by John Norman
The same problems, of course, normally afflict one's enemy. When one understands these factors, and that battles often last several hours, and are sometimes renewed for two or three days, it is easier to understand certain things which might otherwise seem anomalous in this form of warfare, for example, the respites between assaults, the fluctuations of lines, the occasional, apparently incredible truces which can occur by mutual consent here and there in the pockets of a battle, men standing about, looking at one another, sometimes even conversing, and the great importance of the judicious distribution of, and application of, reserves.
For those who are interested in such matters, it might be pointed out that factors such as these seem to be playing their part in the gradual replacement of the phalanx with the square in Gorean warfare. It is not simply that the squares are more tactically flexible, being capable of functioning on broken terrain, and such, but also that they facilitate substitutions in the front lines, permitting the swift injection of fresh troops at crucial points. The success of many generals, in my opinion, is largely a function of their intelligent use of reserves.
Deitrich of Tarnburg, for example, though one often thinks of him in terms of innovations such as the oblique advance and the use of siege equipment in the field, is also, in my opinion, based on my studies of his campaigns, for example, in the commentaries of Minicius and the "Diaries," which some ascribe to Carl Commenius, of Argentum, a military historian, a master of the use of reserves. Some claim, incidentally, the Commenius was himself once a mercenary. I do not know if this is true or not, but his diaries, if, indeed, they are his, suggest that he was not a stranger to the field. I do not think it likely that all the incidents in them, in their detail, are merely based on the reports of others. His accounts of Rovere and Kargash, for example, suggest to me the fidelity, the authenticity, of a perceptive eyewitness. It seems to me, for example, that a common soldier would not be likely to supply a detail such as the loosing of water by a confused, terrified tharlarion in the field. The common soldier would be aware of such things, and, indeed, would even take them for granted, but they are not the sorts of details which he would be likely to include in his accounts of battles. Too, one wonders how a simple scholar could have come by the numerous beautiful slaves and fortresslike villa of a Carl Commenius. I suspect that at one time, perhaps long ago, he may not have been a stranger to the distributions of loot.
"They are drawing back," said a fellow near me. "They have nothing more to gain here," said another.
We looked behind ourselves, wearily. Much of the walkway was now gone, or burning. Great lengths of it, some half submerged, tilting, others at, or almost at, the surface, floated in the water. Some of these lengths had turned, and hewn pilings, in an inch or two of water irregularly moving about over the now-upturned undersides of the lengths, like heavy, coarse wooden points, jutted up.
"We have held the walkway," said a man.
"Yes," said another.
We stood on the blood-stained boards.
It was true, we had held the walkway.
It was the middle of the afternoon. I looked about. It seemed off, where we were, at the new end of that walkway, at the end of what now seemed a meaningless, eccentric bridge leading out from the landing but stopping abruptly in hewn, charred wood. The walkway had been cut behind us. Some of the fellows in the small boats had even drenched the boards behind us with water, to keep the fire from us, while others had hacked away at the pilings. Even so we had felt the heat of the flames at our back. There had been smoke, too, but not enough to affect what occurred on the walkway. Twice, when the wind had turned, it had drifted past us. There was far more smoke from the citadel, which, given the prevailing winds, the force of which had much diminished since the late morning and early afternoon, drifted out over the harbor, toward the river. "Shall we now swim for the piers?" asked a fellow.
"Certainly," said another.
"I, myself," said another, "will prefer waiting for the boats." "And why might that be?" inquired another of our number.
"I do not like getting my feet wet," responded the first.
We watched the fins moving about in the water. Here and there there was a stirring at the surface, as though there might be violent agitation some feet beneath. Too, in places the harbor water suddenly muddied, the mud from the bottom rising to the surface. These upswirling discolorations marked places, I supposed, where, below, unseen, a few yards beneath the surface, the long fish pulling and fighting, snapping and tugging stirred the mud. A small boat struck gently against the piling near us, to the left. There were now eleven of us on the walkway. Two were wounded. One of these was the grizzled fellow, who had been among the first to stand with me on the walkway. He had been wounded in the last assault, the fourteenth. So, too, had the other fellow. We lowered these two into the boat. Two others, too, joined them. The small boat rocked, and was almost swamped.
"Wait," said the fellow at the oars, alarmed, holding up his hand.
The rest of us, seven men, watched the small boat pull away from the walkway. It made slow progress back toward the piers.
"There are fewer fish about now," said a fellow.
"Stay where you are," I advised him. To be sure, he was right. Many of the fish had apparently departed. Indeed, I was sure that many of them, with bodies, and parts of bodies, in their jaws, had sped away, toward the piers, or had gone out farther in the harbor, beyond them, or had even returned to the river, perhaps sometimes followed by several of their brethren. It was, however, I was sure, still dangerous. Sometimes river sharks, like Vosk eels, hang about piers and pilings, in their shade, and are, I am afraid, often rewarded by garbage, or other organic debris. One could still see, here and there, streaks of blood in the water.
"Look!" said a fellow. He pointed toward the landing. There it seemed that a number of small boats was being mustered and not a few raftlike structures, doubtless improvised from materials within, and about, the citadel.
