Richard Parker - Elsewhere

Horses were now flying past on either side of their formation and the halberdiers began to reach out with their weapons, both stabbing and grabbing. First one Knight, then another dropped to the ground and soon Knights were being wrenched from their saddles at an alarming rate. Gwaynn, Vio, Bethany and Marcum along with the other swordsmen, all worked their way through the gaps between spearmen and killed many of the stunned Knights with ease. Over and over Gwaynn moved in and out of the formation to kill those who’d fallen. He killed some who were injured by the fall, some who were dazed and one or two who were unconscious. How long he moved in and out of the line of spearmen to dispatch those unhorsed Gwaynn could not have said, but when he grew tired he realized he must have been at it for a very long time. But even with the vast number of easy kills there were a fair number of Knights who scrambled to their feet and evaded the deadly swordsmen. Unhorsed and on foot they soon began to group together for mutual defense. The Massi swordsmen ignored them and would not be coaxed far from their defensive formations. After quickly killing those they could the Massi soldiers would immediately melt back behind the protective lines of the halberdiers. The Knights on foot were surrounded by enemy formations but they were at a loss as to what to do, so they did nothing. They just continued to merge together into groups and waited for some command to come from their Captains who were still mounted and circling among the enemy formations. But the Knights on horseback ignored their grounded comrades just as thoroughly as their Massi counterparts. In fact, the Knights still on horseback pushed through and circled around the infantry formations, confident of victory. Even now their goal was to encircle the Massi infantry and destroy them, but with each pass more and more Knights were yanked from their saddles. Once again some were quickly killed, while others survived to join their brothers on foot.

All through the battle the isolated groups of Knights on foot continued to be ignored by the Massi, who held to their formations with a tenacity that was unyielding. Their concentration rested completely on the enemy still mounted. The Knights on horseback seemed unaware of the Massi tactics, and continued to race through the Massi lines completely sure that victory was imminent. The mounted Knights fought as they always did, trying to surround the enemy and cut them up piece meal…like so much fodder. To the enemy, the Massi’s odd formation only seemed designed to hasten their inevitable destruction. It was only when the Knights reached the linear Toranado that they faced an enemy they could understand, an enemy which was facing them in a strong unified line. Here was a trained army ready to meet them, not the folly of the split formations they had so easily penetrated. The forward Knights yelled in their excitement and charged the Toranado, not realizing their strength was sorely diminished and that they would hit the heavy infantry not as a unified line, but in the sporadic way common among less disciplined cavalries.

Here and there they crashed against the Toranado lines and though most of the collisions were massive, the experienced and tough heavy infantry lines held against the disorganized strike of the cavalry charge.

Captain Hothgaard, who was near the forefront of the charge, quickly saw that it was doomed to fail. Unbelievably his lines had not held and he instantly grasped the genius of the Massi defense. By allowing for space, his cavalry raced through the paths of least resistance, and in doing so were repeatedly broken into smaller and smaller segments. The farther they moved through the Massi lines the weaker and smaller his own lines became, until they reached the end game and the Toranado heavy infantry.

“Retreat!” Hothgaard yelled. “Retreat!” He cried, acutely aware of the panic that sounded in his voice. The Knights around him stared in his direction, shocked and clearly confused.

“It’s a trap!” He screamed and spun his mount around. To his dismay he found their lines of retreat already being cut off by the now spreading formations of Massi infantry, some of who were now slaughtering the Knights a foot and others who were screaming with bloodlust and racing in his direction. The screams of the Massi infantry sent chills up his spine; they were the screams of vengeance, the screams of imminent victory. Hothgaard looked to the north and south but those avenues were also quickly being sealed.

‘It is not possible,’ he thought, dazed. ‘Defeat! And by a band of infantry…it’s not possible.’

“Form a line on me!” Hothgaard yelled dismissing such pessimistic thoughts. But he knew now that their only chance was to form a strong line and charge hard and fast before the Massi moved in too close. Without a strong line they had no hope of driving a wedge through the mass of foot soldiers that were quickly surrounding them. In moments several hundred men gathered around the Captain’s position and though Hothgaard could see the rest of his Knights disintegrating around him, he did not hesitate. He and his men charged directly for what they believed the weakest Massi position; they charged directly toward Gwaynn and Vio.

But Gwaynn did not get to meet the approaching threat; instead he was quickly jostled backward by his own men until he was safely behind a strong line of halberdiers. The men immediately planted their halberds into the ground and angled them up to meet the oncoming charge.

Under normal conditions the fearsome warhorses of the Knights would have crashed into the lines with fury, but all across the battlefield came the screams of dying horses, this plus the random panicky movements of the many rider-less horses, filled the air with the scent of fear and caused the charge to falter well before the two lines even met.

“HOLD!” Gwaynn yelled in his most commanding voice. The Knights were defeated he knew that now. Only a few hundred were still mounted at this point in the battle, and all around him the Knights afoot were being surrounded. Those who were still fighting were being systematically slaughtered, but many others realized the battle was already lost and were throwing down their arms in capitulation.

“HOLD!” Gwaynn yelled again and slowly the pockets of violence within the sound of his voice began to diminish. As the cries and shouts of battle began to die away the atmosphere slowly began to change to one of inaction. The battlefield was filled with the dead and dying, but also the living. The Temple Knights remaining were now utterly surrounded by the much more numerous Massi and Toranado infantry.

“Sir Knights…do you yield?” Gwaynn cried out over the short distance between his position and the last of the mounted Knights. The Toranado were approaching slowly from the rear and on all sides the infantry was closing on the only large group of mounted enemy.

Captain Hothgaard, who was among the Knights still a horse, looked wildly about in disbelieve, thinking the outcome of the battle was somehow a very big illusion and soon he would spot the rest of his army riding to the rescue. Seconds later he did spot a large formation of cavalry riding toward them from the south of Claymont. Instantly his heart soared, but then he spotted the flag flying at the head of the column, it was a white eagle flying on a dark blue field; the flag of Massi.

‘It could not be…we destroyed them!’ Hothgaard thought.

“Sir Knights…the High King is dead. Lost at sea. You are fighting alone, King Weldon Palmerrio is our prisoner and the Deutzani are destroyed,” the young man behind the formation of spears spoke loudly and directly to Hothgaard. The Captain blinked rapidly at the news.

‘Could it be true? Could the High King be lost?’