A giant black shadow zoomed between the silhouette of the south-western tower and the forest. Michael had trouble keeping his eyes on it as it lifted high into the sky as it drew nearer to the orchards.
A sudden flash of lightning illuminated the creature as it reached the lower clouds in the air. It was monstrous.
In the tiny moment Michael was able to view the beast, he noted the features he saw. A pointed head sat upon a long neck, which led to a thick torso. Two membranous giant wings with three long, bony fingers stretched out from its shoulders. The last thing he saw was a long tail trailing behind as it flapped its wings and suddenly vanished into darkness as the lightning subsided.
A terrible roar of thunder shook the tower the men stood upon. As the sound of thunder diminished the creature bellowed a guttural call that echoed across the sky. Michael’s heart raced and pounded in his ears. He continued to stare in the direction he had last seen the flying beast.
“By the gods,” gasped a tower guard. “What was that?”
Chapter Twelve
“Did you hear that?” gasped a guard standing beside Peter.
All eyes moved towards the south where a great yawn had bellowed through the air. Something terrible was calling out from that direction.
“See anything?” Peter asked.
“Nothing,” Alan replied as he peered towards the south-eastern tower. He could barely make out the forms of the men standing upon it let alone anything beyond.
The sky was pitch black and the rain created a haze over everything between their position and anything beyond the first row of rooftops nearby.
Peter peered down the exterior of the wall to the sheep huddled against it. They acted skittishly, turning their heads towards the direction from which the noise came. Nervously, they huddled and struggled against each other in a mad attempt to get to the centre of their group.
He strode to the other side of the tower and looked down to the small band of soldiers gathered below. They were glancing up to the wall and then to him for someone to explain what was happening.
It seemed a mass-confusion infected them all. No one had the faintest idea of what made the gut wrenching sound. All they did understand was that something new had presented itself.
Something tremendously terrible.
Something to be afraid of.
Clanging from the north-western tower broke the silence and snapped everyone back to reality. All eyes shifted to the direction of the chime.
Peter dropped his gaze to the men below the tower and called out for a runner to be sent.
A soldier obliged by tearing off full speed along the road.
Peter kept his eyes upon the north-western tower while Alan stared off towards the south. It was at that moment when one of the guards realised their attention had been divided.
Some were looking south as others looked west.
But nobody was watching the east.
The guard moved to the guardrail and panned his gaze across the dark expanse of pastureland. He could no longer see the mist from the river. The rain had washed it away.
The steady pour obscured his view of the meadow before him but the hairs on his neck stood up, and he knew he was being watched.
The sheep below stopped moving and averted their gaze from the south towards the east. They sensed it too.
Breaking through the air came a high pitched whistle as a blackened arrow zipped through the air and landed deep into the guard’s heart.
He stood motionless for a moment, not believing what had happened.
Slowly he turned to the others upon the tower with him as he raised a hand to the rod sticking from his chest.
Alan was still staring to the south as Peter and the other guard looked to the west.
The wounded guard opened his mouth to speak. The wind had been knocked from him and all he could manage was a barely audible wheeze, “My lords?”
All eyes moved to the guard who stared at them wide eyed and confused.
He fell, pierced through. Motionless, the guard bled onto the wet platform. His blood was washed through the wooden boards by the falling rain.
Alan stared towards the grassland.
A sudden flash of lightning revealed scores of hooded figures standing upon the field. There were too many to count.
Peter turned his eyes a moment too late to see the crowd outside the wall. Darkness met his gaze but he knew someone was out there.
“Ring the alarm,” Alan ordered the guard.
The guard complied immediately, hitting the small mallet against the iron chime that hung from the rafters.
Now two towers signalled the town of danger.
“Archers ready,” Peter called to the men upon the eastern wall.
The archers loaded their bows.
“There are many,” Alan informed his friend.
“How far out?”
“Perhaps fifty yards,” he replied.
“Fifty?” Peter breathed, finding it hard for anyone to be able to hit a target like the guard so precisely at that distance.
Alan nodded.
“Aim, fifty yards,” Peter shouted.
“Aim fifty yards,” another called further down the line.
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Alan asked, yelling over the sound of the clanging alarm. “Our men are shooting blindly.”
“They can’t retreat that quickly,” Peter answered. “Loose!” he called.
The eastern wall sent a barrage of arrows into the night sky. They flew through the air at great velocity, silently heading for their target fifty yards away.
Alan signalled for the alarm to cease. The tower guard held the hammer to his side as they waited and listened for any sound to come from outside of the wall.
They expected to hear the screams and cries of injured men. Instead, they heard ringing in their ears that resonated from the clanging alarm and the sound of pattering raindrops.
Another high-pitched whistle resounded through the air. An archer, some distance down the eastern line from the north-eastern tower, was punctured through the throat with a black shaft. He stepped backwards towards the edge of the wall. Some men attempted to stop him but he toppled to the ground below.
