Varna Ch. 14

While the elves, half-orcs and mounted men shadowed the enemy host, our own human infantry were behind us, shepherding people and their portable possessions further south or east. If the villagers and small farmers were unwilling to move, then they would have to be driven.

Hurmas and Bathene Esin, with the men of the north, had this unpleasant duty on the southern side; Dergun and Moksha, with Gerdars Ostro and Candre, were doing the same on the eastern side.

Seven hundred of our fighters were thus acting as drovers, pushing non-combatants ahead of them, so that these people and their herds and flocks would not fall into enemy hands. To be fair, many of these folk had been warned in advance; if they had chosen to believe that it would never happen, I could only feel sorry for them. There would be no exceptions.

Within a few days, the enemy were past the lands that we'd burned. Three thousand men take a good deal of feeding, though, and the mercenaries were even more desperate to solve their transport issues. Accordingly, they sent out foraging parties, looking for food, small farms to plunder, and livestock to steal.

There wasn't much food. There weren't many animals.

The following day, they sent out foragers again, while we did nothing. By my order, we didn't strike at them. I wanted to see as much as I could of their methods.

On the third day, we let them feel our presence. Enneiros and his elves attacked a party of mercenaries almost a hundred strong. Half a dozen men were struck by our archers. For a moment there, it seemed that the mercenaries might counter-attack, but then cooler heads prevailed, and they withdrew, pursued and harassed by Enneiros' company.

Little did they know: we wanted them to come after us. Durgat and his fighters were lying in wait, concealed behind the elves.

Alissara and her elves were even more successful. All two hundred of them ambushed a large foraging party from two sides. At first, the mercenaries began to retreat in good order, but as their casualties mounted, they turned and fled.

Our mounted men pounced on another small group of foragers, perhaps fifty strong. This attack did not go so well: as our riders circled behind the enemy, they themselves were ambushed, by a large party of crossbowmen, backed by several hundred more infantry.

We took serious losses before our men could pull away. If the enemy had had archers instead of crossbowmen, it could have gone even worse for us. The crossbow is a powerful, accurate weapon, but it is very time-consuming to reload.

It was enough of a disaster that I went immediately to see the Penedas.

- "I'm so sorry, Lord." said Arvo, the Tir's oldest son. "We had no idea they were there."

- "How bad was it?"

Bad. Very bad. Sixteen dead, and eleven wounded. Ten horses missing. Worst of all, Tir Caenog was among the dead.

I'd never esteemed his judgment very highly, but Caenog was a brave man, and one of our earliest and most loyal supporters. People die, in war, but for some reason we don't expect to lose our closest friends. First Sezima, at Borovo, and now Caenog.� � � � � � � � � � � � �

- "I can't explain it, Lord." said the elder Peneda. "It felt like... more than bad luck. If you know what I mean."

- "Like they were waiting for you?"

Arvo Peneda was no fool. "I know that we walked into a trap." he said. "But how did they know to set it there?"

It was a good question.

That night, the fey gained a measure of revenge for us when they slaughtered several sentries and then launched their arrows into the enemy camp. There was no way of knowing how much damage they'd done, but it had to have struck fear among the mercenaries.

The next day, the enemy changed their tactics. They sent out four large foraging parties, each numbering well over two hundred men.

Alissara's elves were attacking two of these parties, enjoying their ability to strike at our foes from range. Unfortunately, some of the hotter bloods got too close. Then the foragers revealed their surprise: there were crossbowmen concealed among them. Four elves were killed before they could pull back.

By the end of the day, we'd discovered that each foraging group had fifty crossbowmen hidden amongst the foot soldiers.

- "Don't blame yourself." Enneiros told Alissara. "You had no way of knowing."

- "They're cleverer than we expected." I said.

Just how clever, we found out the next day.

Again, the enemy pushed forward four large foraging groups. One of these parties advanced farther than the others. I had Enneiros and his fifty attack them alone. He was very careful not to press too close, staying well out of range of the crossbows.

When the enemy moved towards them, these veteran archers pulled back in a hurry, simulating some confusion. The enemy followed - but in ranks, at a measured pace. It wasn't the headlong pursuit I'd been hoping for.

Again, I had Durgat and his people waiting, with more of Alissara's elves on their flank. We were hoping to spring a trap of our own, on a larger scale.

