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Corfe kicked his horse savagely in the belly and it half reared. He did not fear death, he feared failure. And he had failed. There was nothing more to be afraid of.
He drew Mogen’s sword for the first time that day and turned to Cerne, his trumpeter. “Follow me.”
Then the group of riders took off after him as he rode full tilt up the hillside, into the smoking hell of Armagedir.
H UNDREDS of men lay wounded to the rear of the line here, making it hard for the horses to pick their way over them. The fuming roar of the battle was unbelievable, astonishing. Corfe had never before known its like, not even in the more furious assaults upon Orma
His party dismounted as they approached the ruins of the hamlet around which Aras’s men had made their stand. The ground was too choked with bodies for the horses to be ridden further, and even the war-hardened destriers were becoming terrified by the din.
Aras’s command stood at bay like an island in a sea of Merduks. The enemy had poured around its left flank and was pushing into the right, where it co
The Toru
Corfe shook his hand. “Consider yourself a general now, Aras. You’ve earned it.”
Even under grime and powder-smoke he could see the younger man flush with pleasure. He felt something of a fraud, knowing Aras would not live long enough to enjoy his promotion.
“Your orders, General?” Aras asked, still beaming. “I daresay our flank march will be arriving any time now.”
Corfe did not have to lower his voice to avoid being overheard; the rageing chaos of the battle was like a great curtain.
“I believe our flank march may have run into trouble, Aras. It’s possible you will not be reinforced. We must hold on here to the end. To the end, do you understand me?”
Aras stared at him, the dismay naked across his face for a second. Then he collected himself, and managed a strangled laugh. “At least I’ll die a general. Don’t worry, sir, these men aren’t going anywhere. They know their duty, as do I.”
Corfe gripped his shoulder. “I know,” he said in almost a whisper.
“Sir!” one of the staff officers shouted. “They’re coming in—a whole wave of them.”
The Merduk counter-attack rolled into Armagedir like some unstoppable juggernaut. It was met with a furious crescendo of arquebus fire which obliterated the leading rank, and then it was hand to hand all down the line. The Toru
A sunlit hillside above Aekir in some age of the world long past, and he was sitting on crackling bracken with Heria by his side, sharing wine. His wife’s smile rent his heart.
Andruw laughing amid the roar of guns, a delight in life lighting up his face and making it into that of a boy.
Barbius’s Fimbrians advancing to their deaths in terrible glory at the North More.
Berrona burning low on a far horizon.
A smoky hut in which his mother wept quietly and his father stared at the earthen floor as Corfe told him he was going for a soldier.
Dappled sunlight on the Torrin river as he splashed and swam there one long summer afternoon.
And the roar and blare of many trumpets, the beat of heavy drums rising even over the clamour of war. The press of bodies about him eased. He was hauled to his feet and found himself looking through a film of blood at Aras’s slashed face.
“Andruw has come!” he was shouting. “The Fimbrians have struck the Merduk flank!”
And raising his heavy head he saw the pikes outlined against the fuming sky, and all about him the men of Armagedir were cheering as the Merduks poured away in absolute panic. The dyke veterans were lined on a hillside to the north, blasting out volley after volley into the close-packed throng of the enemy. And the Fimbrians were cutting them down like corn, advancing as relentlessly as if they meant to sweep every Merduk off the edge of the world.
Corfe bent his head and wept.
TWENTY-TWO
T HE levee had gone very well, Murad thought. Half the kingdom’s remaining nobility seemed to have been present, and they had listened, agog, as Murad had told them of his experiences in the west. It was good of the King to have allowed him to do it. It a