Breaking an Empire (3 page)

By the time the first strike impacted, another was in the air and the bombardment had begun. Again, winds tore at the spheres, breaking and diverting their course, but two more impacted, and these struck tighter clumps of troops than the first. Men screamed as fire engulfed them, and within seconds charred skeletons were all that remained. Above those cries of pain rose the sound of a horn, and the soldiers who manned the ridge slipped behind the crest, pulling their dead and wounded with them. Glanhaol Fflamboethi had won this day.

Rhyfelwyr made a little note in the mental scorecard, wherein lay all the battles, skirmishes, and other conflicts in which he had been involved. Today was an empty victory, a light wounding and no more.

A horn sounded and the squads picked up their feet. They stopped atop the hill so recently vacated, and watched their enemy retreat. There was no undignified flight, only orderly withdrawal, and over the distance gestures and shouts were exchanged, crude and inventive alike. The Lianese disappeared into the gathering dusk, and orders came down to form a fortress ring about the camp. That would become life from now on, always expecting attack.

***

Rhyfelwyr started awake, grasped his sword and dove from his sleeping roll. Nearby lay a burning tent, smashed by a barrel of ignited pitch. Cries went up as another barrel arced high overhead, impacting a cooking fire and splashing flames across the quarters nearby.

Rhy beat at the flames, and was soon joined by Llofruddiwr and Gwyth, using bedding and boots to stamp out the fire. There were no more attacks, but the sergeant was cursing all the same. Tonight, Niam Liad had stolen the victory from Glanhaol Fflamboethi. The Veryan soldiers would fall asleep wondering if their tent was next. A small attack, but large damage to moral.

***

Several days passed as both forces took stock of their foe. Occasional skirmishes happened between scouting parties, although one side or another usually withdrew. It was a strange battlefield, two enemies staring at one another for days on end. Taflen wondered if the Lianese sought to draw the army into the jaws of a trap. Rhyfelwyr and Locsyn waved away that notion, not though bravado, but because it seemed unlikely the Lianese could trap such a force as Glanhaol Fflamboethi. To ease all their minds, Rhy sent Llofruddiwr on a scouting mission.

The assassin returned late, sneaking through the sentries to appear at the cook fire. Questioning glances answered his arrival. “If something is going on, the line soldiers don’t know it. They’re wondering why no raids are taking place.” After his longest speech in months, Llofruddiwr disappeared into taciturnity. Gwyth grumbled and grabbed a sharpening stone, grinding it down the edge of his axe with a loud squeal. “So they’re planning something. Bugger.”

The other veterans nodded, while Rhocas piped up. “If their soldiers don’t know what they’re planning, we’re fine. Aren’t we? After all, it can’t happen soon.”

Rhyfelwyr shook his head, while Locsyn answered. “Doesn’t need to be ‘soon’. Just needs to happen. Later might be worse for us, longer to retreat. Better hope our officers have their heads out where they can see.”

Taflen shuffled through the scrolls in his mind, retrieving information. “There are options in a military conflict that only occur when on the defensive. There’s also the possibility of drawing us into a pincer trap. Our biggest problem is their small force retreats at the same speed we move ahead. It allows them to block our scouting attempts, so we are blind to what we walk into. Overall, we are acting as they wish. Confidence is good, but I think our commanders might place too much faith in the strength of our soldiers. Brilliant soldering can’t overcome foolish leadership.” With Taflen’s words of encouragement ringing in their eyes, the squad settled down to sleep.

***

The land around them changed, growing green and fertile, with cool breezes and clouds scudding overhead. The army had reached the great plains north of the peninsula, and a week’s march ahead stood the city of Miath Mhor. It was the first target in Bhreac Veryan’s reconquest of Niam Liad, and where the Lianese army would be forced to turn and fight. Grim eagerness swept through the ranks of Glanhaol Fflamboethi as each man sensed the coming battle. The air filled with the sounds of stones shrieking on swords, armour being examined and polished, and the clash of weapons sparring. After more than two months of marching, the soldiers wanted combat.

Three days later the Lianese gave notice they would stand firm, slicing at the vanguard and the scouts before withdrawing with undue haste. Rhyfelwyr bloodied his sword in that fight, catching a skirmisher in the thigh. It had not been a deep cut, but the impact reminded him of how everything could change in battle. No others in the squad had bloodied their weapons, although a tongue of flame had seemed to reach from Rhocas as part of a blow. Taflen and Locsyn both said they saw nothing, and so Rhyfelwyr discounted it as a glint from the sun. Either that, or a firemage had been near the front and he hadn’t noticed.

