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Emerson
Leopard in the fog
-Battle of Hellfort’s Pass-
Part V
(The sane thing to do)
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There were so many arrows stuck on the ground, behind the burning barricade, it looked like some type of weird tall grass had sprouted overnight, when the fog cleared enough for them to see. They were clearly facing a much too powerful enemy here, to win with trickery, Emerson thought and Spurius old face, tainted black but for the eyes, grimaced reading him.
“Mayhap we should retreat to the bridge as well,” His old friend offered.
There’s gallantry and honor in life, but there’s plaguin’ stupidity as well, was his meaning. At this point, seeing the soldiers pulling back, carrying their injured friends, he couldn’t agree more.
Emerson smacked his lips and eyed Sir Solomon for a long moment, the sweaty knight, his helm held in hand, looking none younger, or less fumed, than any of them.
“You mind riding to Hellfort, see everyone out of it?” He asked him, when the man turned to glare his way, not likening the attention.
“Abandon the castle,” The Knight of Altarin growled, the words painful.
“Spare yer countrymen,” Emerson countered. “We’ve sent warning to the city. Help might be on the way. We can meet them on the other bank of the river.”
Sir Solomon stared at the row of civilians heading towards the bridge, bringing with them what they could. Soren and Victor Hook were leading one such group, Emerson noticed, while waiting for the other knight’s decision.
“I will get my horse,” Sir Solomon relented finally, clenching his jaw, rigid as a board.
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“It’s the right call,” Spurius said, after ordering Marcus to direct the injured towards the river, the healthy soldiers creating a line anchoring at the end of the path leading up the slope, towards the castle.
“Not if they catch us on the move.”
“Why delay it then?” Spurius queried and Emerson glanced at the last civilians heading away in the distance, the river over a kilometer away. A small group coming down the slope and the castle as well. The rest of the mercenaries with Dante and Jinx among them and a couple of civilians.
No Glen though.
What are ye doin’ lad?
Emerson narrowed his eyes, a tang of worry in his heart. He turned to the soldier holding Duke’s reins intent on riding up there and drag him down himself, but a group of riders got out of the smoking and destroyed gate back at the barricade, a good three hundred meters from them and stopped him. A very large group.
“Here they are,” Spurius said, standing on his left shoulder, just as another even larger group emerged. Mounted archers all of them. Over two hundred, they pulled away from the smoke, leaving the space open to yet another group.
“Good grief,” The former Centurion commented.
“PULL THEM BACK!” Emerson bellowed a warning to Marcus. “UP THE SLOPE!”
“YE HEARD HIM LADIES! ON THE BLOODY DOUBLE!” The sergeant echoed.
Spurius got ready to argue, but he saw what Emerson had noticed amidst the ever growing numbers of mounted archers. The latter had pooled left and right from the mouth of the Pass, their center now filling up with shinning, scale armour wearing Cofol Knights.
Cataphracts. Well over a hundred of them, Emerson guessed, turning to Marcus, his heart beating wild. They needed to leave the flat ground fast.
The battle had decided their next stand for them.
“UP THE SLOPE NOW!” The knight thundered and run for his horse.
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Emerson blasted through the open castle gates on Duke, five minutes later, with the rest of the soldiers retreating fast behind him, still further back. He spotted Rolas barking orders to his small group of castle guards and headed his way initially, but caught out of the corner of his left eye Sir Solomon getting out of their barracks, face haunted and stooped like an old man, so he turned the horse to reach him instead. He jumped off the saddle, his knees hurting when he landed, just as the other knight sat down on an upturned wooden case left on the sidewalk.
Collapsed on it, more like.
“What’s the matter wit you?” Emerson asked him that feeling of worry returning tenfold.
“Lord Reeves,” Sir Solomon managed to say, looking at his bloodied hands.
Stiles greeted him with a grimace, when he burst through the open door of the barrack they shared with Glen. There was a big pool of blood next to the door, the young man sitting in the middle of it, his eyes closed and pale as a corpse.
No.
Gods no.
Emerson knelt next to him and searched for a pulse frantically, his mouth dry.
“He’s hanging on,” The ex-pirate said, just as despair started setting in. “Did all I could to patch up the wound. Lost too much blood.”
“What happened?” Emerson grunted, grinding his teeth.
“Got knifed in the lung,” Stiles replied and the knight could see where the armour had yielded to the blade.
Uher curse ye!
“Who did this?”
The former pirate shook his head sadly.
“Was tendin’ to Val outside the stable. Last I saw him, he entered in here unscathed.”
An assassin roaming Hellfort? Emerson wondered, stroking Glen’s messy hair. How did I miss that? That bounty hunter came to mind and he stood up furious.
