Behind him a hundred Legion riders reined in, waiting for orders. Tenaka helped Lucas from the saddle and then dismounted.
‘How did it go?’ asked Ananais.
Tenaka lifted three fingers.
‘It would have been nice had it been five,’ he said.
‘It was a disciplined charge, Ani, one rank at a time.’
‘You have to give that to them – they were always well-disciplined. Still, the day is yet young.’
Rayvan pushed her way forward. ‘Did we lose many?’
‘Around forty men at the charge. But more will be caught in the woods,’ answered Tenaka. Decado and Acuas made their way to the front.
‘General,’ said Acuas, ‘the Legion leader has now been appraised of our position. He is calling in his outriders for a frontal charge.’
‘Thank you. It is what we hoped for.’
‘I hope he does it swiftly,’ said Acuas, scratching his yellow beard. ‘The Templars have breached our defences and soon they will know of your preparations. Then they will convey them to the leader.’
‘If that happens, we are dead,’ muttered Ananais.
‘With all your powers, can you not screen their leader?’ asked Tenaka.
‘We could,’ answered Acuas stiffly, ‘but it would be a grave risk to the men charged with the task.’
‘It so happens,’ snarled Ananais, ‘that we are taking no small risk ourselves.’
‘It will be done,’ said Decado. ‘See to it, Acuas.’
Acuas nodded and closed his eyes.
‘Well, get to it, lad,’ urged Ananais.
‘He is doing it now,’ said Decado softly. ‘Leave him alone.’
The harsh shrieking blasts of the Legion bugles pierced the air and within seconds a line of black-garbed riders rimmed the hill opposite.
‘Get back to the centre,’ Ananais told Rayvan.
‘Don’t treat me like a milkmaid!’
‘I am treating you like a leader, woman! If you fall in the first charge, then the battle is over.’ Rayvan moved back and the men of Skoda readied their bows.
A single bugle blast heralded the charge and the horsemen swept down the low hill. Fear flickered through the ranks of defenders. Ananais sensed it rather than felt it. ‘Steady, lads,’ he called, his voice even.
Tenaka craned to see the formation: one hundred abreast, single lengths between ranks. He cursed softly. The leading rank reached the bottom of the hill and then continued up toward the defenders, slowing as the gradient increased. This brought the second rank even closer. Tenaka smiled. Thirty paces from the defenders, the first line of horsemen hit the hidden trenches, the soft turf laid upon thin branches. The line went down as if poleaxed by an invisible giant. The second line, too close in, went down with them in a milling mass of writhing horses.
‘Charge!’ shouted Ananais, and three hundred Skoda warriors dashed forward hacking and cleaving. The hundred that remained sent volleys of arrows over the heads of their comrades into the ranks of lancers beyond – these had pulled up their mounts and presented sitting targets to the archers. From the hill above, the Legion general, Karespa, cursed and swore. Swinging in his saddle he ordered his bugler to sound ‘Recall’. The shrill notes drifted over the battling men and the Legion pulled back. Karespa waved his arm, signalling left, and the lancers wheeled their mounts for a flank attack. Ananais pulled back his force to the hilltop.
The Legion charged again – only for their horses to hit the hidden trip-wires in the long grass. Karespa ordered ‘Recall’ once more. Bereft of choices he ordered his men to dismount and advance on foot, archers to the rear. They moved forward slowly, the men in the front rank hesitant and fearful. They carried no shields and were loth to approach the bowmen among the Skoda defence.
Just out of bowshot the front rank stopped, readying themselves for the hectic race. At that moment Lake and his fifty men rose from the ground behind them, discarding their blankets interwoven with long grass and climbing from the well-hidden trenches beside granite boulders. From his vantage point on the hilltop, Karespa blinked in disbelief as the men appeared, seemingly from the earth itself.
Lake swiftly strung his bow, his men following suit. Their targets were the enemy archers. Fifty arrows screamed home, then fifty more. All was pandemonium. Ananais led his four hundred men in a sudden attack and the Legion wilted under the storm of slashing blades. Karespa swung in the saddle to order his bugler to sound ‘Retreat’, then his jaw dropped in amazement. His bugler had been dragged from the saddle by a black-bearded warrior, who now stood grinning beside Karespa’s mount with a dagger in his hand. Other warriors stood close by, smiling mirthlessly.