Stuck In Magic

by Christopher Nuttall

  “Set up the guns,” I ordered. The walls were perfect killing grounds, but … I was lucky the warlord hadn’t built his castle on top of a hill. It would have made life a great deal harder. “Prepare to fire on my command.”

  Rupert looked worried as we prepared for the assault. “Should we send a demand for surrender?”

  I wasn’t so sure – killing the warlord and tearing his castle down would send an unmistakable message – but nodded anyway. Better to at least pretend we were doing things by the book. I summoned a messenger, told him to take a demand for unconditional surrender to the warlord, then sent him on his way. The cynical part of my mind insisted the warlord would tell us to go to hell, even if we had a sword at his throat. Even a truce that left us in control of the lands we’d taken would make him look weak, so weak one of his subordinate aristocrats might go for his throat. He might prefer to fight to the last, rather than come to terms.

  We waited. I lifted a telescope and peered at the battlements. They were lined with men, most carrying swords and shields rather than muskets or crossbows. I guessed the murder holes, clearly visible along the lower walls, were already manned, archers standing at the ready to wreck havoc on our lines. The gatehouse was almost a small castle in its own right, looking tougher than the citadel we’d taken earlier. It would be a pain to take even with modern weapons, or what passed for modern weapons in this world. A single MOAB would level both the castle and a surprisingly-large chunk of the surrounding countryside.

  Fallon caught my arm. “There’s a great deal of magic woven into the walls.”

  I nodded, curtly. Magical defences, from what I’d been told, seemed designed to cope with magical threats. It was perfectly possible to punch out – or shoot –

  a magician who didn’t craft his wards specifically to handle a physical threat.

  I supposed it made a certain kind of sense – most people would hesitate to get into a fight with someone who could stop them with a snap of their fingers – but

  it was a curious blindspot. If what I’d been told was true, even hardened wards acted like deflector shields. Every time they were hit, they got weaker.

  The messenger returned, looking grim. “My Lord,” he said, to Rupert. “They …

  ah … refused your kind offer.”

  Rupert smiled, although I could tell he was nervous. “And what did they actually say?”

  I ignored the messenger’s spluttering – the warlord had probably said something scatological or worse – and snapped orders. The cannons started to boom, hurling heavy shot towards the walls; the musketmen unleashed a furious volley, sweeping dozens of men off the battlements and causing the rest to hastily duck.

  I cursed under my breath as the cannonballs struck the walls and shattered, or bounced off, without doing any noticeable damage. The walls were either thick enough to take the blows without shattering, which seemed unlikely as I couldn’t see any cracks, or the magic reinforcing them was strong enough to keep them intact. I hoped the noise was doing at least some damage. I’d been in tanks that had been under heavy attack. Their armour had stood up to the hammering, but the noise had threatened to drive us all mad.

  “The magic is holding,” Fallon told me. “You’re not hitting it hard enough to take it down.”

  I nodded, watching grimly as the second volley was no more effective than the first. The only success was a cannonball that went over the walls, crashing down somewhere within the keep. I hoped it had done some real damage, although it was impossible to be sure. A handful of archers were trying to shoot at us, but finding it hard. My musketmen fired at them every time they showed their faces. I hoped they’d stay well back. I needed the cannoneers to keep firing into the castle.

  “Aim the canister so it lands in the courtyards, then add some fire arrows,” I ordered. The flaming arrows were coated with something magic, something – I’d been assured – that was hard to put out. “And order the sappers to start their work.”

  My lips twisted into a grim smile as the noise grew louder. I wasn’t expecting the canister shot to do much of anything, although it would be great if the flaming arrows ignited a barrel of gunpowder, but it would force them to keep their heads down. The defenders might even be assuming I was wasting my time, expending gunpowder and cannonballs in a fit of bad temper before I had to withdraw before I ran out of supplies. Reading between the lines, I had a theory that most of the warlords had done pretty much the same at one time or another.

  Rupert stepped up to me. “How long can we keep this up?”

  “Long enough, I hope,” I said. I’d drilled him in logistics. He wasn’t a bad organiser … I wondered, idly, if he’d make a good Pompey the Great. Pompey had lacked the flair of his arch-enemy, and he’d been hammered when he’d fought someone who was his tactical superior, but his grasp of logistics had been magnificent. “We just need to keep them from realising what we’re really doing.”

  I glanced at Fallon, then issued more orders. The skirmishers would have to take the lead, when we poured into the castle. I wished, not for the first time, that I’d spent more time on basic weapons training … or that we had more than a handful of flintlocks. We were going to be fighting the bastards on nearly even terms, when we got into the castle. And yet … I braced myself as the sappers returned, reporting success. The gunpowder was in position.

  “Stay back,” I ordered Rupert. “You do not want to be caught in the fighting.”

  Rupert looked mutinous. I understood. Harbin – damn the man – had at least managed to die bravely. Rupert’s reputation would be dented if he didn’t lead the offensive in person. But there was no choice. I needed Rupert to remain alive. And besides, if we won the battle, we could easily compose narratives that made Rupert the hero. Reality was more than a little flexible. The story would stick because we wanted it to stick.