“He needs a dottore,” Stiles said, himself sounding devastated. Perhaps because his well-being was tied to the young Lord’s. “A darn good one.”
The Cofols were going to take the castle, before the day was over. Emerson knew that. It was also obvious they wanted the Reeves family killed off. The constant attempts on his life, the murder of his father and grandfather, all painting a clear enough picture.
“They can’t find him,” Emerson started, realizing he’d no plan, or even a glimpse of an idea, on how to prevent that. “Else, even if he lasts that long, he’s doomed.”
They all were, in a sense.
“I shall fall here then, with Lord Reeves,” Sir Solomon announced returning, a grim look on his aged face. “I vow before all Gods, to gladly die next to him.”
“I’d rather save him, Sir Solomon,” Emerson said stiffly, not liking all this sanctimonious talk. “If there’s a way.”
“There is,” A voice said in common. Emerson turned to see who it was; saw no one, but a bewildered Stiles staring at the knight’s feet and narrowed his eyes frustrated.
“Who plaguin’ said that?” He grunted, then lowered his eyes to see for himself, what it was the former pirate had found that piqued his interest so.
Sir Solomon spoke first, surprise turning to anger.
“Is that a bloody dwarf?” The knight asked, his hand dropping to the handle of his sword.
Emerson remembered Glen’s wild stories back in Castalor. He entertained the idea then, not really much believing it, but the short chubby creature standing not a foot from him, appeared to be just that. Or a small child with a long earth-colored beard that reached his knees, a grand mustache under a prominent nose, on par with his large head and in stark contrast to the rest of his body.
That was too much hair, for any kid Emerson had ever seen.
“Stay that blade, Sir Solomon!” He snapped at the wild-eyed knight.
“I prefer the name Folk meself. Less bigoted a term,” The dwarf said all serious, manly voice surprising Emerson even more and small arms crossed on his chest, as he stared them all down; sort of plaguin’ speak. “Name’s Fikumin Flintfoot by the way.”
“Hah,” Stiles guffawed, breaking the uncomfortable tension that followed his words. “For a moment, I thought I’d gone crazy!”
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“Good grief, Sir Lennox!” Solomon Arno protested. “You can’t allow this thing treating Lord Reeves!” Emerson scrunched his jaw, eyes pausing on the deathly pale Glen and the dwarf checking on his wound, before returning on the incensed knight.
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“Do you have an alternative at the ready, Sir Solomon?”
“What?”
“You heard me!”
Solomon grimaced. “I was tasked to protect Lord Reeves,” He said, voice cracking at the end. The fact he failed him left unsaid.
“The Cofols will break through those gates,” Emerson said much softer, his mouth dry. “They brought an army ready to fight and we have a meager force here,” He breathed once deep, seeing the dwarf looking around and finding a laden burlap sack, rummaging quickly through its contents. “We are trapped and even if we surrender, he’s not walking out of this.”
Or any of us, he thought.
“Bah,” Sir Solomon grunted and run his fingers through his greying hair. “I can’t just trust… what if he’s lying?”
“What's the worst he could do?” Emerson bitterly countered, adding. “Can you find Marcus and bring him here?”
“What do you want him for?”
He pointed at Fikumin, at that time examining a small bowl he’d found inside the sack. A black-marble mortar and pestle on a second glance.
What in Uher’s name?
“We need to give him time,” He told Sir Solomon, shaking his head at all the bizarre stuff happening, but willing to take a step back and give it a shot. Emerson couldn’t assent all was lost, nor could he give up on trying to save Glen’s life. Not after everything that plaguin’ happened. The boy deserves better. “But we can’t direct the siege from here.”
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“Is there a way out?” He asked the dwarf, when the knight run away to find Marcus.
“Possibly.”
“I need more than that, mister Fikumin!” Emerson grunted.
“We will have to move him,” The dwarf explained, adding some of the water Stiles brought him in the mortar, but drinking most of the wine, remembering to pour some of it in as well, in the end. Fikumin kept grinding at the mixture as he continued. “Slowly and through difficult terrain, in the dark.”
Emerson blinked in surprise, as with the fog gone and the skies clearer, the late morning sun illuminated the yard outside more than adequately.
“Where are you taking him?”
“The mines,” Fikumin answered simply and used his finger to apply some of the poultice on the cleaned up wound. Stiles had helped him remove Glen’s armour earlier. “We’ll need a good head start, Sir Knight.”
Emerson nodded and hearing boots approaching turned to greet a sweaty Marcus. The ex-legion sergeant stepped inside, frowned seeing Glen on death’s door and then his eyes opened wide in shock at the sight of Fikumin.
“What in Tyeus arse—?”
