When Darkness Descends by G. W. Lücke

Author:G. W. Lücke
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: With Distinction Consultants

~ Chapter 19 ~

Straddling his heavily armoured destrier, Badulf surveyed the muddy battlefield from behind the safety of a makeshift palisade. Catching his reflection in the polished umbo of a metal shield, he barely recognised himself. Skin once taut with subcutaneous fat now drooped from his bones as the demands of war took their toll, every defeat seemingly etched in deep recesses criss-crossing his face. He almost fell from his horse, daydreaming about a victory that was always out of reach.

Laid out before him, the Riverlands battlefield of Flüsse had been churned over from the panicked hooves of war beasts and the leather boots of weary fighters. Puddles littered the field like pit traps waiting for an unsuspecting footfall. An occasional blade of grass fluttered in the stiff breeze; a lonely survivor waving the white flag of surrender. The woodland surrounding the field burned and tendrils of silvergrey smoke wrapped themselves around the bodies of dead Erstürmen soldiers like smouldering funeral shrouds. Badulf grimaced as the screams of the injured pierced the smoky haze, disrupting a moment of calm before the next onslaught ensued.

Like giant ghosts silhouetted against the haze, grell slaves lumbered through the carnage. They cleared the battlefield of the dead and piled the bodies in grotesque heaps, setting fire to the inert flesh with flaming torches. Enemy casualties trapped on the field were dispatched with a halberd to the throat by the slaves’ overseers.

Mounted next to Badulf was Willem, one of his lieutenants. Both had been fighting the Riverlands War since the beginning, seven seasons past. They’d hoped for a quick and easy victory. At first, it appeared their prayers would be answered as the Riverlands farmers were taken by surprise at the size and ferocity of the Erstürmen attack. But the tide of battle soon turned when the farmers gained an unexpected ally; skilled fighters from an unknown land. Now, the Erstürmen soldiers played a waiting game, holding their ground until the long-promised reinforcements arrived from Sardis.

At one end of the battlefield, twenty Erstürmen archers with crossbows took cover in a shoulder-high trench dug into the black soil. Each archer had two bows and a ‘loader’; another soldier whose job was to load the crossbow after each shot. This avoided the long delays between firing that were characteristic of this weapon and made archers vulnerable to counter attack.

The trench sergeant shouted and the archers positioned their crossbows over the lip of the channel, aiming them at the field. In the distance, barely visible over the crest of a rise, Badulf saw the heads of peasant farmers marching to battle bobbing determinedly towards their enemy. The archers held steady, waiting for the farmers to come into range, and the signal to fire. The grell slaves and their masters scattered as the farmers approached.

“Fire!” yelled the trench sergeant.

Badulf jolted upright as the archers loosed their arrows at the marching farmers. Most of the projectiles fell short of their targets. The farmers halted their advance and stood defiant with the blunt end of their spears, sickles and pitchforks planted firmly in the soft mud.

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