The artillery men turned the gun carts and hauled them to within fifty paces of the makeshift barrier.

  Some of the Agrysi infantry began to fire their muskets. Several of the artillery men took body shots. Sarmoth gave the signal and the Order arquebusiers moved forward, loaded their smoothbores and fired a volley. A cloud of smoke obscured the barricade, but not the screams from the wounded. After three more volleys, there were no more shots from behind the obstacle.

  The arquebusiers stood at the ready while the artillery fired the first salvo. It struck the barrier like a tornado, throwing broken wood and shrapnel in every direction. When the smoke had cleared, Sarmoth could see that the Agrysi had completely retired from the field. It took two more volleys before the last of the wagons was torn into kindling wood.

  He had his trumpeter sound the order to move forward. They made their way cautiously over the smashed carts, carriages, chunks of stone and brick, furniture and dead carcasses, picking up speed as they made their way onto the stone avenue. He could see columns of smoke pointing up to the sky from every direction in the city. Now that the siege was over, the townsmen were looting and burning whatever was left. He noted that most of the fires were coming from the waterfront area, which, according to Soton’s map, was where most of the nobles and rich merchants lived.

  They encountered several parties of disheveled townspeople along the road. A few carried torches and one or two fired shots from antique calivers
and arquebuses, but most just stared and pointed.

  II

  Great King Demistophon soiled his breeches again, when the Guard Captain came into the audience chamber to tell him that the Styphoni had broken their way through the city walls. Once again, he attempted to push his way off the Throne, but he was stuck like a cork in a bottle. He had been unable to get out of the Throne of Lights for over several candles and it appeared they would have to destroy it to liberate him. No matter what, he didn’t want the Styphoni to discover him like this, awash in a bed of his own filth unable to rise off his Throne.

  Chancellor Tramoth danced around the chamber like one possessed by demons.

  “Captain, order your men to pull me off my Throne!” he ordered.

  The Captain laughed. “Your orders are meaningless now. You stinking, bloated piece of filth. If you’d stopped your eating while the rest of the City was starving, you wouldn’t have a problem!”

  “How dare you talk to me like that!”

  He spat into the King’s face. “I can’t believe I wasted a third of my life in service to you! I’m off to take my reward. Boys, come with me!”

  “Stop them! Chancellor, find my soldiers. They’re going to steal my gold!”

  “Then I’m going with them,” Chancellor Tramoth cried, as he skipped out of the chamber. “Maybe I can buy my way out of the Investigation.”

  “To Regwarn with the lot of you!” the King cried. Only two or three guards remained and they were looking at him in a strange manner, as if he were a tempting morsel of food.

  “Jannos, I want the crown,” the first guard said.

  “It’s yours, I’m going after the jewels on the throne,” the other guard said as he removed a dagger from the sheath at his belt.

  Demistophon watched as the guards approached. “Help, help!” he cried.

  The one named Jannos smiled wickedly. “We are your help, only now we’re going to help ourselves, King Swineherd!”

  He tried to push the other guard away, who was tugging on his crown. Then a hard fist struck him in the face, loosening several teeth. “Yeow! You can’t touch Our person. We are Your King!”

  The guard grabbed his crown again, ripping it off his head.

  “Stop this! I order you to!”

  Both guards laughed and spit in his face. He started to cry, tears streaming down his face.

  “What a pathetic bloated pig of a man,” Jannos said under his breath, as he ripped the gold chain from around the King’s neck. “That’s for my back wages!” He pulled a long pointed dagger from his doublet, suddenly stabbing the King in the eye. “And this is for those starving wretches outside!”

  Demistophon screamed at the top of his lungs. His eye felt like it was on fire, but all he could see was a black swirl—

  III

  They hadn’t gone much over three or four marches from the breach, when a large party of Agrysi cavalry, with white and red banners, charged them from a side street. Sarmoth was surprised to see so many horses, their intelligencers had reported that most of the animals in the City had been eaten a moon half ago. These must be the famed Royal Guardsmen, he concluded.

  Sarmoth had two choices: Wheel to meet their charge or keep going to the palace. Fighting now would put the Knights at a grave disadvantage, despite their greater numbers as well as better fed and rested horses. If they waited and wheeled around to face the Agrysi Guardsmen when they reached the palace, their ranks would be slowed by winded and hungry horses.

  The Agrysi yelled taunts and some fired their pistols, mostly out of range except for the first two ranks. A Knight went down in a tangle of horseflesh and armor.

  Lytris’ own luck, thought Sarmoth, who knew that shooting a horsepistol from a cantering horse was usually a waste of good fireseed.

  The Guardsmen quickly dropped behind as the Styphoni continued down the broad avenue toward the palace.

  Well-rested and well-fed mounts made a lot of difference, Sarmoth observed. He could see the Palace clearly now; the king’s residence was at the top of a ridge that ran along the Agrys River and was surrounded by walls four to five rods, or two lances, tall, products of an earlier, ruder age. At one time this was the seat of Agrys City before the city’s growing population overflowed the ridgetop. Fortunately, the gates were open, as Soton had surmised, with courtiers and servants leaving the palace like rats running out of a burning warehouse.