Somehow, though, the mercenaries sniffed it out. They came within sight of the half-orcs, and immediately began to retreat. It began as an orderly withdrawal, but quickly turned into a rapid retrograde movement.

Durgat's half-orcs had yet to see any action. Some of the younger, more eager warriors surged forward.

Fortunately, though, two people smelled a rat. One was Yazgash. She bellowed out orders to halt.

The second person was me. There was something too quick about the mercenaries' response. It was too orderly. They were doing exactly the same thing that we were: trying to draw us into a charge, or a large-scale attack.

With the help of Yazgash, Durgat was able to restrain the hotheads. We advanced together, with elves on either flank. I was no longer thinking of pressing the attack; I wanted to see what the mercenaries were up to.

The enemy suddenly turned their backs and ran. Again, it was too... organized. They all broke away from us at the same time.

- "Pull back!" I shouted. "Everybody back!"

I don't know how many of our people heard me, because the cannons behind the fleeing mercenaries opened up. The guns were aimed over the heads of their own troops, so they were essentially firing blind.

The enemy had led us directly onto their guns, and we'd very nearly walked into them.

At very long range, firing indiscriminately, twenty of their guns managed to score two hits. Two half-orcs were killed, and another lost his lower leg. An elf was also struck dead.

We escaped the trap, suitably chastened.

Others were not so lucky.

Our mounted men were eager to redeem themselves, after their first disastrous foray. Now that we knew the enemy had attached their crossbowmen to their foraging parties, our riders felt that they could still unsettle the mercenaries by sweeping around their flank and threatening their rear.

The Penedas wisely avoided coming too close to the eastern-most foraging party, choosing instead to stay out of crossbow range, and to work around them.

They rode straight into ten enemy guns.

Our horsemen were good riders, but they were essentially just mounted retainers. They were not a highly-trained force of cavalry, and most definitely not a single cohesive unit. The men followed seven or eight different lords.

They retreated in disorder - directly back the way they'd come. Unfortunately, that gave the enemy a chance to reload and then shoot at them again. Had our riders veered to the right instead of going straight back, they could have avoided that second volley from the guns.

The butcher's bill was heavy: sixteen dead, and six wounded. The wounded were not likely to be available for further fighting; they'd lost limbs, or were just barely clinging to life. We'd also lost twenty horses.

I called a council of captains for the following night.

The next day, Alissara and Enneiros harassed the enemy foragers, but only at long range. We were all very wary of being tricked again. Unfortunately, the enemy found a few isolated farms which had not been evacuated. They slaughtered the inhabitants - after raping the women - stole every bit of food they could find, and carried off the livestock.

Our friends and allies gathered in a very glum mood. They weren't defeated - just disappointed by the way the invasion had begun. We'd struck a few blows, but the enemy seemed to be step ahead of us.

Sanatha was going to open the discussion, but Arvo Peneda, the Tir's heir forestalled her. He stepped forward, and went down on one knee.

- "My Lady. Lord. I've let you down. I've failed our men. I will understand - in fact, I will welcome it - if you should choose to appoint a new commander for our mounted men."

I already liked the eldest son of Tir Peneda. He was much older than I was, but this was his first truly independent command. He'd always served under his father, who was still at home with a broken hip. Finally on his own, he felt that he was entirely to blame for the reverses his men had suffered.

I jumped up at once, and raised him to his feet.

- "My Lord - you are no more at fault than any of us. We have all come very close to disaster. The enemy is much more clever than we expected. We underestimated them."

I looked around the gathering, at Yazgash and Enneiros, Alissara and Durgat. Hurmas and Bathene Esin were there, with Benaz Corig, as a courtesy. Dergun and Moksha, Pyera and half a dozen Gerdars... none of them were to blame.

"The fault is mostly mine, my Lords." I said.

It took me far too long to reason it out. I might still be puzzled, struggling to understand how things could have gone so wrong for us. But Rhigen had taken me aside, late the night before. He led me to the tent I shared with his daughter.

Glasha was asleep. No - that was wrong. She was unconscious. Her breathing was shallow. Her hair was damp, and stuck to her head, as if she was feverish.

I didn't have to ask. She'd been time-walking - and she'd over-extended herself. Rhigen confirmed it for me.

- "You're not the only one who takes dangerous risks, you know. You just set a terrible example for the rest of us."

I knelt down beside her. "How... how bad is it?"

- "I don't know." said her father. "I've never seen her this far gone."

