The Lone Traveler - Part Twenty-Six

The Lone Traveler

Chapter Twenty-Six



The torrential rain was pouring down incessantly. Rivers of muddy water ran through the streets of Lorainne and the great river beneath the towering walls was overflowing its banks, cascading over the steep falls below the castle in a raging torrent. The castle was located on the eastern side of the river overlooking the towering cliffs of the great freshwater sea. The only viable approach for an enemy was the southern and northern wall of the castle. The brick walls there stood fifty feet tall and ten feet wide with battlements and small towers every two hundred feet. Any attempt by an enemy to cross the raging river would be futile for even in the heat of summer the great river ran fast and deadly. Many unwary people had been swept over the falls to their deaths.

The city of Lorainne spread out around the castle, with the major portion on the west side of the river. The majority of the defensive forces were posted in a semi-circle around the outlying city with a smaller force stationed on the castle battlements. In the event a major breach of the defensive circle was made, the defending forces were ordered to retreat to the castle to hold off a siege. A large stone bridge crossed the river half a mile east and an elite force of knights was assigned to hold the bridge so the retreating forces on the west side could cross. No plans had been made to bring the peasants and laborers from the city into the castle, only wealthy merchants, lords and knights were allowed entry. There simply was not enough room for thousands of the slum people.

A small portion of the city had burned during the aerial assault by the Alatrarian War Birds and Valkyri and food was short due to the large combined armies and the long delay by King George to amass his forces the previous spring. A prolonged siege would create starvation among the city rabble, but there was enough grain and food stored within the great castle larders to hold off for a month or more without severe rationing. Lord Noragant was as efficient and reliable as ever in anticipating the foreseeable needs of the castle.

Those in the city capable of fighting were organized into fyrds, groups of a hundred and assigned a knight to command them, this provided a fighting force of thirty thousand untrained, unarmored, and poorly armed men. The queen’s housecarls, or men-at-arms, consisted of around five thousand men and the additional housecarls of the major lords beefed that up to twelve thousand. In addition to the knights brought up by King Charles, there were around twelve thousand still in service after the disastrous battle of the crossroads. Many had deserted during the withdrawal from Alataria, disliking the command of Licinius.

Pieter was stationed at the stone bridge with the forces of Province Donedon, and he consequently came under the command of Lord David Alwaythe. Although he would have preferred to ride the great white dragon and fight alongside the Dragon Riders, his training and skill in flight maneuvers was almost nil, thus he would be more of a hindrance than help. David had placed a squadron of mounted infantry armored with hauberks and half helms under his command due to the great losses of experienced knights at the battle of the crossroads. His duties were to patrol the road leading to the bridge and prevent anyone from crossing the bridge who was not allowed, which included all peasants and serfs.

Word received from the Dragon Riders and Valkyri indicated that the Angalund Army of seventy thousand or more was less than a day away from the city. Their force of twenty thousand knights and mounted infantry were already camped on the hills within sight of the great castle walls. Prince Robert rode through the defending army several times a day, surrounded by Lords in lavish armor with King Charles often seen riding at his side. It was a display designed to build confidence in the soldiers and drafted city men and serfs still smarting from being forced into the lines, especially since their families had not been allowed the safety of the castle.

“We cannot allow the Angalund Army to take the city,” Queen Denize stated. “The supplies they obtain will be enough to see them through several month’s siege and they can still be logistically reinforced from Alataria. We know the capitol of Alation is about to fall which will provide them with even more wheat, fodder, and corn.”

“We do not have the manpower to prevent them from taking the city” Lord Connahe quickly replied. “We are stretched far too thin as it stands.”

Lord Smythwaite coughed to get attention. “That’s the point, we cannot possibly hope to hold the territory encompassing the entire city. I suggest we forego defense of the city and meet them when they come through the pass at this point.” He jabbed a fat finger at a mile long pass to the east of the city. “We can hit them on their flanks and the armored knights can strike them from the front and boxing them in so our remaining archers can pour volleys into them.”

