The Promised Lie

by Christopher Nuttall

  “Our Lord is with us,” the Red Monk said. “We will not fall.”

  Garston concealed his annoyance with an effort. He’d never had time for organised religion, beyond regular sacrifices to the God of Battles. The Red Monks were just another bunch of tame priests, promising everything to their followers and giving nothing. But the king had insisted that he install one of the sinister bastards on his staff ... no doubt as payment for services rendered. The man had done nothing, as far as Garston could tell. His face was so thoroughly hidden behind his robes that there was no way to tell if there was one monk or a multitude. But at least the Red Monk wasn’t as annoying as the councillors.

  Perhaps the king will let me execute the councillors, if we win, he thought. The Summer Isle didn’t need a bunch of treacherous morons running its second-largest city. And then we can put the city under a more practical regime.

  He studied the map, cursing under his breath. Prince Reginald had landed a vast number of troops before Garston’s pickets had located the landing site. If Garston had had more men under his command, he would have marched on the landing site at once and tried to push the invaders back into the sea, but he barely had enough troops to hold Racal’s Bay. And that depended on the city’s guardsmen – and militia – remaining loyal. Racal’s Bay had switched sides before and would do so again, if the alternative was worse. The city fathers would only stay loyal for as long as a blade was held against their throats.

  “You can’t fight them in the city,” Wade insisted. “I suggest ...”

  Garston ignored the rest of his wittering. The hell of it was that Wade had a point. Racal’s Bay wasn’t particularly well defended, even in these troubled times. The walls were strong, in theory, but any experienced commander would have no difficulty getting men over the stone and into the city. And then ... half the city was made of wood, for crying out loud! If Prince Reginald wanted to burn the city to the ground, he’d just have to start shooting flaming arrows over the walls until the fires spread out of control.

  An officer stuck his head into the room. “Sir, a messenger has arrived, under flag of truce,” he said. “We’re holding him in the gatehouse.”

  “Blindfold him, then escort him up here,” Garston ordered. Using messengers as spies was an old ruse, one that had been rediscovered in the last few years. Letting the bastard see how paltry the defences really were would only encourage Prince Reginald to demand stiffer terms. “And make sure he stays away from the troops.”

  “We should not talk with the enemy,” the Red Monk said. “He ...”

  “Might be offering us terms we can accept,” Wade said, quickly. The councillors had lodged official protests about the Red Monks preaching in the streets, protests Garston had simply ignored. “We should not be so quick to dismiss their words.”

  Garston ignored the byplay and waited until a young man – his eyes hidden behind a makeshift blindfold – was escorted into the room. It was impossible to be sure, but the young man – still a boy, in many ways – held himself like an aristocrat. A junior nobleman, then, someone seeking glory and lands beside his prince. He wouldn’t be someone too important, Garston reminded himself. Killing a messenger was a declaration of total war, but it had been known to happen. Sometimes, it had even been the accident it had been claimed to be.

  “I am Sir Gaston,” he said, once the blindfold was removed. It was unlikely the messenger had ever heard of him. The Summer Isle’s peerage had waxed and waned over the last few years as round after round of civil war claimed hundreds of lives. “What do you have to tell me?”

  The young man straightened. “I am Caen, Equerry to Crown Prince Reginald, rightful heir to the thrones of Andalusia and the Summer Isle. He calls on you to surrender Racal’s Bay to him without further delay. Your officers and men will be treated fairly, as laid down in the books of war, and the population of Racal’s Bay will be protected by my lord.”

  Wade made a coughing sound. Garston ignored him.

  “I assume there’s an or else attached to this,” he said, calmly. “What is it?”

  “If you refuse to surrender, you will be treated as rebels against your rightful lord,” Caen informed him. “The consequences will be ... unfortunate.”