"They will be coming out to the piers to finish their work," said a man. "What we have done has been for naught," said another.
"The harbor is closed with Cosian ships and the chain of rafts," said another. "There is no escape."
"Apparently is it not their intent to starve us out, on the piers," said another.
"They are impatient fellows," observed a man.
"They have waited a long time," said another. "They would like to finish their business this afternoon."
"It should not prove difficult," said another. "It will be a slaughter on the piers," said a fellow. "There is no shelter there. They are open, exposed. What can a handful of shields do there? Little or nothing. They can do as they wish. They can pick their targets from boats, and rafts. They can attack in force."
"They will probably signal the other fellows, out where the harbor is closed," said a man, "so that they can attack on two sides at once."
"It is all finished," said another fellow.
"It will be done in two or three Ahn," said another.
"You two in this boar," I said to two of them, as another of the small craft touched against the piling. The oarsmen stood up, a fisherman, and extended his hand, to help the two fellows into the boat. We had overloaded the last boat. We, the five of us remaining on the walkway, watched this second small boat pull away, moving slowly toward the piers.
"I would like to say goodbye to my companion," said one of the fellows. "Perhaps she is still alive out there," said another.
"When do you think it will be over?" asked one of the fellows.
"By the fifteenth Ahn," said another, grimly.
"Good," said a fellow.
"Good?" asked the other.
"Yes," he said, "then we will not have to miss another supper." "How would you like to get your feet wet?" asked the grim fellow.
"No I," replied the other.
In a bit another one of the tiny boats had come to the walkway and the two fellows embarked in it.
There were then three of u
s left on the walkway.
"It is the women and children I feel most sorry for," said the fellow beside me, looking back toward the piers. They were crowded with noncombatants. I suppose there must have been somewhere between two thousand and twenty-five hundred women and children crowded on the piers. By now there were probably not more than two or three hundred able-bodied men. In a few moments another small boat arrived.
"No," I said. "Go." The two fellows then stepped down, carefully, into the small boat. I was then left alone on the walkway.
I saw a piece of the broken walkway, half submerged, off to the right.
I looked up, from where I crouched behind the shield. Then I rose up, lifting the shield once more.
A solitary figure, with no shield, but in helmet, and with sheathed sword, approached. It seemed a long walk, coming toward me, on the walkway. I could hear his steps when he came within a few yards of me. The water lapped about the pilings beneath the walkway. There was the cry of a Vosk gull overhead. I could see the smoke still lifting from the citadel, then drifting out, toward the river.
"Do not come closer," I told him.
"The day belongs to Cos," he said.
"Yes," I said.
"There remains to be accomplished only the slaughter on the piers." I did not respond.
"Thus what you have done here has gone for naught."
I did not respond. What had been done here, however, had been entered into the annals of reality. The meaning of history is its own terrain, its own mountains and summits, here and there, wherever they be found. It is not all prologue to a last act, following which comes nothing.
"It is speculated that you are not of Ar's Station," he said.
I shrugged.
He did not attempt to come closer.
"It is speculated that you are a mercenary," he said. "Cos has us of such. I come on behalf of Aristimines, Commander of Cos in the north. He is pleased with your work, through it has been to his own cost. I have here a purse of gold. Contract your sword to Cos and it is yours." He dropped the leather purse, drawn shut with strings, to the boards of the walk. He then stepped back. "See?" he said. "We do not cut at your neck, as you bend to take it."
"I am not taking fee today," I said.
"You are then, of Ar's Station, or Ar herself?" he asked.
"No," I said.
"With the gold," said he, "comes a command, and women, slaves trained to please men in all ways, domestic and lascivious."
"Aristimines is generous," I said.
"Your answer?" he asked.
"I am not taking fee today," I said.
"But what of the women?" he asked.
"I will take my own," I said.
He approached the gold, bent down and picked it up. He did not even watch me as he did this. I accepted this tribute to my honor He tucked the gold back in his tunic. "You are not a mercenary, then?" he said. "I did not say that," I said.
"Choose for Cos," he said.
"Not today," I said.
"Yet today, I think," said he, glancing out to the piers, "would be a good day to choose for Cos."
"Why did not relief come to Ar's Station?" I asked.
"It was not the will of Lurius of Jad, Ubar of Cos," said he.
"I see," I said. How lofty then, I thought, must be the heights of treachery within the walls of Ar.
"And the will of Lurius has not yet been accomplished in the north," said he. I did not understand this.
"I have brought you the gold of Cos," he said. "When I return, you understand, I must bring her steel."
"The walkway is meaningless," I said to him.
"Not to Aristimines," he said.
"I wish you well," I said.
"And I, too, wish you well," said he. He then turned and walked rapidly back toward the landing. He had not taken more than five steps before a number of Cosians, who had been waiting on the landing, hurried onto the walkway. He was for a moment like a rock in the midst of their stream, and then he turned, facing me. At the same time some small craft set out from the landing. Two of the fellows hurrying toward me were too eager, separating themselves from their fellows. One's shield, he charging, I struck obliquely to the side, and he, in the grip of his own momentum, lost the walkway. I cut at the other below the shield, above the knee, and he slipped to the boards. "Hold, fellow," called the officer, behind the men, he who had come with the gold on the walkway. "Good," he said. "Together now, gently fellows, spears down. Look for your chance. Forward, carefully. There is only one man there. Swordsmen for flanking, behind spearmen. To each side, fellows. Forward."
