Shadow Games: The Fourth Chronicles of the Black Company: First Book of the South (33 page)

I arrayed Mogaba’s legion on the left, Ochiba’s on the right, and put Sindawe’s
new outfit in the middle. Behind them I put all the former prisoners we’d been
able to arm and hoped they did not look too much like a rabble. The front
formations looked good in their white, organized and professional and ready.

Intimidation games.

I had each legion arrayed by hundreds, with aisles between the companies. I
hoped the other side would not be smart enough to jump on that right away.

Lady grabbed my hand before she mounted up, squeezed. “Tonight in Stormgard.”

“Right.” I kissed her cheek.

She whispered, “I don’t think I can stand to sit on this saddle. I’m sore.”

“Curse of being a woman.”

I mounted up.

Two big black crows dropped onto my shoulders immediately, their sudden weight
startling me. Everybody gawked. I scanned the hills but saw no sign of my
walking stump. But we were making some kind of headway here. This was the second
time everybody else saw the crows.

I donned my helmet. One-Eye stoked the fires of illusion. I assumed my post in
front of Mogaba’s legion. Lady moved out in front of Ochiba’s bunch. Murgen
planted the standard in front of Sindawe’s legion, ten paces in front of
everyone else.

I was tempted to charge right then. The other side was having a fire drill
trying to get organized. But I gave them a while. From the looks of them most of
the ones out of Stormgard did not want to be there. Let them look at us, all in
neat array, all in white, all ready to carve them up. Let them think about how
nice it would be to get back inside those incredible walls.

I signalled Murgen. He trotted forward, galloped along the face of the enemy
showing the standard. Arrows flew and missed. He shouted mockeries. They were
not terrified into running for it.

My two crows flapped after him, and were joined by thousands more who came from
the gods knew where. The brotherhood of death, winging it over the doomed. Nice
touch, old stump. But not enough to make anybody run away.

My two crows returned to my shoulders. I felt like a monument. I hoped crows had
better manners than pigeons.

Murgen did not get enough of a rise first pass so he rode back the other
direction, yelling louder.

I noted a disturbance in the enemy formation, moving forward. Someone or
something seated in the lotus position, all in black, floating five feet off the
ground, drifted to a halt a dozen yards in front of the other army.

Shadowmaster? Had to be. I got a creepy feeling just looking at it. Me there in
my spiffy but fake outfit.

Murgen’s taunts got somebody’s goat. A handful of horsemen, then a bunch, lit
out after him. He turned in the saddle and shouted at them. There was no way
they could catch him, of course. Not when he was on that horse.

I grumbled. The indiscipline was not as general as I wanted.

Murgen dawdled, letting them come closer and closer—then took off when they were
only a dozen yards away. They chased him right into the maze of tripwires I’d
had woven into the grass during the night.

Men and horses sprawled. More horses tripped on animals already down. My archers
lofted arrows that fell straight down and slaughtered most of the men and
horses.

I drew my sword, which smoked and smoldered, and signalled the advance. The
drums beat the slow cadence. The men in the front rank slashed the tripwires,

finished the wounded. Otto and Hagop, on the flanks, had trumpets sounded but
did not charge. Not yet.

My boys could march in a straight line. On that nice flat ground they kept their
dress all across their front. That had to be an impressive sight from across the
way, where they still had guys who hadn’t found their places in ranks.

We passed the first of the several low mounds that spotted the plain. The
artillery was supposed to get up on that one and mass fire wherever it seemed
appropriate. I hoped Cletus and the boys had sense enough to harass the
Shadowmaster.

That critter was the big unknown quantity here.

I hoped Shifter was around somewhere. This whole thing could go to hell if he
wasn’t and that bastard over there cut loose.

Two hundred yards away. Their archers lofted poorly aimed shafts at Lady and me.

I halted, gave another signal. The legions halted, too. Very good. The Nar were
paying attention.

Gods, there were a lot of them over there.

And that Shadowmaster, just floating there, maybe waiting for me to stick my
foot in it. Seemed like I was staring up his nostrils.

