The flags of the morning star fluttered in the light breeze of dusk. The red fabric moved in an almost unnatural flutter before the men on Eternon’s walls. Hundreds of the banners lined up alongside thousands of soldiers holding the round shields and curved swords and sabers of Teljuk warriors as their leaders led them in chants of glory and their musicians drummed in rhythm with the bleating trumpeters. It seemed to the defenders that the line of troops massed from one end of the plains to the sea, spanning the thin land of the Tolian Bridge from shore to shore.
All day the bombardment had lasted, till a little over an hour ago when the cannons fell silent and the troops marched forward under the setting sun. That golden ball of light, falling on the other side of the city, now only peaked over the edge of Infinity’s Wisdom as if the deity Itself were waiting till the last moment to see the events to come before Triumph’s rotation cast It’s eye away.
The defenders knew that once that sun had set, once it no longer shone in the eyes of the ranked attackers, the assault would begin. So like a counting down clock, the legion defending Eternon waited and watched, listened and prayed, till the sun disappeared beneath the city’s tall dome.
A loud, single blast of trumpets followed by a ceaseless cadence of drumming roared from the Teljuk lines, and they advanced. As a single mass, the entire army of Hemend marched in beat with the musicians with shield and sword at the ready.
After over a kilometer of marching, now half a kilometer from the city, they broke into a fast march.
“There are three holes in the third wall, counting the gap made in the gate,” Murel said, his arms crossed behind his back as he looked at the oncoming attackers. “And Eternine doesn’t have enough troops to cover all of them.”
“Hmm,” Sono said in an impatient grunt, her arms crossed over her chest.
Four hundred meters.
Nege stood next to his fellow Prophets near the third tower in the second wall. Nege had wanted to be on the first wall, to see the initial assault close up. Fearing the Red’s temptation to act, the White and the Gold insisted they take a further vantage point.
The location made Nege anxious, useless from this distance. Only the sight of Eternine, standing near the wide gates and double towers of the second wall, just a few hundred meters away, eased the Red’s nerves. The emperor’s armor shone dimly with the low light as he shouted orders and spoke quickly with his commanders.
Three hundred meters.
The Teljuk army progressed in a solid mass, as if the land itself were being transformed into a living field with red-clothed banners for trees and swords for grass. Nege watched as half the Truscan legion, the second and third regiments, maintained position behind the second gate. A reserve regiment, the fourth, waited at the first. The first regiment was amassed with bow and musket in hand along the walls.
Not a soldier on the ground came into view for the Teljuks. They raced toward a seemingly empty city as artillery burst into life to give them cover. Nege could now hear the shouts of the attackers and the cries to “hold steady” along all positions in the walls.
At two hundred meters, the entire army of the morning star came to a sudden halt that stirred the dust to a hazy cloud, all save one group along the northern side. While the rest of the army stopped, a single regiment continued forward at a fast march toward the city. They charged toward the large gap in the third wall directly in front of them.
This single line now in range, the guns and few cannons of Eternon opened up.
“They aren’t attacking together?” Sono asked.
“Initial attack,” Murel noted. “Hemend doesn’t expect to win the city initially. He wants to test the defenses, and Eternine’s tactics.”
Sono made another impatient grunt as the attackers broke into a run.
With disciplined motion, the front ranks of the only Truscan legion marched toward the weak spot where the attack would land. Not a soldier was out of place in the march and not a one blinked in the face of the attackers. Each held stiff his tower shield and long-tipped pike, thinking to the safety of the short Truscan sword at his hip and the tall Truscan soldier pressed against it.
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One hundred meters from the walls, the attackers now saw a porcupine of metal and wood standing in the very spot they were headed. The pat-pat of musket fire sounded off from the walls with the occasional burst of a cannonball slamming into the outer defenses.
At fifty meters, one Teljuk warrior wielding the morning star flag ran ahead of his fellow soldiers. Waving the banner as if its red image would chase away the now positioned defenders, he roared at the ranks in front of him. The front rank on one knee, the second crouched, the third standing erect, set a three-tiered row of death that the Teljuks would have to charge into. Yet they ran and held their wood and metal shields ready to force through the line.