"Help!" cried the fellow in the water, grasping upward. He was trying to climb the piling, but slipped on it. He could not reach the surface of the remains of the walkway. The piece of broken walkway which had been to the right was now back, a few feet from the torn end of he walkway, floating in the inner harbor. "Stop!" I ordered the approaching Cosians.
They, puzzled, stopped.
The fellow whose leg I had cut was backing away, towards his fellows, limping. Blood flowed down his leg, running among, and over, the thongs of the high, bootlike sandal he wore. His retreat could be traced in the trail of blood on the walkway.
I put down my shield on he walkway, and extended my hand down to the fellow in the water. There were fewer fish about now, I was sure, but I did not think he would be likely to thrash alone for more than a moment or two. I could already see two dark shapes beneath him.
"Do not move," said the officer to his men.
The man in the water, frenzied with terror, his eyes bulging, seized my hand and I drew him to his stomach, to the walkway. He lay there on the drenched boards, trembling. I do not think I could have managed this as little as a quarter of an Ahn earlier. I think it likely he would then have been seized in the jaws of some fish or other, perhaps one of the visitors from the river, drawn by the traces of blood in the water.
I then stepped back, and faced the Cosians, some yards toward the landing. The officer lifted his sword to me, in salute. I returned this salute. The men with him smote with their steel on their shields. I acknowledged their tribute as well.
"On my own authority," called the officer, "and at my own risk, that of my life for yours, should this not be found meet by Aristimines, I again offer you the gold of Cos!"
I sheathed my sword. "I am not taking fee today," I said.
"Lower spears," said the officer to his men. "Swordsmen, flank." I turned, suddenly, then, and ran to the end of the walkway. There I leapt from the walkway out, over the water, to the piece of half-submerged wreckage, cut from the walkway. It sank down a foot or two into the water, but then rose up, again. A moment or so later a dozen or so Cosians crowded the charred end of the walkway. None of them, as I had anticipated, cared to attempt the same leap. I had had a running start. I had known where the wreckage was. I had kept it in mind. I did not think that one of them, given the crowding on the walkway, would attempt the same leap. If he did, and managed to reach the wreckage, I would be waiting there, sword drawn. My ankles were under water. The force of my leap had thrust the piece of wreckage out further, toward the piers. The men on the walkway and I regarded one another. Several lifted their weapons in salute. I lifted my hand, too, to them. It was, I suppose, one of the odd moments that sometimes occur in war, one of those moments in which the rose of gallantry suddenly emerges from the background of danger and blood. A great, long body suddenly emerged from the water and lay half on the wreckage. With my foot I thrust it back into the water. I saw some small craft from the landing approaching, with crossbowmen in them. But then, too, I saw the rowers of these small vessels, rest on their oars. About the piece of wreckage on which I stood, then, were small boats from the piers. On one of them I saw the young fellow with the crossbow. No quarrels were exchanged. I stepped from the wreckage into one of the small boats. We then put about, and I was rowed slowly toward the piers.
20 The Piers
I climbed from the small boat
to one of the piers.
Men lifted their weapons, saluting me.
"Come with me," said a fellow.
I passed among wounded men. I saw there, Marsias, the grizzled fellow, the men who had originally stood with me on the walkway, and many others. I passed, too, among many women and children.
I was conducted into the presence of Aemilianus.
"You did well, to hold the walkway, you and others," said Aemilianus. He was sitting on a pier, propped up against some boxes. Those piers are the main harbor piers, between the inner harbor, that between them and the citadel landing, and the outer harbor, which leads to the river. the outer harbor, now, of course, was blocked, a few hundred yards out, with the chain of rafts and, behind them, five ships.
"These would be dead now," said he, gesturing about himself, "had you and those with you not done so."
I looked back to the walkway in the distance, across the inner harbor. "The standard of Cos now surmounts it," I said.
"You held it for the time that was needed," said Aemilianus, "the time required to seal off the piers."
It interested me that Cos would bother setting its standard there, at the end of that charred walk, jutting out toward the piers. Apparently we had made it mean something to them.
I looked back, too, to the citadel, and the city. The citadel was afire. Fires, too, still, after all these days, burned in the city.
"You are not Marsias," said a man to me. "Who are you?"
"Ar's Station is gone," I said to Aemilianus.
"No," he said. "Its Home Stone survives."
"It was taken from the city?" I asked.
"Yes," he said. "Weeks ago it was smuggled from the city, and sent south to Ar, where, if all went well, it must now be."
"So long ago," I said, "you did not expect relief from Ar?"
"I was right," he said, bitterly.
I nodded. One does not keep secret the siege of a city such as Ar's Station. It was one of the largest of the ports on the Vosk. Too, anyone can read a calendar.
"You maintained a brave front," I said.
"And what would you have done, had you been commander in Ar's Station?" I shrugged. "Much the same, I suppose," I said.