Ranger's Apprentice 3 & 4 Bindup (44 page)

For a moment, it looked as if discipline and reason had forsaken the Skandians. Ragnak realised that, in the heat of the moment, they were on the verge of pursuing the retreating Temujai back to their own lines – and to certain death for the Skandians. He quickly jumped up on the breastworks and bellowed, in his loudest storm-quelling voice: ‘Kormak! Back here! Now!'

There was no need for the ram's horn to reinforce the order. The Oberjarl's voice carried clearly to the Skandians and, as one, they ran for the shelter of the fortifications. Realising too late what was happening, some of the Temujai sheathed their sabres and turned back to send a volley of arrows sailing after the Skandians.

But it was too little and too late. Apart from a few minor flesh wounds, there were no injuries.

Will and Horace exchanged glances. So far, things had gone pretty well as Halt had predicted. But they didn't think the Temujai wouldn't be trying that particular trick again.

‘Next time,' said Will, ‘it'll be our turn.'

General Haz'kam trotted his horse along the front rank of his army, watching as the first skirmish party made their way back to his lines.

He had lost perhaps two hundred men killed and wounded in that first encounter, he estimated. And perhaps half that number of horses. With an army of six thousand combat troops, of course, the numbers in themselves weren't terribly significant.

What was significant, however, was the behaviour of the Skandians. That first attack had been designed to reduce
their
numbers by several hundred, not his own. In fact, there had even been the slight hope that the majority of the Skandians might have been drawn out from behind their defensive positions, into the exposed ground where they would have been easy meat for his mounted archers.

He reined in as he came level with a group of his officers. Among them, he recognised Colonel Bin'zak,
his head of intelligence. The colonel was looking decidedly uncomfortable, he saw. As well he might be.

Haz'kam caught his eye now and jerked his head towards the Skandian defences.

‘That was not what I was led to expect,' he said. His voice was deceptively mild. The colonel urged his own horse forward a few paces and saluted as he came level with his commander.

‘I don't know what happened, Shan Haz'kam,' he replied. ‘Somehow, they seemed to see through the trap. It's not the way I expected them to react. It's …' He searched for the right words, finally saying weakly, ‘It totally un-Skandian behaviour.'

Haz'kam nodded several times. He held in his anger with an effort. It was undignified for a Temujai commander to show emotion on the field of battle.

‘Does it occur to you, perhaps,' he said eventually, when he was sure he could keep control of his voice, ‘that the Skandians may have someone with them who knows our way of fighting?'

Bin'zak frowned as he turned this thought over. In truth, it hadn't occurred to him. But now that the Shan mentioned it, it seemed the logical conclusion. Except for one factor.

‘It would be unlike the Skandians to give field command to a foreigner,' he said thoughtfully. Haz'kam smiled at him. But it was a smile without the faintest touch of humour in it.

‘It was unlike them to break off their pursuit, form a shield wall and then hit us with a surprise attack from the woods, too,' he pointed out. The colonel said nothing to that. The truth of the statement was self-evident.

‘There have been reports,' the Shan continued, ‘that a foreigner has been seen with the Skandians … one of those cursed
Atabi
.'

Atabi
, literally meaning ‘the green ones', was the Temujai term for Rangers. In the years since Halt had made his successful horse raid, the Temujai leaders had attempted to gather as much knowledge as they could about the mysterious force of men who wore green and grey cloaks and seemed to meld into the forest. In the past few years, in preparation for this campaign, spies had even reached as far as Araluen itself, asking questions and seeking answers. They had learned little. The Rangers guarded their secrets jealously and the ordinary Araluans were reluctant to discuss the Ranger Corps with foreigners. There was a strong undercurrent of belief among Araluans that Rangers dabbled in magic and the black arts. Nobody was too keen to discuss such matters.

Now, at this mention of an
Atabi
among the enemy, Colonel Bin'zak shrugged.

‘They were rumours only, Shan,' he protested. ‘None of my men could confirm the fact.'

The general's gaze locked on his. ‘I think we've just had it confirmed,' he said, holding the colonel's eyes until the officer looked down and away.

‘Yes, Shan,' he said bitterly. He knew his career was finished. Haz'kam now raised his voice, addressing the other officers gathered around and dismissing the matter of the failed intelligence colonel.

‘It might also explain why our own planned surprise attack from the ocean failed to materialise,' he said, and there were a few assenting grunts. The plot with Slagor
had also been hatched by Bin'zak. Now, it seemed, the one hundred and fifty men who had embarked on the Skandian ships four days ago had simply vanished into thin air.

The general came to a decision. ‘No more subterfuge. We've wasted enough time here. We've been delayed by three weeks already. Standard attack from now on: Rolling arrow storm until we create a weakness, then we drive through their line.'

His commanders nodded their assent. He looked around at them, seeing their determination, their grim confidence. The Temujai were about to do what they did best, using their mobility and the devastating force of their mounted archers to probe and weaken the enemy line. Then, when the moment was right, they would drive in with their sabres and lances and finish the job. There was no shouting of battle cries, no histrionics from these men.

This was a normal day at work for them.

‘Give your orders,' Haz'kam told them. ‘Watch for my commands.'

He wheeled his horse, ready to ride back to the knoll where he had set up his command position. Already, signal flags were beginning to order the standard assault. A voice from behind made him pause.

‘General!' It was Bin'zak. He had forsaken the social honorific of ‘Shan', Haz'kam noticed, and addressed him by his military title. The general faced his disgraced intelligence colonel now, waiting for his next words.

