Their first encounter was with two sentries who, seeing the trio coming, charged at them. Stryke and Pepperdyne engaged the
pair in swordplay. Haskeer raced on and barrelled into a lone archer in the process of drawing his bow. He battered the man,
then proceeded to pound his head against the battlement wall, dashing his brains out.
Stryke and Pepperdyne, having finished the sentries, caught up. The three ran on.
They headed for a knot of four or five archers. Two of them loosed arrows in their direction. One was hopelessly wide of the
mark. The other came so close to hitting Stryke he felt the displacement of air as it whistled past his ear.
Before they could take another shot, Pepperdyne, Stryke, then Haskeer hurtled into them. A bloody reckoning with blades, fists
and boots left four sprawled on the walkway and one plummeting to the parade ground.
From the rear, Prooq yelled a warning. Stryke and the others dropped. A flight of arrows swept overhead and punched into three
fast-approaching sentries. Back on their feet, Stryke, Haskeer and Pepperdyne darted onwards.
They didn’t have to work for the next brace of kills. A couple of bowmen in their path succumbed to blazing arrows from orc
compatriots below.
Ten paces later half a dozen sentries ganged up on them. Haskeer exposed the windpipe of the first one to venture near his
blade. Pepperdyne punctured the second’s chest. Stryke ran through the third with a savage thrust, then went on to eviscerate
the fourth. Pepperdyne sliced into the fifth’s belly, while Haskeer snapped the neck of the sixth.
There was no hiatus. The trio had left just a short trail of bloody footprints before they ran into the next clutch of defenders.
And so it went, with a seemingly never-ending cavalcade of human flesh to be carved, stabbed and slashed.
Until at last they stood breathless at the parapet’s end, surrounded by a litter of corpses.
Haskeer had hold of the remaining defender. He lifted the dazed, beaten human, with the intention of throwing him from the
battlements and down the cliff face. Suddenly he stopped, seemed to lose interest in the man and casually dropped him on to
the parapet’s flagstones.
“What’s going on down there?” he said.
Stryke joined him.
He saw the wreckage of the demolished hovels at the bottom of the cliff, with flames playing over them and billowing smoke.
But what really caught his attention was the dozens of soldiers milling about the ruins, and what they must have been doing.
“They were going for the tunnel,” he murmered.
“Look at this!” Pepperdyne said. He was standing on the other side of the parapet, staring down at the fighting.
Stryke and Haskeer went to him.
A large number of troops were emerging from a maze of outbuildings and rushing towards the square.
“Must have been holding them back,” Stryke realised.
“Set us up,” Haskeer growled.
“There’s got to be a hundred of them, or more,” Pepperdyne reckoned. “Stryke, we can’ t —”
“I know.
Come on!
”
They sprinted along the parapet to the three grunts, and all of them pelted down the stairs.
The battle was still raging. Stryke spotted Coilla and made for her. He began yelling, “There’s a —”
“We see them!”
The first of the reinforcements were spilling into the square, forcing the orcs back.
Brelan arrived, panting. “Look who’s with them!” He pointed to a figure striding along in the midst of the troops.
“Who?” Stryke said.
“That’s Kapple Hacher. The commander-in-chief himself.”
“This ain’t by chance,” Haskeer stated. “We’ve been stitched.”
“We can’t beat these odds,” Coilla said.
“No,” Stryke agreed bitterly. “Haskeer, sound the retreat.”
The sergeant took a curved horn from his belt and pressed it to his lips.
As its strident note rang out, Stryke bellowed, “
Pull back! Pull back!
”
The shrill, insistent note Haskeer sent out sparked an exodus.
All over the fort’s parade ground, orcs disengaged and headed for the gates. Or at least most did. A few couldn’t extricate
themselves from overwhelming odds and imminent death. Others lay wounded, or were on the point of capture, and chose to turn
their blades on themselves rather than fall into enemy hands. Those who did withdraw were hotly pursued, and rearguard actions
were fought across the square.
The retreating Wolverines, resistance members and Vixens clustered at the gates, urging on stragglers and loosing arrows at
the humans chasing them.
“Isn’t that one of the Ceragans?” Coilla exclaimed, pointing into the heaving scrimmage.
Stryke nodded. “It’s Ignar.”
