Alector's Choice (47 page)

“Fifteenth Company to
the walls!” snapped Bhoral, “Squad one…” He echoed Mykel’s orders.

Once he was satisfied
that all his men were in place, Mykel climbed the steps beside the west gate,
where he stood on the walls below the south tower. He looked westward under the
noon sun. The seltyrs’ forces had halted a good half vingt to the west, and
were stretched out in front of the end of the casaran orchards, forming a line
of riders a good five hundred yards across and at least three ranks deep. Most
of the riders had dismounted.

That bothered Mykel,
although it was what he would have done.

He turned and walked
along the top of the wall to the southwest corner, then most of the way toward
the east wall of the compound. A half vingt to the east was another formation,
considerably smaller, with more clad in green than in blue.

After studying the
second formation and confirming that they were also dismounted, Mykel returned
to his former position on the wall beneath the south guard tower.

“Sir?” Bhoral
appeared.

“Have the men stand
down in position. There won’t be an attack for a little while at least. But
check on the mounts. We still might need them—one way or another.”

The squad leader
nodded and slipped away.

“You don’t think
we’ll see an attack right now?” asked Dohark, who had appeared at the top of
the steps.

“Not for a while. Do
you?”

“No. They’re not
mounted. They’re resting their horses.”

“They’ve got
something else in mind, I’d wager,” suggested Mykel.

“Siege ladders?”

“Could be.”

“They wouldn’t try
blasting powder,” said Dohark.

“They probably would
if they could get any.” As Mykel said that, he wondered if that happened to be
the reason why whichever alectors had provided the rifles had done so—so that
the seltyrs wouldn’t develop something worse?

“You’re cheerful.”

“I expect the
strongest aspects of human nature to surface—greed, destructiveness,
shortsightedness—all the good things.” Mykel’s tone was more sardonic than he’d
meant it to be.

“I’m headed over to
the north tower to see if I can get a better view,” Dohark finally said.

“Yes, sir.” There was
little that Mykel could do but wait.

Another half glass
went by before Mykel heard a dull rumbling sound. He looked northward, thinking
it might be a storm, but the sky remained clear. His eyes went to the west. Six
wagons with angled timber barricades five yards wide reaching from knee height
to almost two yards lumbered down the road toward the west gate, slowly, but
seemingly by themselves. It took Mykel but a moment to realize that troopers
behind the timbers were pushing me heavy wagons. He had no doubts that behind
or in the wagons were long siege ladders that would be swung up to the walls,
that or something else to allow them over the walls.

Very shortly, he had
to wonder, because the wagons swung wide of the road and stopped short of the
walls, a good sixty yards back, three on each side, lined up barricade to
barricade.

A long single note on
a horn sounded.

Crack! Crack!

Mykel ducked as he
heard the first shots. Staying low behind the stone parapets, he studied the
barricades, realizing that the regularly placed narrow slits in the heavy
timbers were for rifles.

A long wagon moved
slowly down the road toward the rebels’ movable barricades, drawn by eight
riders, four on each side of what looked to be an enormous wagon shaft. As it
neared the barricades, Mykel looked more closely. A tree trunk almost a yard
across had been fastened to an eight-wheeled wagon, and the forward end of the
trunk had been covered in iron. As Mykel watched and waited for the riders to get
closer to the walls, they began to urge the horses into a fast trot, then even
faster.

The firing from
behind the timbered wagons intensified.

“First squad! Aim for
the riders!” He raised his rifle and began to aim.

Just as he squeezed
the trigger, with the wagon-ram less than thirty yards from the west gate, the
riders swerved away and let the wagon rumble toward the heavy oak gates alone.

Thuddd! The impact of
the heavy tree trunk ram, with its iron cap, shook the walls, but the gate
held.

“Gates held!” called
a ranker from somewhere.

Peering from beside
one of the merlons, Mykel watched as the wagon began to roll backward. How
could that be? Then he saw the long cable attached to the rear of the
wagon-ram. While the road from Dramuria rose most of the way from the town to
the compound, the last eighty yards before the gates were flat, and the smooth
and level stone road leading across that stretch to the west gate made the
scheme possible—and all too likely to succeed. The riders didn’t have to get that
close, and they could try until the ram failed or the gates collapsed.

