Chapter Thirty-Seven

They left Golconda in the black of night just before dawn. Gorst went out through the barricade first. They went as silently as it is possible for a thousand men walking over rocky ground. None spoke a word. No drums played, no pipes or bugles sounded. Every soldier marched with bayonets fixed to their muskets. Those officers who still had their horses led them out on foot to avoid being seen. A skeleton crew of the fort garrison, a few company mercenaries, and artillerymen stayed back in the fort commanded by Colonel Hood. The rest went out in the order that they were to climb the pass.

Dryden shook hands with Pugh in silence as they parted, Captain Pugh going up to the left and Dryden the centre. Lieutenant Cavallo, one of Hood’s officers, a mercenary from Ist, and a solid veteran infantry leader, commanded the right flank. Several units of sepoys took up positions at the back of the army. Dryden stayed with Gorst. Mar, Sergeant Locke, and Private Harper went with Dryden. Then, with everyone in position, their actions still unnoticed by the Vuruni army, the Vastrum men began to march up the steep hill towards Settru Pass.

The walking was hard for most of the men. There was an easy road up the middle of the approach to the pass, but everywhere else on the rise was poor terrain for marching. It was hard for men to stay together as they went and it did not take long before the order of the march was poor and slow. They had been marching upwards for perhaps ten minutes when finally the horn of the enemy sounded. They had hoped it would take the enemy longer to see what they were about, but Dryden knew they had been lucky to get this far. So many men are not easy to hide, even in the pitch black. Now the first hint of light was beginning to creep into the sky in the east. Dryden took one last look backwards, then took Rosie’s reins, slipped his foot into the stirrup and mounted up. The other officers did the same. There was no point in hiding now.

“Why don’t you stay down? You’ll be an easy target up there. If you and the major die, who will give us orders?” Private Harper asked Colonel Gorst, who rode nearby.

Gorst looked around at the men and then back at the young soldier. This was his answer, “An officer’s whole point, once the battle starts, is to keep the morale of his men high. Battles are chaos and smoke and blood, son, a hurricane of powder and shot and bayonets. You make your plans before it starts and watch them fall to pieces. There is no controlling it once it starts. Orders are lost or disobeyed. Men are afraid. All reason is lost at the first volley. Two things keep men moving forward. To see their commanders unafraid, and to follow the king’s colours.” He smiled wistfully at the young man, “Forward!” He said loudly for all to hear, “Forward to the ramparts of the enemy, and onward to the friendly gates of Andaban!”

The men gave a cheer then and marched faster. Dryden hazarded a glance over his shoulder and saw hordes of cavalry coming from the direction of the enemy camp. They were disorganized and riding freely across the rocky terrain. The only thing stopping them was the thin line of sepoy infantry which had turned to face them and was preparing to fight. Cannon thundered from the fort as the riders came on. Men and horse were plucked from the charging mob as cannonballs ripped bloody gashes in the horde. But there were so few cannon and so many riders. The sepoy lines fired one volley, then two and the riders swerved at the last moment as ranks of horsemen fell and those behind them floundered. Then, as the horse began to recover to come again for the Guludan infantry, he heard a bugle calling for squares and the whole of the sepoy infantry began to form up.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

“Now that is soldiery, Major,” Gorst said to Dryden, and it was.

The square formation began to take shape quickly. Two ranks of infantry set in a square shape facing outwards. The front row kneeling, the second standing behind. The horse refused to ride into the bayonets which bristled outwards like a porcupine. The second rank fired into the cavalry felling horse and riders alike. Crates of ammunition were stacked up in the middle along with a handful of sepoy officers led by Captain Khathan. Quickly they were obscured by riders and the smoke from their muskets. Cannon fired in around them, shooting close but never hitting the square. Soon the cavalry backed off and began to reform. More riders were still coming from over the hill. Dryden wondered how many there were now, how many clans had come to follow Kurush, how many came to kill off the last soldiers of the Vastrum army, the army of oppression that had conquered and brutally ruled their land.

The marching lines of men continued to make their way up the hill. Behind them the square held and the cannon covered them. Dryden knew this would only last until the bullets and powder ran out. They had given much of what they had to those sepoys. The army would not need their guns to take this hill. At the top, it would be a bloody business for fine fellows.

The front of the army, a skirmish line of rangers and grenadiers, perhaps numbering only fifty men, was halfway up when the first jezail shots from above rang out. The line was not thickly defended. It heartened him to see that while there were shots, the wall was not manned by a thousand furious Vuruni warriors, but rather by a hundred or so. Gorst had the right of it. They had to get bayonets stuck into those men and force their way through.

Something buzzed by Dryden’s ear. He swatted at it, thinking it a horsefly or other large bug. Then another thing whizzed by with a cracking sound. He looked around for the fly again. Then something buzzed in and struck a man marching nearby. The man fell to his knees gurgling. It was a musket ball fired from above. It had hit the soldier in the throat.

“Show no fear, Major.” Gorst reminded him in a hushed tone, “The men are watching us to see how we react.” Then he turned back to the men and nodded, “Forward men, up and at them, at the double now!” A bugler blew out the call for double time and the men began to march more quickly.

Dryden looked back again at the enemy who was still struggling to fight their way past the sepoys. Khathan’s square was doing its job and then some, though he could not see the Guludan square, he could see the results of the fighting. Every so often he gained a glimpse through the smoke and enemy cavalry. Finally, he turned again and looked upon his own goal. In the last glimpse he saw of them, the Guludan soldiers stood strong in their square against the hordes of Vuruni, their golden tiger banner flying high in the red light of dawn.