“He’s in trouble, Stryke.”
The raw recruit had almost reached the edge of the scrum when a group of troopers caught up with him. He was trying to beat
them off.
“I’m going in,” Stryke decided.
“I’m with you,” she said.
“Me too,” Pepperdyne announced.
With Stryke in the lead they ran towards the mob.
On their way they met the van of the pursuers. Four bawling soldiers blocked their path. Stryke hacked down the leader with
a single potent blow. Coilla and Pepperdyne tackled the others as he sprinted on.
Ignar was battling two opponents. He was outclassed, and he was injured. Blood flowed freely from several wounds, not least
a broad gash to the chest. It was all he could do to fend off his attackers, and as Stryke approached he slumped to his knees.
One of the soldiers lifted his sword to deliver a killing stroke.
Stryke intervened. A powerful swipe of his blade all but severed the human’s sword arm. The man screamed and stumbled away,
gushing blood. Stryke spun to face his charging companion. Their swords clashed and they furiously hacked at each other. The
flurry ended with the soldier taking steel to his belly.
Ignar had fallen. Stryke went to him and found him barely conscious. Coilla and Pepperdyne arrived.
“He’s in a bad way,” Coilla pronounced as she examined the recruit. “Lot of blood lost.”
“We’ll get him clear,” Stryke said.
He and Pepperdyne half carried, half dragged Ignar while Coilla kept any other would-be attackers at bay. As they neared the
gates, orc archers sent out covering fire for them.
They laid Ignar on the ground, and somebody propped his head with a folded jerkin. He seemed unconscious.
Stryke lightly slapped his pallid cheeks. “Ignar.
Ignar
.”
The young orc’s eyes flickered open.
“Here,” Coilla said, handing Stryke a canteen.
“With a wound like that,” Pepperdyne remarked, “he shouldn’t drink.”
“It doesn’t matter now,” Stryke told him. He dampened Ignar’s lips with a little water.
Ignar tried to speak. Stryke allowed him a drink from the canteen. He coughed, and murmured something. Stryke leaned closer.
“
I’m… sorry
,” Ignar whispered.
“No need,” Stryke replied. “You fought well, and you die a Wolverine.”
Ignar managed a faint smile. Then his eyes closed for the last time.
Coilla hissed, “Shit.”
“We can’t hold here much longer,” Pepperdyne said.
“Get ’em moving,” Stryke ordered, rising.
“We’ve got comrades in there,” Brelan protested. “We can’t leave them.”
“We take losses,” Stryke said, glancing at Ignar’s corpse. “It’s part of the price. Linger here and we’ll lose more.”
“Or all,” Coilla amended. She pointed at the mass of humans across the square. They vastly outnumbered the orcs, and they
were grouping for an all-out assault. “We have to go.
Now
.”
Reluctantly, Brelan nodded assent.
Stryke turned to Coilla and Jup. “They all know where the rendezvous point is. Any wounded or foot-draggers on the way get
left behind. It’s every orc for themselves. Pass it on.”
They moved off to spread the word.
He looked at Pepperdyne. “Ready for a fast retreat, human?”
“Just say the word.”
Stryke signalled Haskeer. The sergeant gave another blast on the horn. Orc archers stepped up their flow of arrows.
The retreat began.
They poured out of the gates and on to the approach road. Shedding excess kit and even some weapons, they headed inland, their
pace increasing to a sprint. The tail of the column had barely cleared the fort’s precincts when the first of the humans came
after them. Orc arrows helped slow the pursuit.
“We’re fucked if they’ve got cavalry,” Coilla said, jogging alongside Jup.
“That’s right,” the dwarf panted, “look on the bright side.”
No riders appeared. But more soldiers exited and joined the chase.
The orcs topped a rise and swept down on to the plain beyond. They made for a stand of trees an arrow’s flight ahead.
Pepperdyne, next to Stryke at the column’s head, glanced back. He saw the pursuing humans on the crest, outlined against the
cloudless sky. “Doesn’t look like all the garrison. Not by a long shot.”
“Good,” Stryke replied.
“But why aren’t more of them following us?”
Stryke shrugged and upped the pace.
They got to the line of trees and through them. That put them in the first of a series of meadows. They crossed those too,
trampling down hedgerows when there was no easier path. Another stretch of open pasture followed, with several copses at its
far end.
