Kelven's Riddle Book Five

by Daniel Hylton

  The Guardians saw the danger as well.

  Suddenly, blazing white fire joined with the golden flame of the Sword of Heaven.

  Lashers went down in heaps, dying amidst bursts of argent lightning.

  But there were still very many.

  Out on the edge of this terrible yet astonishing scene, Nikolus and Jared had joined Ruben and Varen, and much of their troop were still alive and able to fight. As the lashers turned away from the men and horses, thinking them vanquished, and crowded in eagerly toward the prize, the horses and their riders took advantage of the beasts’ inattention.

  Earlier in the battle, when Nikolus and Jared and their company had arrived upon the scene, Ruben and Varen and their half of the cavalry were already heavily engaged. When Donnick’s line broke before the lasher onslaught, Ruben and Varen had led their troop into the breach, trying to stem the rising tide of disaster. But because of the fractured nature of the collapse of the line, the horsemen had found it impossible to maintain order as they drove in with their lances.

  The lashers, impelled forward by the success and impetus of their charge, had succeeded in isolating the cavalry into small companies; in some places they had encircled even smaller groups. Men and horses were fighting for their lives – and losing. Though, here and there, they succeeded in wounding and even killing a beast, more men and horses went down than lashers. The situation rapidly became grave.

  Nikolus took all of this in as he and his troop came up.

  Quickly dividing his four hundred horses and riders into four long lines under their captains, he sent them through the melee from east to west. He recognized instantly that it was utterly impossible to save Donnick’s formation – it had vanished, killed and scattered. Not a single infantryman stood erect across a hundred yards of front.

  There was only to save what they could of the cavalry.

  “Gather up our people as you go through!” Nikolus shouted. “Tell them to follow us out – we will reform on the other side and come at them from there!”

  Jared sent the same instruction into the minds of the horses. Men and horses were lost as they drove through the maelstrom of battle, but enough disorder was created in the lasher formations by the horses’ passage that most of Ruben’s men and horses that had survived were able to disentangle themselves and escape the carnage.

  As they charged through the breach, using their lances to good effect, though causing few deaths among the great beasts, they found Findaen, Andaran, and a small cohort of horsemen, fighting for their lives against a company of encircling lashers that slashed and swung with their deadly halberds. Findaen’s group grew smaller with each deadly moment that passed.

  “Swing away, Findaen!” Nikolus shouted, as he and Jared drove past. Jared smashed into two lashers that had focused upon Findaen and Andaran, catching them off-guard. One beast went down, roaring with rage and pain. “Hold on!” Jared told Nikolus and the big brown horse reared and drove his front hooves hard into the face of the second. He was rewarded by the sight of flesh and bone giving way before the force of his hooves. The lasher’s features crumpled inward and he went down, never to rise again.

  Grasping the opportunity, Andaran leapt away and followed Jared out, along with the rest of the group around him and Findaen.

  On the other side of where the lashers had punched through the army, Kavnaugh Berezan had turned his right flank to face the gray men that had massed there, and was desperately trying to rally the men that had survived the breach.

  Marcus was there as well, mounted on Phagan, exhorting the men of Elam to, “Stand firm!” When he saw the cavalry sweeping toward him and discerned their intent, the High Prince glanced around and spied an abandoned pike that was still sound.

  “Quick!” He yelled to Kavnaugh. “Hand me that weapon, general!”

  Kavnaugh retrieved the pike and looked up into Marcus’ face. What he saw there gave him pause.

  “Your Highness – are you certain –?”

  “I will not be left out of this fight, general,” Marcus told him, and his tone brooked no refusal.

  Berezan yet resisted, holding the pike. “We cannot have you die, Your Highness,” he insisted.

  Marcus’ eyes narrowed into thin bands of steely blue as he reached for the weapon. “This is an hour when one man’s life does not matter,” he told the general. “Naught but victory counts today. Give me the pike.”

  The general hesitated but a moment longer. “Take care, my friend, please,” he replied then, and obediently handed the weapon into Marcus’ hand.

  Marcus spoke to Phagan. “We are going in with Nikolus and Jared,” he told the horse. “Find an opening and join the column.”

  “As you will,” Phagan replied, and finding a gap in the column of horses, swung into the line.

  Nikolus and Jared pounded past, swung up the slope and turned back toward the east. “Tell the others of your people, Jared,” Nikolus said, “that we are going to attack in one long line – staying clear of the main body of lashers – we will harass them along the edges, kill as we can, but no direct engagement. Tell the horses to explain this to their riders; for there is no time to halt and form up. We must attack now if we are to have any chance to contain this breach.”

  After a moment, as Jared wheeled and charged back down the slope toward the expanding breach and Nikolus readied his lance to strike, the horse replied, “They understand.”

  “Alright. Stay clear of those beasts’ weapons,” Nikolus said. “No more heroics. I don’t want you injured – but get me close enough to do what damage I can.”

  “These foul creatures will not hinder me,” the horse replied.

  The cavalry made several of these passes. With nearly seven hundred horses still at his disposal, Nikolus was able to configure the nature of the attack so that when the last rider made his pass, he and Jared, as the first in line, came at the enemy again.