Almost half a glass
passed before the wagon-ram had been drawn back past the barricade wagons. The
riders—or another group—re-formed on each side of the front part of the
wagon-ram. Several moments passed before the device began to move along the
road toward the west gate.

“Aim for the riders
on the north—just on the north!” Mykel ordered.

“Aim for the riders!
North side!” echoed Gendsyr.

Mykel sighted on the
lead rider, squeezing the trigger, and willing his shot home.

The rider crumpled in
the saddle, but dropped the lead or whatever linked him to the ram, and his
mount carried him off the road. The ram continued to rumble toward the gates.

Mykel shifted his aim
to the second rider, aiming and firing.

Just as he squeezed
the trigger, the riders broke away from the ram, earlier than they had before,
and the heavy contraption rumbled inexorably toward the gates.

Thudddl Once more,
the gates and walls shook.

Mykel looked down.
The gates were definitely bowed, and at least one of the heavy timbers was
splintered in one place.

“Aim for the horses!”
ordered Dohark from the north tower. “Drop the horses!”

The Cadmians waited,
and Mykel wondered if they would not have done better if all the Third
Battalion companies had followed his example and tried to whittle away the
seltyrs’ forces in the field. Then, Heransyr had tried that, and Seventeenth
Company had been wiped out.

Once more the
wagon-ram began to move forward, but this time, the horses only started it,
well behind the barricades, and moved away, while a good score of bluecoats
used leads attached to the rear of the ram and others just pushed it from
behind.

“Fire!” ordered Mykel
and Dohark near-simultaneously.

Mykel brought down
three of those pushing the ram, and another half score fell to other fire, but
other bluecoats took their places and the ram rumbled toward the west gate.

The thudding impact
was accompanied not only by the shaking of the walls, but by the sound of
splintering timbers.

Mykel looked down to
see the north side of the gate ripped open wide enough for a man to enter.
Outside the walls, the rebels were dragging back their ram once more.

“One more time, sir,
and the gates’ll go,” Gendsyr said. “Two at most, and we’re not stopping ‘em
with rifles.”

Mykel could see that.
So far there were perhaps twoscore bodies strewn on the flat east of the
gates—if that. There were a good thousand bluecoats waiting back out of easy
rifle range.

After a quick glance
back outside, Mykel scurried down the steps to where one of the kegs of
gunpowder had been placed at the base of the stone wall. There were also
several casks of oil. The gate was bowed enough that he could i squeeze both
through—he thought.

Overhead he could
hear Dohark barking out orders about timbers and wagons, but Mykel would leave
that to the overcaptain. If the ram weren’t stopped before it did more damage,
Dohark’s timbers would do little good.

“Fifth squad! To me!”
Mykel ordered.

Vhanyr appeared
instantly. “Sir.”

“We need to get that
keg and two of those casks out through that gap. I need someone to go out there
with me.”

Vhanyr turned.
“Lortyr! Fonyt!”

Mykel looked up.
“Gendsyr! We’re headed out in front of the gates! Open fire at those barricades
and anyone who even looks up!

“Yes, sir. First
squad! Stand by to fire!”

Mykel waited until
the two rankers stood beside him. “You’re going to set those casks of oil out
in front of the gates—a good five yards. Put them so close together that they
touch—right in the middle of the road. I’ll be right behind you with this keg
of powder.”

The two rankers
looked at Mykel and the keg of gunpowder.

“You don’t mind if we
hurry, sir?” asked Lortyr.

Mykel grinned. “The
faster, the better.” Behind him, he could see rankers pushing two wagons toward
the gate, probably to overturn and block the entry as well as they could.

Lortyr rolled one
cask to the gate, right up to the opening, then turned it sideways. He had to
lift it—with the help of two others—almost chest high to get it through the
bowed part. Then he slipped under the cask and helped lower it to the stone
pavement. Keeping low, he turned the cask and rolled it out five yards or so.
He kept the cask between him and the bluecoats, even while he levered it
upright.