  They were about three blocks away from the ridgetop when they ran into another blockade of tree trunks, wagons and carts at a big intersection. Behind the barricade there were several companies of Agrysi musketeers and pikemen.

  He quickly noted that there were blockades on the cross streets on each side of the intersection. If they continued on toward the palace, they’d be trapped between three bands of infantry, as well as the Guardsmen cavalry coming from behind. He made an instant decision and signaled to his trumpeter to bring the command to a halt, then wheel and face the enemy. It was a slow maneuver and they barely had time to wheel around fast enough to face the now galloping Agrysi cavalry less than a quarter of a march away.

  Sarmoth gave the signal for charge. He was now at the back of the formation and could do little other than sit on Steel Hooves and watch. The heavier Order chargers, with their full horse armor, made a big difference; the Agrysi horse didn’t have either the room or any place to evade their charge without charging into alleys or onto wooden sidewalks.

  The Knights slammed into the Agrysi cavalry as if they were a troop of ponies, knocking men out of their saddles and rolling up the smaller, frailer horses. They followed that with their horse pistols, shooting the Agrysi cavalrymen point-blank with their pistols until they were all discharged, then they slashed the enemy with their sabers, using the points Kalvan-style as well as the blades.

  The Agrysi banner bearer took a sword blow that took off his arm and sent his banner flying. The rest of the Agrysi cavalry were taking a terrible beating from the Knights’ determined onslaught. Still, a lot had to be said for their bravery, since the Agrysi refused every request for surrender. When cut down to less than half of their original force, the Guardsmen finally broke off from the engagement, which was when the real slaughter began. The Knights chased them down like whipped dogs, sabering them, shooting them, cutting them down, even riding over them. Wounded, tired and their horses blown, the Agrysi were slaughtered almost to a man. Yet, not a man jack of them asked for terms.

  It took almost another candle to reform his command. Sarmoth’s losses were surprisingly light, less than forty Knights dead and seventy wounded, only thirty of them grievously enough that they had to be taken off the active muster list.

  Regardless of their victory over the King’s Guardsmen in this skirmish, he had failed in his greater objective. Without foot and artillery support, there was no way he was going to get past the barricades much less into King Demistophon’s palace. He signaled his men to mount up and return to the breach and Grand Master Soton.

  SIXTEEN

  I

  The Grand Master sat upon his horse as frozen as a marble statue while Horse Master Sarmoth finished his report. “I turned back, rather than engage the Agrysi infantry, because it would have been a slaughter. I suggest we move the Order Foot and at least one battery of guns down Cylos Street and dispatch the Agrysi formations piecemeal. The Palace Gates were open but anyone inside with more sense than a bedbug will probably order them closed.”

  “I concur,” Soton said. “I see no advantage to cavalry fighting infantry in a prepared position. Your judgment was sound, Horse Master.”

  Sarmoth felt as if an anvil had been lifted off his shoulders.

  “However, after so much time, we will be lucky to find a few phenigs when we do take the Treasury. Regardless, we now own this City and we will take back what is ours. I have men stationed at every gate and entryway with orders to take anyone who leaves prisoner. That should keep most of the gold and silver inside these walls until we can shake it loose
.”

  “All that gold will be a temptation even to the Order Foot,” Sarmoth noted.

  Soton reared back and laughed. “Not when they learn that any man in possession of booty, be it clothes, coins or jewelry, will be presented before the Investigation.”

  Sarmoth blanched. “I thought Roxthar was on his way to Balph.”

  “He is, but as far as our men are concerned his Investigators are hiding behind every cot and straw-tick mattress in the Five Kingdoms.”

  “This is true, they believe he has preternatural powers.”

  Soton made the sign of two horns with his fist. “Sometimes, I almost believe that myself. Archpriest Roxthar’s a strange and powerful man, almost beyond mortal ken. I had a chance to take his head during the siege, but I was frozen as if in a nightmare. Before I could give the order, he was gone.”

  Soton shook his body as if shrugging off a chill, then continued. “Before you returned, I found out that King Demistophon is dead, cut to pieces while upon his own Throne. Someone removed his head for a trophy; I pray we find enough of it that we can mount it on a pole before the City Gates. I had hoped you would find him before his people expressed their displeasure firsthand. As Styphon Wills: what will be, will be.

  “I will let you see to the Agrysi infantry. You can take two artillery companies with you and all the Order Foot you can find that’s not on guard duty.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  “First, feed your men and water the horses. Remember, your men are only as good as their last meal.”

  “Yes, Grand Master.”

  II

  Darnos had been resting in the sagging cot for three or four days, or however long it had been since the siege ended. He was inside an old nobleman’s home that had been stripped of furnishings and hangings down to the very walls. There were about thirty or so wounded and dying soldiers strewn about the great hall, lying on mattresses, old cots, straw ticks and bundles of old rags.