But he did not do anything.

The ground shuddered. The enemy ranks stirred. They saw it coming and it was too
late for them to do anything.

The elephants thundered up the aisles through the legions, gaining momentum.

When those monsters passed me the guys over there were already yelling and
looking for somewhere to run.

A salvo of twelve ballistae shafts ripped overhead and spattered around the
Shadowmaster. They were well aimed. Four actually struck him. They encountered
protective sorceries but battered him around. Very sluggish, the Shadowmaster.

Keeping himself alive seemed to be his limit.

A second salvo hit him an instant before the elephants reached his men. The
ballistae had been laid even more carefully.

I gave the signal that sent my front four thousand men, and the cavalry, howling
forward.

The remainder of the men formed a normal front, then advanced.

The carnage was incredible.

We drove them back and back and back, but there were so damned many of them we
never really broke them. When they did flee the majority made it into the camp.

None got back into Stormgard. The city had closed its gates on them. They
dragged their Shadowmaster champion with them. I would not have bothered. He had
been useless as tits on a boar hog.

Of course, one of the second flight of ballistae shafts had gotten through his
protection. I suppose that distracted him.

His ineffectuality had to be Shifter’s doing.

They left maybe five thousand men behind. The warlord side of me was
disappointed. I’d hoped to do more damage. I was not going to storm the camp to
do it, though. I backed the men off, set men to police up our casualties, placed
cavalry to meet anyone coming out of camp or city, then got on with business.

I planted my right wing yards from the road we had followed down to Stormgard,

just out of bowshot of the barbican at the gate it entered. My line ran at right
angles to the road. I let the men relax.

My levee builders got to work putting their training to use. On the far side of
the road they began digging a trench. It started a bowshot from the wall and ran
to the foot of the hills. It would be wide and deep and would shield my flank.

The workers carried the earth to the road and began building a ramp. Others
began building mantlets to protect the ramp builders as they approached the
wall.

That many men can move a lot of earth. The defenders saw we would have a ramp
right up to the wall in just a few days. They were not pleased. But they had no
means to stop us.

Men scurried like ants. The former prisoners had scores to even and went at it
like they wanted blood by sundown.

By mid-afternoon they were taking the city end of the trench downward, deep, and
toward the wall, not hiding the fact that they were mining, aiming to go under
as well as over. And they had begun breaking ground for a trench on my left
flank as well.

In three days my army would be protected by a pair of deep trenches that would
funnel my attack up the ramp and over the wall. There would be no stopping us.

They had to do something in there.

I hoped to do something to them before they thought of something to do to me.

Late afternoon. The sky began clouding over. Lightning frolicked behind the
hills to the south. Not a good sign. A storm would be tougher on my guys than on
theirs.

Even so, despite the cold wind and scattered sprinkles moving in, the builders
only broke for a spartan supper before setting out lanterns and building
bonfires so they could continue after dark. I posted pickets so there would be
no surprises, began rotating my troops out of position for food and rest.

Some day. All I’d had to do was sit in one place and look elegant and give
orders I’d already worked out in my head.

And think about what last night had meant, in its highly anticlimactic fashion.

It had been a night of nights of nights, but it had not lived up to the
anticipation. Had even been, in a well-we’ve-finally-gotten-around-to-it way,

something of a disappointment.

Not that I would trade it in or take it back. Never.

Someday, when I’m old and retired and have nothing better to do than
philosophize, I’m going to sit down for a year and figure out why it’s always
better in the anticipation than in the consummation.

I sent Frogface flitting around checking the enemy’s mood. That was black. They
wanted no more fighting after duking it out with elephants.

Stormgard’s walls were not heavily patrolled. Most of the male population had
marched out in the morning and not made it back. But Frogface reported no great
distress around the central citadel, where another Shadowmaster was in
residence. In fact, he thought he sensed confidence in the eventual outcome.

