Metrias Corodin was a maker of scientific instruments, and a good one too. By day he worked in a small but adequate shop on the second level of the western balcony of the instrument-makers’ courtyard, torturing his eyes as he marked out the tiny calibrations on the scales and barrels of the instruments and scorching his fingers over the soldering lamp. In the evenings, he was the sergeant of his watch district; it was a social function as much as anything else, an honour bestowed on him by his neighbours in recognition of a useful and industrious life. He enjoyed the duty; a few hours a week of drill, a little paperwork, a good excuse to hold meetings that people could linger after to talk shop and share news and a jug or two of cider. The drill wasn’t particularly irksome; as a young man he’d been something of an athlete, and he wasn’t so much out of condition that half an hour’s square-bashing or a morning at the butts was a problem for him, even if the straps had had to be let out a few times since the shirt was new.
Now he was standing in front of a line of bleary-eyed nervous men drawn up across the entrance to the coopers’ square. His small company was wedged in between the coopers and the nailmakers, two substantial detachments, each with several sergeants. By a quirk of seniority and guild etiquette, however, he found himself in overall command of the defence of the lower city.
Until the real soldiers get here
, he reassured himself,
which must be soon, surely
. Somewhere ahead, an indeterminate distance away, there were unnerving noises, shouts and yells and sporadic clashes of metal on metal. Something was coming this way, and he had a nasty feeling it was the war.
He tried to remember his basic theory; Ninas Elius’
Art of Urban Defence
, required reading for watch officials for the last hundred and twenty years.
Defensive actions in a confined space against an oncoming enemy
- he could remember swotting up on the section for his lance-corporal’s examination twenty years ago -
are to be conducted in two phases, comprising the disruptive use of archery and the obstructive effect of an infantry line
. He’d learnt it, yes, but never stopped to think what it might mean. Shoot the buggers first and then hit them, he guessed. It seemed to be the sensible thing to do.
As he peered into the darkness ahead he cursed his poor eyesight, and the years of crouching over his bench that had bowed his legs and cramped his back. His helmet felt loose on his head, despite his wife’s last-minute packing with a woollen scarf, and with the sideflaps tied down he was sure he could only hear about half as well as usual.
The disruptive effect of archery
. . . Well, time to get ready to do something about that. Nervously, his voice higher and squeakier than it should have been, he gave the order to string bows, and set about bending his own; the end of the bottom limb trapped against the outside of the right foot, then the left leg steps over the bow until the underside of the knee is brought to bear on the inside of the bow, just below the handle; grip the upper limb firmly in the left hand and flex it inwards (and every time he did it, he felt sure the bow would snap, though it hadn’t done so yet), while the right hand brings the loop of the bowstring over the nock, thus completing the manoeuvre. Standard bow drill, he’d done it many thousands of times; but tonight he had to try three times before he got it right.
The noise was nearer, close enough that he could make a good estimate of where they were; just inside the plumbers’ quarter, where the tank-makers had their shops. He tried to imagine the scene, but couldn’t; bloodthirsty savages swarming past shops he’d known since he was a boy, the idea was so incongruous as to be laughable. He gave the order to nock arrows.
A fairly new bow, this. Last spring, when the tournament season started, he’d finally been forced to admit that his old bow, twenty-five years old and still as sound as the day it was made, was getting too heavy for him to draw, and so he’d treated himself to a brand new one, a hickory and lemonwood ninety-five pounder instead of the hundred and twenty pound draw of the old self yew. Ninety-five was still too stiff, if the truth be told, but a man has his pride. The string felt dry against his fingers - shame on him for neglecting to wax it, he’d have nobody to blame but himself if it broke on him now. As for the arrow, he’d instinctively chosen the worst of the set, slightly bowed and a bit shabby in the fletchings; it always flew left and a little high; he knew the degree of variance well enough. This would almost certainly be the last time he drew it; other things more important in a battle than retrieving spent arrows, after all. The thought of aiming it deliberately at someone was quite bizarre; hadn’t he spent the last fifteen years as range officer telling the archers never under any circumstances to point a bow at anyone?
