The San are said to be some of the earliest peoples in Elfirca. Descendent from the first inhabitants in Botswana and South Elfrica, they were a nomadic people. Hunter-gatherers would move from one place to another once they depleted the resources in an area.
When the Bantus from Central Elfrica migrated to South Elfrica, they encountered the San who were very different from them. This period was known as the Bantu expansion. They are the ancestors of the Baganda people of Uganda, Shona of the Zimbabwe, Zulu and Xhosa of South Elfrica. When the Bantus first encountered the San, they found other elves that looked different from them. And in these foreign lands, they submitted to the wisdom of the San. The San became the Shanman of various ceremonies and rites.
But relationships could not be summarized in a simple sentence. Sometimes they made love with one another, other times they fought with one another. Still, the San are unique. For they are hunter-gatherers. They do not farm. They do not own cattle. They live off the land.
Most prominent about the peoples are the use of poison in their weaponry. Diamphotoxin is secreted by the Diamphidia beetle. It is haemolytic, which ruptures red blood cells. It is also cardiotoxic and will damage the heart.
It allows small ions to pass through red blood cell membranes easily, disrupting the cell’s ion levels. This causes catastrophic failure, resulting in the death of the red blood cell. Although it does not harm the nerves, it will reduce the number of red blood cells by as much as 75%. Any prey would be fatigued by the lack of red blood cells due to the anaemia. This was how the San hunt. And this is how they’re able to take out large mammals, which will easily collapse from even a small dose.
If an antelope collapsed from such an arrow, now imagine a human or an elf being struck by such an arrow.
All of the men instantly took cover under the wagons as the San fired arrows as the Xhosa still tried to flee.
“Fok! Why did we have to be attacked by the bushmen!” Pietje grumbled as he hid under the wagon.
“They must have mistaken us for the Xhosa as for Zulu!” Russell commented.
Now, Jan didn’t want all the Xhosas to perish. The Boers were all under the safety of their laagers, and the San would naturally use their arrows on easier targets. That meant total extermination of the Xhosas that he deployed outside. It’s not like he didn’t mind if they perished, but sticking his head out meant a fatal arrow.
Worst of all was the future of Xhosa relations. If all the men you hired died, then what did it say about you? It was likely the Xhosa would see him as just another Boer who saw the Xhosa as disposable tools. It was unlikely he would be obtaining any future labourers from them.
The only way to guarantee his safety is if every man got out from their hidey holes and open fire at the San all at the same time. To buy some time for the Xhosa to get into the laager. He doubted the San would dare to intrude upon the laager. Their bands number in the tens to hundreds. One will not be able to support a large population by relying on solely living off the land.
“Gentlemen, are you all to cower beneath your wagons and hope for the bushmen to go away? Fokken get your firearms and open fire at them!” Potgieter hollered, and the men got to work.
They grabbed their firearms and from their numerous positions, whether it be under the wagon or behind the wagon’s wheels, they pointed into the bush and opened fire.
Boom! The cacophony of gunfire with the smoke raising gave away all their positions. And the arrows came right after striking some men down. Those arrows were likely fatal, and any man struck is likely dead, so Jan ignored the wounded.
Potgieter bashed his fist against the wagon in anger while reloading his musket.
The bush is hell to fight as Potgieter had once said. First of all, you can’t see your enemy, but they can see you. If they had a large retinue of elves, he would have them swarm the bush and sniff the San out. But these Boers wouldn’t dare to go and get themselves impaled on a spear or be shot dead by an arrow.
All they could do is hunker down and hoped that the San would leave them alone.
Jan also bashed his fist against the ground. This is no good.
The ace he had in his hands was the artillery, but if the shot does not hit the San, that's what use was the artillery. But what if he didn’t need to hit the San?
He only needed to scare them off. And like the Boers, the elves were also deeply religious. Perhaps he could trick them into thinking the gods were descending or whatnot. But the San must have dealt with artillery before, the Zulus’ casual usage in the Free States made sure of that.
One artillery piece would not do, but how about all of them? If all of them were fired at the same time, it might be loud enough to trick them into a route. It would make them think the sky is collapsing on them.
“Potgieter, any plans?” Jan decided to ask Potgieter as they cowered under the wagons. The arrows stopped falling, but any sudden movements would be watched.
“All I got is waiting. Unless any of your men are willing to search through the bush.”