  Garston glared. Unfortunate. The city would be sacked; men would be killed, women would be raped, children would be brutally slaughtered ... by the time Prince Reginald called a halt, Racal’s Bay would be devastated. And his men ... if they were treated as rebels, they’d be executed on the spot. Prince Reginald hadn’t even bothered to offer to accept turncoats. It wasn’t a good sign. Garston’s future looked very short and unpleasant indeed.

  “King Rufus is our rightful lord,” the Red Monk said. “We will not surrender ...”

  Wade choked. “But the city ...”

  “You have one hour to decide,” Caen informed them. “If you refuse to accept these terms, or if you decide not to let me return to my lines, there will be no further negotiation.”

  “You will be returned,” Garston said, shortly. An hour ... Prince Reginald clearly wasn’t in a position to attack, not yet. A lot could happen in an hour. “You will have our answer before the hour runs out.”

  He nodded to the guards, ordering them to escort Caen back to his master, then turned to the other two. Wade would want to surrender, of course. Racal’s Bay would be devastated by the fighting. Who knew? It might push the freemen to demand a new set of city fathers. If, of course, the invaders allowed their new subjects that much freedom. A population seized by war could be treated as nothing more than serfs and Wade knew it. But Garston ... he had no future, not if he surrendered. King Rufus would order his execution when he returned to Allenstown.

  And Prince Reginald clearly isn’t interested in making a deal with me, he thought. That didn’t bode well for the future. Garston was minor nobility, only raised up after the last round of civil war, but he was far from incompetent. Prince Reginald probably intended to parcel out land to his supporters. And that meant that he had to remove the current owners. I don’t have a future at all.

  “We must agree to his terms,” Wade said. “I ...”

  “This is treason,” the Red Monk snapped. “This city must be held for King Rufus!”

  “The city can’t be held,” Wade said. “And I will not allow ...”

  “Enough,” Garston said. “We will fight.”

  He rang his bell. Two messengers hurried into the room and snapped to attention.

  “You are to ride straight to Allenstown,” he ordered. Prince Reginald would have pickets blocking the roads, he was sure, but the invaders lacked any kind of local knowledge. “You are to inform Lord Francis that the enemy has landed – and that we intend to fight. He must dispatch reinforcements immediately.”

  “Yes, My Lord.”

  The timing was unfortunate, he conceded ruefully. King Rufus and his army had set off to the Narrows, if the last report was accurate. It would take days – if not weeks – for messengers to reach them, then yet more days for the army to march to Racal’s Bay. By then, Prince Reginald would be well on his way to Allenstown. He might even have a chance to lay siege to the city before King Rufus arrived.

  “Tell your sailors to start destroying the docks,” he added, addressing Wade. “We can destroy most of the facilities before time runs out.”

  Wade paled. “We need those docks.”

  “The kingdom doesn’t need those docks,” Garston said. “And it certainly doesn’t need them in enemy hands.”

  He summoned his subordinates. There wasn’t much time to prepare. They’d just have to make the best possible use of it. And then ...

  We won’t see another sunrise, he thought, morbidly. He felt a flicker of pity for his wife and son, who would soon be at the mercy of their legal guardian. Thankfully, a wife and underage son could not be held responsible for his failure. His wife might be married off to the king’s choice, but she wouldn’t be killed. All we can do is fight to the last.


  ***

  Reginald kept one eye on the hourglass as he paced the war tent, watching his subordinates update the map while he waited for time to run out. Everything was going perfectly, if the map was to be believed, although he knew from bitter experience that it could be treacherously deceptive. A unit on the map – everything from a lone picket to a regiment of soldiers – could be out of place or destroyed and he wouldn’t know about it until someone brought a report back to the tent. It was frustrating, in many ways. The map seemed to offer the promise of moving his forces around like pieces on a chessboard, but it was just an illusion. There was no way he could manage every detail of a battle.

  Caen stepped into the tent, looking relieved. Reginald allowed himself a moment of relief, too. Sending a messenger had been risky, even though very few would take the risk of harming or killing someone under a flag of truce. Doing so would put them completely beyond the pale. No one would complain if Reginald chose to slaughter the defenders to the last man in response.

