Dan Parkinson - Hammer and Axe

The first such tower to come within range was cut to rubble by disks from the great discobels on the dwarven ramparts, but stones from catapults showered the discobels in return, smashing the frame of one of them so that it yawed, tipped, and fell crashing from the high rampart, tearing itself to pieces on the rockfall slope below. The second discobel was withdrawn for repair, and dwarven slingers flanking the main guard towers concentrated their fire on the humans’ near engines, driving back their crews and footmen.

One slung catapult was abandoned three hundred yards from the western rampart, and when human footmen from the near ranks ran out to retrieve it they were met by a company of the dwarven home guard fresh from the citadel of Gatekeep. Fierce, hand-to-hand fighting ensued, sweeping this way and that along the wide, paved staging area. Human and dwarf warriors met and mingled, swords slashing, hammers flashing, shields ringing with the song of deadly conflict.

Hand to hand and eye to belt buckle, the tall, savage people of the plains threw themselves upon the short, stocky people of the mountains and met a grim, determined resistance as fierce as their own attack. Shields high and weapons whining, the dwarves drove into the human ranks like wedges of short demons, and many a human learned the truth of the legends—that inch for inch a dwarf was both heavier and stronger than a human and that dwarven steel was the finest in the world.

In the thick of the melee, Theiwar workers made their way to the abandoned catapult, defended it with sledges swung by massive arms, and turned it.

Seeing what the Theiwar were doing, the home guard responded, gradually changing the pattern of the conflict from random melee to a purposeful herding of the humans. The guard spread into lines, swept forward along two fronts of the human assault, and, blow by blow, drove the tall people back, compacting them against their own kind. Wielding weapons and prybars furiously, the dozen Theiwar—they had numbered twenty when they first reached the catapult—lowered the engine’s elevating blocks and anchored its trailing runners, then shouted in unison, “Now!”

As the home guards turned and raced away, the catapult was released, point-blank, directly into the crowded human defense. Its missile, a two-hundred-pound stone, carved a yard-wide path of death through the crowd, and the home guards turned again, rushed upon the survivors, and renewed their attack.

Humans turned to flee, and the retreat became a rout until the pursuing dwarves were flanked by other units of the human army and cut down from both sides.

Lodar Yellowkilt’s Golden Hammer charged into the thick of this new fight, a murderous, solid rank of bright shields, bright cloaks, and bright blades, scattering humans as it went.

As though the widening conflict at the western staging flat were a signal, the human army launched an all-out attack all along the dwarven defensive front. For long minutes the dwarven lines held, meeting every thrust with good dwarven steel. But as each human fell, a dozen more swarmed in to take his place, and the dwarves began to retreat, step by step, crouching and shielding, slashing and pounding as they worked their way backward up the narrowing stageways toward the ramparts themselves.

One large group of barbarians, breaking away from the rest, launched a direct attack between the ramparts. Using picks, throw-hooks, and climbing lines they headed directly for the gateway ledge two hundred feet above. Barek Stone watched them come, swarming up the steep slope, and waited until most of them were committed, clinging to their lines, before responding. At his order, a hinged shelf atop the ledge wall tipped upward, dwarves with prybars behind it, and dozens of open casks filled with burning lamp oil cascaded down on the climbers. Walls of fire blazed up from the sedge and brush below, and the screaming humans disappeared into the fire.

Catapult stones and tumbling log rams arced above the furious combat at the lower ramparts to smash into the dwarven guard towers. One of the human archers’ towers rolled into place, and volleys of arrows streamed from it, seeking the dwarves above on the ledge and those along the climbing ramparts. Most of the bolts caromed off dwarven shields, but here and there, a few buried themselves in dwarven flesh.

Vicious hand-darts, the favored weapon of Sackmen raiders, hissed through the turmoil like striking vipers, deadly in their accuracy. All along the front, human raiders pushed forward, driving the dwarves ever back, up the staging areas and onto the ramparts themselves, relentless human hordes following and pushing.

The second discobel, hastily repaired, rolled forth from behind a guard tower, dwarves falling from its timbers as arrows and darts found them. But as they fell, others climbed, and the tower was aligned, armed, and discharged, its crackling thunder echoing above the turmoil below. The great, toothed iron disk flashed in high sunlight for an instant, then collided with the human archers’ tower, cutting cleanly through half its timbers. The tower tilted, timbers groaning and cables singing as they broke, then collapsed straight down upon itself, carrying its human occupants with it.

Fresh marauders, coming up from behind, veered around the wreckage and its screaming, bleeding victims as they ran to strengthen the attacking forces.

For an hour the fighting raged unchecked, and then another hour, and Willen Ironmaul saw, bleakly, that the dwarves had lost fully half the frontal space they had set out to defend. The massive human army pressed forward relentlessly. Clearly now, Willen could see the wizards behind them, driving them on.

The humans fought like maniacs. They were obviously only mercenaries, but the way they threw themselves into battle was awesome. It was as though they were driven by devils, and Willen realized that what he was seeing was the power of magic on the human mind. Somehow, the wizards had altered their warriors so that each seemed to see himself as invincible and invulnerable. Without the wizards, these human marauders would have faltered long since. But the spells that had been put upon them drove them on relentlessly.

Suddenly the chief of chiefs saw something else and pointed.

Sweeping in from the Promontory, behind the human ranks, was a thundering arc of mounted dwarves, nearly a thousand in number.

“The Neidar!” Willen shouted. “Cale Greeneye has brought the Neidar!”

Scattering surprised wizards and stunned laggards, the Neidar charge hit the rear of the human assault and collapsed it inward. Like legions of death, the grim open-sky dwarves drove into the enemy, broad axes flashing steel-bright and blood-red, their war horses white-eyed and back-eared as they kicked humans aside and trampled the fallen.

It was only a quick slash-and-run attack and ended before most of the humans realized what had hit them, but it was enough to break the momentum of the assault. Humans withdrew everywhere, backing away warily. The dwarves in front of the fortress regained their formations and mounted new defenses at the very aprons of the stronghold’s mighty ramparts.

Out on the verge of the Promontory, the Neidar strikers wheeled their mounts in salute, and drums spoke above the noise of battle and withdrawal. Ignoring a hasty volley of arrows from below, Willen Ironmaul climbed to the top of the gate-ledge wall and raised an arm in salute. In the distance, Cale Greeneye responded, then wheeled his forces and headed eastward, down the Promontory toward the distant border of Ergoth.

Like Willen, he had heard the sentinel drums in the night and was on his way to repel the wandering marauders crossing Ergoth toward Kal-Thax in hope of gaining spoils from the fighting there.