“Then, let’s use the artillery I have to scare them off. We’ll fire blanks.”
“I disagree, fire them with their ammunition. It would create an impact, such as the shredding of vegetation if we use buckshot. Then perhaps we would be able to find them and fire at them. Or, we might get lucky and shred them.”
Potgieter barked orders to the men cowering in the wagons to retrieve the artillery from inside the wagons and have them shifted out of the wagon.
The men dutifully did so. They poked their heads out of the wagon, and finding no more approaching fire, they slowly lugged it towards the ground. On the ground, they filled it with shot and gunpowder and pointed at the surrounding bush.
13 cannons from 13 artillery wagons. Since their laager was in a circle, two artillery pieces were placed in the north and south. Four artillery pieces were put in the east and west, respectively. The spare was allocated to the north on a whim.
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Potgieter was observing the bodies of the Xhosa and imagining where the angles of the arrows came from. Watching the arrow stuck out the Xhosa's back, he concluded the San must have shot behind the elf. But there was no telling whether the bushman repositioned. It was likely they did so as any good sniper did, so the enemy would not be able to retaliate.
Since no arrows were coming, did they use all of them? Or were all the easy targets taken out, and they were waiting for the bigger fish to swim over to them?
“Cannons loaded!” The Boer yelled before hiding back in his hiding spot.
Covering his ears, the brave cannoneers fired buckshot in the bush around them. Vegetation was shredded right before their eyes. It was accompanied by the scream of strangers. The Boers grabbed their muskets and pointed in the direction of the yells, and they found a shredded San salad.
The San had a fellow hunter right by his comrade's side, checking his comrade’s wounds. Those with quick hands pointed at the hunter and opened fire, gunning him down. Avenging the Boers and Xhosa who perished, the men reloaded their muskets and waited for another target to come out.
5 minutes passed, and no one came.
One by one, they came out of their hiding holes and checked for danger. No San arrows came, and no one was impaled by a spear.
“It seems they left,” Potgieter remarked, looking at the dead Xhosas and Boers that were piled up the respective Boers.
“Whew, I survived,” Pietje remarked, before looking at his dead comrades with dismay.
Russell walked over to the remains of the two San. One was full of bullet holes, the other had its body shredded by the cannon’s buckshot.
“Lesson learnt. Next time when travelling through the bush, bring lots of elves to scout the bush,” Jan remarked.
“Better yet. Don’t even get near the bush,” Potgieter added.
Multiple graves were dug up. One grave was allocated to a dead Boer. About 8 men perished in the ambush. 3 dead Xhosas, and 5 Boers.
The Boers focused on the comrades, whilst the Xhosa talked to their dead comrades. They lugged their corpses onto the wagons.
One of them came up to him.
With very broken Elfrikaans, he requested, “I wish to bring them back to their home.”
Deciding to appease the Xhosa, he acceded to the request. The men would have to deal with a dead Xhosa on the wagon with them, but they should get used to it.
Worst of all, was that he had nothing to offer to the families of the dead. What can he offer? As the Commando, he was responsible for their deaths. If they had obtained gold or many cattle during their trip then he wouldn’t feel so empty, but they’ve practically obtained nothing. All they’ve obtained were plans in action, but would such things appease the families?
He held his head in his hands, unsure of what to do.
Potgieter, seeing the distress his junior faced, came over and patted Jan’s shoulder.
“I see a great many men die during our treks. Even if we’re willing to be amicable, the elves aren’t and would have us killed. Had to fight many battles like that. We’re not like Pretorius, you know? That man seldom gets anyone killed in his battles, it's absurdly ridiculous, and it makes me jealous. Just know that it’s not your fault.”
Jan nodded, took a deep breath, and took a scan of the situation. No point lingering any further, better get a move on before some other party sought to have them killed.
Movement from the bushes sent the men on high alert, and they pointed their firearms back at the bush. A firearm peeked through the bush, causing most men’s fingers to hover over their triggers.
A whole Zulu Impi party came out of the bush, and they looked at the Boers that heavily outnumbered them in firepower. Then they looked at the dead and the graves marking them.
“Uhmm… sorry?” The leader of the party apologized to Elfrikaans.
Even though their communication in Elfrikaans was poor, there were still Xhosa servants alive, so Jan sent them to communicate with the Zulus.
