by Ben Cassidy
The troops standing idly in formation tensed, gripping their weapons and scanning the hilltops above them with sudden fear.
And then, like ghosts from out of the ground, a line of armed men appeared on the top of the valley first to the right, and then to the left. They chanted incessantly, their drummers beating a staccato beat as they marched forward.
Above their heads, against the early light of the dawn sky, flew the tattered banner of a raven, its black fabric glistening in the pounding rain. The pale gleam of morning glinted off huge double-handed swords, battle-axes, and spears too numerous to count.
There had to be thousands of them. All with blood in their eyes, and all of them raving for battle.
“Now we die,” said Kendril.
Chapter 11
Kara galloped up, her bow in her hand. A full quiver of arrows that she had managed to acquire somewhere in the camp jangled across her back. She pulled her horse to a stop, her hood up against the rain.
“We’re trapped!” she shouted to Joseph and Maklavir. There was a sudden flash of lightning, followed by a crashing of thunder that caused the horses to jump with fright. Kara struggled to control her mount. “They’re on both sides of the valley.”
Maklavir drew his sword with shaking hands and mumbled a hurried prayer under his breath.
The soldiers jostled and turned, the fear showing on their faces. Sergeants and lieutenants shouted out orders, beating men back into line. A line of pikes came up within each of the regiments, clacking and bristling as the wooden stocks collided with each other.
Like fireflies dozens of matchcords flickered in the falling rain as musketeers attempted to light their weapons. Cursing was heard up and down the line as cords sputtered and went out, doused by the wind and falling water. Hundreds of crossbows were bent back and locked into position, their strings humming as they were stretched into place.
The wailing began again, howling over the darkened valley and the struggling regiments.
Maklavir’s face went white as a ghost. “What is that exactly?” he stammered.
“Bagpipes,” said Kendril. His face didn’t turn. “They’re trying to unnerve us.”
Kara strung her bow. “Then they’re doing a good job.”
Joseph turned his head away from the Llewyllian regiments, and looked over at the Ghostwalker beside him. “They’ll all be killed, Kendril!”
He didn’t move, his eyes staring straight ahead from underneath his black hood.
Without warning, Joseph reached over, and slapped the Ghostwalker hard across the face.
Kendril jumped, and wrenched his head around in anger.
“I didn’t come out here to die, Kendril,” Joseph roared. He grabbed the Ghostwalker by the lapel of his cloak. “And neither did you. You know what to do here. I know you do. Now stop moping in self-pity or whatever it is that you’re doing, and do something!”
Kendril’s eyes blazed. His cheek stung red where Joseph struck him. “Lord Whitmore’s in command here,” he shot back. “Not me. I—”
There was another loud wailing noise that echoed over the valley, followed by the thunderous noise of drums. From the line of barbarians several women came forth, wearing animal skins and deer antlers on their heads. They began cutting themselves with knifes and sharp flints, screeching obscenities to the skies above. There was another burst of nearly simultaneous thunder and lightning.
“Lord Whitmore doesn’t know what he’s doing,” shouted Joseph. “You do. Now do something or we’re all going to die!”
Kendril’s face twisted in fury for a moment. He opened his mouth to respond.
Before he could Lord Whitmore’s regiment, alone on the far side of the encampment, collapsed.
The soldiers, already struggling to form into lines, and unnerved by the screeching mob on the valley rim above them, began to disintegrate. Pikes were tossed to the ground as men began to scatter, tearing off their buff coats and breastplates. Some ran screaming, covering their ears with their hands.
Lasinger rode up and down the crumbling line, waving his sword and shouting at the men to stand their ground.
Above them on the valley crest the barbarian line gave a terrifying shout, then surged forward, their warriors gibbering for blood.
Lord Whitmore’s regimental banner toppled, then fell to the grass, trampled in the mud by the fleeing men. On the other side of the valley crest the barbarians gave their kinsmen an answering shout. With a blare of bagpipes and rolling of drums they attacked as well, hurtling down the steep slope toward the other two regiments in the valley below.
