John Flanagan - The Emperor of Nihon-Ja

'Your preference is noted, Halto-san,' said Shigeru, making no move to retire back down the ladder. Halt met his gaze for a few seconds, then shrugged.

'Well, I tried,' he said.

At a shouted order, the attacking force suddenly broke into a run. They had no particular formation. They spread out in a rough line as far as the narrow valley walls would allow. The line was three or four men deep. Halt made out five rudimentary scaling ladders – each one nothing more than a single thick sapling trunk, notched to accept crosspieces, which were then bound in place to act as rungs. At least another ten men were carrying ropes and grapnels. The plan was obviously to assault the wall at fifteen or sixteen different points at once to overextend the thirty-odd Senshi who could be seen defending the palisade.

The attackers had no idea that a hundred Kikori were crouched below the wooden ramparts. The first three ladders crashed against the wall almost simultaneously at three different points and Shigeru's men moved to bar the way to the men climbing them. Halt waited until each ladder had several men on it.

'Kikori! Now!' he yelled.

The waiting timber workers rose to their feet with a wordless roar of defiance. Rocks showered over the ramparts, hurled down into the mass of Senshi at the bases of the ladders. The first attacker to reach the top of a ladder cut at a Kikori, who ducked the whistling blade just in time. Moka thrust with his sword and the man screamed and plummeted off the ladder.

Elsewhere, Horace blocked another attacker's sword with his shield. Before he could retaliate, however, a wild-eyed Kikori spearman shoved him aside and buried his spear in the Senshi's shoulder. With a screech of pain, the man fell back onto his comrades, massed below.

A third ladder was sent toppling as four Kikori pikemen thrust their long poles against it, shoving it sideways until it crashed over. The Senshi closest to the top managed to spring onto the rampart. It was only a momentary respite. He barely regained his balance before a Kikori axe sheared through his armour. He toppled forward, crumpled over the rampart. Another defender shoved a spear handle under his shoulders and levered him back, sending him crashing back to the side he came from.

Grapnels were rattling against the walls now as Arisaka's men tried to clamber up hand over hand. Halt heard Reito and Moka, the two senior members of the Emperor's Senshi, shouting instructions to the defenders, and he knew the gist of their words. Let them get at least halfway up before you cut the ropes! They had determined this strategy the night before. A man falling from three or four metres stood a good chance of being injured – particularly if his comrades below were brandishing weapons.

At the midpoint of the wall, Halt saw one of Shigeru's bodyguard engaged in swordplay with an attacker who had made it over the wall. The still forms of two Kikori were at the attacker's feet. As Halt watched, an arrow slammed into the defender's chest and sent him staggering back off the rampart.

Before the attacking warrior could take advantage of his momentary respite, Selethen's tall form moved gracefully to the attack. His curved sabre cut into the gap between the Senshi's helmet and the neck piece of his armour.

Satisfied that the threat had been taken care of, Halt glanced around and saw another defender, a Kikori axeman this time, fall to the planks with an arrow in his chest. The Ranger searched the valley below the wall. Five Senshi, armed with the long, asymmetrical recurve bows favoured by the Nihon-Jan, had stopped some thirty metres behind their comrades and were picking off the defenders.

'Will!' he shouted. His apprentice had moved away to cut through a grapnel rope with his saxe knife. Now he looked, saw Halt's outstretched arm pointing to the group of archers and slipped the bow off his shoulder.

'You from the left. Me from the right!' shouted Halt and Will nodded. Once before, they had made the mistake of shooting at the same enemy in a battle. Now both longbows sang their dreadful song and the Senshi at either end of the line of archers staggered back, staring in horror at the arrows that had punched through their leather armour as if it weren't there. Before their comrades registered the fact that they were down, the Rangers dropped the next two within a heartbeat of each other. The fifth man searched in vain for the source of these deadly return shots. He had an arrow nocked, ready to draw and shoot as soon as he saw his opponent. He never managed it. Will's third arrow slammed into him. He dropped his bow, clutching at the terrible shaft, then fell and lay still.

Now a captain among the attackers, realising that the first blind, formless rush had failed, was taking stock of the situation. He saw the patched and sagging western section of the palisade and realised this was an opportunity. He gestured for two men to pick up a fallen ladder and follow him. Along the way, he gathered three more, equipped with grapnels and ropes. The hastily assembled assault party ran along the base of the wall, dodging rocks that showered down from above, to the weakened section. As they went, the captain rallied more men until at least thirty Senshi were following him. He gestured at the single-trunk ladder, then at the rotting beams of the wall.

'Use it as a battering ram! Smash through the wall!' he yelled. Half a dozen more men, suddenly seeing what he was about, joined the two Senshi wielding the log. They charged at the wall and, with one of them counting tempo, slammed it again and again into the brittle timbers of the palisade. Two of the old logs shattered and split, a third sagged away at the next strike of the ram. More rocks hailed down on them, but the defenders' aim was not as accurate as before. Panic, the captain thought. He screamed at the men with grapnels, pointing to the top of the palisade.

'Don't try to climb it! Pull it down!' he ordered. The grapnels whirred around, then sailed upwards, each one trailing a tail of rope behind it. One clattered back but two bit into the wood and held fast. Instantly, eight or nine men tailed onto the ropes and heaved and strained backwards. A three-metre section of the wooden parapet gave way and came crashing down in a cloud of dust and splinters. The men heaving on the rope staggered and fell but recovered quickly and cast again. The grapnel that had missed with the first cast was now solidly buried in the timber at the top of the wall. As the attackers further down the wall saw what was happening, more of them streamed to join the assault on the western section. The tree-trunk battering ram smashed into the wall again, tearing a rent between two of the upright timbers. More men joined in the assault, swinging the ram with even greater force.

Rocks and spears showered down on them now but the attackers were mad with battle rage and they knew that the section of wall was almost breached. They could see the defenders deserting the ruined wall, running in panic to escape before it came crashing down. Yelling their battle cries, they surged forward triumphantly as, under the combined force of the ram and four grapnel ropes, the wall finally gave way and a four-metre breach appeared. They clambered up over the shattered timbers, swarming through the gap.

The first men through stopped, bewildered, faced by a new, lower wall that enclosed them on three sides. But the press of their companions behind them forced them forward into the enclosed space. More and more of them poured in before they realised they were in a trap. Horrified, they saw a line of heads appear over the top of the new palisade – at least fifty of them. Then a storm of hurled rocks and spears broke over them – and this time, the defenders seemed to have regained their former accuracy.

'Go forward! Keep going forward!' The captain who had begun the assault was still alive. He brandished his sword now to lead the Senshi to a new attack. There was no way they could get back through the crowded, crammed breach. Their only hope was to scale this new, lower wall in front of them.