15
For ten days work progressed. Fire gullies ten yards wide were dug four feet deep across the open ground between Walls One and Two, and again between Walls Three and Four. These were filled with brushwood and small timber, while vats were placed along each gully ready to pour oils to the dry wood.
Bowman’s archers hammered white stakes in the open ground at various points between walls, and also out on the plain before the fortress. Each line of stakes represented sixty paces, and his men practised for several hours each day, black clouds of shafts slicing the air above each row as the commands were shouted.
Target dummies were set up on the plain, only to be splintered by scores of arrows, even at 120 paces. The skills of the Skultik archers were formidable.
Hogun rehearsed withdrawals, timing the men by drumbeats as they dashed from the battlements, across the plank bridges of the fire gullies to scale the ropes to the next wall. Each day they became more swift.
Minor points began to occupy more time as the overall fitness and readiness of the troops increased.
‘When do we add the oil?’ Hogun asked Druss, as the men took an afternoon break.
‘Between Walls One and Two, it will have to be filled on the day of the first attack. Until the first day we will have no real idea of how well the men will stand up to the assault.’
‘There remains the problem,’ added Orrin, ‘of who lights the gullies and when. For example, if the wall is breached we could have Nadir tribesmen racing side by side with our own men. No easy decision to throw in a lighted torch.’
‘And if we give men the duty,’ said Hogun, ‘what happens if they are killed on the wall?’
‘We will have to have a torch duty,’ said Druss. ‘And the decision will be relayed by a bugler from Wall Two. An officer of cool nerve will be needed to judge the issue. When the bugle sounds the gully goes up – no matter who is left behind.’
Matters such as these occupied Druss more and more, until his head swam with plans, ideas, stratagems and ploys. Several times during such discussions the old man’s temper flared and his huge fists hammered the table, or else he strode around the room like a caged bear.
‘I’m a soldier – not a damned planner,’ he would announce, and the meeting would be adjourned for an hour.
Combustibles were carted in from outlying villages, a seemingly endless number of despatches arrived from Drenan and Abalayn’s panicked government, and a multitude of small problems -concerning delayed mail, new recruits, personal worries and squabbles between groups – threatened to overwhelm the three men.
One officer complained that the latrine area of Wall One was in danger of causing a health hazard, since it was not of regulation depth and lacked an adequate cess pit.
Druss set a working party to enlarge the area.
Abalayn himself demanded a complete strategic appraisal of all Dros Delnoch’s defences, which Druss refused since the information could be leaked to Nadir sympathisers. This in turn brought a swift rebuke from Drenan and a firm request for an apology. Orrin penned this, claiming it would keep the politicians off their backs.
Then Woundweaver sent a requisition for the Legion’s mounts, claiming that since the order was to hold to the last man, the horses would be of little use at Delnoch. He allowed that twenty should be retained for dispatch purposes. This so enraged Hogun that he was unapproachable for days.
Added to this, the burghers had begun to complain about the rowdy behaviour of the troops in civilian areas. All in all Druss was beginning to feel at the end of his tether, and had begun to voice openly his desire that the Nadir would arrive and the devil with the consequences!
Three days later his wish was partly answered.
A Nadir troop, under a flag of truce, galloped in from the north. Word spread like wildfire, and by the time it reached Druss in the main hall of the Keep an air of panic was abroad in the town.