‘Permission to ride with one of the
Ulans
, sir,' Bin'zak said, his head held high.
Ulan
was the Temujai word for the formation of sixty riders that was the basic unit of the Temujai force. Haz'kam considered the request. Normally,
field grade officers were kept out of the close contact part of battles. They had no need to prove their courage or dedication. The general finally nodded permission.

‘Granted,' he said, and spurred his horse back to the command position.

‘Now what?' said Ragnak irritably, as he watched the Temujai cavalry forming into groups.

Halt watched too, his eyes narrowed. ‘Now, I think, it's the end of the opening gambits. Now they're going to hit us in earnest.' He pointed with his bow, sweeping it along the line of mounted horsemen facing them. ‘They'll fight in their
Ulans
, sixty men in each unit, hitting us all along the line and wheeling away before we can respond. The idea is to pick off as many of our men with arrows before launching a concentrated attack at a selected spot.'

‘Which is where?' Erak asked. This tactical talk was making him increasingly irritable. All he wanted was a dozen or so Temujai within reach of his axe. Now it appeared he would have to continue waiting for that eventuality.

Halt turned to the signaller with the horn.

‘Give the “ready” call for the archers,' he said, and as the man blew a series of long short, long short notes, he replied to Erak's question: ‘Wherever their general decides they've created a weakness in our line.'

‘So what do we do while we're waiting for him to make up his mind?' Ragnak asked irritably. Halt grinned to himself. Patience certainly wasn't high on the Skandian list of virtues, he thought.

‘We surprise them with our own archers,' he said. ‘And we try to kill as many of them as we can before they become used to the fact that someone's shooting back at them.'

All of Will's hundred archers heard the horn signal and there was an instant stirring among them. He held up a hand to calm them.

‘Stay down!' he called. He took his time and was pleased that his voice didn't crack. Maybe that was the answer for the future, he thought. He climbed up on the raised step that had been built into his command position. Horace, his shield ready, stood beside him. The wicker breastworks still concealed the archers but, when the time came, they would be pushed aside and the shield bearers would have the responsibility for protecting them from the answering storm of arrows that the Temujai would send their way.

Below Horace and Will's more exposed position, protected by earthworks and a wicker overhang, Evanlyn crouched in her position, with a clear sight of the line of archers.

The assembled troops of horsemen began to move now, cantering slowly at first, then at increasing speed. Will could see that, this time, each man was armed with a bow.

They thundered towards the Skandian line – not in one extended line as they had before, but in a dozen separate groups. Then, a hundred metres from the Skandians, each group wheeled, so they were heading in a dozen different directions, and sending volley after volley of arrows arcing up and over the Skandian lines.

Will drummed his fingers nervously on the breastworks before him. He wanted to see the Temujai pattern before he committed his men. The first surprise would have the maximum potential to disrupt the enemy and he wanted to make sure he didn't waste it.

Now there was a continuous rattle as the raised Skandian shields caught the majority of the arrows that the Temujai were pouring in. But not all. Men were falling along the Skandian lines, and being dragged back out of the battle line by those behind them, who then stepped in to replace them. Now the second and third ranks of Skandians held their shields high, to protect them against plunging fire, while the front rank presented their shields to the more direct frontal fire.

It was an effective ploy. But it left the men blinded to the approach of the Temujai. Now, as Will watched, one group of sixty quickly slung their bows, drew sabres and darted into the Skandian line in a slashing attack, killing a dozen men before the Skandians even realised they were there. As the Skandians re-formed and moved to counterattack, the Temujai withdrew rapidly, and another
Ulan
, waiting for this exact opportunity, poured a deadly hail of arrows into the disrupted shield wall.

‘We'd better do something,' Horace muttered. Will held his hand up for silence. The seemingly random movements of the Temujai
Ulans
actually had a complex pattern to them and, now he had seen it, he could predict their movements.

The horsemen were wheeling again, galloping away from the Skandian line and back to re-form. Behind them, more than fifty Skandians lay dead, victims of either the
arrows or the slashing Temujai sabres. Half a dozen Temujai bodies lay around the breastworks where the
Ulans
had made their lightning attack.

The Temujai riders were back in their own lines now. They would rest their horses, letting them recover their wind, while another ten
Ulans
took up the attack. It would be the same pattern, forcing the Skandians to cover up behind their shields, then attacking with sabres when they were blinded and, finally, pouring in volley after volley of arrows as their own men withdrew, leaving a gap in the shield wall. It was simple. It was effective. And there was a deadly inevitability about it.

Now the
Ulans
began their wheeling, galloping dance once again. Will fixed his attention on a troop at the middle of the line, knowing that it would curve and turn and eventually come at them on a diagonal. He muttered to Horace.

‘Get those breastworks down.'

He heard the muscular apprentice bellow: ‘Shields! Uncover!' The shield bearers rushed to shove the wicker walls down, leaving the archers behind a waist-high earth berm and with a clear field.

‘Ready,' called Evanlyn, indicating that each man in the line of archers had an arrow nocked to the string. Then it was up to Will.

‘Half left!' he called, and the archers all turned to the same direction.

‘Position two!'

A hundred arms raised to the same angle, as Will watched the approaching group of riders, seeing in his mind's eye the galloping Temujai and the flight of arrows converging to meet at the same point in time and space.

‘Down a half … draw!'

The elevation corrected and one hundred arrows came back to full draw. He paused, counted to three to make sure he wasn't too soon, then yelled: