“How old would I have to be?” he asked.
“I believe most apprentices are fifteen,” Halt told him. “So you have a couple of years to wait.”
“Oh. Right.” Gilan considered that for a few seconds. “Are you planning on taking an apprentice?”
Halt sat straighter in the saddle, surprised by the question. “Not if I can help it,” he muttered. He touched his heels into Abelard’s sides and cantered to where Lorriac had the troop formed up in three files. Gilan followed a few strides behind him, sensing that the subject of his becoming a Ranger was now closed.
Lorriac nodded as Halt drew up to one side. The captain was slouched comfortably in the saddle, facing the assembled troop.
“Ready, Halt?” he asked. Halt made a gesture for him to proceed with his briefing and he raised his voice so that those in the rear of the troop could hear him.
“We’ll travel single file,” Lorriac said. “The Ranger and the battle master’s son will lead the way.”
“His name is Gilan,” Halt said quietly, and Lorriac hesitated, then realized that by referring to Gilan as “the battle master’s son” he might be diminishing the boy’s sense of individuality. He corrected himself, with a nod to the Ranger.
“The Ranger and Gilan, our guide, will lead the way. We’ll follow in this order. Left file first, then the middle file, then the right. I’ll bring up the rear. Sergeants and corporals, keep the men moving. Don’t let them get separated.”
Lorriac had formed the troop up with his best and most reliable men in the left and right files. The shirkers, potential troublemakers and the thoughtless individuals who were always present in any group, he had placed in the center rank. That way, they would be sandwiched between the more reliable troops in front and behind.
“Stay closed up. Don’t cause delays. The trail is marked every five meters by blaze marks on the trees, at eye height.” He glanced at Halt to confirm that this was correct. The Ranger indicated that it was and Lorriac continued. “We want to be through the trees and across the ford within the next two hours. Chances are, Morgarath’s army will attack today and our comrades are going to need us. So if the rider in front of you is slowing you up, poke his horse in the backside with the butt of your spear to get him moving. If that doesn’t work, poke the rider with the point.” There was a muted chuckle from the troopers. He paused, glancing along the triple line of faces. “Questions?”
One trooper raised his hand. “When we reach the ford, do we push on across, or do we wait for you?”
Lorriac glanced at Halt and indicated that he should answer.
“Gilan will cross first,” Halt said, raising his voice, “to make sure there are no deep holes or problems with the ford. Then I’ll wait on the bank on this side while the rest of you go across. There’s more open space for you to form up on the far side.” He glanced at the left-hand file and singled out a sergeant. “Sergeant, you take charge forming them up on the far side. By the time the last man is across, we want to move off.”
They paused, scanning the ranks to see if there were any more questions. Three lines of faces stared back at them. Lorriac raised his right hand and pointed to the forest.
“Ranger, Gilan, lead us out, please.”
Halt and Gilan tapped their heels into their horses’ ribs and cantered toward the trees. Behind them, they heard the jingle of harness and weapons and creaking of saddle leather, as the men began to follow them in a long, snaking file.
They rode into the dimness under the trees. The sudden loss of light caused Gilan to hesitate for a moment, then he made out the first of the white slashes Halt had made in the bark of a tree and his confidence returned. He headed toward it, saw the second marked tree slightly to the right, and urged his horse forward. Halt followed a few strides behind him.
The men grew silent as they moved into the forest, following the slightly zigzag path laid out by their guides. There was no real reason for them to maintain silence, but the dimness and the close presence of the trees tended to inhibit idle conversation.
Halt glanced back over his shoulder. He could see the first ten men behind them, then the irregular path they were taking, and the lack of light, made it difficult to see any farther. But he could hear the noises of horses shoving their way through the undergrowth and the jingle of harness behind him.
“Keep closed up. Keep moving,” he called. Already, he could see that the first few men behind him were leaving greater spacing between them than was necessary. He assumed it would be the same for the men behind them. As he called the order, he heard the sound of voices urging the horses on and the line closed up a little. In the near distance, he heard a sergeant calling the same order.
He was glad now that he’d thought to mark the trees along the path. Using the Northseeker would have been time-consuming and awkward. This way, Gilan could move confidently from one marker to the next, his eyes searching the shadows for the white marks in the darker bark of the trees.
They moved on. Gradually, the sun rose higher, sending its rays slanting down through the forest canopy. Birds began to sing in the trees and the day grew hotter. Halt wiped the perspiration from the back of his neck. The close-growing trees allowed no breeze and he thought that soon he would have to take off his cloak.
Still Gilan moved on, aided by the marks on the trees, and the line of men moved steadily toward the river, twisting first one way, then the other as the track avoided the thickest growth of trees. But always it came back to that constant easterly path.
They came to a small clearing and Gilan paused, looking round the open space for the sight of the next blazed tree. Halt urged Abelard up beside him and smiled encouragingly.
“How are you doing?” he asked.
Gilan was frowning in concentration. Then his face cleared as he saw the next mark and pushed forward. He glanced round at Halt and smiled quickly.
“Fine,” he said. “We should be there soon.”
