‘Come on!’ said Will, leading the way towards the trench. Horace followed close behind him.
A Temujai warrior barred his way and he struck at the man with his saxe knife, feeling the blow jar all the way up his arm as it struck home. A warning cry from Horace alerted him to danger and he turned just in time to block a savage sabre cut with his crossed knives. Then Horace was by his side, slashing at the man who had attacked him, and the three others with him. The two friends fought side by side, but there were too many of the Temujai. Will’s heart sank as he realised that they were not going to reach the trench in time. He could see Evanlyn, not twenty metres away, with a group of archers around her, facing a still larger group of Temujai as they advanced up the trench – moving slowly, held back only by the threat of the bows.
‘Look out, Will!’ It was Horace again, and once more they were fighting for their lives as more of the Temujai swarmed towards them.
Nit’zak led a party of men into the trenches that had sheltered the Skandian archers. His other men could take care of the two young warriors who had counterattacked so effectively. His task was to silence the archers once and for all.
His men poured into the trench behind him, striking out at the unarmoured, virtually unarmed bowmen. They retreated down the line of the earthworks, some of them scrambling up and over and running to the rear. Grimly, Nit’zak followed until, rounding an angle in the trench, he stopped in surprise.
There was a young girl facing him, a long dagger in her hand and a look of total defiance in her eyes. The remaining archers gathered protectively round her. Then, on her command, they brought their bows up to the present position.
The two groups faced each other. There were at least ten bows aimed at him, Nit’zak saw – at a range of barely ten metres. If the girl gave the order, there was no way the archers could miss. Yet, once that first volley was released, the girl and her archers would be helpless.
He flicked his eyes sideways. His men were level with him, and there were more behind. He had no intention of dying under the Skandian volley. If it might serve a purpose he would do so willingly. But he had a job to do and he didn’t have the right to die until that job was done. On the other hand, he had no qualms about sacrificing ten or twelve of his own men, if necessary, to get that job done. He gestured them forward.
‘Attack,’ he said calmly, and his men surged forward in the constricted space of the trench.
There was a second’s hesitation, then he heard the girl’s command to shoot and the instant thrum of the bowstrings. The arrows tore into his men, killing or wounding seven of them. But the others kept on, joined by more men from behind him, and the archers broke and ran, leaving only the girl to face him. Nit’zak stepped forward, raising the sabre in both hands. Curious, he studied her eyes for some sign of fear and saw none there. It would be almost a shame to kill one so brave, he thought.
Off to one side, he heard an agonised cry – a young man’s voice that broke with fear and pain.
‘Evanlyn!’
He assumed it must be the girl’s name. He saw her eyes flick away from his and then, she smiled sadly at someone out of his view. It was a smile of farewell.
Will had witnessed it all. Helpless to intervene, fighting desperately to protect Horace’s back and his own life, he had seen the Temujai move up the trench, saw the archers threaten them with a point blank volley, and then watched, horrified, as the Temujai calmly moved forward once more, oblivious to the danger. The final volley stopped them for a second or two, then they charged, sweeping the archers away before them.
Horace’s urgent warning brought him back to his own situation and he darted sideways to avoid a sabre, jabbing with the saxe to drive the off-balance Tem’uj back a few paces. He turned to look again and saw a Temujai officer poised over Evanlyn, his sword held in two hands as he raised it.
‘Evanlyn!’ he cried in torment. And, hearing him, she turned, met his agonised gaze and smiled at him – a smile that remembered all they had been through together in the past eleven months.
A smile that remembered all they had ever meant to each other.
And in that moment, he couldn’t let her die. He spun the saxe knife in his hand, catching it by the point, feeling the balance, then brought his arm back, then forward in one fluid movement.
The big knife took Nit’zak under the left arm just before he began his downward cut.
