Imager’s Battalion

20

For Quaeryt, the glasses between the time he briefed his officers and sunset seemed to drag by endlessly. The local forces remained behind their stoneworks, barely glimpsed so that it was not obvious how many troops there might be, and after the use of archers, Skarpa, Meinyt, and Quaeryt had to assume that they were well trained.

Skarpa did not send out the scouts with reeds until full dark, close to eighth glass. By then, Quaeryt had slipped away from Fifth Battalion and raised a personal concealment shield to walk up along the side of the road, just far enough so that he could watch the scouts. If the Bovarians saw the scouts, their sentries or lookouts gave no indication, or none that he could see or hear.

That bothered Quaeryt. What if they’ve already anticipated a night attack? What would they do?

Unfortunately, he had too many ideas of what might come. So he watched the scouts and where they placed the reeds. That placement confirmed his suspicions, because there were no reeds closer than four yards to the road, and none at all on the river side. That indicated, as Skarpa had surmised, the defense strategy was to funnel attackers onto the road, with a possible bombardment of Antiagon Fire … and there was no way to tell if the attacks, countermeasures, and defenses Quaeryt had planned for the imagers would work.

Once the scouts moved beyond what he could see in the dim light, Quaeryt walked back to where Fifth Battalion waited, lifting the concealment before he was close enough so that anyone might see him reappear, and waited with Zhelan and the imagers.

Another glass passed before the scouts returned, and Quaeryt formed up Fifth company, as silently as possible. First company led the way for Fifth Battalion, with the imagers riding the right flank of the company, on the shoulder of the road, escorted by half a squad from first company. Quaeryt led the imagers, riding almost even with the front rank of first company. The plan of attack was simple enough-to get enough riders high enough on the slope to be above the stone walls so that they could swing and ride down from behind, trapping the defenders between their walls and their other defenses.

In the stillness of the night, with both Artiema and Erion less than a quarter full, the sound of hooves on the road echoed like thunder in Quaeryt’s ears, although he kept telling himself that the mounts were walking slowly and that the sound was nowhere near that loud. It couldn’t have been, because first company reached a point on the road less than three hundred yards below the walls, without any outcry or action from the defenders.

Then, Quaeryt thought he heard … something. Out of caution-and fear-he extended his shields across the front rank of first company. Barely had he done so when he felt an impact, followed by a wave of heat and flame as a fire grenade flared across the shields. As he watched, some of the crimson-greenish-yellow fire splashed over the top of his shields and spilled onto riders in the third rank, turning several into instant torches, even as the other riders moved away, helpless to do anything.

“Charge!” ordered Quaeryt, and Zhelan immediately echoed the order.

“Watch the walls!” Quaeryt urged the mare forward, trying to hold his shields to protect the front rank for at least a time. “Image pepper and smoke!” Since he could not see much except the outline of the walls, not with the Antiagon Fire burning a few yards away and the darkness beyond, he could only hope that the undercaptains’ imaging would have some effect.

A fire grenade burst into flame just short of the charging riders. One mount reared, and several others piled into it, but most of the squad managed to avoid the column of fire.

Another grenade rebounded from Quaeryt’s shields, flaring into flame as it slid toward the left shoulder of the road, where it ignited grass and brush. Quaeryt felt as though that fire had burned his face.

Still another grenade arched overhead, heading farther downslope, trailing flames, then exploded above the lead company of Fifth Regiment, with lines of fire falling across the troopers. A second, and a third followed, with more globs of sticky fire raining down on the troopers. Despite the screams of horses being burned, and the jostling to avoid the patches of Antiagon Fire, both regiments moved up the road swiftly.

Quaeryt reined up near the top of the rise, bringing the imagers to a halt against the stone wall at the edge of the bluff and letting first company and the rest of the battalion swing toward the stone walls. As they thundered past, he stood in the stirrups, looking to the walls and trying to locate the catapults, but he could see no frameworks or timber structures, suggesting the catapults were comparatively small.

A handful of defenders rushed forward with pikes. Quaeryt glanced back, then concentrated on imaging the contents of the last grenade back against the defenders. Only about half flared up, but that was enough to unsettle the others. But as they fell back, more pikemen rushed forward to try to halt the oncoming troopers.

Then, in the light of the Antiagon Fire that he had imaged against the pikemen, behind them he saw a figure with a framework and a sling-pouch-what he thought was a one-man trebuchet, or something like it. As the sling-catapult arm went back, Quaeryt imaged away part of the wooden arm, and the sling-pouch swung sideways, and Antiagon Fire flared along the wide trench behind the stone wall, and toward the pikemen.

“More pepper and smoke!” ordered Quaeryt.

Even he spoke, he heard the muffled thwump even before he saw a larger dark globe arc from a larger catapult through the air and strike the shoulder of the road more than a hundred yards downhill from where he watched, then explode into a ball of mixed crimson and yellow-green flames, an incandescence whose heat he could feel from more than a hundred yards away.

What can you do to stop that?

Almost without thinking, he imaged that mass of fire back onto the pikemen-except a good half of it vanished as he did, and there was a loud sizzling and a welter of steam rose around the remaining pikemen.

Why-He didn’t bother to complete the thought. He knew why. All the effort it had taken to image the Antiagon Fire back uphill had created ice around it and the ice had dropped on the edges of the fire.

Another fire grenade slammed against Quaeryt’s shields, and he could feel his control slipping. He contracted them to protect himself, feeling guilty as he did, glancing back in the direction of the sloping meadow and stone walls.

One trooper, trying to escape another fireball, rode off the road and across the grass toward the stone wall. His mount appeared to stumble, and then a gout of flame rose from the concealed pit, immersing man and mount in greenish yellow flames with crimson overshades.

From somewhere in the direction of the town, he heard a horn, and then several squads of men, perhaps a company of cavalry, plunged down the road toward Quaeryt and the troopers of Third Regiment who were pressing past him and toward the stone walls.

“Fourth company! On me! To the right!”

Quaeryt didn’t recognize the officer’s voice, but appreciated the speed and decisiveness of his action.

Even so, close to a squad of Bovarian riders broke past fourth company and rode down the narrow strip between the road and the wall, galloping toward the imagers at full speed.

Although some of the rankers in Third Regiment saw them, Quaeryt realized they wouldn’t react in time. “Imagers! Attack from the town. Image pepper!”

He hoped that they would react quickly, but suspected most wouldn’t be able to change their focus fast enough, and that some were probably already exhausted. He urged the mare forward, widening his shields slightly.

The three leading Bovarians raised blades, markedly longer than Telaryn sabres, and spurred toward him.

Quaeryt aimed the mare between two of them, then let the shields knock them aside. One mount veered into the one closest to the stone wall and that horse crashed into the stone. The remaining Bovarians slashed at Quaeryt, and while he could feel the impact of every blow on his shields, they held. Then he found himself in a small open space short of Third Regiment’s fourth company, in the process of cutting down and routing the Bovarians.

He turned the mare back toward the imager undercaptains, then reined up. The Telaryn troopers had followed him-or enough had-that the Bovarians who had charged the imagers were either wounded or dead. From what he could tell, the Telaryn forces had overrun the stone walls, at least to the extent that no more fireballs had appeared.

After a time, he eased the mare along the wall back toward the undercaptains. Once he returned, he stopped and studied them. Akoryt was slumped over the neck of his mount. But the others were more upright in their saddles, although Shaelyt looked to be shivering … or shuddering.

Sweat dripped from under the visor cap, through his hair, and down Quaeryt’s brow, while tiny flashes of light flickered across his vision. After another glance around, he pulled out his water bottle and took several swallows of watered lager. Several swallows later, the light flashes subsided, but did not entirely vanish.

Should you have continued the charge with the battalion? Even though he knew he’d been able to do more from where he placed the imagers, letting Zhelan lead them had bothered him, much as he knew that the major was far better trained in that than he was, and that he’d survived by imaging skill and not skill in leadership or arms. He was also aware that he was getting tired, and that any more imaging might not be possible.

His eyes scanned the slope and stone walls once more.

The night had taken on a muted lurid light, with patches of Antiagon Fire still burning here and there, and other fires that had spread through the drier vegetation. The various kinds of smoke billowed and swirled in an unpleasant and acrid mixture.

Quaeryt’s head ached so much that he could barely see. His eyes burned from the smoke, and his guts were churning from the odor of burned flesh. Through tearing eyes, he tried to make out the walls, but in the gloom from all the dying embers, he could make out little, except that it was clear that the Bovarians and Antiagons had broken and were fleeing … and that there was little more that he could do for the moment.

