Forged in Fire (Destiny's Crucible Book 4)

by Olan Thorensen

  Welman Stent

  The Stent Clan hetman looked at a map of the same territory—a map that also showed arrows and positions. Joining him in examination were his senior commanders—colonels and majors, by Yozef’s nomenclature. His force had grown in the three days since the Narthani crossed into Eywell and would continue to grow until he had twenty-five thousand men—dragoons, 6-pounder batteries, and medium-sized wagons able to move fast. The men had varying expressions of determination, eagerness, and nervousness—sometimes all from the same individual, as emotions cycled through them.

  “I reiterate. Our goal is NOT to stop the Narthani’s advance or engage in a major battle. Yet. We are to slow them to give our provinces enough time to finish emptying and withdrawing to redoubts and finish mustering all our fighting men. We’ll withdraw from Hanslow back into Moreland and see if they slow down to assess Hanslow. Limited contact will be necessary only to convince them to periodically stop their advance to take up defensive positions, or at least make them more cautious. Once we believe the clans are as mobilized as they’re going to be, then and only then will we shift to making serious contact and try to lure them north toward the Moraine and Coast sites.”

  A Bultecki colonel voiced a question several others were thinking.

  “I know the plan, but it will gall me to watch them ravage a province, even if not mine.”

  “Our time will come,” Stent assured him, “when and where it’s determined to be the right time and place.”

  “You mean when Yozef Kolsko says when and where,” quipped a Seaborn major softly. Rumors had finally reached even the most remote corners of Caedellium.

  Stent wasn’t sure how to respond. After all, although he belonged to the War Council, even he didn’t know the degree of validity of the major’s question. Yozef never expressly gave orders, but somehow major decisions always seemed to settle on his opinions—usually after discussions with all the council members. Recently, on some occasions, Yozef seemed to give an order as if he were in sole command, and none of the other leaders had objected or refused yet.

  “Wherever and from whomever such decisions are made,” said Stent, “all we need to focus on right now is our assigned task—to slow the Narthani’s advance.”

  Gullar

  At sixteen miles into Moreland, the Narthani forward scouts ran into the first major islander units. Vastly outnumbered, the scouts retreated to within visual distance of the main columns and reported the sightings.

  “At least several thousand horsemen about four miles in front of us,” Gullar summarized to his six main subordinate generals. “Perhaps some cannon, but the scouts couldn’t get close enough to be sure.”

  “Switch from scouts to reconnaissance-in-force?” asked the Narthani cavalry commander.

  “I think so,” agreed Gullar. “Make it two companies. No cannon. Push out no more than . . . let’s say, five miles, and see how they react.”

  Stent

  The hilltop gave a good perch from which to watch the forefront of Narthani companies leave a cavalry flanking column and trot ahead of the rest of the army. The tree cover let Stent observe without being seen.

  “Like I said, Welman,” his cousin affirmed, “they didn’t like their scouts turned back and wanted to try to force a look.” Stent hadn’t assigned his cousin as leader of the forward pickets keeping a close eye on the Narthani because he was a relative but because he might as well have been born on a horse.

  “Well, we’ll just have to give them something to think about, won’t we?” Stent grinned with an expression of anticipation, not humor. “I think where the valley narrows about four miles east of here will be the right place.” His cousin’s grin matched Stent’s.

  Gullar

  “Cannon fire to the northeast, Marshal,” offered one of Gullar’s aides—redundantly, because the marshal could clearly hear it himself.

  “Sounds about four to five miles away,” added his second-in-command. “Send forward to support—cavalry and infantry?”

  “I think so, General. A battalion of cavalry and the forward infantry regiment. Double time the infantry, but don’t get more than two miles ahead. The rest of the army will continue at the current pace.”

  Stent

  After ambushing the Narthani cavalry companies, Stent kept his men digging deeper, waiting for the Narthani to react. A larger cavalry unit had arrived, briefly tested his men’s positions, and been repulsed, twice, then tried to circle behind them—only to be turned back by larger clan dragoon forces. A thousand of Stent’s men blocked the road, using the crest of a natural slope running perpendicular to the road that zig-zagged three times upward. A quarter of the men had dug in on the crest, while the other 250 men held the horses two hundred yards on the back side and out of shot exposure. They anchored twenty 6-pounders on the back slope with their barrels just clearing the crest.

  Fifteen minutes after the Narthani cavalry gave up flanking them, infantry appeared and spread out on a thousand-yard front with 12-pounder cannon in gaps between infantry blocks. Stent had another six thousand men one to three miles to his rear, but this was only the first round of the delaying game. He let his artillery exchange a dozen barrages with the Narthani, with 6-pounder solid shot cutting a few gaps in the Narthani infantry and hitting one 12-pounder. The Narthani shot mainly buried in the forward slope or sailed over the crest to land beyond the horses, though both their mounts and the men holding them had an exciting time listening to cannonballs whizzing over their heads.

