“Leave him,” I said. “If you don’t mind, I’ll accompany you today. I don’t want to spend the day in the castle, listening to falling rock. And if I get a chance to swing my blade a few more times in the right direction—”
“All right.” He chuckled humorlessly. “I’m sure we can find something for you to do.”
The grooms had emptied the stables during the night. Our horses were penned with the cavalry’s mounts outside in the main camp. Davin joined us in the courtyard, now littered with fallen stone, and together the three of us walked out toward the military camp.
The sky grew lighter. I saw that the clouds still swirled endlessly overhead.
Halfway to the army camp, the lightning started again behind us. I glanced over my shoulder at the castle, as bolt after bolt of blue lanced from the sky, striking the tallest towers. More stones fell, raising clouds of dust. I didn’t envy those still inside. I knew it wouldn’t be a pleasant day for them.
Ahead, horns began to sound.
“That’s an attack!” Locke cried, recognizing the call to arms and sprinting for the pens of horses.
Davin and I followed on his heels.
Chapter 19
By the time we reached the horses, the grooms had already saddled Locke’s black stallion. Locke mounted without hesitation and took off at a gallop.
Davin and I waited impatiently for our own horses to be readied. “Does anyone know what’s happening?” I called, but none of the grooms or the soldiers at nearby tents spoke up. The soldiers were grimly putting on armor and buckling on their weapons.
Finally our horses were ready, and we took off after Locke. It didn’t take us long to find the command tent, and when we ducked through the flaps, we found our brother barking orders.
“They’re marching on our men to the north,” he said to Davin.
“The recruits?” Davin paled. “They’re not ready!”
“They’ve just become our front lines. Muster the Wolves, Bears, and Panthers. We need archers at the fore. Put them… put them at Beck’s Ridge.”
“Got it.” Davin turned and ran.
Locke looked to me. “You said you fought them for a year. What advice can you give me?”
“Are they on foot or mounted?” I asked.
“Tell him,” Locke said to one of the captains standing before him.
The man turned to me. “Both,” he said. “They have two lines of creatures with pikes marching at the fore. Horsemen with swords ride behind. No archers that I could see.”
“That sounds right,” I said. I swallowed at the sudden lump in my throat. It was just like Ilerium all over again, only larger. There, we had lost battles steadily for a year, and we had been able to fall back as necessary. Here we had a castle to defend. A siege seemed inevitable. And yet, with the lightning blasting the castle to ruin, we would find no safety within its walls.
To Locke, I said, “Their mounted troops are the biggest danger right now. Their horses breathe fire, remember, and they kill men as readily as the riders do.”
“Then I’ll have our archers take out as many horses and riders as they can,” Locke said.
“Fight the horsemen with two weapons,” I continued. “Keep a knife pointed at the horse and it won’t come too close. The riders are strong and like to beat down their opponents, so keep moving and keep them off-balance. Fight two or three on one.”
“What weapons are best?” the captain asked.
“Spears, pikes, and arrows.” I glanced at Locke. “How many archers do you have, anyway?”
“Five thousand, more or less.”
I whistled. “That many!” For the first time, I felt a surge of hope. “It may be enough.”
“Best guess at their numbers?” Locke asked the captain.
“Maybe ten thousand, from what I saw. We outnumber them.”
Locke frowned. “That’s too few,” he said. “There should be more. They’ve scouted us. They know how many we have.”
Horns began to sound again outside. A runner came through the flaps.
Gasping for breath, half bent over with his hands on his knees, he managed to say: “More of them marching against us, General! From the east and the south! Thousands!”
Nodding like he’d expected it, Locke rose. “Sound the ready call. We march in five minutes. Split the forces evenly in thirds. Archers to the front, pikes and spears behind. I’ll lead the west, Davin the east. Oberon, will you take the south?”
“Yes,” I said.
He nodded. “We’ll pick off as many as we can with the archers. Keep falling back around the castle. If necessary, we’ll regroup there and make our stand.”
“All right,” I said.
“Parketh,” he said to one of his aides, “find Lord Oberon some armor. Move!”
The number of men assigned to my command—nearly twenty-five thousand infantry, with spears and pikes, plus two thousand archers and a thousand cavalry—seemed impossibly huge, and yet as I rode down the assembled ranks, I couldn’t help but feel it wouldn’t be enough. This attack had been well orchestrated… the hell-creatures knew our numbers, and still they came. Somehow, I thought we had missed some important detail.
Then I glanced up at the sky, at the swirling black mass of clouds over Juniper, and I wondered if they counted on the lightning to help destroy us. If we fell back around the castle, we would certainly be within its range…
No sense worrying about retreat now, I thought with a sigh. If we carried the day, we wouldn’t have to worry about getting too close to the castle.
I reached the end of my troops, raised my sword, and cried, “On to victory!”
The men gave a cheer, then began to march forward, heading south across the fields.
As we neared the woods, troops began to pour from the forest silently, waves of hell-creatures armed with pikes. I saw no sign of their horsemen yet, but I knew they wouldn’t be far behind. We couldn’t wait for them—our archers would have to take out their first wave of attackers.
“Archers ready!” I called, and the bugler sounded my commands so all could hear.
Our front lines dropped to one knee, giving the archers room to aim.
“Fire!” I screamed.
They began to let loose their arrows, huge volleys of them. The front line of hell-creatures fell, but more swarmed from the trees in a seemingly endless black wave.
My archers continued to shoot, but there were too many of the hell-creatures. For every one that fell, five more took his place, advancing on us at a run. And then, behind them, I saw lines of hell-creatures on horseback making their way steadily toward us.
“Sound the call for the pikemen!” I said to the bugler, as their first men neared our lines.
He blew the call, and our archers dropped back. The line of pikemen rushed forward, screaming fierce battle cries. The archers raised their bows and fired over the pike-men’s heads, killing more of the hell-creatures to the rear.
“Hold some arrows back for their horses!” I shouted. “Aim for their mounts whenever you have a clear shot!”
Both sides met in the middle of the field, a huge writhing mass of bodies. From my vantage point on my horse’s back, I saw still more hell-creatures pouring from the forest, although there had to be tens of thousands already fighting.
Our archers kept firing as they found targets, but I held our horsemen back. Their mounts shifted impatiently, eager to charge.
“Steady… steady…” I murmured.
The battle slowly turned in the hell-creatures’ favor. Half my troops had fallen, and the remaining half seemed badly outnumbered. The archers had begun to fall back; they couldn’t pick out targets easily. I knew the time had come to send in my horsemen.
“Sound the charge,” I said, raising my sword.
To the wailing call of the horn, I spurred my own mount, and together with my two thousand cavalrymen, I rode into the battle.