Oh, Glasha. How far did you reach? Who were you trying to follow? I shed my tears beside her, even as I stroked her hair and implored her to come back to me.

Only after that did I make the connection, and realize what was going on. I brought it to our captains that next night.

"Do you know what they call me, my Lords and Ladies? In Galtin's Port and Portoa?"

They did. None of them would say it, though.

"I'm the Witch King." I reminded them. "Now, if you were going to fight a Witch King... what would you bring with you?"

Yazgash seemed to understand me first. Hurmas was second.

"Other than cannons." I said. "Wouldn't you want some... magic?"

Now they were all looking at me, eyes wide.

"They have a time-walker." I said. "Someone - or more than one - is providing the enemy with information on our plans and movements." I turned to Peneda's son. "That is why, my Lord, they have been able to ambush you. You made no errors. They knew exactly where you would be."

- "But... how?"

- "Did you inform your allies and captains of your plans the night before?"

- "I... I did."

- "That's how the enemy knew."

The enemy might very well be present in this council, but I explained to our captains how time-walking permitted two people who knew each other well to communicate, no matter how far they were separated, in terms of distance.

The mercenaries had a mage. A time-walker. I'd tried to imagine who he or she might be communicating with. Someone in our army was passing on our plans.

I immediately suspected Kalju, Captain Urbo's friend who had spied for us in Galtin's Port. What if his brother wasn't dead, but instead was held hostage, in order to compel Kalju to cooperate? There was no way he could have known of our mounted men's plans, but just to be safe, I sent him to Elmina.

Our foes might very well have more than one mage. I would have, if I could hire them.

- "We have to change our ways." Sanatha told the council. "We had a good plan. It may still succeed. But the mercenaries aren't going to blindly walk into the traps we set. As we've seen, they're going to set traps of their own. We will have to be flexible, and adaptable."

On the positive side, Arvo Peneda regained a measure of confidence. I suspected that our overall morale had rebounded, at least a bit - now that we knew how the enemy had fooled us. We would all be on the lookout for traitors - but how would we recognize them? Had I overreacted, in the case of Kalju?

The mercenaries had to be hungry. Their plans to trap or ambush us had delivered only limited results. We'd lost a quarter of our mounted men, but that was hardly decisive. What would they do next?

***

Sometimes, it rains. Sometimes, it pours.

It might have been the conference with our captains which caused our next setback. Then again, it might have been planned all along.

My brother Toran had married Adjan Moksha. They were completely unsuited for each other. I suspected Tir Moksha of engineering the whole affair, and manipulating my brother.

Toran and his wife died outside Whydah. Tir Moksha was mortally wounded.

After our civil war - the War of the Brothers - Sanatha and I chose to restore the Moksha lands to a cousin of the dead Tir. He seemed to be properly grateful.

Until he betrayed us.

With 150 men - some of them former Beksha supporters - the new Tir Moksha took 100 horses and a dozen wagons loaded with supplies, and joined our enemies. He left just before dawn, and achieved complete surprise.

- "I trusted him!" said my friend Dergun.

- "He fooled us all." I said. "What does he know?"

- "Everything." said Dergun. "Our strategies. The evacuation plan for Calep, if it should come to that. Plus everything that was said at our council."

- "Hmm." The enemy now knew that we knew that they had a time-walker. They knew... oh, it was getting complicated. "Concentrate on the evacuation plan for Calep." I said. "Who else knows? And then change it. Start now."

I had two dozen concerns, all of them pressing, but my sister could tell that I was worried about Glasha.

- "Go check on her." said Sanatha. "I can handle things for an afternoon."

I went to our tent, which had been moved every day, as the mercenaries pressed forward. They advanced between six and eight leagues a day, just as we tried to evacuate ten leagues ahead of them.

Rhigen and several of the fey had taken charge of moving Glasha every day. I slept next to her, for a few hours. Some mornings, she was gone before I awoke.

I caught up to them next to a small hamlet that had been evacuated two days before. When I entered the small cottage which the fey had appropriated, I met Rhigen's reproachful look.

Beside him, though, I saw my Glasha. She was lying on her back, with a rolled-up carpet tucked under her head.

Her eyes were open. I went to my knees beside her.

- "Glasha. Thank the Gods and Goddesses."

- "I found him." she said.

- "Eh?"

- "I found him." she repeated. "I found Gedere."

*****