That night saw one last bout of preparation, before the long, hard time of waiting. Gwyth tugged on each strap of his armour till it seemed they would tear, checking them over and over. Taflen had fallen into a meditative state, running through each and every possible contortion to the battle that might occur, readying those ideas that felt most useful. Llofruddiwr and Locsyn had fallen asleep hours ago, unphased by the coming conflict. Locsyn’s moustache bounced as he snored, a loud rumble cutting through speech. Rhocas stood, sat, paced, went through the training cuts with his weapon, jogged to the sentries to look towards the enemy camp, always to report “No change”. Gwyth tired of the skipping energy and bade Rhocas sleep. He would need the energy on the morrow.

The next morning’s dawn saw the vanguard in the centre of the line of battle, with the main bulk of the army spread to the left and right in flanking wings, serried blocks many men deep. Across from them was the thinner, yet still large, line of the Lianese army, their banners and armament a motley array compared to the insectoid armour of Bhreac Veryan. It looked to be an easy day tactically, for both sides had arrayed their regiments to roll up one end of the opposition, crumpling them from the outside in. Taflen wondered what the Lianese might have to change the balance in their favour, but dismissed those thoughts when the horn sounded “Slow March”.

With the tramp of measured feet, Glanhaol Fflamboethi surged into life, a rippling motion all along the shield wall as soldiers took their first step. The great mass trundled forward, closing the gap to their foe. A trumpet blew amongst the Lianese, and they in turn marched forth, banners cracking in the high breeze, the snap of flags audible over the rumble of marching troops. Soon there was but a quarter-mile between the two forces, and the horn for “Quick March” rang out.

Rhyfelwyr picked up his pace, and felt those around him do the same. As he did, he let his hand draw and cradle one of the glass globes that hung in leather pouches at his waist. Filled with glass dust and broken shards, the spheres would fracture on striking, spraying their contents across those near the point of impact. All around, Rhy sensed the unlimbering of weapons as that quarter mile shrank away, until only a hundred yards separated one foe from another. He could see Lianese javelins being pulled from their cases, held high in throwing hands in anticipation of release.

The cry came for “Assault”, and the battle was upon them.

Arrows and javelins flew through the air, and Veryan soldiers lifted their shields to catch the incoming darts. Most skipped off shields or armour, but some struck true, and the screams of the injured and the dying began to fill the air. Locsyn and Rhyfelwyr felt the old sensations again, the weight of all their previous battles come forward to claim this moment as their own, to add it to the tally that each carried within. A sigh escaped Locsyn’s lips at the sadness of it all, but he lowered his shield and threw his momentum into the toss, sending the glass sphere flying to burst in a cloud of painful dust across the enemy line. Others from Bhreac Veryan had done the same, and up and down the Lianese line soldiers coughed and cursed and scratched at their throat and face, and some began coughing blood as the razor-edged clouds ripped apart their lungs.

The Veryan army paused its headlong rush, bracing itself to take the impact of the disorganized Lianese charge, the front ranks ripped apart by the salvo of spheres. A silence descended on the field for a moment, a quiet as if all sound had been pulled away, only to return with a mighty crash as the Lianese attack smashed into the shield wall of Glanhaol Fflamboethi. The shield wall bent, pushed by the momentum of the attackers, but soon righted itself and began driving into lightly armoured Lianese.

Slightly to the right of centre, Rhyfelwyr’s squad was set three in the first rank, three behind. The sergeant, Locsyn, and Gwyth stood solid in the front, warding blows with their shields and striking back with short sword thrusts. Reaching over their shoulders, the other three soldiers struck and struck hard, making the Veryan wall a forest of stabbing blades.

Rhocas stood very pale, his face twisted as his arm rose and fell in the mechanical motions of the training ground. He had seen but a few brief moments of fighting in the skirmish the day before, and this cacophony of noises and sounds overwhelmed his senses. He stood wondering at the why of it all, for this battle was against those who had been friends mere seasons ago. Rhocas could feel his optimism being stripped away with each stroke. How could this be some grand adventure, when he did nothing more than stab people when they weren’t looking? It was a sordid battle, and the groans and the shrieks made his stomach roil and churn until he became sick. Another soldier stepped around Rhocas and into his place in line, and the war continued, never missing a beat.