  The men and horses managed to injure many of the beasts, some seriously, and even slew several. Even so, the cavalry’s losses quickly became unsustainable. The great horned monsters swung their deadly, scythe-like halberds with hideous precision. These were Manon’s crack troops; they were now deployed in a deadly crescent with no more enemies behind them, and they were taking no prisoners. As gaps appeared in Nikolus’ long line, and the lashers continued their methodical advance toward the crest of the ridge, order began to dissolve.

  Despair once again made its presence known across the length of that bloody hundred yards.

  Then Lord Aram arrived upon the rocky shelf.

  He and Thaniel charged straight into the midst of the lasher horde and abruptly the nature of the struggle changed.

  As knowledge spread among the beasts that the man their master despised, the man that they had all sought for so long, had suddenly inserted himself into their midst, all interest in widening the breach or continuing the fight with the mounted riders left them.

  Almost as one, they turned with eager maliciousness toward the man on the great black horse.

  Nikolus was quick to recognize opportunity.

  “Reform the line!”

  From his vantage on Jared’s back, it looked to Nikolus almost like a reprise of the Battle of Bloody Stream, with the king isolated and surrounded. But there was a difference this time. Lord Aram was still mounted upon his mighty steed. Thaniel was turning in tight rotation inside the massed lashers, and with each of the horse’s turns, more bodies of Manon’s beasts mounded up, laid low by Aram’s magical sword and by the power of those strange and unseen companions that went with him everywhere.

  Perhaps the greatest difference was that, as the monsters bent their focus away from the mounted riders and toward the one man at the center of their troop, the cavalry, all of whom by now were seasoned warriors, and every one of whom was eager for revenge upon the loathsome beasts, already knew the tactic that was called for at this time and in this place.

  And they put that tactic into immediate emp
loyment.

  With swords, lances, or abandoned pikes, Jared and Nikolus, Ruben and Varen, Marcus and Phagan, and the rest of the cavalry once again deployed into a long line and drove back and forth at the rear of the mob of lashers, slashing and stabbing. With renewed vigor and confidence, they assaulted the lashers without pause, causing so much disarray that many of the beasts were forced to reluctantly turn their attention away from Aram and Thaniel at the center of the swirling fight and fend off this new assault from those they had thought finished.

  Seeing the change in circumstances that occurred with Lord Aram’s arrival, men from Duridia that had fled the terrible lasher assault took heart. Having taken refuge behind the lines of men that still contested with the flanking attacks of gray men, these soldiers had not fled the field, but nonetheless had remained out of the fight. As Boman moved back and forth along the line of his troops where it angled to face the flanking gray men, he spoke kindly to these frightened men, encouraging them to stand up and lend aid to their comrades that still fought on.

  And slowly, under that benevolent persuasion, courage was reborn. One by one, and then in small groups, picking up weapons that others had discarded or dead men had dropped, they formed up and re-joined the fight. Gradually, the Duridians began to push the gray men back.

  To the west, finding his own front holding well against gray men only, as their lasher overlords had all gone east toward the fight in front of Donnick, Kavnaugh Berezan also rallied the remains of the regiment that had fled from the enemy’s flanking attack at the right end of his line.

  Using these traumatized troops as reserves to buttress those that he had turned to face the assault of the gray men the lashers had relieved from in front of Donnick, Kavnaugh created a line that not only held but began to move the gray men back. On the extreme right end of his angled line, the cavalry aided his cause by chipping away at the numbers of gray soldiers with every pass they made as they swung around to go again at the lashers.

  The gray men in front of Berezan’s Elamites began to break.

  Then, as they were pushed back against the melee of lashers surrounding Aram, they broke completely, abandoning the flanking attack and retreating around the mass of lasher overlords to safety. These gray soldiers did not rejoin the main line but went out upon the level area of the rocky shelf where they milled about in uncertainty.

  Seizing the opportunity presented by the sudden easing of pressure upon his flank, Kavnaugh left one company angled toward the lasher horde in case the monsters decided to take up where their lesser companions had failed, and looked to his front.

  The gray line of the enemy was beginning to falter there as well. It was time to push.

  Despite the limited number of reserves at his disposal – most of them battered survivors of the disaster in front of Donnick – Kavnaugh nonetheless chose a place in his line where the strength of the enemy had grown thin and put them in.

  “Vengeance, boys!” He told them. “It is time for vengeance for our fallen friends! Now – drive them!”

  Their courage renewed, these men pushed into the line and broke through, opening up an ever-widening gap.

  Minutes later, in front of Kavnaugh Berezan’s green troops, the enemy line began to give way.

  Over on the east of the breach, throughout the day, Boman had managed his Duridians with his usual pragmatic calmness, and by judicious use of his reserves. As a result of his battlefield acumen and the stout courage of the men of the southern plains, his lines had held throughout the battle. Now, with the tide of conflict turning in his favor, Boman had one last weapon in his arsenal.