“They possess twice the armor and three times the manpower we have,” Lord Haupt quickly responded. “If they get armored knights on our flanks, the war is all but over. That can easily be done if an enterprising commander goes around these smaller hills to the flanks of the pass. I have met Lord Clynton, he is a tactical genius and very capable commander. He will already have advanced armor in moving through those passes.”

“I agree with Lord Smythwaite,” Queen Denize replied, tracing her finger on the large wall map. “We cannot hold the city and the pass offers too good an opportunity to forego. We can always fall back on the bridge crossing.”

“What about the supplies in the city, Your Majesty?” David had finally built up the courage to offer an opinion.”

“The city is to be evacuated,” Queen Denize casually replied. “Each person will be allotted enough food for one week and they will be sent into the western part of the realm. The Lords in those provinces who can take them in, will do so, the rest can fend for themselves.”

“Many may starve,” Lord Eferem, one of the western lords spoke. “I have barely enough in my province to take care of my own people, much less hundreds more.”

“You think they will not starve if the enemy takes the city?” Queen Denize hotly replied. “You think the Angalunders will feed them? Would you prefer to listen to their wails of hunger and cries for pity while standing safely behind the castle walls, or listen to the screams of the young girls as they are raped? They will be better off in the wilderness or the far west provinces.” Lord Eferem bowed his bald head conceding the point.

“We will follow Lord Smythwaite’s plan,” the Queen continued, “and strike them at the pass.”

The soldiers manning the defensive perimeter of the city were ordered to evacuate the city, ensuring that food for seven days was allotted to each person. Any extra provisions were loaded on carts and sent to the castle larders. Rather than fight with the people, the elderly and infirm who could not travel were allowed to remain in their homes. They would have to take their chances with the enemy occupiers if the defense of the pass did not hold. Once the city was empty, the allied forces marched east to take up their positions along the pass. They noticed the legions of Emperor Licinius camped in their logistics squares on the top of a low hill to their left. Licinius was sitting on his magnificent white horse casually watching the army as it took up positions to ambush the Angalund Army.

“Bastard is waiting to see how the battle goes,” Lord Haupt remarked to Pieter riding beside him nodding at one perfectly formed cohort of Tyberian heavy infantry. “He’s flying the white banner with the green olive wreath on it. That signifies he is no longer our part of our alliance and open to discussion with the Angalund Lords.”

“What of his wife and son?” Pieter asked. “He knows they have been taken hostage and are being held in a hidden place.”

“You saw enough of the man to know that power means more to him than family,” Lord Haupt replied. “Women mean little and he is young enough to sire more sons.”

At noon of the following day, the hasty ambush was sprung. As the enemy forces slowly moved through the pass they were suddenly attacked on both flanks by allied infantry standing behind shield walls. The Angalund infantry took serious losses until their unit commanders formed their own stout shield walls. For a while they lobbed their javelins and short spears over the enemy shields, while the archers and slingers poured volley after volley into their ranks. The knight commanders and men at arms at the front of the enemy column, which had already cleared the pass, formed a semi-circle shield wall with the ends butted up against the hills.

Prince Robert sent spearmen forward to attack the Anglanders but they were met with a vicious barrage of enemy missiles consisting of axes and stones since most of the javelins had already been used. Try as they may, the housecarls and men-at-arms could not force their way through the strong enemy shield walls. The cavalry was sent in to try and break the forward wall, but failed to do so because of the steep terrain. At that time, armored enemy knights in great numbers were riding fast to strike the flanks of the allied armies just as Lord Haupt had predicted. A general retreat started and slowly developed into a mad dash for the river and safety on the other side of the bridge.

Prince Robert and several of his cooler-headed commanders, tried to stop the flow of men now retreating in panic, but to no avail. Prince Robert’s war horse was killed by an enemy lance and a quick rumor then spread that the Prince was dead. Pieter quickly rode up and gave his horse, Ogre, to the Prince urging him to remove his helmet and ride among the men so they could see that he was alive and well, and to form an armored line to hold back the enemy cavalry.

His brave actions did not stop the flight of the panicked infantry, but the remaining knights, seeing their young Prince making a stand with the royal banner at the fore, halted and formed a line to protect the Prince and the retreating infantry. They were not attacked by the enemy armored knights as too few had crossed the side passes to effectively challenge them. They provided security until all the infantry forces had made it safely across the bridge. Pieter was one of the last to cross the stone bridge.