Several defenders fled downhill. In the dim light, Quaeryt saw one man flail and then disappear into a hidden pit. With all the sound of horses, riders, and weapons, he couldn’t hear if the Bovarian cried out.

“Sir?” asked Voltyr, moving his mount up past the leading rank of the squad protecting the imagers. “Do we need to do anything more?”

Can any of you? Quaeryt didn’t ask that. He turned. “Not now. I hope not. We’ll see.” He glanced at the fires and the smoke and stifled a cough. Was there any way he could project small shields away from him-to stop the fire grenades right after they were launched, so that they would explode then and shower fire on the Antiagons? Should he have thought of that earlier?

It wouldn’t have mattered. You’d have to see them much earlier than you could in the dark. He shook his head. You need to teach some of the imagers about shields. At least, Voltyr and Shaelyt … and the others later. Some of them might have noticed the way the fire hadn’t struck him, but in the darkness, they couldn’t have been certain, and he doubted that they’d been looking at him all the time, not in a battle. Still … that was another problem.

He took a deep breath.

He was still watching the last of what appeared to have degenerated into a slaughter two quints later when Zhelan rode back out of the heavier smoke that surrounded the stone walls.

The major reined up. “Sir … the area is ours. Those defenders who remain are dead or in no way able to fight.”

“What did it cost?” asked Quaeryt. “Do you know yet?”

“No, sir, but it looks worse than it was. Ghaelyn reports he lost ten men and has five wounded. The Khellans … they don’t know yet.”

“You did better than I hoped, leading the attack.” Ghaelyn’s casualties didn’t sound too bad, not when he’d been the first to reach the defenders, but Quaeryt worried about exactly why the Khellans didn’t know. Hunting down fleeing Bovarians?

“They were bunched in too tight, and got in each other’s way. The smoke and pepper helped. At first, they couldn’t see much.” Zhelan paused. “If there’s nothing else, sir?”

Quaeryt managed a laugh. “Trying to gather up the Khellans?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Go…”

Less than half a quint after Zhelan vanished into the lurid gloom and smoke, Skarpa rode over to Quaeryt and reined up. “A good third of the survivors, it looks, have run down into those woods. Those who are left.”

“You don’t want to send troopers in there in the dark?”

“Would you?”

Quaeryt wouldn’t. “Are there any of their catapults intact? Or any fire grenades left? That’s about the only thing you might do. You might see if you could use their catapults and drop the Antiagon Fire grenades into the woods. There’s enough open ground between where the trees end and the town proper. Then have the men wait for them to come out.”

“The fire could still spread to the town, and we might lose men trying to figure out how to use them.”

“It could,” said Quaeryt. “And you could lose more men in the woods. Or you could post men around the woods and wait.”

“And we could wait for days or weeks.”

Quaeryt nodded. “Or you could just let them hide and slip away. Just post a company or two between the woods and the town.”

“Your imagers can’t do anything?”

“They’re spent.”

“I’d rather not endanger the town. We may be here for a while. And I’d rather not burn the survivors out. Would you?”

“No. It’s one thing in battle, another afterward.” Quaeryt snorted. “Not that Kharst would see the difference or care.” The wind swirled around him, blowing past him from the northeast. He glanced at the meadow and the fires still burning in front of the stone walls, then said, “You may not have a choice if the wind continues.”

Skarpa shook his head. “Rather not have that happen. If they surrender, we’ll have a few days to work out something.” He paused, then said, “Even in the dark, you look like something the Namer dragged in.”

Quaeryt laughed hoarsely, then blotted his eyes with his sleeve.

“Once you’ve got your battalion back together, why don’t you see if you can find quarters or the like for them.” Skarpa’s last words were not a question.

“Yes, sir.”

Quaeryt couldn’t disagree. Every moment was an effort. He watched as the commander rode toward the slightly higher ground behind the devastation around the stone walls. He just hoped the Khellans hadn’t gotten too out of hand, but in the smoke and darkness there was no way he was going to be able to track them down.

He could only deal with it later-if they had exceeded his orders-after the fact, because he was in no shape to do anything else.

That bothered him as well.