  “Looks like they’re getting ready for a serious attack,” said Colonel Postwyn. He stood to Stent’s left and likewise surveyed the Narthani deployment through a telescope. The Mittackian’s regiment had been the first to encounter the Narthani’s push. Stent had thought the first messages from Postwyn had a panicked tone to them, but the regiment had retired in good order and managed to slow the Narthani with a sabotage of bridges and small ambushes. Stent changed his opinion once he talked with Postwyn. The man had been nervous, as anyone should have been, but he did what he was supposed to and acted in a timely manner.

  “More infantry forming up behind those on line and cavalry massing on both flanks.”

  “That’s the way it looks,” agreed Stent. “With another three or four thousand men here, we could hold for several hours at least, but that’s not our intent. It’s time for us to pull back as soon as all the dead and wounded are away.”

  Gullar

  “No recovered islander casualties?” the marshal asked.

  “No, sir. By the time we realized they had left, there was plenty of time for them to take any wounded and dead with them.”

  “And our casualties?”

  “Twenty-one dead and another fifty to sixty wounded.”

  Gullar cursed. Although the first action was minor, the enemy would reasonably consider the outcome a success. Seventy to eighty casualties were not significant for the fifty-two thousand in his force, but he didn’t like to give the opposition any reason to be encouraged or lay any seed of doubt in his own men.

  The islanders had not made an offensive move—merely defended their position until more of his men arrived, and then they’d pulled out. If he had to guess, it would be a repeating pattern. His men would assess the outcome; bury the dead, to be retrieved later for a proper ceremony; evaluate the wounded, to either continue with the army or be sent back to Preddi City; and have scouts confirm that the islanders had withdrawn. The confrontation had cost enough time to make it too late in the day to continue. Gullar ordered the nightly encampment an hour earlier than protocol dictated.

  The islanders’ well-planned action and their quick coordinated movement were not good signs. He didn’t expect major problems in defeating an islander army, but neither was he one to casually underestimate any foe.

  He found the other action of the day equally disturbing. When the support force had reached his forward cavalry, a mile-and-a-half gap had opened back to the main force. The gap contained sc
attered Narthani, messengers and medical wagons going after and returning with casualties. Several hundred islander riders had brazenly cut through the gap from south to north. Except for a few killed and wagons lost, this had accomplished no direct military purpose. But it was as if the islanders were teasing his men. They had stayed out of musket range and left before artillery could set up. It let thousands of his men see the enemy for the first time. He also felt disconcerted that they could recognize the separation in his forces so quickly. In response, he decided to keep a tighter formation from then on and refrain from a reconnaissance getting too separated.

  Marshal Gullar didn’t realize this was exactly the decision the islanders had tried to elicit. The teasing game with the Narthani continued for the next two days. Islanders would threaten a cavalry screen, force the Narthani to respond, and then withdraw. Although the maneuvers had no military effect on the Narthani, their two-day march from the Eywell/Moreland border to Moreland City stretched into the fourth day until the farthest-forward screen reported sighting the city. The Narthani encamped just within sight of the city walls and with a view of thousands of islander riders swirling on the plain where the Battle of Moreland City had been fought. Tomorrow they would deploy for battle.

  Stent

  Stent rode through the clan camp in front of the city. Or rather, their simulated camp. His now twelve thousand men had done everything they could to make the Narthani think they faced at least twice that number of Caedelli. It had been Maera Kolsko who suggested using different clan flags and colored banners to suggest a general gathering of all clan forces. The same flagmen wore out several horses as they rode around, brandishing different colors. In addition, at dark, Stent’s men lit enough campfires to support a larger islander army. The remaining thirteen thousand men stayed seven miles north of Moreland City and waited for those facing the Narthani to withdraw.

  At first light the next day, the Narthani army deployed across the plain of the previous battle. Infantry regiments occupied the northern ridgeline and wooded hills to the south that had demarcated the flanks of the previous Narthani force. Masses of cavalry protected the flanks and the rear, and cannon were unlimbered and made ready. Stent waited atop the highest roof in Moreland City. When he could barely see the nearest Narthani formation finish deploying in the lightening darkness, he nodded to a man standing ten feet away and holding a brass horn.

  “All right, Rigmor, send the signal and let’s get out of here.”

  Within fifteen minutes, no clan fighters remained in Moreland City or facing the Narthani formations finishing deployment.

  The sun had just hit the highest peaks to the north when the Narthani realized all was not as expected.

  Gullar

  “Gone?” the surprised marshal said for the third time. “All of them?”

  “As far as we can tell,” repeated his second-in-command. “Several patrols are carefully moving forward, but the only thing between us and the city walls are smoldering campfires.”

  “Did they withdraw into the city?”

  The second looked discomfited.

  “That’s the other report. No sign of activity is seen on the walls.” He hesitated, then continued, “Uh . . . as if . . . as if no one is there, either.”

  “You’re suggesting they might have abandoned the entire city,” returned a surprised General Balko.

  “We’ll know soon,” said Gullar. “The patrols were ordered to advance until they hit resistance.”

  An hour later, as the command staff waited at the front of the Narthani army, they saw a Narthani flag raise over a section of the wall. Another ten minutes and a rider came galloping up with a message from the major whose infantry battalion had breached a wall gate. No sign of any living person. They further confirmed this when they opened a main gate from within, and both infantry and cavalry units scoured the city.