That one Teljuk flagbearer caught the eye of a Truscan in the third rank, and raised his curved saber at the man. Before the Truscan could hear the flag bearer’s curses, he and the rest of the third and second ranks crouched to their knees as two rows of musketmen stepped forward with their guns held ready, one rank crouched, the other standing.
Within ten yards, the guns burst fire and lead as they blasted into the front ranks of the attackers. The flagbearer and his red morning star banner fell to the ground, rippled with holes as the soldiers behind him tripped over the fallen front rank and lost all their momentum. In unison, the musketmen stepped back and the pikemen returned to formation just in time to thrust their weapons into the slow-moving, confused ranks of Teljuk soldiers.
“This,” Murel said, pointing at the skirmish. “This siege, will not be a quick engagement.”
Sono grunted once more.
Murel was right, Nege noted as the last bits of light trailed away. This was only a test, the first battle in a long line of engagements. Hemend wanted to test Eternine. And Eternine passed almost too easily. Yet attacking with the sun beyond set ensured the battle would be minor, guaranteeing minimal losses for whoever failed. Before the battle could even really get started, the Teljuks retreated with the fading light covering their escape, the defenders’ gunfire replaced with their taunts and cheers.
As he watched the battle draw to a quick close, Nege was glad the White Prophet beside him lacked the empathic ability to read his emotions.
A streak of blood stained the already red-painted piles of stone, collapsed on top of each other in the wall’s southern break. The blood shot out of the gaping hole of a Teljuk musketman’s neck after a charging line of pikes and tower shields plowed into his thinly-ranked brethren.
With a shout of “Victory!” the Truscan legionnaires allowed this to be the last casualty of the day as they halted their pursuit only twenty paces out from the protection of their walls. Teljuk cannon fire stopped, as did the quick popping of the muskets lining Eternon’s crumbling outer walls.
“Reform ranks in the central corridor!” the legion company’s captain ordered the men standing in the gap between the second and third walls. Stepping lively, ignoring their tired arms and the bodies they had to step over or around, the formation of soldiers made their way back toward the gate to rejoin their fellow soldiers who had participated in the other half of the battle.
“Eternine is taking an interesting tactic,” Murel noted.
“What’s that?” Sono asked, her lip curled in a similar fashion as it had following the previous day’s skirmish.
“There were barely enough soldiers at the gap to the south to compensate for that attack, barely enough to contain the one on the north as well.” Murel pointed to the Teljuk soldiers, fleeing in a semi-orderly fashion from both ends of the outer walls against the setting sun. “The attack came from the center, toward the same spot they attacked yesterday, but with three times the amount of soldiers.”
In a fast march, the Teljuk regiment had gone straight for the gap, then broke away at the last second to attack the external points. “An interesting diversionary tactic,” Murel noted. “But it seems that Eternine did not blink.”
The emperor had kept his troops behind the second wall till the last moment, keeping in quick contact with the ballistic troops on the walls to know the enemy’s movement. It was only when the attack’s position was obvious that he gave the order to place his troops in the slim gaps and defend the pincer motion assault.
“Just in time with just the right amount of troops, the other two regiments held in reserve,” Murel said with admiration.
“He’s defending a city that held off worse attacks using fewer men. But there is no chance this lone legion can defend a massed assault,” Sono added. “Skirmishing only delays.”
“Did anyone else notice that Teljuk regiment wore fur skins behind their backs?” Nege asked as the fur-skinned troops merged into the rest of the camped army.
“Ah, so that was Hemend’s nomads. Fierce, but without discipline,” Murel said.
“If Hemend wants to attack he should use his entire force. And if Eternine wants to defend why does he hold so much of his tiny force back?” Sono asked.
“Just watch, Sono,” Murel said, resting his gauntleted hand against the stone edge of the second wall. “It may not make tactical sense to use these surgical defenses against superior forces. But it may have an effect you wouldn’t expect.”
The three Prophets turned toward the armored emperor, standing on the walls a few hundred yards away. The man ignored all offers of congratulations, silencing those around him as he conferred with his commanders. Each Prophet held a different set of emotions as they stared at Eternine the Third.