Shaking his head, Taflen continued his methodical strikes over the arms of Gwyth, waiting until he had a wide opening. The historian had seen many battles and read countless more. Not the sanitized reports that appeared in publications and histories, but the personal accounts of the soldiers who had been there, the heartfelt and gruesome stories of survival. He used those now to build a wall about his mind, composing his tale of the battle. Later this night he would venture around the campfires, asking soldiers for their impressions of the day, before sleep robbed the images of reality.

Their blades hacking and slashing, stripped of any grace but brute efficiency, Rhyfelwyr, Gwyth, and Locsyn forced their enemies back, driving the Lianese soldiers, grinding them against the mass of the army behind. The shield wall had begun to break, organization lost as the battle became muddied, a long spate of conflict where encirclements in miniature took place.

This stand and brawl combat was suited to Veryan temperaments, and it showed on the field that day, as the Lianese soldiers began to lose heart, dropping their weapons and fleeing towards Miath Mhor. Llofruddiwr shrugged, for those who fled would likely be caught before they reached the city, and those who weren’t would put an undue burden on the resources there. Either way, it was good for the soldiers of Glanhaol Fflamboethi.

Gwyth breathed heavily, his weapon stained with the blood of many foes, and exhaustion slowed his axe and shield, making each parry feel as if it took an age, each counter unbearable in its crawling. The only reason he still stood with little more than nicks and cuts was that those Lianese he faced were as tired, and for that Gwyth was thankful. He pressed forward all the same, letting his arms do their work. For that was combat to Gwyth, nothing more than work. It involved killing, yes, but that was a minor part of marching and practising.

As Rhyfelwyr had feared, their attachment to the rest of the army became tenuous. Fighting spilled behind the squad, and the six of them had to become a circle, moving slowly through the Lianese forces. Thankfully, this close to the front line most were already engaged, and so the fighting was no more hectic than in the shield wall.

An arrow clipped off Taflen’s shield, and he saw a small band of archers and javelin throwers gathering themselves to strike the squad’s huddled mass. “Shields!” came the cry, and the initial volley skittered away, leaving scrapes and nothing more. Rhyfelwyr called “Charge!”, and the six men thundered down on the skirmishers, their shields held to ward incoming projectiles. The archers stood their ground, firing another volley. Rhocas screamed, an arrow piercing him through the calf. Llofruddiwr slowed his charge, grabbed the recruit by the arm, and dragged him into a hopping run.

Using his free hand, Llofruddiwr flung daggers at the archers, daggers that had been hidden in his many sheaths. Two archers fell beneath the flying knives, while one of the javelin throwers countered by whipping his weapon towards the Veryan soldiers. Gwyth caught it on his shield, but the throw had been so hard that it slammed through, the bolt coming to rest with its tip touching the soldier’s arm. Growling, Gwyth tossed away his shield. Taking his axe in a two-handed grip, he fell amongst the skirmishers, his weapon rising and falling as one after another died beneath that onslaught.

Bereft of his defence, Gwyth took several countering blows, shrugging them off and continuing to kill as Rhyfelwyr and Locsyn arrived, their matched style working through the lightly armoured foes with ease. Soon all who stood near the squad had fled or been killed, and Llofruddiwr began the process of retrieving his knives from various corpses. Surveying the state of his soldiers, Rhy nodded once then gestured towards the advancing Veryan soldiers. “We’ll rest, and get Rhocas to a medic. If they need a pursuit, well, we’ll be in for it. Otherwise, we’ve done our work for the day.” Llofruddiwr and Taflen took Rhocas’s weight, and the squad limped through the shield wall.

Carnage ran rampant as they crossed the fields, the dead and the dying in clumps, where one side or the other had cut away an incursion. Most piles were Lianese soldiers, their bodies gouged by sword blows and left to rot.

Back within their own lines, Rhyfelwyr found a cutter and dragged him over to examine the wounded in the squad. The medic worked quickly, removing the arrow from Rhocas’s leg. Rhocas screamed as the barbs came out, and with it a bright well of blood, flowing once more as the bolt no longer blocked its path. Cleansing herbs were stuffed into the wound, and white cloth bound about. “He’ll be able to walk in a few days, it won’t hinder him much.” The cutter set off for the next screaming soldier.