  “Their wards are still holding,” Fallon commented. She sounded oddly impressed.

  “Their walls are barely damaged.”

  I nodded, pretending to be unconcerned. The magic might be beyond me, but it clearly had limits. I could easily imagine a shield that only blocked attacks from the outside, allowing their archers to stand up in the open air and shoot their bows in perfect safety. It didn’t seem to be possible. The locals might not understand modern technology, but they sure as hell grasped magic. It was such an obvious concept that I was sure that, it was possible, it would have been done.

  “Send the signal,” I ordered. The enemy didn’t seem to have realised what we were doing, but that could easily change at any moment. For all I knew, time was about to run out. I wasn’t sure what they could do about it, but I didn’t want to find out the hard way. “Detonate the mine.”

  A moment later, the world seemed to explode.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  I covered my eyes, hastily, as the ground shook violently, great clouds of dust and smoke rising up from the walls. It was glorious! The magically-reinforced walls were warped and twisted, great chunks of stone crashing to the ground despite the spells woven into the building. The blast had clearly reached further into the castle than I’d expected … I snickered as I realised the enemy wards had actually deflected the blast deeper into the castle, rather than redirect the force back at us. They really hadn’t expected such an attack, I decided. The idea of undermining a castle’s walls wasn’t new, but cramming gunpowder into the mine and detonating it under the walls was.

  “Musketmen, sweep the walls,” I barked. The enemy soldiers were stunned. We had to take them at a run, before it was too late. “Cannoneers, target the inner keep!”

  I nodded to Rupert as the cannons started firing again. A handful aimed canister shot into the shattered walls, hoping to kill anyone who’d survived the blast, while the remainder directed cannonballs into the inner building. I was unsure if they were as heavily warded as the outer wards, but it didn’t matter.

  We’d breached the walls. A smart enemy would be trying to surrender now, to g
et the white flag into the air before we plunged through the walls and into the keep. If they refused to surrender, we would be quite within our rights to kill everyone inside the building without even trying to take them prisoner.

  They’ve nowhere to go, I thought, as I rallied my skirmishers. All they can do now is hurt us as much as possible before we kill them all.

  I raised my hand, feeling the air shake as my troops braced themselves. They looked eager to get to grips with the enemy … that wouldn’t last, I was sure.

  House-to-house combat was never fun, even if you had body armour and microscopic drones and all the other toys that had been tried and tested in the Middle East.

  Urban warfare cut the advantages of modern technology down to almost nothing … I told myself not to be so pessimistic. The enemy didn’t have AK-47s or IEDs or anything along those lines either.

  “Follow me,” I shouted. It was hardly professional, but I didn’t give a damn.

  “Charge!”

  The men cheered as I led them towards the smoking remnants of the mine, musket balls cracking over our heads as the musketmen sought to cover us. My ears ached as I plunged through the crater, then scrambled up the far side and into the castle, eyes sweeping from side to side for potential threats. It looked like the building had been torn right open by the blast; walls scorched and battered, doors lying on the floor in ruins. I led my men onwards, directing half of them to seize the upper levels while the remainder held upon the breach to allow more and more invaders to enter the castle. If the defenders weren’t going to surrender, they’d have to muster a counterattack before we solidified our foothold and started to take the rest of the castle.

  I led the way down the corridor and stepped into a mini-courtyard, looking as if someone had screwed up the plans when the castle had been put together. There was hardly any space for anything, as far as I could tell. I heard a shout a moment later and saw men boiling out of the far door, urged on by someone remaining safely at the rear. I raised my pistol and shot him, then barked orders to my men as the attackers started to slow in confusion. My men opened fire a second later, musket and flintlock balls tearing though the attackers and sending them crashing to the ground. Another man appeared, waving his hand to snatch a fireball out of nowhere and hurl it at me. I blinked at it, stunned, then ducked sharply as it shot over my head and crashed into a far wall. An instant later, another fireball burned his head to a crisp.

  I looked back. Fallon was standing there, looking pleased with herself. My lips moved soundlessly. I hadn’t expected her to follow me. She really shouldn’t have followed me. And yet, she’d saved my life. If she could do that

  … I nodded to her – this was neither the time nor the place for an argument –

  then started barking orders again as reinforcements kept flowing into the castle. We needed to push onwards before the defenders started to rally again.

  “Surrender,” I bellowed. My parade ground voice was loud, but practically lost amidst the din of battle. “Surrender and your lives will be spared!”

  I heard some angry muttering behind me. I ignored it. I didn’t particularly want to sack the castle. I certainly didn’t want my men to get into bad habits by raping and slaughtering what remained of the castle’s population. If they were prepared to surrender, I’d accept it instead of forcing them to fight to the last. The warlord himself shouldn’t live past the fighting – my ancestors had had no shortage of problems when the old ruling caste hadn’t been uprooted and destroyed – but there were innocents in his castle. Even his men were only following orders. Here, it excused everything.

