Jeff Salyards - Veil of the Deserters

When we got near the top of the incline, I saw the others had already gone prone and inched up to the edge, helmets off so as not to reflect any moonlight. I dropped to my belly and did the same, creeping forward until I could look down on the hunting lodge and surrounding area.

There were torches on the walls of the compound, and in the tall wooden towers along the wall, and while it was impossible to make out much in the way of detail, the shapes of the priestguards were hard not to miss, and the light glinting off mail or helms.

The besiegers’ small camp had plenty of torches too, away from the tents, and some in the hands of soldiers moving about, so it was even more difficult to discern much, except that there was plenty of activity, and while some figures didn’t catch the light, wearing gambesons, most were in hauberks.

Mulldoos shook his head. “If Gurdinn is down there-”

“He is,” Captain Killcoin countered emphatically, pointing out a figure striding between his men. He had a full hauberk as well with a coat of plates over the top, the rivets winking on and off as they caught the light, and his spaulders, steel vambraces, and finger gauntlets reflecting the fire and moon as well. There was no mistaking him for anyone other than the commander of the forces.

“Fine. That’s him,” Mulldoos said. “But what’s he plaguing playing at? That might not be a castle, but it’s a lot more fortified than any lodge has a right to be.”

Vendurro asked, “He can’t be thinking of attacking, can he? He’d be a fool to, right?”

Hewspear grunted as his ribs pressed against cold ground. “He is a stubborn man, but you’re right-it would be foolish to attack an enemy dug in like that. Especially since he doesn’t have siege engines. This is our first night-perhaps he’s ordered feinted attacks like this the last few nights and evenings.”

Mulldoos mulled that over. “Wear the holy bastards down, you think? Gurdinn’s got more men, for certain. Keeping watch on a wall tweaks your nerves tight as it is, but especially if you think an attack might be coming.”

“Or maybe,” Vendurro offered, “he feints a few nights in a row, until the priest’s guard is either so tired, or right sure it’s nothing but another fake, lets their guard down some.”

“Nah. He ain’t attacking. Like the wizened windmill said, he’s stubborn, but not stupid. Not that stupid, anyway.”

We watched and waited as the pearl light crept over the horizon to the east. The dawn suffused the thin clouds above the treeline. I rubbed my hands together, looking forward to the warmth the sun would bring, and wondered just how long we planned on laying in the dirt waiting for something to happen. I leaned close to Vendurro and tried to ask only so loud for him to hear, “Why would it be so foolish to attack? If it’s not as sound defensively as a castle, that is?”

But Hewspear overheard. “Not a castle, true. But they’d still have to make a break over open ground, arrows raining down, and then try to scale the wall. The defenders, even at a numerical disadvantage, are in a stronger position.”

“What’re you babbling on about?” Mulldoos asked.

Hewspear repeated my question, and Mulldoos looked over at me. I expected some hostility, but he was remarkably restrained. “Gurdinn’s got more men, twice as many, maybe. But he’d lose big numbers charging that wall. Not worth it. No commander orders a siege, even on a fortified hunting lodge. Not unless he’s got to.”

“You mean, if his men are starving or freezing?”

“Don’t go laying siege in the winter, scribbler. But starving, yeah, losing men to desertion, disease. None of which are in play here. Only been here a few days. No call to waste men on the walls at all.”

Hewspear, ever eager to contest his comrade’s opinion, said, “Unless there were other reasons the commander had little choice.”

“Such as?”

Vendurro piped up, “Maybe the commander don’t want to pay a visit to that table in the baron’s playroom you all told me about.”

Braylar said, “No, the Baron might be impatient, even impulsive, but he’s no fool-he would have no wish to see his men’s lives thrown away.”

“Even to capture a man who tried to kill him?”

Braylar shook his head. “Suspects attempted to kill him. That is the key. Suspects. That, and he values Captain Honeycock too highly.”

I watched the torches moving in Gurdinn’s camp. While the men wielding them seemed to be moving almost randomly before, several appeared to be forming up roughly into a square now.

“What if,” I asked carefully, “the High Priest is expecting reinforcements?”

Mulldoos turned and spit against a nearby tree. “Nah. They got their household guard, and some troops on hand. But no army to speak of. Gurdinn might not have one gathered here either, but he’s got a sizable enough force. Henny’s got no reinforcements.”

“Sellswords maybe?” Vendurro asked.

Mulldoos shot the younger man a look. “You been kicked in the head by your horse recently? Nowhere near enough time to hire help of that kind. Telling you, Gurdinn’s just playing games here. He…”

Mulldoos trailed off as the torches and dark figures indicated more Brunesmen had formed up into another sizable square, thick with shields held above their heads and in the front line.

Both squares started forward as the first light of dawn broke over the horizon.

“Nahhhh, he ain’t plaguing doing it. Feint, nothing but a feint.” But Mulldoos didn’t sound entirely convinced.

The priestguard in the towers started shooting arrows. I couldn’t make them out really, but I heard the twang of the bowstrings, and then saw a few strike the ground in front of the Brunesmen.

The two squares suddenly surged forward, breaking into a trot as they rushed the wall. Once in range, the arrows started to come fast, but the initial barrage thunked into the shields held overhead.

Vendurro slapped the cold ground. “Plague me, but they’re doing it. Mad bastards are rushing the wall!”

If there had been more men on the walls with bows, they might have whittled the Brunesmen down quickly with a withering hail, but there only seemed to be a handful of bows shooting at them, and the locked shields did their job for the most part-only two soldiers were struck, neither fatally.

The two squares reached the wall and Brunesmen stepped out to throw torches. One was struck in the shoulder by an arrow and his torch fell harmlessly to the ground, but the other launched his up into the wooden tower as an arrow whizzed above his head and forced him to step back under cover of the shields. The squares parted a little, and the Brunesmen positioned ladders in the base of the dry moat as best they could and leaned them up against the wall. It didn’t look easy, but Henlester hadn’t thought to fill the dry moat with any kind of spikes or impediment, so it didn’t slow down the besiegers overmuch. A concentrated rain of arrows came fast and heavy, and a few more Brunesmen were hit, their armor sparing some the worst wounds, but still, men fell in the dry moat, some certainly never to rise again.

I found myself leaning forward to watch, and saw the others doing the same. Suddenly I heard a scream, and thought one of the Brunesmen dead or dying, but it was an archer on the wall. He had an arrow in his neck and toppled backwards, disappearing from view.

Gurdinn had brought some bows, and the archers were out there in the dark between the torchlit camp and the torchlit wall, loosing arrows with little risk of being hit themselves.

Mulldoos actually whooped. “He might be a plaguing horsecunt, Cap, and a fool besides, but he’s got guts! Got to give the bastard that.”