In a place where generations of smugglers had improved upon and shortened the former game trail through the expedient of digging a cut through a knob and deeply ditching on each side to prevent erosion from restoring the natural contours, a deadly chorus of twanging bowstrings and the hissing hum of whirling slings heralded the descent of a shower of death from within the woods atop the slope to the right.
Looking back to see dozens of his men flopping and screaming or lying still, sprawled unnaturally in the dust, Barnz waved his long sword horizontally and roared to his subordinates, “Ditch to the right flank. Get them into it, the dartmen. Get our archers into the left-flank ditch and get them returning fire at the bastards.” But then, as the first men to obey his orders hurled themselves into the brushy ditches, Barnz and those men received another painful surprise.
Dartman Seth of Libberyburk had just been remarking to his marching companion, Dee Lainee, that the brush-filled ditches would make splendid habitats for snakes. But now Dartman Dee lay in the roadway, coughing out his life with an arrow transfixing his throat, and Seth forgot the possibility of snakes diving into the protection offered by that same ditch. Seth began to scream, however, even before his body struck the ground. He screamed with the white-hot agony of some something piercing through his leather trousers into and then through the flesh and muscles of his thigh. And his was but one in a veritable chorus of screams and shrieks from up and down the lengths of -both roadside ditches.
Those men unhurt cleared away the brush to find that it concealed a thick sowing of solid wooden stakes, the sharp ends of which had apparently, from the look and the stink, been soaked in fermenting dung.
With at least half of his command dead or wounded from arrow or slingstone or the devilish stakes, Captain Barnz halted his survivors where they lay. Let the main column catch up with htm. His contract with Duke Alex committed him and his regiment to siege warfare not the steady and costly attrition of counter-guerrilla combat.
But the noble nincompoop in command of the detachment of Duke Alex’s marines profanely insisted that the wounded be left behind for the main column to collect if the enemy had not slowly butchered them by that time, while the hale men pressed forward into the forbidding country ahead. When Barnz, no less profanely, had made it clear that where he and his much reduced three companies were was where they were going to stay until the arrival of the main force, the fuming young officer formed up his detachment and went I marching up the road. No one ever saw any of that detachment again.
That night, in one among the labyrinth of bluff caves, Count Martuhn squatted, his eyes smarting at the smoke of the fire before him but showing a rare grin withal.
“We’ve slowed them and stung them, which is about all that I aimed for to start We just lack the strength to do more.”
Nahseer nodded. “Were all the lands between here and the city broken, hilly and wooded with but a single, narrow track, we might continue to nibble away at them until they broke and mutinied or, at least, lost heart for a protracted war. But once they are through the saddle there, it were suicide to attempt opposition. We are far too few and mostly unmounted, and their horsemen would ride us down at will.”
When, shortly after he and the boys rode in with Wolf, the Zahrtohgahn had lowered his mindshield that Martuhn might survey his training and experience, the new-made Count of Twocityport had quickly realized just what a treasure had fallen into his hands and had willingly entrusted the delaying action to his newest lieutenant, leaving him and Sir Wolf free to attend to the multitudinous minutiae attendant to preparing the fortress and its garrison for a siege of uncertain length. But when, after the first messenger to deliver word that the enemy fleet was standing off the beach below the bluffs was not followed by another, Martuhn had taken a small escort and ridden up to the cave that had been marked on the maps to serve as Nahseer’s headquarters. The Zahrtohgahn had simply said, “I sent you word that they were about to land, my captain, and they landed, although we made that landing difficult, time-consuming and costly to them. But nothing untoward happened after that and I had suffered no casualties, so I could see no reason to afflict you with a horde of riders who could only have told you that our affairs here were proceeding as planned. Did I displease you, sir?” “You displease me?” Martuhn shook his head vehemently. “Anything but, my good Lieutenant Nahseer. But it has been so long since I have had any officer save Sir Wolf who was capable of thinking on his feet and properly handling a protracted action without seeking my help or advice that it is difficult for me to reaccustom myself to one such as you.”
Changing the subject, he asked, “And how are our little nomads faring? I was loath to send boys so young on this mission. Wouldn’t have, had not you and Wolf been so insistent.”
Nahseer smiled. “Bahb and Djoh, for all their tender years, are the best archers I command and better field soldiers than men two and three times their ages. They both have shown a quick, sure grasp of tactical principles, and the fact that they are telepaths, as am I, allows me far better view over and control of an ambuscade than any nontelepathic commander could have.” Martuhn nodded. “I know that feeling well, my friend. The fact that Wolf and I can communicate silently and over a distance has been vitally useful on more than one occasion over the years.
“But getting back to the subject that brought me up here, you do plan to withdraw before the enemy reaches the plain and traps you with cavalry? I could ill afford to lose so many archers and missilemen out of my garrison at the citadel.”
“And I,” replied Nahseer, “have no slightest desire to die trying to digest a lance point. For all the joy it has given me to once again command warriors independently, when the van of the Traderstown army comes within sight of the gap,, my rear guard and I will assuredly spur for the citadel; the main body should be there by then. I doubt me not that the wagons bearing those engines that served us so well are at the gates even as we speak.”
Martuhn, much relieved of mind and feeling even more blessed in Wolfs finding of the huge, tough and intelligent Zahrtohgahn, rested men and horses through the rest of the night and set out for Twocityport with the first light of the new day. While he would have enjoyed the acceptance of his new subordinate’s offer to stay and watch the last big ambush of the enemy, he had ever been a slave to duty and he knew that there was much yet to be done in the citadel.
10
Stehfahnah awoke shivering lying on the floor -beside the cold hearth, but her first instinctive movements set off such waves of blinding red agony in her head that she sank sobbing back onto the icy floor of packed earth. It was some time before the twin forces of her will and the cold enveloping her naked body could force her to risk again the crippling effect of that hellish pain. And it was even longer before she could will herself to rise to a huddled sitting position, the lowest part of her back pressed against the mortared stones of the hearth, her arms hugging her small breasts, rocking and moaning softly with the rhythm of the splitting pains in her head, even while her white teeth chattered and the rest of her shuddered with the agony of the cold. Finally, after what seemed to be eons of time wherein a third force, that of raging thirst, commenced to drive her, she commenced a snail-like crawl to where the water skin hung. It required every ounce of her strength to pull her body up onto her wobbling legs, but the first cool gush of water into the dry desert her mouth and throat had become revived and revitalized her to a great extent, though it did nothing to alleviate the pain.
She wisely decided not to try walking yet. Rather did she sink back as gently as possible onto her haunches, then crawled over to the bed and the precious warmth of its thick blankets. Hardly had she wrapped herself against the cold than consciousness again left her and awareness of the pain with it Thump, came the loud noise. Thump thump thump, THUMP. Stehfahnah slowly came awake, dragged back to awareness by the insistent thumpings. Then the adrenalin rush of fear brought her upright on the bed. The man, he was trying to break down the door!