Paul Thompson - The Middle of Nowhere

“Could be ogres.”

A signal trumpet blared, to be answered by horns in the other bandit camps. Once the armored brigands were in place, they halted, facing Nowhere. Long, pointed banners flipped slowly in the light midday airs.

“Robien, go to Khorr. Have his men stand ready to reinforce us,” Howland said. The bounty hunter departed on his mission. Wilf stepped up beside the old Knight, nudging him.

“What is it?”

Wilf held a cavalry helmet out to Howland, one taken from the recently beaten bandits. “For you, sir.” Worn bright by years of use, it was real iron, with a peeling leather pad inside.

“Thank you.” Howland slipped the helmet on. The cheek pieces were hot against his face. It fit perfectly. He buckled the strap under his chin.

Wilf made an awkward attempt to salute. Howland was touched, but the moment was broken by Raika’s loud shout, “Wilf? Wilf? Where’s that idiot gone off to now?”

The young farmer ran back to his place with the spearmen. Howland was waiting for Robien’s return when someone else touched his elbow: It was Ezu. Maybe the helmet muffled his footsteps, but Howland had heard and seen nothing of the odd traveler until he appeared.

“Where have you been?” Howland demanded.

“Here and there,” said Ezu. “You’re busy? I’ll come back-”

“You stay right by my side!” Howland thundered. “I need you-”

Out on the plain, the armored brigands started forward.

“Stay by me!”

“I’m no warrior,” said Ezu mildly.

“You are now!”

The bandit elite kept their lines straight and came on, not at wasteful gallop but at a steady trot.

“Stand by to receive cavalry!”

Raika, Amergin, and all the villagers looked at Howland in surprise. Though they’d heard his shouted commands for a while now, there was something different about his last command. Maybe it was the helmet or the sight of enemy knights, but the years seemed to have fallen away from him. He stood straighter, and his voice carried across the dusty common with uncommon energy and clarity. This was Sir Howland as he once had been.

The villagers knelt in two staggered lines, spears wedged against the ground. No attempt would be made to meet the enemy in the gaps as before. Behind the spear carriers, Amergin placed his slingers. Carver and the oldest half-dozen boys occupied the rooftops, while the younger feverishly cut up arrows and passed bundles of remade darts up to their friends. Of Robien, curiously, there was no sign. Howland glanced around for him, frowning.

At forty yards the riders swung their lances down, first the front rank then the second. They increased their pace to a canter.

“What are you waiting for, kender? Let them have it!”

With a whoop, Carver flung the first dart. It caromed off the visor of one of the riders. Dismayed, he ordered his boys to try their luck. Even with iron-tipped darts, they could make no impression on the armored riders.

Reluctantly, for kender liked animals, Carver cried, “Aim for the horses!”

At ten yards the enemy burst forward in a sudden spurt. There was no room to achieve a gallop, but they put on speed and crashed bodily through the barriers between the huts. Darts and sling shot clattered off them like hail. One or two horses got tangled in the vines and thorns, but the riders lowered their lance tips to the ground and with a single upward swing, swept the tangle aside.

The farmers’ line of spears stirred restlessly. Raika, standing behind Bakar, called out, “Those lances don’t hurt at all, you know, going in.”

“Really?” said Bakar, face streaming sweat.

“Yeah, it’s the coming out that kills you.”

Four armored riders broke through into the commons. One fell when Amergin put one of his precious metal stars through a slit in his visor. Howland drew his sword. “All right, then! Get them!”

Shouting and screaming, the farmers broke ranks and raced at the bandits. The rider nearest Howland calmly spitted first one, then another villager with his lance, flicking the impaled body of the first off before striking the second. Howland yelled to distract the deadly lancer, who promptly turned toward him. The black iron lance head cut through the air, driving toward Howland’s chest. Fear and weakness he’d learned since leaving the trade of arms vanished, and all the old moves flowed back from the depths of Howland’s memory. He struck the lance aside with the flat of his sword and got under his opponent’s reach. Once you beat the tip, he thought, a lancer was at a disadvantage against a good swordsman. Howland gripped his hilt in both hands and thrust hard at the rider’s belly. He twisted away, and the point of Howland’s blade skidded off his iron cuirass. The old Knight spun around, ducking under the horse’s head and coming up on the lancer’s left. The horseman was clad in three-quarter armor, not full plate, so the back of his legs were vulnerable. Howland swung with all his might, and felt his old sword bite hard behind his enemy’s knee. The bandit brought his heavy lance around, and the shaft connected solidly with Howland’s head. His new helmet saved him, but he went down. Moments later the lancer fell too, bleeding heavily from his leg wound. He tried to rise, but Wilf ran up and struck the lancer on the head with his spear shaft, flattening the struggling rider. Howland rolled to his feet, snatching the dagger from his belt. He jammed the point through the joint between the lancer’s gorget and helmet. Shuddering, the bandit went slack.

On his feet again, Howland looked for the gallant Wilf, but the melee had separated them again. More lancers had penetrated the line of huts, and though the farmers were fighting valiantly, giving as hard as they got, the enemy was too powerful to stand up to at close quarters. Howland was about to order his people to fall back to the well when one of the whippik boys screamed, “They’re coming! They’re coming this way!”

Between two houses Howland glimpsed another force of riders approaching. There was no way to stop them unless Khorr’s men left the trench and helped them. Where was Robien? Why had he not returned?

“Fall back! Fall back to the well!” Howland cried. The defenders tried to obey, but they were thoroughly mixed in with the enemy. Bakar fell, lanced in the back when he dropped his broken spear and tried to run. Seeing him fall, Raika felt a surge of rage. She threw down her spear and sprang at the man who’d struck Bakar, vaulting onto the rump of his horse. The heavily armored bandit couldn’t deal with Raika so close behind him. She twisted back and forth until she got a hand on his chin and wrenched him right out of the saddle, hurling him to the bloody earth.

Taking up the reins, she recovered a lance and used it to impale first one foe then another. The bandits shrank back, giving way before her.

Howland and Amergin gathered eleven villagers by the well. Cut, bleeding, and panting, they put their backs to the stone wall, ready to ward off another charge.

The elf felt something warm on his back. He was pressed against the Ancestor, and the fractured totem was warm to the touch, far warmer than the other stones in the wall. Yet there was no time to contemplate this mystery. The second wave of attackers were riding through the gaps created by the lancers.

“Time to sell our lives dearly,” Howland shouted. Beside him, Amergin loaded his last bronze star.

Just as the bandits cleared the huts, a noise at the flank made them slow. Startled beyond measure, the defenders clustered around the well saw what looked like a two-wheeled cart come charging over the dirt mound behind the trench. In the cart were Robien and three farmers, armed with spears. Pushing the cart from behind was Khorr, head down and feet churning.