  The army encamped in front of the city while units finished a thorough sweep. The initial caution for traps proved unnecessary. There had been no attempt to defend the city or to leave traps for the Narthani. The islanders had chosen not to defend the city. Patrols to the northeast reported many fresh tracks, horses and wagons, on the road and parallel in the direction of Orosz.

  By nightfall, the confirmation was final, and Gullar met with his staff in his command wagon. Apparently cleared of danger or not, the marshal felt leery of putting larger numbers of his men in the city, because unexpected surprises could play on the minds of troops expecting a battle.

  “Any thoughts on all this?” asked Gullar. He, of course, had his own thoughts, but one of his strengths was soliciting frank opinions from his senior officers. He didn’t think of himself as brilliant, but he compensated by utilizing ideas from subordinates—the selection of which he did think of himself as skilled.

  “I think they saw what was coming and decided they couldn’t stop us,” a senior general replied. “Not in the field or the city. The city has walls, but many sections are wooden or low masonry—nothing that would slow a determined assault by our men. Faced with the situation, they opted to retreat. I admit, however, I was surprised. It’s a decision we might have made if positions were reversed. I would have expected the islanders, and especially ones of this clan, to put up as much resistance as possible. Such societies can be irrational when defending their home ground. Obviously, I was wrong.”

  “Signs are Caedelli fighters pulled away to the north,” said Avan. “I would have expected northwest toward the next province, Orosz. The briefing reports say that it’s the titular capitol of the island.”

  “We don’t know when the city’s population left. If it was during the night, they can’t be moving that fast, and we might be able to catch them. There are two problems, though. We can’t know when they left, and even if last night, I’m sure the islander cavalry we’ve seen would try to slow us down. They would be on our left flank.”

  “Look back at the last few days,” Balkto said. “Their actions might have been simply to slow us down to give the population time to get far enough away that we couldn’t catch them.”

  “I agree, slowing us might have been a major factor,” countered the youngest general and the one whose men had searched the city, “but I think they never intended to defend it. You know how troops are. While searching any city, any valuables they come across somehow tend to stick to their fingers. What we’ve seen is nothing of significant value. No gold, silver, or jewelry in the houses. The city’s abbey is also empty. We should have found medical instruments and medicines in the hospital and books in their library. Both were empty. I think they’ve been moving out of the city for at least a few sixdays before we got here, maybe longer.”

  “Something else that supports that possibility,” added a grizzled officer. “In a city this size, there would always have been a few people left behind. Those who refused to leave their homes, usually older ones, some too sick to move, some mentally deficient that had no better sense . . . someone. Here there’s not a single soul, which smacks of a careful and well-executed evacuation by their authorities.”

  The discussion continued for another twenty minutes until Gullar thought they were into the repetition phase, having exhausted most new contributions.

  “The question then facing us is what to do next?” said Gullar. “The original plan was to reduce Moreland City, then continue on to Orosz City. We expected to fight a battle here, and while that didn’t happen, is there any reason not to continue as planned?”

  “It depends on our immediate objective,” said Avan. “If the ones withdrawing to the north are their main force, do we want to pursue them? Alternatively, we continue to Orosz City. No matter what their army, if we choose to call it that, is doing now, eventually they have to stand and fight. Either option is arguable, but I favor continuing east and ignoring their army’s movement, for the moment. If they wouldn’t fight here, maybe they will at Orosz City. They may be trying to draw us away from their capital.

  “However,
I must say the behavior of the islanders makes me uneasy. I know we cannot expect an enemy to do what we planned for them, but the willingness of a clan to abandon an entire province should make us question any other assumptions we might have had about these islanders. It reminds us of General Akuyun’s warnings about them.”

  No other officer countered Avan’s summary, and Gullar ordered the next step.

  “I think we’re all in agreement to continue on to Orosz City. We resume our march tomorrow morning at first sunrise. Once the main force is clear of the city to the northeast, burn Moreland City to ground. Not a single structure of any kind is to be left. If they’re going to abandon major cities without a fight, they at least need to see the consequences.”

  By noon the next day, the Narthani army was ten miles northeast of Moreland City—or, more correctly, where Moreland City had been. The prevailing winds blew to the north-northwest. Thus, the smoke from the burning city moved perpendicular to the army’s route—perfect for viewing the immense smoke plume that covered the sky and remained in plain view for both the Narthani and any Caedelli within twenty miles.

  One group of seventeen Moreland men watched silently as the first whiffs of smoke appeared, until it covered the entire sky from the city to the horizon. Half of them had lived in the city. No one said a word. Their leader finally roused the grim-faced men to resume shadowing the Narthani army. More than a couple of faces had tear traces running into their beards, but eyes were cold and mouths clenched.

  Chapter 43: Waiting

  Orosz City had never contained anywhere near the number of people who now sheltered within its walls. That number would only grow, because more kept streaming in and would do so for several days. Despite months of planning, it seemed at times chaotic as people were directed to assigned areas, either within the city itself or on to the mountain valleys to the north. The latter were those too old, young, or infirm to stand on the walls if the Narthani assaulted. For those, the mountain terrain and minimal forces needed to block the few passages would be their protection.