Joseph stared, his mouth open.
In the space of a heartbeat something seemed to snap in Kendril’s eyes. “If that regiment breaks the others will be caught in the rear. Let’s move!” He spun, and kicked Simon into an unsteady gallop.
Startled by the sudden change in their companion, Joseph, Kara, and Maklavir obeyed, lunging their horses into action.
Lord Whitmore had just enough time to draw his rapier before the barbarians attacked, crashing down into the narrow ravine where he was.
The Royal Guards reacted instantly, pulling out pistols and drawing rapiers with a fierce battle cry. Their horses reared in confusion, pawing the air as the barbarians surged forward with bagpipes droning.
A few arrows whistled through the air, and next to Lord Whitmore’s side a rider fell with a shaft protruding from his chest. The man’s horse cantered off, riderless.
A sudden panic seized Whitmore and spread through his body until he couldn’t move.
Around him came the screams and cries of dying men. Pistol shots began to crack off in rapid succession.
The Jogarthi swept in amongst the horses, slashing and pulling at the riders while howling curses in their dark tongue.
The Royal Guards fought back furiously, slashing and hacking down at the enemy with the edges of their rapiers.
Whitmore watched it all, his body frozen.
Kendril had been right, he realized with a horrific thrill.
They were all going to die.
Simon lurched to a stop, and brayed irritably as Kendril whipped out his sword, holding it aloft. He tore back his hood, rain spattering against his raised arm and head.
Kara came up beside him, her bow out and ready.
In front of them was the remains of Lord Whitmore’s regiment, broken and fleeing through the tents of the camp. Behind the scattered soldiers the barbarians were streaming down the hill, waving battle-axes and double-handed swords as they came.
On the top of the valley crest the barbarian women continued to scream supplications to the skies above as the howling mass descended onto the camp below.
Kendril charged forward. He grabbed a fleeing man by the shoulder and wrenched him around.
The sputtering soldier lashed the Ghostwalker’s arm away. “Let me go!” he screamed. He stumbled in the mud.
Kendril punched the man hard in the face and knocked him to the ground. He whirled, then snatched another man and yanked him back. “Form a line!” he yelled, pushing him back. “Now!”
Kara and Maklavir rode up.
They stared at the Ghostwalker in amazement. Rain and mud spattered his face, but there was a look of fire in his eyes.
Kendril stopped another man, and pushed him back. “If you run you’ll die,” he roared. “Your only chance is to form a line! Now move!” He turned to Joseph, whose rapier was already in his hand. “Joseph, get these men in a line. Crossbows in front, pikes behind.” He spun and galloped back down through the mud and tents, then stopped in front of two other men. He pointed his sword back towards an abandoned cannon chassis a few yards away.
“You two! Get that gun turned around! Maklavir, give them a hand! I want it firing in two minutes. Go!”
He swiped his sword down, and raced back a few yards. He swatted two more men with the flat of his blade, knocking them back towards the fighting.
A line began to form as Joseph stopped m
en and threw them back into place.
Two sergeants quickly recovered their nerves, and began barking orders at the fleeing men, smacking them back into place as well.
Kendril rode back and forth like a man possessed, shouting orders and giving words of encouragement to the bedraggled men.
Not more than a hundred yards in front of them, the barbarians were hacking at the last remnants of Lord Whitmore’s regiment, screaming as they tore down the few men who still stood their ground.
Sir Lasinger’s riderless horse galloped by, but there was no other sign of the regiment’s commander.
The Jogarthi warriors began to flood into the camp area, pillaging tents and supply wagons as they went.
Kendril stopped his mule right in front of the makeshift line of soldiers. His clothes were absolutely soaked from the downpour.
“Prepare volley fire!” he ordered. His voice boomed out across the line.
Kara wiped the rain from her eyes, and watched with awe as the haphazard formation of men, who had been fleeing in terror just moments before, obeyed.