  “They promised an answer before time runs out,” Caen informed him. “And then they sent me back.”

  Reginald glanced at the hourglass. Thirty minutes to go. He would have preferred to push them a little harder, but he needed time to get his army into place. Thankfully, the troops were recovering fast, now they were on solid ground. He dreaded to think of what would have happened if they’d been caught on the beaches.

  “With me,” he said.

  He strode out of the tent, Caen following like an over-eager puppy. The advance elements had established an observation station on a nearby hill, allowing them to peer down into the city. Reginald walked up the hill, nodded politely to the picket troops and then took a telescope for himself. Racal’s Bay looked formidable, from the outside, but he was experienced enough to see its weaknesses. Clearly, the occupants had never believed they would come under attack.

  Odd, he thought. The Summer Isle has been fighting civil wars for the last five years.

  He swept the telescope over the city. A single wall, the battlements manned by soldiers; a gatehouse, dominating the sole road in and out of the city; a castle that barely deserved the name ... it didn’t look very strong. The stone houses at the centre of the city would make good strongpoints, if the enemy had the troops to hold them, but the wooden houses on the outskirts would be nothing more than firetraps. The wretched idiots had allowed the citizens to build their homes on both sides of the walls! Reginald would have summarily demoted – or executed – anyone stupid enough to allow that during wartime. The defenders should have broken down the hovels for scrap years ago.

  Pushing the thought aside, he glanced at Caen. “Did you see anything from the inside?”

  “They had me blindfolded,” Caen said. “I think they took me to the castle, but I don’t know.”

  Reginald nodded. A smart defender would have made sure to walk Caen around the block a few times, just to confuse him. It was an acceptable ruse, all the more so as messengers were normally also spies. The defenders might be in the castle, but given how poorly it had been designed it was quite possible that they were elsewhere. He shrugged, dismissing the thought. Racal’s Bay couldn’t hold out for long.

  He heard the sound of hooves and turned to see a messenger riding up. “Your Highness,” the rider said. “Captain-General Gars sends his compliments, Sir, and wishes to inform you that no enemy envoy has crossed the line.”

  Reginald frowned. The enemy commander had to know he couldn’t hold out indefinitely, not when his city was so poorly defended. And there were no troops in range to come to their aid. Reginald’s pickets would give him more than ample warning if that changed ... he glanced at the sun, silently estimating the time, then shrugged. He’d given them more than enough chances to surrender.

  “My compliments to Captain-General Gars,” he said. “Inform him that if the enemy fail to surrender by the time the hourglass runs out, he is to launch the attack without further delay.”

  “Yes, Your Highness.”

  Reginald grinned as the messenger turned and rode away. “Shall we go closer?”

  “You shouldn’t put yourself in too much danger, Your Highness,” Caen said. “Your father wouldn’t thank me if you died here.”

  “No,” Reginald agreed. “But I can’t afford to skulk at the back, either.”

  ***

  “Not a particularly well-defended town,” Lord Robin observed. “What do you think?”

  Isabella shrugged. She could see a dozen ways to sneak into Racal’s Bay – without magic – that would have a very good chance of avoiding detection. She was mildly surprised Prince Reginald hadn’t started sending infiltrators over the walls already, although she supposed he thought he didn’t need them. The attack was scheduled to begin in less than twenty minutes, after all. Anyone who made it over the walls would run the risk of being cut down by their own side.

  “We won’t have any problem getting close to the walls,” Dolman said. The swordsman looked eager for battle. “Are you sure you can knock them down?”

  “Yes,” Isabella said, flatly. It was impossible to be entirely sure, of course, but she hadn’t sensed any magical defences woven into the walls. There weren’t even the basic runes designed to make it harder for attackers to scramble up into the battlements. “I can put a hole in the wall.”

  “If you’re sure you can do it without harming yourself,” Lord Robin said. “I don’t want to have to carry you back to the tent.”