As he stood sweating on the left bank among the defending forces, Prince Robert trotted up riding a new charger and holding the reigns of Ogre in his hand. Several Lords accompanied him, including David Alwaythe.

“Your horse, Ser Schermon,” he smiled. “He’s a spirited war horse and knows when to take the initiative, just like his master.” It was a great compliment coming from the Prince. “Your quick thinking helped to save the day.” All those present at the time knew that Pieter had urged Prince Robert to undertake the dangerous ride and make the perilous stand that had halted the enemy advance.

“You will remain here with a squadron of cavalry and five hundred levies to hold the bridge until the rest of the army is secure inside the castle,” David ordered. His tone of voice portrayed a hint of jealousy and ill-concealed conceit.

“The enemy must not cross this bridge until every last defender is in the castle,” Lord Jeffreys, the infantry commander added. “Hold them as long as you can, Ser,” he smiled, a look of genuine pride on his aging face. “Make you departed sire proud of the name of Schermon, I proudly rode with him and Ser Thoragild into many a desperate battle.”

Several hours later, the Angalund Army advanced into the flatlands and rapidly spread out around the city. A large force of knights was sent to the stone bridge to assess the forces defending it and report back to their field commander, Lord Clynton. David watched as a regally armored group of knights rode to the top of the small hill where Emperor Licinius sat on his white stallion. They dismounted and were quickly led into a large tent.

It was late in the day with perhaps three hours of daylight remaining before twilight would set in. The bright sun beat down over his right shoulder and dust clouds stirred up by the milling enemy cavalry clogged his nostrils. Pieter was exhausted. He had been in the forefront of several of the assaults on the enemy shield wall in the pass, had jogged with the infantry retreat in his heavy chainmail after giving his mount to the Prince, and his energy was rapidly fading. He still had a small amount of water left in is canteen, but he had eaten nothing since breaking his fast well before daybreak on a small amount of bread and cheese.

A few minutes later, they heard the braying sound of cornicens blowing and noticed one of the Tyberian Legions slowly marching down the small hill towards the bridge. They were in perfect formation with the front ranks carrying twenty foot lances to ward off any enemy cavalry that might challenge them. This was a tactic they had learned to use as their infantry was not designed to fight against armored cavalry and it worked effectively. The lances would be discarded once they closed in with the enemy.

“Looks like Licinius has joined with the Angalunders,” a knight to Pieter’s right stated. “The bastard want’s his slice of the pie if they defeat us.”

“The price of his acceptance by the Angalund Lords must be to take the bridge,” Pieter replied. “It’s probably their way of telling him that he must prove his newly chosen fealty.”

“I have first dibs on the bastard,” another of the knights stated. “Can’t wait to shove my blade up his aristocratic arse and twist it until ‘e screams.”

“I seriously doubt he will place himself in such danger,” Pieter smiled. “He will not cross the bridge until his legions have driven us back into the castle.”

They watched as the legion formed up fifty yards in front of the bridge. The Camalund forces stood in a semi-circle with their backs to the bridge on the western side of the river. If they could prevent the enemy from pushing onto the bridge, they could hold them in check for hours. Each man was armed with heavy conical shields reinforced with an iron rim with which to make a sturdy shield wall. Most were armed with long swords, a few with spears and maces and those in the front ranks wore chain mail hauberks. Pieter ordered the small squadron of cavalry back over the bridge with additional orders to form a shield wall on the eastern side of the river. They would be of no use against the imperial legions.

When the legion halted, one cohort slowly advanced to within fifty feet of the bridge defenders. The cohort consisted of six centuries of a hundred men each, with the first cohort doubled, a total of around eight hundred men, six cohorts formed a single legion so they had around five thousand Tyberians facing them.