The storm marched north. And it was a bitch kitty. I gathered my captains. “We
got a mean storm coming. Might make what we’re going to try tricky, but we’re
going to do it anyway. Be even less expected. Goblin. One-Eye. Get the dust off
your old reliable snooze spell.”

They eyed me suspiciously. Goblin muttered, “Here it comes. Some damnfool reason
for not getting any sleep again tonight.”

One-Eye told him, “I’m going to use that spell on him one of these first days.”

Louder, “Right, Croaker. What’s up?”

“Us. Up and over those walls and open the gate after you put the sentries to
sleep.”

Even Lady was surprised. “You’re going to waste all that work on that ramp?”

“I never intended to use it. I wanted them convinced I was committed to a
certain course.”

Mogaba smiled. I suspected he’d figured it out ahead of time.

“It won’t work,” Goblin muttered.

I gave him a look. “The men working the trenches at the city end are armed. I
promised them first crack at getting even. We get the gates open all we have to
do is lean back and watch.”

“Won’t work. You’re forgetting that Shadowmaster in there. You think you’re
going to sneak up on him?”

“Yes. Our guardian angel will make sure.”

“Shifter? I’d trust him as far as I can throw a pregnant elephant.”

“I say anything about trusting him? He wants us for a stalking horse for some
scheme. He’s got to keep us healthy. Right?”

“Your mind is going, Croaker,” One-Eye said. “You been hanging around Lady too
long.”

She kept a blank face on. That might not have been a compliment.

“Mogaba, I’ll need a dozen of the Nar. After Goblin and One-Eye put the sentries
to sleep Frogface will climb the wall with a rope and anchor it. Your boys will
go up and take the barbican from the rear and open the gate.”

He nodded. “How soon?”

“Anytime. One-Eye. Send Frogface scouting. I want to know what that Shadowmaster
is doing. If he’s watching us we won’t go.”

We moved an hour later. It went like operations go in textbooks. Like it was
ordained by the gods. In another hour every one of the freed prisoners, except
those we had enrolled in the legions, was inside the city. They reached the
citadel and broke in before resistance developed.

They raged through Stormgard, ignoring the rain and thunder and lightning,

venting a lot of rage, probably mostly in directions askew.

Me in my Widowmaker suit stalked through the open gates fifteen minutes after
the mob rush. Lifetaker rode beside me. The locals eowered away from us, though
some seemed to be welcoming their liberators. Halfway to the citadel Lady said,

“You even fooled me this time. When you said tonight in Stormgard . . . ”

A gust and ferocious fusillade of rain silenced her. Lightning cut loose in a
sudden vicious duel. By the flashes I witnessed the passage of a pair of
panthers that I would have missed otherwise. Chills not of the rain crawled my
spine. I had seen that bigger one before, in another embattled city, when I was
young.

They were headed toward the citadel, too.

I asked, “What are they up to?” My confidence was less than complete. There were
no crows out in this storm. I realized I had come to count them my good luck.

“I don’t know.”

“Better check it.” I increased my pace.

There were a lot of dead men around the entrance to the citadel. Most were my
laborers. Sounds of fighting still echoed inside. Grinning guards saluted me
clumsily. I asked, “Where’s the Shadowmaster?”

“I hear she’s in the big tower. Up high. Her men are fighting like crazy. But
she isn’t helping them.”

Thunder and lightning went mad for a full minute. Bolts smashed at the city. Had
the god of thunders gone crazy? But for the torrential rainfall a hundred fires
might have started.

I pitied the legions, out there on guard. Maybe Mogaba would bring them in out
of it.

The storm died into an almost normal rain after that last insane fit, with only
a few lightweight flashes.

I looked up the one tower that loomed over the rest of the citadel—and, deja vu,

in a flash spied a cat shape scaling its face.

“Damn me!”

The thunder had left me unable to hear the horses coming. I looked back.

One-Eye, Goblin, and Murgen, still flaunting the Company standard. One-Eye was
staring up at the tower. His face was not pleasant to behold.

He was flashing on the same memory. “Forvalaka, Croaker.”