“He’s a real dwarf,” Stiles explained, as if he was an expert on the matter and seeing the hale man’s rugged face contorting in bewilderment, he added with a quick glance at the scowling Fikumin. “But we can’t call him that.”
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“I put our supplies to the torch,” Spurius said hours later, the afternoon sun still strong over their heads, smoke clouds covering the castle’s yard and almost everything inside burning from wall to wall. “The way they hurry and with that numbers of animals, they must ‘burn’ through ‘em faster than a rat does a piece of fresh cheese.”
Emerson nodded, lips pulled back in a grimace of a smile, skin on his neck chafed where the gambeson met the chainmail. He’d drank the last of his water a while back and had no stomach for a final meal, even with cheese in it.
He thought of Glen, pale and with one foot in the grave, awkwardly secured on Marcus’ back and probably still trapped in the mines; that is unless a dwarf, of all plaguin’ things, had decided to speak a lick of truth for the first time in his life, according to the tales at least, while relatively sober.
Then his mind wandered to his years growing up in Lesia and training in his father’s castle yard. Much bigger than this one, lemon trees offering shade and two water wells providing clean water for everyone. Emerson recalled his mother’s soft knitted shirt, the one she had gifted him when he put his first set of armor on and his little sister’s laughter.
The knight had worn out that shirt long ago and the last time he’d laid eyes on his sister, she was crying her eyes out utterly heartbroken. These memories Emerson would rather forget. He spat down, mouth bitter and dry, making a mockery of it and unsheathed his father’s blade, seeing the first riders coming through the broken down Hellfort’s gates.
This battle, was almost over.
“You want my shield?” Spurius probed, a resigned look on his aged, soot covered face. “It’s been ages since I used one.”
“Reckon they won’t charge inside the yard,” Emerson replied and as if on que, some of the Cofols jumped off their saddles. “Them slant-eyed devils care about ‘em horses something fierce.”
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Sir Solomon got skewered through the chest with a three meters long lance, as if to prove him wrong not long after, the experienced knight killing the onrushing Cataphract in the process, with a slash that went under the rim of his helm. The Cofol rode painting his white armor a deep red for a while, his horse enraged, tongue hanging and frothing at the mouth, before he slipped from the saddle into a heap on the ground.
The Hellfort’s defenders cheered at that, but the Cofol knight’s friends broke through with a decisive mass charge soon after, the less than thirty soldiers left trying to create another shieldwall, behind the now lost castle walls, too beaten up to hold them back. The survivors that weren’t slaughtered outright, dispersed into smaller groups inside the yard, all of them surrounded; most fighting it out to the last.
Emerson himself, retreated towards the mine’s gaping mouth, keeping the Tower on his left shoulder with a wounded Spurius and seven soldiers following him. Rolas Pontus with another three brave souls covered their final retreat, but caught an arrow right through the neck and died drowning in his own blood before their eyes.
“ARROWS!” Spurius bellowed and some of the soldiers managed to raise their shields to stop some of them. The Cofols, ever practical and even-keeled, lined up less than twenty meters from them and fired again.
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At least twenty armed men charged after the volley to finish them off, under the thunderous cheers of their watching comrades. At least a thousand of them had flooded the castle’s yard. Emerson glanced towards Spurius, five arrows caught on his shield, with two going through wood and metal sheet, to see if he was still standing. The Centurion cursed, a splinter opening a cut on his cheek, signaling he was fine and Emerson stepped forward, going over a pincushioned and bleeding out soldier.
The first Cofol went for the man standing next to him, Emerson couldn’t recall his name much as he tried, yielding a nasty spear with both hands. The knight cut him on the left thigh and messed his aim up, but the man still managed to fatally wound the soldier on the side.
Emerson ducked under a scimitar, the charging mounted-scout now on foot, losing his balance and meeting the knight’s rising blade with his neck. He parried a spear away and into a Cataphract’s sabre, saving the soldier still standing on his other shoulder, then punched hard the irate Cofol with the warspear right at his nose-guard, caving the narrow metal inwards and sending what was left of the poor man’s broken bones in his brain.
The Cataphract slashed at him savagely from the side, but he caught it on the vambrace, darn thing riding the metal down, sparks flying all over and opening a wound at his wrist. Emerson jumped back out of reach, caught sight of Spurius getting a dagger under the armpit and stumble down with a groan, four Cofol rangers surrounding him like starving hyenas and landed on a wild-eyed scout, a deep cut splitting his ruined face in two equal parts right at the nose, the gap bleeding profoundly.
Emerson shoved the injured Cofol back, turned the Cataphract’s lunge down and kicked a charging howling ranger at the knee, breaking it with a sickening crunch that doubled him down and stopped his attack dead. The knight retreated a step, then another two and felt vertical rock from the mountain on his back, the mass of the tower thirty meters away to his right. He realized he was the last one standing, everyone else either slain, or too injured to stand.