Some of the soldiers that still had crossbows and matchlock muskets knelt in the front of the line, trying to shield their lit matchcords and bow strings from the relentless rain.
Thunder crashed overhead as Kendril rode along the front, his sword lifted high in the air.
From behind the line Joseph was riding fast, helping soldiers bring up pikes to the soldiers that had lost theirs during the rout.
On the far left Maklavir was shouting orders to four men who were man-handling the cannon around, pointing its muzzle towards the approaching enemy.
Kara glanced behind her, and looked across the tent-strewn valley towards the swirling masses of men on the other side.
Both Mulcher and Fielding’s regiments were fighting hard against the barbarians, crossbows singing out and pikes jabbing forward as the Jogarthi desperately hacked away at the hedged wall of steel that confronted them. Gunfire exploded sporadically from the squares, and barbarians fell right and left.
There were never enough killed, however. Three more barbarians took the place of each one that fell, waving their weapons and screaming curses at the soldiers before them.
Kara turned her head back to the front. She readied her bow to fire.
The barbarians were a shrieking mass, pillaging and plundering their way through the camp as they came. Some tents caught fire, the flames quickly spreading despite the pouring rain.
A massive man, his body wrapped in a red and green tartan and his face covered with blue war paint, jumped on top of an overturned crate. With a shout he lifted a gigantic war club and urged his men forwards. His arms and chest were covered with strange tattoos, some carved in the representation of spiral shapes and dizzying swirls. His bellowing voice carried across the tents.
The pillaging barbarians began to turn, forgetting the plunder for a moment as they began to notice Kendril’s ragged line forming in front of them.
Joseph came galloping up beside Kara as the barbarian chieftain continued to shout above the din of battle.
“There’s too many of them!” the scout said before his horse had even stopped. “We can’t hold this line if—”
A single rifle shot cracked out over the valley, its sharp cry audible for a moment above everything else.
The chieftain standing on the crate stumbled, then toppled back onto the muddy ground.
The Jogarthi warriors paused, a sudden uncertainty rippling through their ranks.
Kendril lowered his smoking rifle, and drew his sword again. “Ready!” he shouted.
The line of crossbowmen and musketeers took a half step forward, holding their weapons in their hands.
Several Jogarthi tribesmen leapt in front of their men, urging the others forward. They seemed to recover themselves, and charged forward once again with a yell.
“Aim!” Kendril’s words were almost lost in the deafening Jogarthi war cry.
The musketeers and crossbowmen brought their weapons up to their cheeks, and aimed at the quickly approaching enemy.
Kendril held his sword in the air for what seemed an eternity, rain dripping from the hilt.
The Jogarthi surged so close that Kara could see them clearly for the first time. Many were tall, half naked and covered with war paint. Tartans of different clans were sprinkled throughout their ranks, and many different banners waved in the wind. Some had wicker or wooden shields decorated with more spirals or the symbol of the raven, while others carried no shields at all. Almost none wore armor of any kind, and they carried every possible variety of sword, axe, and spear imaginable.
They advanced so close that Kara could see the colored tassels hanging from their belts.
Kendril’s sword swept down. “Fire!”
The line exploded with a shaking barrage of gun and crossbow fire.
The front mass of advancing Jogarthi was literally swept away as bullets and crossbow bolts tore into unprotected flesh and bone.
A second later the cannon thundered. The ball cut through rank after rank of barbarians, and left dozens dead in its wake.
The second line of Jogarthi warriors stumbled over the first, many tripping into the mud and becoming trampled by the surge behind them.
Kara fired as well. Her bow sang out as the arrows disappeared into the mass of Jogarthi in front of her. The barbarians were so tightly packed that it was almost impossible to miss.
The impact of the first volley had been shattering. Many of the tribal chieftains who had been leading the charge now lay dead with everyone else in the first line.
The Jogarthi seemed to collectively pause, as if unsure whether to continue on or run. The warriors in the rear continued to push their companions in front forward, and the teeming mass began to sweep towards the Llewyllian line once more.