“By the gods,” Peter hissed.
“They see us, but we don’t see them,” Alan said. “They can pick us off one by one.”
As if to credit Alan’s point, another arrow struck an archer further down the line. This one broke through the bridge of the man’s nose and dug into his skull.
“I’m at a loss, Alan,” Peter confessed. “What do we do? Should we send soldiers out to meet them?”
“No,” Alan replied. “That’s what they want.”
Lightning bounced in the clouds above, enough to shed some light upon the meadow. Alan briefly saw numerous hooded figures moving about. Some were closer to the village, others further away.
“Send another volley,” Alan suggested. “Stagger the targets. Some closer, some further out.”
“I don’t understand,” Peter admitted.
“They’re moving about,” Alan explained. “The darkness is their cover and they’re using it to vary their positions.”
“Archers ready,” Peter called. Someone once again, repeated the order further along the wall. “I hope you’re right,” he said to Alan.
“So do I.”
“Vary your targets,” Peter ordered. “Thirty, fifty, sixty yards.”
He waited for the order to be relayed along the barrier. “Loose!”
Arrows flung into the air and the warriors crouched behind the protection of the wall and waited silently in anticipation for a result.
They were not disappointed.
Several screams and roars bellowed across the field. None sounded like the calls of men.
“What was that?” the tower guard cried.
The tower guard in the north-western tower dropped the hammer to the floor. The clanging alarm pealed into the night air and was overtaken
by the sound of falling rain. He faced towards the east and peered across the rooftops to the wall at the opposite side of the village.
Lawrence and Hugh were giving their full attention to the tree line. The sudden silence caused Hugh to turn his head to the guard.
“Why did you stop?” he asked.
“I think something is happening on the eastern wall.”
“What?” Hush quizzed, stepping away from the guardrail and closer to the guard. He scanned the eastern horizon but saw only flashes of lightning in the clouds and rain.
“I don’t know, my lord. There just seems to be movement along the top of the wall. I think they’re engaged with the enemy.”
“A runner from the eastern wall, my lords,” a voice called from below.
“What news has he?” Hugh called.
“Nothing, my lord. His orders are to find out why we sounded the alarm.”
“He must have been sent before whatever is happening over there started,” Lawrence suggested.
Hugh nodded his agreement. “Tell him we have spotted torches in the trees,” Hugh called down. “Now there is just one remaining.”
He stared through the rain at one flickering light that stood alone where the grove met the forest. It hadn’t moved in some time.
“Perhaps this one is a distraction,” Lawrence proposed.
“Should we send some of our archers to the eastern wall?” one of the tower guards asked.
“No,” Hugh replied. “We don’t know how many are out there. The eastern wall could be the distraction while they gather their forces here. We can’t afford to thin our defences in any place.”
“We should find out what is going on over there,” Lawrence said.
Hugh strode across the platform and peered over the side to the soldiers below. “Send a runner to find out what is happening on the eastern wall,” he instructed.
“Yes, my lord,” the voice below replied.
Within moments they heard the patter of two sets of feet running through the street as the runner from the far wall returned to his post with a runner from the west.
Lawrence locked his eyes upon the flickering light just within the trees. He sensed something was out there watching them.
A chill ran up his spine as he thought about the imminent threat upon the village’s borders. His mind pictured the loaded wagon once again and he knew he was making the right decision to leave.
“What’s on your mind?” Hugh asked.
“Nothing,” he responded. “I’m just concerned about whoever is out there and what they want with us.”
It wasn’t entirely a lie. He was concerned about the invaders. Hugh didn’t need to know he and his family were leaving in the morning. He would keep that news to himself.
He wasn’t sure why he wanted to keep it to himself.
Was it out of pride?
Perhaps he just didn’t want to argue with his friends about the reasons why he should stay.
Maybe it was shame.
In any case, he would hold on to his secret and leave without telling any of them.
With luck, he would be upon the southern mountain pass before anyone realised he was gone.
Until then, he focused upon the flickering light within the tree line and pondered why these foes had chosen Woodmyst as their target.
It wasn’t as if they were a wealthy village. They fished and farmed. That was all.
The miners in the cities to the south had more wealth with what jewels they dug from the ground. They had gold, rubies and diamonds to spare.
Woodmyst had milk, wool and crops.
The comparison was baseless.
There was nothing here to warrant invasion.
Yet here they were.
Invaders surrounded them and held them at siege in their own homes.
The lone light flickered, wafting in the breeze slightly as the rain fell steadily all around. Lightning flashed above, sending thunderous roars to the ground.
Lawrence let his thoughts return to the wagon.
Chapter Thirteen
Leaning over the eastern side of the tower as far as he could, Michael moved his eyes between the archers on the wall to the meadow on the northern side of the river. The enemy was there. They hadn’t crossed the water to attack the southern end of the structure.