There it is then, Emerson thought, sweat burning his eyes, the helm fused on his head and the handle of his sword slippery with his own blood. Hope ye make it out my boy, not much else I can do. His eyes measured his opponents, at least thirty on the front line, mostly mounted-scouts now on foot carrying scimitars, long dagger wielding Cofol rangers reaching for their bows again and the Cataphract that had been hunting him since the start of the scrap.
“Wanna take a crack at it, lad? Ye’ve been itchin’ for a taste all day,” Emerson taunted him in common and the armoured man charged the few meters separating them with a growl, sabre gleaming in the sun.
Emerson’s rising sword beat the blade away, cut diagonally on the return, sharp edge cutting through scaled armor, but stopping sort on the chainmail shirt underneath. The Cataphract recoiled, the smirking face engraved in silver on the visor remaining frozen, but for the fear in his eyes. Emerson stepped forward, turned the man’s defensive slash towards the ground and slashed upwards himself splitting that face-mask in two, the Cofol’s pale sweaty face revealed underneath immediately painted red, his desperate howl of pain increasing tenfold, when he realized the tip of Emerson’s blade had taken out his right eye.
The Cataphract stumbled back on weak knees, hand on his face and a one of the scouts charged behind him, the rest momentarily stunned at the turn of events. Emerson twisted to defend himself, breathing heavy though the slits of his helm, one eye on the onrushing nimble scout, the other on his fast recovering friends and the still mounted Cataphract that had appeared behind them, gold leopard mask tainted in dark tar, but clearly visible.
The lightly-armored scout got a handbreadth of steel in his gut, Emerson riding it sideways to lengthen the wound, before pulling the sword out, spilling the man’s inwards out. He then turned to finish off the still groaning injured Cataphract kneeled a couple of meters from him, his hapless opponent desperately trying to put his spilled eye back in and failing, before the rest of the Cofols got their shit together.
Something punched him in the chest, hard as a mule’s hinder kick a mere stride in, his boots sliding backwards in the mud. Then another came, darn prickly thing a couple of fingers bellow it. Emerson stopped and stared at the Cofol rangers, now in the process of nocking fresh arrows to their bows about ten meters from him, since they’d retreated instead of coming forward. In a sense, twas the sane thing to do, he thought not begrudging them that, tasting blood in his mouth and more trickling down his belly under his armour.
“ENOUGH!” The gold Leopard barked, voice drowned in righteous indignation.
A fainting Sir Emerson, who sort of had convinced himself, it wasn’t half-a-bad thing to die, wit a clear sky over yer head, almost missed, what was the end of the battle.
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> While hotly disputed by the Khanate’s scholars, it is highly possible that Prince Nout surprised the Duke’s forces, if any were present, broke through Hellfort’s Pass, burn the fort itself to the ground and crossed Teid River in less than a week.
>
> It is unclear whether he defeated Lord Reeves at some point during that time or not, as the elderly Lord of Altarin was reportedly murdered days before this battle happened and probably never left the city. It could be, this was one of his descendants, another hotly contested subject till this day, who was present and killed during the castle’s brief siege.
>
> A couple of famed knights died in that battle, amongst them Sir Solomon Arno and presumably Sir Emerson Lennox, former Lord of Balard’s Castle in Lesia. Dante Blackwood, first Captain of the notorious Gallant Dogs company, fell during the battle as well, fighting on the Duchy’s side. ‘Ye do it for me, Pretty,’ the much-repeated and celebrated tavern toast of all mercenaries today, is according to popular belief, naught but his last words to an unknown Gish ranger.
>
> Whatever the case may be, the famed Gold Leopard had managed complete surprise and now stood before two open roads according to the intelligence of the time. One leading south towards the mighty Yeriden and Rida; Redwood Forest on his army’s east flank, the bountiful Raoz open plains on his west, and the other straight down, following the Teid River, towards the city of Altarin.
>
> Prince Nout, true to his moniker, would surprise all and sundry again in the second month of Spring 189 NC, in what most historians denote as the first battle of the War, since they like to pretend that everything before that didn’t happen; in a little place called Esterlams Crevice across the Threeriver Bridge.
>
>
>
> -
>
> Lord Sirio Veturius
>
> Circa 206 NC
>
> The Fall of Heroes
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> Chapter V
>
> -Prologue-
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> (Prince Nout Radpour,
>
> 'The Leopard loose in Raoz',
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> Battle of Hellfort’s Pass,
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> Late second month of winter,
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> 189 NC.)
>
>
>
>
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