  We charged across the courtyard and crashed into the next building. A man stepped out of the darkness and swung a blade at me. I darted back, wishing I’d spent more time on my swordsmanship, then shot him through the head. I should have brought an axe instead, something I could use without spending weeks in training … I put the thought out of my head as more and more men blocked our way, forcing us to clear them out with musket balls, swords and makeshift grenades. It was damn lucky, I reflected as we pushed onwards, that the warlord had frittered away most of his time. The castle was hard enough to take, even though we’d broken the walls. If he’d taken the task seriously, we might have been in real trouble.

  Darkness fell as we pushed our way further into the castle, crying out for them to see sense and surrender. I gritted my teeth, directing my men to light torches even though it posed a very real risk of giving away our positions. The fighting was growing increasingly chaotic, I knew; I was losing control, if I’d ever really had it. We crashed into a small hall and encountered a bunch of terrified servants, men and women who stared at us in fear. I detailed a handful of men to escort most of the servants out of the castle, back to our lines. The remaining two looked … reasonable.

  I met their eyes. “Where is Aldred?”

  They stared at me, caught between fear of us – the invaders – and their masters.

  I reached into my pouch and produced a handful of gold coins, holding them out to them. Someone gasped behind me. It was more gold than they’d seen in their entire lives, I was sure. They had to be wondering if I’d take their answers and simply slit their throats, rather than actually keeping my side of the deal.

  And yet … there was enough money, resting in my palm, to let them start a new life somewhere well away from their former master.

  “He’s in the throne room,” one of the servants stammered. “I … I can take you there.”

  “Good.” I passed him the coins, ignoring the other servant’s sputtered protests. He’d had his chance. “Lead on. And no detours along the way.”

  The servant nodded and led us down the corridor, then pushed a tapestry aside to reveal a hidden door. I clutched my sword tightly in one hand as we stepped into a darkened passageway, all too aware we could be walking straight into a trap. The servant passageway – I’d seen them in Rupert’s mansion – was just too narrow for us to walk in anything other than single file. I promised myself I’d bury my sword in the servant’s back, if it turned out he was trying to con us.

  He wouldn’t get away with it.

  I felt the air shifting, slightly, as more cannonballs crashed into the keep.

  It was hard to believe, despite the noise, that we weren’t alone within the castle, that we weren’t trapped within a confined space. I’d never been claustrophobic, but it was still a relief when we reached the upper floor. The servant stopped beside a heavy wooden door and tried to open it. It didn’t budge. The bolts on the far side, I realised after a quick inspection, had been firmly shoved into place.

  The servant started to stammer. “Sir, I …”

  “It’s quite all right,” I assured him. I would have been more concerned if the hidden door hadn’t been bolted. “What’s on the far side?”

  “His lordship’s bedroom,” the servant said. “He … ah … uses the tunnels to see his mistresses.”

  Mistresses, I thought. How many does he have?

  “Tell me about the layout,” I said, keeping my voice hushed. The walls were thick, but there was no guarantee we couldn’t be overheard. “What’s on the far side.”

  I listened, then nodded to Fallon. “Open this door.”

  Fallon pointed a finger at the door. I felt my ears pop, an instant before an invisible force crashed into the wood and blasted it open. I would have preferred something a little more subtle – the noise had been loud enough to be heard for quite some distance – but beggars can’t be choosers. I jumped through the wrecked door, looking around for possible threats. The chamber was incredibly gaudy, gold and purple everywhere. Purple was the royal colour, if I recalled correctly. Having so much of it here was a clear sign the warlord had his eye on the throne, as well as absolutely no taste whatsoever. I’d have been embarrassed to rest my head on his bed. I was pretty sure he didn’t have anyone willing and able to tell him his room looked dreadful.

  He’s a warlord with a habit of chopping of
f heads, I thought, as another round of cannonballs crashed into the walls. No one is going to say anything even mildly critical to him if they can help it.

  I glanced at the men, then led them forward into the next room. A maid stared

  at us, her eyes uncomprehending, then dropped to the ground in a faint. I had the feeling she was faking it, but I didn’t have time to check. Instead, we hurried over her body and straight onto the next room. Warlord Aldred sat on a golden throne, every inch a pretender to the real throne; a handful of men in fancy uniforms were pressed against the far wall. The warlord’s presence pervaded the chamber. I was sure he would have made a bid for the kingship if he’d thought he’d get away with it.

  He stood, drawing his sword. I studied him thoughtfully. His paintings weren’t particularly accurate, I noted; he was neither fashionably thin or so fat he might as well be a danger to shipping. His body was thick, but most of it looked to be muscle. He carried his sword as if he knew what to do with it. I was pretty sure he did. Rupert had been taught how to use a sword from birth and his birthplace was reasonably civilised. Aldred had grown up knowing that anyone, even his nearest and dearest, could become an enemy at the drop of a hat.

  It isn’t an excuse, I told myself, firmly. I could understand why everyone from Hitler and Stalin to Saddam and Castro had done the horrible things they’d done, but understanding didn’t bring forgiveness. Quite the opposite. And even if was, there would still have to be a reckoning.