Halt realized there was no need for him to stay with the lad. Gilan was having no trouble finding the trail. He edged Abelard to one side and let the following men move past him. They were keeping good formation, with only a few strides separating each man from the one following. Then there was a longer gap and he assumed he had reached the beginning of the middle file—the slackers and woolgatherers who would lose concentration and allow the column to get ahead of them.
“Pick it up!” he called abruptly, and the first few men reacted as if they had been stung. He realized that, wrapped in his green-and-gray cloak, sitting astride his unmoving gray horse, he had faded into the background and they had no idea he was there until he spoke.
The startled troopers urged their horses to close the gap between them and the men in front. Halt smiled grimly and remained where he was. Ten men went past, then there was another gap as a trio of riders, having lost sight of the men preceding them, ambled away off the path.
“Wake up!” he snarled, and had the same reaction of sudden surprise. “Keep the line closed up! There’s your next marker! There!” He urged Abelard forward a pace to block their sideways movement and pointed to the next marked tree. Hurriedly, the riders corrected their course and began moving in the right direction. But there was still too big a gap between them and the riders ahead.
“Pace it up!” he snapped at them. They hurried to obey and the men behind them, hearing the anger in the Ranger’s voice, needed no urging to follow them. Halt watched them go, gradually closing up the line, and shook his head in disgust.
“We’ll be in this damn forest all day if they don’t lift their game,” he said. Then, without even checking that he needed to, he snapped once more. “Come on! Close it up!”
Again, the urgent voices of the troopers and the sudden increase in the speed of the horses’ movement told him that he had been right to give the order.
With Halt chivvying and drivi
ng the middle of the column and Gilan keeping a good pace at the head, they reached the bank of the ford just after two hours had passed.
By the time Halt had caught up with the head of the column again, shouting curses and admonishments at the slower riders as he forced his way past them, Gilan had ridden across, testing the ford. Thirty of the troopers were already across with him, forming up under the eye of the sergeant Halt had detailed for the job. As the Ranger had told them, the close-growing trees thinned out somewhat on the far side of the ford. They could see open country beyond.
Gilan had left a trooper by the edge of the river to pass on directions. As Halt began to walk Abelard into the water, the man warned him.
“There’s a deep hole eight meters out from the bank. It drops away quickly, but your horse will manage it. Just be ready for it.”
Halt nodded and rode forward. The men behind him hesitated, giving him a chance to move clear, then followed him into the river. At the point indicated, the water suddenly rose up past Abelard’s body, coming higher than the saddle. Halt held his bow high above him, keeping the string clear of the water. He felt Abelard hesitate, then urged him on. The horse found firm footing and moved with more confidence. Then the bottom of the river rose and he was clear of the water once more, the horse shaking himself violently.
Halt rode up the far side of the ford to where Gilan sat astride his horse, watching anxiously. The Ranger gave him a nod of approval.
“Well done, Gilan. That’s a good morning’s work.”
The boy glowed under the words. Once again, Halt remarked to himself how a few words of praise could do wonders for a young man’s confidence. He dismounted, sat on the ground and took off his boots, pouring the water out of them, then hauling them back on again.
As the men continued to cross, the sergeant chivvied them into formation. Finally, Halt saw Lorriac bringing up the rear. The trooper Gilan had detailed for the job warned him about the deep hole, then followed him into the river. Lorriac rode up the firm sand and glanced at the men, assembled in three files once more, the wet horses steaming under the sun.
“Everyone here?” he asked the sergeant, and received an affirmative answer.
“Then let’s head south again,” the captain said, and trotted his horse to the head of the column, signaling for the front rank to follow him.
With the now-familiar jingle of equipment and harness, the troop rode out.
37
LATE IN THE MORNING, THE WARGAL ARMY BEGAN TO ASSEMBLE on the flat ground on the far side of the ford.
They formed up in three ranks, each consisting of one hundred and fifty troops. Morgarath was committing over half his remaining force to the attack, and the defenders on top of the hill knew this would be a fight to the death. There would be no carefully planned tactics used here. It would be a simple, brutal frontal assault. An attack designed to bludgeon their meager forces and smash its way inside the defensive position.
The command party watched as groups of Wargals lumbered to the wheeled barricades and carried them across the ford. They were easy to handle in the water, as it bore a great deal of their weight. The barricades were placed end to end, with a slight gap between each one. Set that way, they stretched across a front of nearly forty meters.
Once the barricades were across, the rest of the attack force followed, moving in line abreast, and taking their positions behind the barricades. The Wargals who had carried the devices across the river now lifted them again and began to jog up the slope, the ranks of warriors behind them, ready to take shelter behind the protective barriers. The watchers on the hilltop could hear the nerve-grating chant of the Wargals as they advanced.
“Urrgh, urrgh, urrgh-urrgh-urrgh!”
It was repeated over and over, without variation. Crowley fingered an arrow in his quiver, but the enemy was still out of range.
“Wish they’d learn another song,” he said. “I’m tired of this one.”
“It’s certainly not very tuneful,” Arald said. “Why do you suppose they do it?”
“Probably to keep in time. It’s a cadence so they all move together,” Duncan said.