“Reverse ranks! Charge pikes!” Kendril shouted.
The command was echoed up and down the line.
Kara watched in astonishment as the soldiers, most of who still did not know who this Ghostwalker giving the commands was, obeyed.
The line of crossbowmen and musketeers retreated back behind the pikemen, who stepped forward and lowered their pikes in one solid mass, creating a hedge of steel points.
Kendril lifted his sword again. The blade flashed dully in the gray light of the morning dawn.
“Advance!”
With a roar the Llewyllian line swept forward, thrusting their pikes into an enemy that outnumbered them at least three times over.
Kendril led the charge, and crashed into the Jogarthi line just ahead of the pikemen. His sword rose and fell in countless blows until the blade ran red with blood.
Joseph kicked his horse forward, shouting and holding his rapier high as he raced into the thick of the fighting.
Kara continued shooting until all her arrows were gone, her fingers numb from the repeated action of firing.
Over by the cannon Maklavir raised his cap in the air, tossing it back and forth as he cheered the men on.
And then, the unbelievable happened.
The Jogarthi broke.
Slowly at first, and then all at once the barbarians began to flee back through the camp, throwing down their weapons and trampling their own standards.
With a roar the Llewyllians pursued after them, losing all semblance of cohesion as they stabbed, slashed, and shot into the fleeing horde.
The barbarians tumbled back through the tents, and tried to race back up the steep incline of the valley side. Most of them never made it.
Joseph rode through the swirling battle, dodging shouting soldiers who were cutting down barbarians right and left. He saw a black shape through the rain ahead, and galloped over.
Kendril was still on Simon, his face splattered with mud and blood. One of his swords was in his hand, and he was bringing it down on top of a wounded Jogarthi warrior just as Joseph came up.
The Ghostwalker jerked his mule to the side, and slashed out at another fleeing bar
barian. The man stumbled, crying out a plea in his native tongue and throwing up his hands to show he was unarmed.
A snarl of rage on his face, Kendril brought his sword down again and split the man’s head open.
Horrified, Joseph galloped forward, and grabbed Kendril’s arm just as he was about to strike at another fleeing Jogarthi.
“Kendril!” he shouted over the screams and clanging of metal all around them. “Kendril!”
The Ghostwalker turned, and for a moment Joseph was shocked by the look on his face.
Kendril’s features were twisted in a mask of bestial fury, the mud and rain mixing with the blood on his forehead and cheeks. He blinked, then slowly lowered his sword.
Joseph let go of his arm.
The Ghostwalker wiped his sleeve across his face, and glanced towards the far side of the valley. Both Mulcher’s and Fielding’s regiments had managed to hold against the combined barbarian onslaughts, but the Jogarthi were reforming on the other side of the valley, howling curses down toward the soldiers below.
Kendril turned his head, and looked up the valley slope before them. It was covered with fleeing groups of barbarians. He pointed towards the crest.
“We need to take the high ground before the Jogarthi reform. Get someone over to the other two regiments and tell them to join us there.”
“I’ll go myself,” said Joseph. He gave Kendril a probing look. “Are you all right?”
“Fine,” the Ghostwalker said. “Now move it. We only have a few minutes before the Jogarthi attack again.”
Joseph paused for a moment, looking as if he was going to say something else, but then he turned and galloped off through the pillaged camp.
Kendril arched his neck back, feeling the cold rain on his face.
Simon snorted unhappily, his eyes wide from all the carnage around them. Bodies littered the ground, most of them Jogarthi.
Some of the surviving Llewyllian officers were trying to rally the men, getting them back into some semblance of order after the hectic pursuit.
The rain began to slow to a steady drizzle, plunking in the puddles that now covered the ground.
Kendril turned his head slowly to his right, gazing down the long ravine that led out of the valley. A sudden mist hung over the area, covering it from sight. That had been the last direction that Lord Whitmore and the Royal Guards had gone, before the attack had begun.