His eyes glazed and he crumpled slowly to one side, lurching against the earth wall of the trench, then sliding down to the hard-packed earthen floor. The sabre fell from his hands and he plucked with weakened fingers at the heavy knife in his side. His last thought was that now Haz’kam would probably abandon the invasion after all, and he was angry about that.
Will, now unarmed except for his small throwing knife, was under attack once more. He leaped forward to grapple with a Tem’uj and they rolled down the earthen slope together, with Will clinging desperately to the man’s sword arm, while he, in his turn, tried to avoid the ineffectual slashing attacks Will made with the small knife.
He saw Horace overwhelmed by four warriors attacking him at once and he realised that, finally, it was all over.
And then he heard a blood-chilling roar and a huge figure was standing over him, literally plucking his adversary from the ground and throwing him a dozen metres down the slope, to send another three men sprawling under the impact.
It was Ragnak, terrifying in his berserker rage. His shirt had been torn to ribbons and he wore no armour save his massive horned helmet. The horrifying roaring noise came constantly from his throat as he plunged into the midst of the Temujai attackers, the huge double-bladed axe whirling in giant circles as he struck his enemies down on either side.
He made no effort to protect himself and he was cut and wounded over and again. He simply ignored the fact and cut and hacked and beat at the men who had invaded his country – who had dared to awaken the berserker rage in his blood.
His personal guard followed him, each man in the same awful killing rage. They drove a wedge into the Temujai force, implacable, irresistible. A dozen men who didn’t care if they lived or died. Who cared about one thing and one thing only: getting close to their enemies and killing them. As many as possible. As quickly as possible.
‘Horace!’ Will croaked, and tried to scramble to his feet, remembering that last image of Horace desperately holding off four attackers. And then he heard another sound – a familiar one this time. It was the deep-throated thrum of a longbow and, as he watched, Horace’s attackers seemed to fade away like snow in the sunshine and he knew that Halt had arrived.
On a knoll a kilometre away, Haz’kam, general of the army and Shan of the People, watched his attack fail. The enemy’s left flank had curled around to crash into his main force, buckling them and driving them back, causing severe losses. On the enemy’s right flank, Nit’zak and his men had finally managed to silence the Skandian archers. In his heart, he had always known that his old friend would succeed in the task.
But he had taken too long over it. The success had come too late, after his main force had been demoralised and disorganised by the constant hail of arrows. After they had been driven back in confusion by that flanking attack.
It was just one failed attack, of course, and he knew he could still win this battle, if he chose to. He could regroup his Ulans, commit his fresh reserves and drive these damned Skandians out from behind their defences and send them scattering into the hills and the trees. For a moment, he was tempted to do it – to have a savage revenge on these people who had thwarted his plans.
But the cost would be too high. He had lost thousands of men already and another attack, even a successful one, would cost him more than he could afford. He turned in his saddle and beckoned the bugler forward.
‘Sound the general withdrawal,’ he said calmly. His face gave no hint of the seething fury, the bitter rage of failure that burned in his heart.
It was not polite for a Temuj
ai general to allow his emotions to show.
Ragnak’s body was cremated the day after the battle.
The Oberjarl had died in the final moments, before the Temujai had begun their withdrawal. He had died battling a group of eighteen Temujai warriors. Two of them survived – so badly injured they could barely crawl away from the terrifying figure of the Skandian leader.
There was no way of knowing who had struck the fatal blow, if, indeed, there had been one. They counted over fifty separate wounds on the Oberjarl, half a dozen of which could have caused death under ordinary conditions. As was the Skandian custom, the body was laid on his cremation pyre as it was – without any attempt to clean away the blood or the mire of battle.
The four Araluans were invited to pay their last respects to the dead Oberjarl and they stood silently for a few moments before the massive pile of pitch-soaked pine logs, gazing up at the still figure. Then, politely but firmly, they were informed that the funeral of an Oberjarl, and the subsequent election of his successor, was a matter for Skandians only and they returned to Halt’s apartment to await events.
