John Carr - Siege of Tarr-Hostigos

Three siege guns were now firing from the Host's battery in front of the main gate, over the heads of the column marching to the gate. Big guns, too. Ptosphes saw half the main gate flung backward off its hinges into the portcullis, which bent ominously.

A less well-aimed shot ploughed through the infantry of the storming column. They halted, giving the guns and riflemen and musketeers on the gate towers an even better target. Their firing sounded like a single volley, and they fired three more times before the enemy column moved again. It moved more slowly now, leaving behind a trail of writhing, bloody bodies, like a dying animal dragging its guts behind as it sought to close with the hunter.

The column coming at the breach was taking the most punishment from the mortars, whose crews were firing much too fast to be concerned with safety. Ptosphes saw one man knocked down and crushed as a mortar shifted on its base, and a shell with a fuse cut too short blew up just above the walls. A dozen defenders went down. The ones who rose again shook their fists at the mortar crews.

Now the guns beside Ptosphes were shooting at the wheeled platforms. The first shot flew high, glancing off the heavy timbers and soaring over the heads of the Harphaxi infantry directly behind the platform. Another regiment was coming into sight behind the first one-armored men in blackened armor, marching under a black banner with a silver sun-wheel. Soton's Knights were fighting on foot today.

The second shot bowled into the prisoners hauling the platform. The third chewed splinters from its edge. Before a fourth could hit, the people in front of the platform dropped their ropes and ran.

The infantry charged forward, though the gaps between the platforms. The fourth shot smashed the head of a company of arquebusiers, halting it. The rest of the company reached open ground. The pikemen picked up the fallen ropes, while others leveled musketoons, arquebuses and pistols, firing at the fleeing Hostigi rushing towards Tarr-Hostigos. A few of the townspeople tried to run back behind the platforms, but were cut down by the swords and maces of the advancing Knights.

Ptosphes had long given up hope of adequately cursing Styphon or his servants. He merely shouted, "Change to case shot!" Those platforms weren't going to be smashed or stopped, but they could be made useless by killing enough of the Grand Host ready to pull them into place and climb from them up on to the walls.

Forget the Hostigi prisoners. They were doomed.

So was the garrison of Tarr-Hostigos. Not that there'd been much doubt about this, since they'd refused Soton's latest offer of terms. (And what terms-death for all the captains and the rest to be at the mercy of Roxthar's Investigators!) The last quarter-candle had just made an existing certainty more certain still. Men who stormed a castle after this kind of punishment would be half-mad and totally deaf to requests for quarter, which they wouldn't give anyway.

The siege guns aimed at the main gate were firing higher now, trying to silence the guns in the gate tower. One of them was disabled, but the other two were still hurling case shot straight into the column, inflicting hideous losses. Guns from the other towers were now hammering at the column as well, scything down entire companies like farmers harvesting wheat.

Smoke gushed up from the enemy battery, more than one could expect from the discharge of even the largest gun. Ptosphes saw men flying into the air and others running with their clothing on fire. He heard the thump of an explosion-someone careless with fireseed-as the rate of fire increased.

More Hostigi case shot tore into the column then, suddenly, it was breaking up and the men were running back down the draw in a futile effort to find shelter, some of their officers beating at them with halberds and swords, others joining the rout. From the walls of Tarr-Hostigos, cheers joined the gunfire.

Ptosphes had a moment of thinking that perhaps their doom wasn't so certain after all. One column broken, its men looking as if they would be hard to rally for another attack. If the defenders could do the same with the other two columns, the mercenary captains might have the same second thoughts they'd had during the first storming attempt. If they had second thoughts and let Styphon's House know them, the False God himself couldn't keep the Archpriests from having to listen. And if the Archpriests chose to turn the Red Hand loose on the mercenaries, the Grand Host's war against Hostigos would become a civil war within its own ranks-

Ptosphes' moment of hope ended as he saw the column approaching the breach suddenly sprout scaling ladders. They were going to get in or at least close; the heavy mortars had fired off all their shells and round shot wouldn't do so well even against packed men-

The twelve-pounder on top of the barricade let fly with a triple charge of musket balls. "I told you it wouldn't blow!" Thalmoth cried. Like a volley from a massed regiment, it smashed into the column. Already ragged from climbing the slope, the column now barely deserved the name.

Hard on the twelve pounder's heels came point-blank musketry that melted away more of the column. Every musketeer within range had six or seven loaded weapons ready to hand for just this moment. For a brief space, they could fire as fast as the rifles of Great King Truman's host with their 'magazines' of eight rounds.

These foes had their blood up though, or maybe better captains. Then Ptosphes saw blue and orange colors and recognized the Sacred Squares of Hos-Ktemnos, the reputed 'best' infantry in the Seven Kingdoms. They rose across the rubble before the breach like a blue wave, with clumps of musketeers on the flanks firing over the heads of the storming parties to keep down Hostigi fire. The crews of the useless heavy mortars drew swords and pistols and joined the mass of men struggling in the breach. Ptosphes drew his own sword, ready to join them if they showed signs of flagging.

Two of the three platforms were still closing the walls, a third had put one wheel through the roof of a sinkhole and was defying all efforts of the men on its ropes to get it moving again. Around the others was a mob of Hostigi prisoners, Zarthani Knights and mercenary infantry being hit every minute by case shot and rifle bullets but coming on nonetheless-

One of the overheated four-pounders beside Ptosphes recoiled so violently that it snapped its breechings and knocked down Thalmoth. He lay with his thigh a mass of blood, white bone shining through the torn flesh, cursing the gun crew for not remembering what he taught them and asking for a pistol. Ptosphes gave him one of his own pistols.

The first platform rumbled up the last few paces of the slope and crashed across the moat, which ran some ten rods wide and eight rods deep. Soldiers on the top of the platforms began to hoist ladders. The Hostigi riflemen firing inside the castle's towers thinned their ranks.

The first ladder rose up on the platform, and then flew to pieces as a shot from nowhere split it from top to bottom. At least it came from what seemed like nowhere to Ptosphes, although he knew that the part of the battle he could see and hear must be rapidly shrinking. This storming of Tarr-Hostigos was already making every other battle he'd fought sound like a mother's lullaby.

Off to the left of the platform, Soton's guns were finally coming into action. One was firing from an incline, with dead gunners around it showing that the Hostigi riflemen hadn't overlooked this new target. The other guns were being emplaced on the open hillside by men working in frantic haste, obviously eager to start shooting before the battle ended and they lost their share of glory. Ptosphes wondered what share of glory they would have if they hit more of their own men than the enemy's. Their share of broken bones and heads, more likely.