Behind him, Fonyt
followed the same example.

Once Fonyt was
through the gate, Mykel lifted the smaller keg of powder, standing by the gate,
waiting for both rankers to dash back.

Mykel scuttled out,
quickly setting the powder directly behind the two barrels of oil, then returning,
almost diving through the narrow opening in the gates. He’d sensed shots, but
all had seemed high, perhaps because the angle of the slits in the rebel
barricades had been designed more to allow shots at the positions on the top of
the wall.

The two rankers
grinned at the captain. “That all, sir?”

“For now.” Mykel
grinned back, but only for a moment.

“Clear the gate
space!” Dohark bellowed from above.

Mykel hurried back up
to the top of the wall on the south side.

Out to the west, the
rebels were readying the wagon-ram for another run at the gates. Below, behind
the gates, rankers were wedging timbers and the wagon beds into place, as well
as they could be, to reinforce the battered and bowed west gates.

More slowly, the
wagon-ram began to move eastward.

“First squad! Fire!”

More of the bluecoats
pushing the ram dropped than on earlier runs, and the ram did not seem to have
quite the same speed. Mykel also thought that it was wobbling somewhat, but it
still stayed on the road.

He watched, his rifle
ready, sighting on the gunpowder keg. He needed that keg to explode in flame.
He truly needed it. As the shadow of the ram neared the oil casks, he
fired—once, twice, and a third time, willing the explosion.

Crumpt! The walls
shook, and a wave of flame spewed upward across the wagon and the ram. The
front two wheels on the right shattered and the weight of the ram dropped the
corner of the wagon. Then the iron-tipped ram skidded sideways, coming to rest
against the stone gate supports. The wall shook again.

The flames from the
oil and from the burning powder and wagon created a heat so intense that the
Cadmians on each side of the gate were forced to duck completely behind the
merlons and walls.

Mykel studied the
gate below. His explosion had twisted the north side of the gate open farther,
despite the wagon beds and timbers, leaving an opening wide enough for one
rider, perhaps two, once the flames and fire died away—and if the riders could
force back the timbers and wagon bed behind the opening.

The firing from the
timber barricades died away, not that there had ever been that much.

Mykel frowned as he
realized that. Why hadn’t they fired more?

He wanted to shake
his head. Because they were worried about ammunition. They had to be concerned.

He climbed down the
steps and crossed behind the gate, then climbed up to the tower where Dohark
surveyed the road and the still-massed bluecoats.

“You didn’t do much
for the gates, Captain.” Dohark’s tone was half-humorous, half-rueful.

“No, sir, but another
hit from that ram would have done much worse.” He paused. “Did you notice that
they’re not firing that much.”

“Wouldn’t do that
much good.”

“No. I don’t think
that’s the reason.”

“Neither do I. They
can’t have smuggled in that many cartridges. That’s why the timber barricades
and the ram. They’ll probably move up the barricades to shelter then-foot, or
what passes for it, and rush the gates. They have to take us now, or they won’t
ever.”

Mykel wasn’t certain
of that, but Dohark had a point.

“Besides, the western
seltyrs don’t care that much about how many men get killed so long as they get
control.”

The overcaptain had
more of a point there, Mykel reflected.

“You were working on
something else earlier,” Dohark said quietly, still looking westward through
the blackish smoke rising from the burning wagon-ram. The sun, faintly orange
from the smoke, was well past midafternoon. “Would it work against a mass
attack?”

“It should.”

“You’ll probably have
to use it.” Dohark paused. “I only saw cooking oil, you know?”

“That’s all you saw,
sir. I need to see what I can do.”

Dohark nodded, but
said nothing as Mykel left the small north guard tower.

Almost a glass passed
before the flames died down to embers. The bluecoats remained gathered back in
the casaran groves, well out of range.

In the meantime,
Mykel had moved his unwieldy device to a point just behind the gap in the north
gate. First, he’d had to persuade one of the local squad leaders to move two
timber braces and slide back a wagon bed. Then, it had taken three rankers to
lift and carry the big barrel over the bracings to get it into position.