  When the gray men had first rushed upon his lines and come within range of his crossbows, Boman had instructed his men to fire in conjunction with the release of the spikes. But there had been no time to reload for another volley. There was only to pick up the pikes and receive the enemy. Now, however, with the enemy able to exert but minimal pressure upon him, the time had come to put his remaining missiles to use.

  “Third rank!” He shouted. “Drop pikes – load bows!”

  Then, when his commanders along the line returned with, “Ready!” –

  Boman shouted the command. “Front ranks down! Fire!”

  This tricky and dangerous tactic was repeated in the face of the foe, with the ranks rotating back and forth, until each Duridian had exhausted his supply of arrows. Duridia took some casualties but the enemy was reduced even further.

  Then the Duridians re-formed their ranks, pikes at the ready, and advanced. The ranks of the gray men to the front began to break in places and stream away down the slope toward the valley floor, even as the flanking attempt of the enemy upon Boman’s extreme left continued.

  Rather than give chase, Boman thinned his line, extending it westward toward Elam and turning the regiment at the end of his line to face the gray men there and guard against the possibility of a flanking threat from the lashers. Then he gathered up those remaining men from the fractured units that had been with Donnick, rallied them and put them back in as reserves. Before him, too, everywhere, the line of gray men faltered and appeared ready to break completely, even upon his flank.

  46.

  It was at this moment that the battle turned in favor of the allies. As Aram and Thaniel with the Sword of Heaven, aided by the white fire from the glittering swords of the Astra, fought on, everywhere else along the front of the army Manon’s minions were at last beginning to break.

  At the extreme eastern end of the battle, Mallet had regained his hill and then some. Gray men that broke and attempted to run back to the valley floor were caught and slaughtered by wolves. The hooked aspect of Mallet’s line had gone, to be replaced by a solid front of sharp pikes and Senecan swords.

  Olyeg Kraine’s troops, after the passage of Lord Aram and his great black horse had slain or wounded most of the lasher commanders; found their footing and began to push the ranks of the enemy back. Both sides still sustained casualties, but most of those now were of the enemy.

  Kraine consequently discovered that, in places where the gray men were disadvantaged by terrain and gave way, he could now draw reserves straight from the third ranks of frontline troops in those areas and move them as they were needed elsewhere.

  After the sad discovery of Kitchell in the gap that the worthy gentleman had created by his death, Kraine had his body moved back up the slope and away from the conflict. Now, with things to his front in hand for the moment, he decided to go there and accomplish two things – first to pay his respects to his childhood friend, and then to survey the battlefield from the vantage of higher ground.

  As he knelt over the body of his friend, Kraine gained the attention of a surgeon working on the wounded nearby. “Did we find the Governor-general’s arm?” He asked.

  The surgeon, his hands and face caked and streaked with the blood of his patients, looked up with a frown of confusion. “Sir?”

  Kraine indicated the stump below Kitchell’s left shoulder. The pain and sorrow of looking down upon the remains of his friend injected a measure of frustration into his tone. “His arm – did we find it?”

  The surgeon raised up to look at the spot indicated and then let out a breath of fatigue and shook his head. “No, sir. We’ve been very busy for the last hour or so. I will go and look when there is an opportunity.”

  Immediately, Kraine felt a pang of remorse. “No, lad, sorry for that. I will go and look when all this is done. You just keep at what you’re doing.”

  With that, he stood and looked down over the ongoing battle. In front of his lines, the ranks of gray men were showing strain and signs of impending fracture.

  From his part of the field anyway, the battle was starting to look like imminent victory.

  To Kraine’s left, Thom Sota and his mixed regiment of Elam and Lamont had flanked the enemy and were driving them east and west. As the enemy soldiers encountered the occasional rough ravines in the slope, groups of them would peel away and retreat dow
nhill. With few, if any, lasher commanders to hinder them, more and more of them began to think about remaining alive rather than any further attempt at executing their master’s wishes.

  As more and more of the enemy ranks broke away, Thom would leave one solitary yet solid line of men in place and rotate all the others either left or right in order to widen the breach and increase the pressure upon his weakening foe. The necessity of command, however, robbed him of the opportunity to engage in any further personal action.

  Despite that frustration, Thom Sota was busily justifying Lord Aram’s faith in him as a man of war.

  To his left, along Edwar’s front, things were also improving, moment by moment. Most of the lashers to Edwar’s front had long since moved west, toward the road. And over there, for a while, to the front of Timmon’s cannon where Muray commanded, things had been in serious doubt. But now the road was secure once more and Muray was once again standing in the front ranks of his troops, guiding the destruction of the enemy that yet remained in front of him.

  From his vantage point behind the lines, Edwar had watched with mounting agitation as Muray had been assaulted by masses of the horned monsters. But Timmon’s cannon and Lord Aram’s fiery sword had caught those beasts in a deadly vise, and now, over there in the center of the army, things were moving in favor of the allies.

  In that center, standing upon the road with his front ranks, Muray instinctively knew that the enemy would break if pressed. Already heavily disadvantaged, demoralized by having to fight among the mounds of body parts which were all that remained of their overlords, the gray men faltered. Despite their earlier displays of toughness and resolve, Manon’s minions were now also taking casualties that they could not replace.