Since the Xhosa spent some time with them, they could pick up the simple lingo the men used. But it was still limited, so he watched the Xhosa gesture about trying to further explain in Elfrikaans. At some point, the Xhosa gave up and started speaking in its tongue, and the clicks that made no sense to him dribbled out.
He looked towards Potgieter who also shrugged.
“If you ask me, it's kind of obvious what happened,” Russell explained, pointing at the Zulu Impi before pointing at the dead San, “They were tracking the small group of San in the bush. The San were forced over to us and attacked us,”
Jan looked over the Zulus, who were inspecting the dead San. It seemed like just cause to demand compensation. If they could obtain some cattle, he could compensate the families of the dead. But did he want to ruin their relationship over some dead cattle?
“Forget it. We were ill-equipped to deal with the San, we should not seek others to blame for our mistakes,” Jan concluded, and they left the Zulus alone and continued trekking.
After a couple of days of trekking and the Drakensburg mountains were in sight. They were leaving the highveld by the small valley at Van Reenen. Jan sat by the Xhosa driver and watched the mountains. When he told Potgieter that the Zulus might try a Hannibal and cross the mountains to circumvent Van Reenen, he meant it as a joke. But if they could do so, then fortifying Van Reenen would be pointless. Worst of all, was that they would wreak havoc on Natal from two fronts.
He watched the numerous trails around Drakensburg and realized the likelihood of them crossing the mountains was possible. If they were human, then it would be impossible. But they were elves with sangoma and war doctors who could supercharge their physiques to do the impossible.
Just one fort would not do, they were going to need multiple. The only way to do so was to have Boers settle by the Drakensburg at the Free States-Natal border. It looks like he would have to discuss with Pretorius the new townships that have to be created.
Potgieter was also watching the mountains. And realized that simple fortifications that would stop a human army will not do against an elven army. He grimaced knowing how he was responsible for giving him more trouble to Pretorius.
At long last, they stopped at Pietermaritzburg, a bustling town filled with families fleeing the Eastern Cape. The Sixth Frontier Wars with the Xhosa showed the Boers that they could not rely on the useless British for protection by the frontier, so they all left in droves.
Their wagon party was not an outlier, since there were big families who bunched up and came to Pietermaritzburg. They were all here to pay respects to the Voortrekker leader Andries Pretorius before deciding to settle somewhere in the region.
Pretorius was discussing with a trekker group about this when Potgieter knocked on Pretorius’ door.
Apologizing to the trekker for the disruption, Pretorius got out of his seat to open the door. And he saw the man who gave him a headache for the past few weeks.
“Hello, Pretorius,” Potgieter sheepishly greeted.
Pretorius bit his lip, and dismissed the trekker leader from his office, saying that he had more important things to discuss.
“Could you please enlighten me on how you got the Zulus in the Free States?” Pretorius demanded, trying to erase any tinge of frustration from his tone.
Grabbing the copy of the agreement he signed with the Zulus, Potgieter presented it to Pretorius. Scanning through the agreement, the furrows in his brows deepened.
“All this just to get a trade route between both of our towns?”
Potgieter shrugged.
“Not exactly that. Families could settle along the route, so we just got safe land to settle. As well as a safe route between both our towns.”
“Then what about the Zulus?”
Potgieter smirked.
“You think they will dare to fight against you after the Battle of Blood River? You must think too lowly of yourself. Even with 15 thousand to 30 thousand men, they were unable to defeat your small band consisting of hundreds. Any Zulu would fear your name.”
“A victory like that can’t be replicated time and time again. They will improvise, and adapt to our ways of fighting. If we had to fight like that a second time, I’m not sure of our victory.”
“But this time, you don’t only have hundreds. You have thousands settling in your Republic. I have hundreds too. Even if the Zulus adapt to our way of fighting, we do have our allies. The coalition by the Sotho Queen Moshoeshoe, Tswana and Xhosa against the Zulu would support us against any Zulu aggression. I am sure of this because I have been assured by my Tswana allies.”
A commotion racked the town as men and women had their eyes stolen by the approaching army. Officers wearing broad-topped shakoes with short red shell jackets rode on horses of the English Charger breed. Behind them were the Corps of Cape Mounted Riflemen (CMR) who were all Khoikhoi riding English horses as well. Each man was equipped with a sword and carbine.
Potgieter peeked out of the window and whistled.
“Looks like trouble.”