The humans were still on their trail, but had fallen back some distance.
“Think we might outpace ’em?” Jup asked.
“Wouldn’t hold your breath,” Coilla said.
“Not a lot left to hold. How much further is it?”
“I reckon we’re near. Should see a wood soon. It’s past that.”
They had a couple more fields to go across before they spotted the wood’s edge. Putting on a spurt, they quickly reached it
and moved into the trees.
“Be alert!” Stryke warned. “This is a good place to get waylaid. And we’ve had enough ambushes for one day.”
Pepperdyne sidled up to him. “Now I can’t see them at all,” he said, scanning the open ground they’d just left. “Maybe they’ve
given up the chase.”
“Or they’re sneaking round to lie in wait for us, like I said. C’mon, and stay awake.”
The legion of orcs crept through the woods, keeping vigilant and as quiet as over a hundred hastily retreating warriors could.
As they penetrated deeper, dappled sunlight gave way to cool gloom under the leafy canopy. Silence wrapped them, overlaid
only by their muffled footfalls on the loam.
After ten minutes of steady tramping they heard something else. A halt was signalled and they listened. It was the unmistakable
sound of rushing water, close to hand. They pushed on. The trees began to thin and the light increased. Soon the riverbank
was in sight. While the others held back, Stryke and Brelan carried on alone to the water’s edge.
The river was wide and fast-flowing. It was thunderous, throwing off spray and spawning white foam where it churned around
half-submerged rocks. On the river’s far side the wood continued, and beyond it the tops of green hills were just visible.
Brelan cupped his hands over his mouth and gave a passable imitation of shrill birdsong. Further along the bank, five or six
of his compatriots came out of hiding.
“Don’t ask,” Brelan told them as they approached, anticipating their questions about how the raid had gone. Though his expression
held all they needed to know.
“We’ve no time to waste,” Stryke said.
Brelan nodded. “Get the others out here.”
Stryke gestured to their waiting companions. They started spilling on to the riverbank.
Directed to a spot not far from the rendezvous point, the troop set to clearing away a camouflage of undergrowth. It concealed
ten rafts. They were simple but robust, consisting of thick tree trunks lashed together and sealed with tar. Each raft had
a crude rudder, and the minimal protection of a waist-high rope on three sides, looped around several timber uprights.
As they were hauled to the water’s edge, Coilla joined Stryke.
“Shame Dallog and Wheam aren’t here to see this,” she said.
“Or Ignar, or any of the others we lost to deceit today.”
“You reckon it
was
treachery?”
“They weren’t waiting for us by chance.”
“That means somebody in the resistance…” She let the implication hang.
“A mission this big, maybe too many knew the plan.”
“Not that many knew all of it. Like using the catacombs.”
“There were humans down there.”
“What?”
“When we were on the battlements I saw soldiers at the bottom of the cliff. They must have been going for the entrance. Looks
like it was Wheam and Dallog’s wagon that stopped ’em finding it.”
Coilla smiled. “So they did some good.” She sobered. “But if the humans knew about the catacombs —”
“There’s a spy high up in the resistance? Maybe.”
“We’re in trouble if there is, Stryke.”
“There’s nothing we can do about it right now. We have to —”
A chorus of shouting broke out. Orcs were heading up the riverbank, towards a group of figures.
Jup ran past, Spurral in tow. Then Haskeer thundered by, with a bunch of grunts in his wake.
Stryke stared at the commotion. “What the —?”
“This I don’t
believe
,” Coilla exclaimed. “Come on!” She joined the rush.
He followed, and seeing what all the fuss was about, increased his pace.
The advancing figures were orcs. Upwards of a dozen in number, they were bruised and bloodied, with several needing help to
walk. And at the forefront were Dallog and Wheam.
Pepperdyne stared at them. “How the hell… ?”
Dallog grinned. “Just sheer good fortune.”
Coilla gave Wheam’s arm a squeeze. “We thought you were lost.”
“So did we,” the youth replied shakily.
Stryke elbowed his way through. “Didn’t think we’d see you again, Corporal. We’d written you off.”
“We were lucky,” Dallog told him. “The shanties took the brunt when the wagon went over. Most of us came out with petty wounds.
Didn’t lose a hand.”