  Isabella scowled at him. “I can do it.”

  “Remember to duck, afterwards,” Alexis said. “They’ll be firing arrows at you.”

  “Or don’t duck,” Big Richard muttered.

  Isabella resisted – again – the urge to turn him into a frog. Or a pig ... not that anyone would notice any difference. He was already halfway to being a pig ... she pushed the thought out of her head as she gathered her magic, shaping the spell piece by piece. Failure would be embarrassing, particularly when Prince Reginald had asked her – personally – if she could cast the spell. She didn’t want to fail in front of the entire army.

  She listened, grimly, as Lord Robin spoke to some of his officers. Prince Reginald had put him in command of the first echelons, a decidedly mixed blessing. He was a mercenary and could speak to the other mercenaries on even terms, but the first echelons always took the worst of the casualties. Isabella didn’t really blame Prince Reginald for classing the mercenaries as expendable – she understood his reasoning – yet it grated on her. She didn’t consider herself expandable.

  “We’ll punch through the walls, with or without the spell, then open a breach,” Lord Robin said. “And then we can rage into the town.”

  “And loot,” Big Richard said.

  “Battle first, loot later,” Isabella reminded him. She’d seen battles lost because one side had stopped to loot before actually winning the battle, giving their opponents time to catch their breath and return to the fray. “We have to win.”

  Big Richard shot her an annoyed look, but said nothing. Isabella sighed. Maybe he’d take an arrow to the throat and shut up. Or something. It was hard to feel anything but annoyance when he kept sniping at her. She couldn’t help wishing that it had been Big Richard, instead of Little Jim, who’d died in Andalusia ...

  The trumpets blared. Isabella tensed. The city hadn’t surrendered, then. She cursed their leaders under her breath ... didn’t they know it was hopeless? Racal’s Bay was isolated, completely cut off from the rest of the kingdom. No one would have blamed them for surrendering on terms. Prince Reginald had even offered them surprisingly good terms.

  Lord Robin took a breath. “Here we go,” he said. “Isabella?”

  Isabella nodded, stepping forward as she gathered her magic. Flickers of light danced over her hand, as if she was on fire. And then she jabbed her hand towards the walls, casting the spell ...

  The ground shook, violently. The wall exploded into a towering mass of flame. Debris flew in all directions.r />
  “Go,” Lord Robin ordered. He raised his voice. “No mercy!”

  Chapter Twelve

  “Sorcery,” Wade gasped.

  Sir Garston nodded in grim agreement. He hadn’t expected the walls to hold for long – he was painfully aware that he didn’t have the manpower to hold them indefinitely – but he’d hoped they’d last longer than a few seconds. The spell – he could see the damned sorcerer who’d cast it – had blasted a hole right through the wall. His men were hesitating too, damn them. He didn’t think that any of them had seen battlefield sorcery before.

  “Order the archers to take out that sorcerer,” he snapped. “And then move the reserves into position to seal the hole.”

  “We should surrender now,” Wade said, as the messengers hurried to carry out Garston’s orders. “The walls are gone.”

  Garston waved to the guards, then jabbed a finger at Wade. “Take him to the dungeons,” he ordered. “And then put the rest of the city fathers in the cells too.”

  He ignored Wade’s shouting as he turned back to the peephole. The archers were firing, but it didn’t look as though they’d hit their target. The enemy archers were returning fire, snapping off crossbow bolts at every target of opportunity. Wade was right, he conceded sourly. The city was undefendable. But it didn’t really matter. All that mattered was killing as many of the enemy soldiers as possible before the final, inevitable end.

  “We have sent word to our brethren,” the Red Monk said. “The king will be informed.”

  Garston shrugged. It didn’t matter either. By the time the king heard about the invasion force, it would be too late for Racal’s Bay. There was no chance of escape for any of them. He just hoped that making a final bloody stand, with no hope of doing anything but delaying the enemy, would be enough to save his reputation. His son wouldn’t grow up thinking his father had been a coward.