Movement under the archway opposite—
Too dark to make anything out except a general impression of moving bodies, a wave of men advancing steadily, cautious on unfamiliar ground. Not our men, anyway. Without looking round, he stepped back into the line, heard his own voice giving the order to mark and draw . . .
(The strain of the bow against his left wrist; a sharp twinge in his back as he brought his shoulder blades together. He looked for a single target to aim at but there wasn’t one, just a featureless line seventy-five yards away across the square)
. . . Hold and loose; his fingers relaxed and the string pulled away, slapping the inside of his left arm where the bracer protected it. He tried to follow the course of his arrow, but it was lost among so many, and now his voice was calling,
Nock, mark, draw, hold, loose!
and he was doing the drill in time to his own commands, as if he was once more a young boy under the sergeant’s eye. He felt a muscle protesting in his left forearm, easy to pull something if you don’t take care, but there wasn’t time to worry about that, he had to keep up with the commands (
nock, mark, draw, hold, loose
) or else get hopelessly out of step, be the laughing-stock of the quarter—
A shape loomed up at him in the darkness and turned into a man; short, thickset, in early middle age, a spear in both hands and his eyes full of terror, plunging towards him not twenty yards away.
So that’s what the enemy looks like
, he realised as he lowered his aim, picking a spot a hand and two finger’s breadth above the handle and letting his fingers relax. He saw the arrow strike, the shaft vanish into the man’s chest until only the fletchings and the nock were left; he saw the man run on two, three paces until his legs folded under him so that he pitched forward on his face; and behind him another - enough time to nock another arrow, he wondered dispassionately, as one second expanded into a substantial part of a lifetime. Perhaps, but if he was wrong he’d never have time to draw his sword. He let the bow fall (
my beautiful new bow, and someone’s bound to tread on it
) and dropped his hand to his belt, feeling for the pommel of the old standard-issue sword that had been his father’s—
Horrible, heavy great thing, cruel to the hands of a man who made his living by fine work; sword drill was compulsory but he’d never made an effort at it; enough that he should cut his fingers to the bone with a bowstring without rubbing the skin off his palms with a wire-bound sword-hilt . . .)
—Which slid out of its scabbard with a rasping, grating noise and felt hopelessly heavy, lumpish in his hand, as the enemy came forward, running straight towards him—
He’s got his eyes shut
, Corodin noticed with amazement.
Bugger’s charging with his eyes shut. Poor bastard must be scared stiff
.
—In his hand a short-bladed, long-handled sword with a single cutting edge, which he held above his head like a winnowing-flail—
Metrias Corodin the instrument-maker let him come, let him come; and when he was close enough to reach, he held out his sword and let the poor frightened savage run straight onto it; at which point he was close enough to hear the air escaping from the punctured lung, before the man dropped to the ground, pulling Corodin’s arm down and yanking the sword from his grasp. Empty-handed, then, he looked up at the next one, coming straight towards him as the other one had done, a lance in his hands, the same terror reflected in his face. Too late to work the sword free, but he tried it anyway, felt it budge and start to move just as the other man’s spearhead came into sharp focus, so close that even his dim eyes could make it out, down to the fresh marks of the stone on its broad, leaf-shaped blade. He waited for the lance to pierce him, in that long last second thinking,
I wonder if it’ll hurt much
, and was still waiting when the man next to him in the line leant across him and fended the lance away before following up with a thrust that ripped into the other man’s stomach and made him howl. Corodin was grateful to his neighbour - gods, if it wasn’t Gidas Mascaleon under that big, rusty helmet, a cheapskate and a disgrace to our profession - but before he could say thank you, another one of the enemy slashed Gidas Mascaleon across the face, cutting right through his nose just above the bridge; and while he was still stunned with the shock and the pain, drove the sword into his chest and killed him.
Corodin had his sword free by now and looked round for the man who’d killed his neighbour, but somehow wasn’t there any more. No time to look more carefully; another one of them straight ahead, running in, but slowing down to climb over the drift of dead and dying men that was starting to build up around the feet of the defenders. As Corodin watched, the man seemed to lose his sense of purpose; there was fear in his eyes too, but the man was thinking, weighing up whether the attempt was feasible. He stood there for a moment astride a dying man; a tall, thin boy with a straggle of beard and slim, muscular arms showing under the baggy sleeves of a mailshirt, a sensible lad who realised the attack was over, and turned his back and ran off the way he’d come.