Crowley stared down the hill through slitted eyes. Most of the ground cover on the slope was long grass, slippery underfoot—although the Wargals, with their heavily clawed legs, seemed to have no trouble finding a firm footing. He had marked a small scrubby bush sprouting out of the grass a hundred and twenty meters below them. When the Wargals reached that point, they would be well within range. They were five meters short of the bush now. They were still in open formation, those directly behind the barricades marching upright, so their heads and shoulders were unprotected. As they came level with the bush, and trampled it underfoot, he nocked an arrow, raised his bow, found a target and released. He heard two of the other Rangers shoot as well and silently berated himself for not organizing a full volley from all of them. His shaft hit the target, sending the Wargal he’d selected staggering back down the hill, clutching at the heavy arrow in its throat.
Then the barricades moved together and the Wargals carrying them lowered them until the barricades were rolling on the heavy wheels at either end. The troops massed behind them dropped into a crouch, so they were completely concealed. The grunted cadence became slower and more deliberate now as the barricades rolled forward at a slow walking pace. The archers, under Wearne, released a volley, but the shafts smacked harmlessly into the soaked hides covering the timber frames.
“Save your arrows!” Crowley called.
Wearne repeated the order to his men, then ran forward to speak with the Ranger. “Will we try a plunging volley?” he asked.
Crowley considered the suggestion, frowning. He pointed to where the rear ranks of the advancing Wargals had produced shields and were holding them over their heads for protection against such a ploy.
“Save your arrows until they’re at close range,” he said. “They’ll have to show themselves sooner or later.”
The art of shooting nearly vertically and letting the arrow plunge back to earth with devastating speed was a difficult skill to master. All archers practiced it, but it was usually employed against a static target. With the Wargals moving forward, even slowly, it meant the range was changing all the time. And the downhill slope didn’t help. The arrows would come down not vertically, which was their most devastating angle, but obliquely, which would cause them to skip off the tilted shields.
Wearne nodded, studied the inexorable approach of the Wargal army, then hurried back to his own men. Crowley saw a gap between two of the barricades widen momentarily, exposing a Wargal behind them. He raised his bow and shot. The Wargal screamed and fell.
“Good shot,” Arald said beside him.
“We’re not getting enough chances for them,” Crowley said bitterly. His men could kill the occasional enemy warrior with shots like that, but they couldn’t match the devastating volleys they had released at Ashdown Cut. Their shots were mere pinpricks against the massed forces.
He shaded his eyes, searching the hill for Morgarath. If they couldn’t kill the Wargals in large numbers, perhaps he’d manage a shot at their leader and controller. He scanned the advancing army and finally saw Morgarath off to his left. His black armor and white horse should have made him stand out, but he was surrounded by a group of riders, all carrying long, kite-shaped shields. Crowley could see only occasional glimpses of him. His head was above the shield barrier, but he was wearing a full-face jousting helmet and not even a Ranger longbow could send a shaft to penetrate that.
Arald had followed the direction of Crowley’s gaze. “He’s no fool,” he said.
Crowley laughed bitterly. “More’s the pity. He’s certainly out-thought us this time.”
“Keep an eye on him,” Arald said. “He may get careless.”
Their conversation was interrupted by a sharp command from Lord Northolt. “First squa
d! Stand to!”
There was a rustle of armor and equipment, and forty men moved to the first defensive position. They stepped up onto the waist-high earthwork, standing above the deep ditch, with the pointed stakes between them, angled down and designed to funnel the attackers into set channels. Each of the soldiers was armed with a heavy spear and a triangular shield of wood reinforced with metal strips. They all wore armor—mainly a knee-length tunic of hardened leather with brass scales riveted to it. Their helmets were simple iron caps, each one with a nasal—a protective strip that came down over the nose, guarding the nose and face from attack. They wore long swords at their belts and heavy-bladed daggers. But in this first engagement, the spears would be their most effective weapons.
“Second squad! Stand ready!”
Another forty men moved forward and stood behind the earthworks. They’d take over when the first squad tired, bringing fresh muscles into play.
The enemy barricades were thirty meters away now, and the chanting was almost deafening. It grated on the nerves of the waiting men, a bestial, inhuman sound. Hands clenched and unclenched around spear shafts as the Araluen soldiers waited in silence.
Crowley leapt up onto the earthworks and scanned the enemy lines. He saw another Wargal raise his head to peer over the barricade toward the enemy. It was the last thing the Wargal did. Crowley’s arrow hit him on the forehead, below the iron peak of his metal skullcap.
Then they were a mere ten meters away and a horn sounded. The barricades swung open like gates and the Wargals behind them surged forward, growling and snarling their battle cries. As they did, Crowley’s men, who had been waiting for this opportunity, released a volley and twelve of the beasts went down. Not all were dead, however. At least half of them, some with more than one arrow in their bodies, scrambled upright and continued to charge for the ditch.
The Wargals swarmed down the far side of the ditch and pushed forward. Now the defenders were close to them and the Rangers couldn’t continue to shoot, for fear of hitting their own men in the snarling, struggling mass.