“Keep watch of the river,” he called to the tower guards. “I can’t see these bastards through the rain. If anything large makes a splash down there, I want it taken down immediately.”
Lightning opened the sky with a bright white light and illuminated the pastureland. The men on the south-eastern tower saw a large mass of hooded figures not far from the wall on the northern side of the waterway.
Darkness veiled everything again as a clap of thunder shook the tower. Michael saw spots before his eyes as they tried to readjust after the sudden flash of light.
“Dammit,” he called. “I can’t see a thing.”
“A report from below says they’re targeting archers, my lord,” a guard called from the far side of the tower platform.
“Keep to the cover,” Michael hollered along the wall to the archers nearby.
Part of him wished he was with Alan and Peter in the tower at the far end of the wall. At least there, he would be in the thick of the action instead of waiting for something to happen at his current posting.
Then there was the flying creature.
No one had seen hide or hair of it since it climbed into the clouds above. For all he knew, it was still up there waiting for an opportunity to attack. This bout on the north shore could well be the occasion it was looking for. All eyes were scanning the other side of the river when, perhaps, they should have been looking to the south.
Michael kept this in mind and occasionally turned his face towards the air above the orchards for any sign of the monster in the sky.
He pointed to a few of the archers on the southern wall, who were craning their necks in order to see what was happening beyond the river, and yelled to one of the tower guards, “Tell them to keep watch over the plantations. We’ll worry about the east.”
The guard turned to see the men neglecting their duty and swore.
“Keep watch on your quadrant,” he barked.
The men quickly returned to their watch as Michael panned his eyes across the expanse between the hill and the wall between the river and the grove.
He was able to make out the silhouette of the trees and mountains in the distance. The hooded invaders, however, proved to be more difficult to locate.
The cover of darkness, the steady fall of the rain and the irregular flashes of lightning worked in the enemy’s favour.
They could be anywhere.
“Make sure the eastern wall is well supplied with ammunition,” Chief Shelley called to the men bustling about in the armoury. “And get some cider and water over there.”
His anxiety was evident as he pointed and shouted, paced and commanded his men from the rooms within the armoury. News came constantly of the exchange of arrows on the eastern wall. The need to make sure his men were well supplied became his mission in life.
The chief’s biggest trepidation was the imminent return of the flying beast he had heard. He didn’t need the reports from the runners to understand the village was under serious threat.
A number of serves and soldiers hurried themselves loading sacks, baskets, wooden boxes and their pockets with whatever they could hold. There were arrows, canteens of water, hot cider, loaves of bread and hooded cloaks being sorted into piles.
Some men left, carrying the supplies to the men on the wall as others returned with lists of demands and needs.
“More covers are needed,” shouted one of the serves as he burst through the door, sopping wet from the rain.
“We’re running low, my lord,” another yelled across the din to the chief.
“Take what you can,” Chief Shelley instructed.
The men gathered together the cloaks and blankets piled u
pon the tables and ran back into the downpour. The chief turned to a soldier who was loading a box with arrows, ready to be transferred to the archers upon the eastern wall.
“You,” he called.
“Yes, my lord.” The soldier stood at attention.
“Go to the Great Hall,” Chief Shelley instructed. “Find my wife and tell her we need as many blankets as can be spared. Go!”
The soldier disappeared into the darkness beyond the door.
The chief took over loading the arrows as others around him continued with their duties. Some gave him a sideways glance as they observed their leader partaking in lowly work.
He noticed their stares and shot a quick glance to each of the onlookers.
“I wasn’t always chief, gentlemen,” he said. “I was once a soldier, like you. Filling boxes with arrows is not beneath me.”
More soldiers and serves entered the door as he finished loading the box. He slid it across the table to one of the men. “Take that to the wall,” he ordered as he reached for a new box to load.
Peering from the south-western tower, across the orchards in the distance, Richard kept his eyes peeled for any enemy warriors who may try to flank them. Apart from the close call with the monster in the sky, the night had been uneventful at his posting.
The increasing sound of excitement from the east held his curiosity. He had found himself turning towards the direction of the noise.
The distance alone was enough to prevent any view of what lay beyond the wall. The steady downpour of rain added to the obstruction.
He forced himself to keep his eyes on the area between the forest to his right and the fields directly ahead of him. Ignoring the noise of shouting that echoed across the village, he scanned the trees slowly, lingering his gaze for a moment longer in certain areas when flashes of lightning illuminated his view.
His eyes flicked towards the clouds every once in a while. The hairs on the back of his neck continued to warn him of the threat from above. Lightning reminded him of the great beast that had rushed past him earlier.
Richard thought back to the alarm from the northern towers. He had since discovered why the chimes were rung in the northeast. The reason for the clanging in the north-western tower still eluded him.
The Walls of Woodmyst Page 11