The funeral rituals went on for three days. This was a tradition that had been established to allow jarls from outlying settlements time to reach Hallasholm and participate in the election of the next Oberjarl. Obviously, there were few jarls expected from the areas that the Temujai had already passed through, and the majority of the others had already been summoned to repel the invasion. But tradition called for a three-day period of mourning – which, in Skandia, took the form of a lot of drinking and much enthusiastic recounting of the deceased’s prowess in battle.
And tradition, of course, was sacred to the Skandians – particularly tradition that involved a lot of drinking and carousing late into the night. It was noticeable that the amount of liquor consumed and the degree of enthusiasm in the recounting of Ragnak’s prowess seemed to be in direct correlation.
On the second night, Evanlyn frowned at the sound of drunken voices raised in song, counterpointed by the splintering sounds of furniture breaking as a fight got under way.
‘They don’t seem very sad about it,’ she pointed out and Halt merely shrugged.
‘It’s their way,’ he said. ‘Besides, Ragnak died in battle, as a berserker, and that’s a fate that every true Skandian would envy. It gains him instant entry to the highest level of their version of heaven.’
Evanlyn twisted her mouth in a disapproving pout. ‘Still,’ she said, ‘it seems so disrespectful. And he did save our lives, after all.’
There was an awkward silence in the room. None of the other three could think of a tactful way of pointing out that, had Ragnak survived, he was sworn to kill Evanlyn. When she spoke of him now, it was as if she had lost an old, respected friend. Horace looked from Halt to Will and back again, waiting to see if either of them cared to raise the matter. All he got was an almost imperceptible shake of the head from Will when he made eye contact. Horace shrugged. If two Rangers didn’t think the matter worth raising, who was he to disagree?
Finally, the period of mourning was over, and the senior jarls gathered in the Great Hall to elect their new Oberjarl. Will said hopefully, ‘Do you think Erak has a chance?’ But his hopes were dashed when Halt shook his head.
‘He’s a popular war leader, but he’s only one of four or five. Add to that the fact that he’s no administrator. And he’s certainly no diplomat, either,’ he added with some feeling.
‘Is that important?’ Horace asked. ‘From what I’ve seen, diplomacy is very low on the list of required skills in this country.’
Halt acknowledged the point with a grin. ‘True,’ he admitted. ‘But a certain amount of schmoozing is necessary when there’s an election among peers like this. Nobody gives their vote because you’re the best candidate. They vote for you because you can do something for them.’
‘I guess the fact that Erak’s spent the last few years as Ragnak’s chief tax collector isn’t going to help, either,’ Will chipped in. ‘After all, a lot of the people voting are the ones he’s threatened to brain with an axe.’
Again Halt nodded. ‘Not a good career move if you hope to be Oberjarl one day.’
In truth, the Ranger was indulging in a mild form of personal superstition by talking down Erak’s chances in the election. There were still issues to be settled between Skandia and Araluen and he would have preferred to be settling them with Erak as the Skandian supreme leader. Still, the more they talked, the slimmer Erak’s chances became. He hadn’t known about the tax collecting until Will mentioned it. That would seem to put the final stopper on the Jarl’s chances.
Not, he realised, that Erak had shown the slightest interest in becoming Oberjarl.
And, after all, Halt’s three companions were only interested in his chances because he was a friend and the only senior Skandian leader they knew well.
‘He probably wouldn’t make a good Oberjarl anyway,’ Horace decided. ‘What he really wants to do is get back to sea in his wolfship and go raiding somewhere.’
The others all agreed.
Which only goes to show how wrong you can be when you indulge in reasoned, rational discussion. On the fifth day, the door to Halt’s apartment opened and a stunned-looking Erak stepped in, looked around at the four expectant faces and said:
‘I’m the new Oberjarl.’
‘I knew it,’ said Halt instantly, and the other three looked at him, totally scandalised.