At a command from the cohort centurion, the first rank hefted their short pilums, or spears, and cast them into the defenders shield wall. The men behind them continued to pass their pilums to the front rank who cast again and again until every pilum in the cohort had been thrown. By this time hundreds of pilums were lodged in the shields of the defending force. Many shields were hit so often, the shields were too heavy to hold up and the pilums difficult to remove. The pilums were designed to penetrate the shields and the intentional soft shafts bent from the pressure.

Pieter glanced around and saw scores of men casting their now useless shields aside. There were few injuries or wounds except for a few who received shallow wounds from a glancing pilum, but their hauberks had saved them from any severe strikes. He heard another command from the Primus Pilus, or Commanding Centurion, and the cohort drew their short stabbing swords, or gladius as they called them, and rushed towards the defenders carrying their oblong shields in a stout wall.

When the Tyberian Legionnaires struck Pieter’s shield wall, it buckled but slowly held. For half an hour or more, the fight moved back and forth, the Tyberians taking most of the casualties, but very few. As the front ranks of the cohort tired, they were replaced by the second rank, while the first rank went to the rear of the line to rest. It was a never ending cycle. Pieter’s forces did not have that luxury. Every man on the line continued for fight until exhausted and were only replaced in a haphazard manner so the wall continued to dwindle.

The Tyberian’s held the tactical advantage and slowly pushed the exhausted defenders back to the narrow bridge. Another cornicen sounded and Pieter saw the fighting cohort disengage to be replaced by a fresh one coming up quickly. Just as the first cohort had done, the fresh cohort started lofting their pilum into the defenders as soon as the first had cleared the field to fall in behind the last cohort in the legion to rest and resupply with new pilums. It was a never ending wheel of fresh Legionnaires moving to the fore.

The pilums started to penetrate the chain mail hauberks because most of their shields by this time were useless and had been discarded. The Legionnaires moved closer and lobbed the pilums up so they would drop at an angle, striking the defenders in the faces. Pieter was awed by the organization and efficiency of the assaulting Legionnaires and realized what the lords had said about an antique army, was completely false. Here was a force that could stand against any infantry in the realm, except perhaps fully armored knights.

As he and his men were slowly pushed back across the bridge, Pieter glanced to his rear and saw that the remaining levies posted on the east bank were suddenly fleeing in panic towards the castle. There were less than fifty men and a few knights left to defend the bridge. Their cause was lost, they could not hold against the might of the cohorts now advancing onto the bridge with their shield walls to the front. Dead and dying men-at-arms littered the ground before the bridge and more were quickly falling from sheer exhaustion. One last backward glance told him that most of the army had retreated to the safety of the castle.

Pieter turned to the knight who had been fighting on his right. “Take what men are left and run for the castle,” he ordered. “We cannot hold against them. Anyone who wishes to stay for a last defense, may do so. I will yield no ground.”

The older knight looked at him as if he had lost his senses, then turned and ordered the last of the defenders to follow him. They raced towards the castle as fast as their exhaustion would carry them. Two men remained with Pieter, the knight who asked for dibs on the Emperor, and a youth from the levies without a hauberk or shield. He held a long sword in his hand which he had obviously picked up off the bloody ground. Pieter smiled and the three spread out to hold their position.

The advancing Legionnaires raised their pilums to cast them into the three idiots remaining on the bridge. They were within fifteen feet and could not miss. Just as they were prepared to release, a command of hold was shouted. Their Primus Pilus, or Cohort Commander, pushed through the ranks and walked up to Pieter.

“No need to die, lad” the rugged looking man stated. “You and you men fought well. It is no shame to surrender against unsurmountable odds, and I see that you are so exhausted that you can barely stand.”

Pieter glanced at his companions to his left and right and nodded his head. He turned his sword around and offered the hilt to the Tyberian.

“See that no harm comes to these three,” the commander ordered. “Escort them to the tent of Emperor Licinius.”

Pieter glanced up at the castle battlements as he and his companions were taken away. It was too far to discern faces, but he was certain that most of his remaining men had made it to the safety of the castle.

He had done his best with what he had been given.

“A complete waste of good men,” Lord Haupt stated, watching from the battlements as the last three defenders were taken into captivity. ”Defending that bridge was a fool’s call.” He glanced over to where the other lords stood and shook his head in disgust.