‘We’ve tried three charges,’ the man said, a junior captain of the line. ‘It’s hopeless, we just can’t budge them.’
‘Why the hell are you bothering with that?’ Temrai panted. ‘Get your men out of my way so I can clear this lot out with my archers.’
Four volleys was all it took (
nock, mark, draw, hold, loose
) and then the few that were left standing broke and ran, leaving the way clear for another hundred yards or so. As his line advanced Temrai felt a cold rage inside him towards the young captain, the man whose mistake had cost the lives of many of his men; but he ignored it, concentrating on the way ahead, desperately trying to remember the geography, whether there was any point ahead that was likely to harbour an ambush, how the streets were laid out, whether there was another lane alongside this one that the enemy could come down and take them in flank and rear. Each time one of his men fell he wanted to run to him, protect him, get his body away from the danger just in case there was a little drop of life still left in him. But it was out of his hands now, he couldn’t afford the luxury of indulging his finer sentiments and his noble nature, not when everything that happened here was his responsibility. He couldn’t have run forward into the thick of the fighting even if he’d wanted to.
Sounds like an excuse to me
, he told himself, but he knew that wasn’t true.
Where in hell were the enemy? Three squares they’d crossed and not an arrow loosed at them, nothing in their path except a few parked wagons and the occasional trader’s booth. A trap? Or were they struggling to bring their men up in time, or letting this district go so as to form a defence in strength at some more advantageous point? There was a map somewhere, but he couldn’t remember who’d had it last; besides, he ought to know these things. He looked round and shouted, furious that in spite of everything he’d said the line wasn’t keeping level. The right wing was trailing behind, the centre was too far forward. Gods, if they were to attack us now . . .
Down this one, Loredan muttered to himself, past the livery stable and the tavern that does cheap mutton pies, should bring us out opposite the beltmakers’ guildhall, and that’ll be right. Assuming they’ve advanced as fast as I think they have, and I haven’t missed a turning in the dark.
Here we are; but we’re too early, got to give them time to run up against the force blocking the chandlers’ arch. Then we’ll have them front and back, without room to turn or use their bows. At least, that’s the theory.
Wonderful thing, theory.
He stopped and raised his hand, and behind him the column bustled to a halt. Slowly he counted to fifty - why fifty? Well, as good a number as any - before dropping his hand and turning the corner back into the Grand Avenue, which was full of people.
It was like a Navy Day parade, seen from behind. In front, in the distance, a solid wedge of people squeezed down the street, followed by the stragglers, the people who couldn’t be bothered to walk fast and keep up.
We’ll have them at any rate
, he muttered to himself as he ran forward, quickly selecting a man at random.
Whoever he was, he can’t have known very much about it; and then he was down, with Loredan stepping over him and a scrum of soldiers close behind, surging forward and across to fill the width of the street. Only a few of the enemy had turned round to face them by the time they were close enough to make contact, and after that it was sheer hard work, swinging the arms and taxing the shoulders, like digging peat or cutting back an overgrown stream. It was possible to feel the ripples of panic spreading out, from the back of the crush where Loredan’s men were cutting out their path, on into the middle where men were packed so closely that their main concern was avoiding the sharp butt-spikes on the ends of the spears of the men in front. It was a little bit like watching something melt, seeing the solid turn to liquid under the heat.
Gods, it was a trap after all, and I fell for it
. Temrai tried to look back and see the extent of the disaster, but there were too many heads in the way; all he could see was heads and shoulders and a forest of spears. But he could feel the shock running through his army as the men behind shoved forward to get as far away as they could from the shambles they couldn’t see. There didn’t seem to be a way out of it; not unless by some miracle another part of his army happened along and took the ambush in rear. For an instant, Temrai’s mind was full of a ludicrous vision of the Grand Avenue, crammed as full of men as a sausage skin, alternating strata of them and us, each layer stabbing the backs of the men in front, being stabbed by the men behind, until only the very front and rear detachments were left to fight it out on top of a mattress of corpses.