‘You did?’ Erak asked, his voice hollow, his eyes still showing the shock of his sudden elevation to the highest office in Skandia.
‘Of course,’ said the Ranger, shrugging. ‘You’re big, mean and ugly and those seem to be the qualities Skandians value most.’
Erak drew himself up to his full height, trying to muster the sort of dignity that he felt an Oberjarl should assume.
‘Is that how you Araluans speak to an Oberjarl?’ he asked, and Halt finally grinned.
‘No. That’s how we speak to a friend. Come in and have a drink.’
Over the next few days, it began to appear as if the council of jarls had chosen wisely. Erak quickly moved to end old feuds with other jarls, particularly those he had visited in his role as tax collector. And, surprisingly, he kept Borsa in the role of hilfmann.
‘I thought he couldn’t stand Borsa,’ Will said, puzzled. But Halt merely nodded his head in acknowledgement of Erak’s choice.
‘Borsa’s a good administrator, and that’s what Erak’s going to need. A good leader is someone who knows what he’s bad at, and hires someone who’s good at it to take care of it for him.’
Will, Horace and Evanlyn had to think that through for a few seconds before they saw the logic in it. Horace, in fact, was still pondering it some time after the others had nodded and moved on to discuss other matters.
As Oberjarl, Erak would no longer be able to go on his annual raiding cruises at the helm of Wolfwind, and that fact tinged his sudden elevation with a certain amount of regret. But he announced that he would be making one last voyage before he handed the ship over to the care of Svengal, his long-time first mate.
‘I’ll be taking you lot back to Araluen,’ he announced. ‘Seems only fair, since I was the one responsible for your being here in the first place.’
Will was quietly pleased with the news. Now that the time was almost here to return home, he realised that he would be sad to farewell the big, boisterous pirate. With some surprise, he recognised the fact that he had come to regard Erak as a good friend. Anything that delayed the moment of parting found favour in his eyes.
Spring had come, the geese were returning from the south and there were deer back in the hills, so there was plenty of fresh meat in place of the dried and salted provisions that had formed the bulk of the winter fare in Hallasholm.
When he saw the first hunting parties returning from the high reaches inland of the Skandian capital, Will remembered one debt he still owed. Early one morning, he slipped quietly away on Tug, and heade
d up the trail that he and Evanlyn had followed so many months ago, in a freezing blizzard.
At the little cabin where they had sheltered through the winter, he found the uncomplaining, shaggy little pony who had saved his life. The patient creature had broken the light tether holding him in the lean-to stable behind the cabin, and was quietly cropping the new season grass in the clearing when Will arrived.
Tug looked a little askance at his master when Will unfastened a small sack of oats, indicating that it was for the pony alone. Will consoled his horse with a quiet pat on the muzzle.
‘He’s earned it,’ he told Tug, and the Ranger horse shrugged – insofar as any horse is capable of shrugging. The nondescript pony may well have earned the sack of oats, but that didn’t stop Tug’s mouth salivating at the sight and smell of them. When the pony had finished the oats, Will remounted Tug and, holding onto the lead rein, rode back down to Hallasholm, where he quietly returned the pony to Erak’s stable.
The night before they were due to leave, Erak threw a farewell banquet in their honour. The Skandians were eager to show their appreciation of the efforts of the four Araluans in defending their land against the invaders. And with the shadow of the Vallasvow lifted from Evanlyn, they paid particular attention to her – repeatedly toasting her bravery and resourcefulness in continuing to direct the fire of the archers as their position was being overrun.
Halt, Borsa and Erak sat in a quiet huddle at the head table, discussing outstanding matters such as the repatriation of the slaves who had served in the archers’ corps. Sadly, many of them hadn’t survived the battle, but the promise of freedom had been made to their dependants as well, and the details had to be thrashed out. When the subject was finally closed, Halt judged the moment right and said quietly:
‘So what will you do when the Temujai come back?’