“No, and their camp is where I thought it was, but they sent cavalry. I can hear hooves, way out there.” Gar pointed off toward the west.
Cort froze, listening, but all he could hear was the breeze. “You’ve good ears, sergeant.”
“It was just a minute’s sound blown on a breeze,” Gar told him, “a freak echo from the far side of the valley, and of course I can’t be sure it’s the Hawk Company…”
“But farmers don’t usually drive that many horses on their wagons,” Cort said with sarcasm. “Wake Sergeant Otto and get the company on the march.”
The men weren’t happy about marching at night—they muttered constantly, and fearfully, about the Fair Folk and other night-spirits.
“Stop worrying about something you might run into,” Dirk told them, “and pay attention to the danger you can be sure will jump you, if you don’t keep moving—the Hawk Company!”
The muttering didn’t stop, but the men did march faster.
Even without the wounded men and the corpses, they would have gone far more slowly than the horsemen who were chasing them. With them, progress seemed to be a crawl. Gar kept listening, though, and claimed to be able to hear the Hawks. They were approaching, but were having trouble finding the Blue Company’s trail—they had expected them to stay on the roads. So they weren’t following directly—they were going at an angle, cutting across the Blue Company’s line of march, then turning to search and cutting across the line again. “They’ll find us sooner or later, lieutenant, but it’ll be dawn before they can see our signs well enough to catch up fast.”
“With any luck, we’ll have found a stronghold by then, or been able to talk the free town into sheltering us,” Cort said, but his stomach was hollow with dread.
The world paled with predawn light, and finally, on the crisp breeze that blew through the clear air of early morning, Cort heard it, too: the distant thudding of hooves, almost felt rather than heard, horses at the trot.
The soldiers heard it as well. They glanced over their shoulders and muttered with dread, but the hooves faded again.
“Still cutting our trail,” Gar reported, “but it won’t be long before they see our footprints, and follow directly.”
“Faster!” Cort barked. “I know you’re dog tired, but march faster, blast it! Or you’ll have a worse lash than mine on your backs!”
“There!” Dirk pointed uphill, at a towering mass of stone pierced here and there by holes. “Better than nothing, lieutenant!”
“I’ll take it! There, men—march for that wall, quickstep!”
The soldiers needed no urging. Exhausted but on the verge of panic, they picked up the pace to a double march.
As they came up to the wall, they heard the sound of hooves come back, faint with distance, but it didn’t fade this time.
“They’ve found our trail!” Gar snapped. “Quickly, lieutenant! Fort up!”
They rode around behind the wall—and stared. “Thank all our lucky stars,” Cort breathed. “Shelter!”
There was no roof and maybe never had been, but the wall extended around them in a circle, only fifty feet across, and was pierced here and there with tall, narrow holes. “It is a stronghold,” Cort cried, “or the ruins of one! Thanks be to whatever ancestors built it!”
One of the soldiers let out a cry, pointing upward. Cort whirled to look, and saw a man in green clothing slide down a slope of the wall and leap to the ground.
“Bring him down!” Sergeant Otto called, and two soldiers ran for the gateway, hefting their spears.
“No!” Cort bellowed. “We’re guests, and we want their hospitality! Let them bring all the troopers they have! Maybe they’ll fight the Hawks for us!”
“And maybe they’ll spit us like pheasants for roasting,” Otto grumbled. “But you’re right, lieutenant, they’re probably more interested in making friends with a Free Company, as long as it doesn’t have enough men to threaten them.”
The sentry appeared again through the gateway, running flat out across the fields toward a walled town with a small castle that appeared through the morning mist as a sunbeam struck it, turning it golden. The soldiers lowered their spears reluctantly; the man was running in a straight line, and was a tempting target. Even as they watched, though, he veered, then veered again.
“Smart,” Otto approved. “Ran straight just long enough to draw our fire, then swerved in time to avoid it.”
“It might be that we’re not dealing with amateurs,” Cort said.
Then he realized that the drum of hooves had become louder. “Into the arrow slits, quickly! A ruin is better protection than none! One man to each aperture, hurry!”
Sergeants bawled orders, and the soldiers set down their wounded comrades behind the walls. Dirk, Gar, and Cort tied their horses to large rocks, then scrambled upward. Even the walking wounded climbed up to the embrasures. Loose rock slipped under foot, and men went sliding, but their comrades caught them and pulled them up.
“Stay out of sight unless they charge us!” Cort called.
All the men flattened themselves against the wall beside the arrow slits, watching the grassy courtyard below, waiting for the sound of the Hawks’ horses on the outside of the wall.
Finally it came, drumming closer and closer; then slowing to a walk, and a disgusted voice cried, “A fortress! And they’ve gone in!”
“Then we’ll have to go in after them,” a heavier voice growled. “Follow their track around! Ready your crossbows!”
Several of the Blue Company blanched—they only had one spear each, and two javelins across their backs. But Cort grinned with delight and hefted a rock half the size of his head, nodding to his men. The sergeants nodded and turned to the men, pantomiming javelin throwing. The soldiers took their short spears from their backs and lifted them.
The horses suddenly leaped into a gallop and burst into the courtyard below. Eighteen arms swung, filling the air with javelins. Even as they did, bowstrings twanged. The Blue Company threw themselves to the ground. One or two shouted oaths as crossbow bolts caught them in buttock or leg, whichever was too slow in falling. Then Cort leaped up, and the men who could, imitated him, their second javelins in their hands. They saw half a dozen Hawk horses with empty saddles, their riders writhing on the ground.
The crossbows would take too long to crank. The Hawk commander shouted “Charge!” and spurred his horse. His men pounded after him.
“The idiots!” Cort called, to hearten his men. “Charging stone walls! Wait for sure targets!” But as they came close, the horses suddenly swerved, galloping in zigzags, almost colliding but never quite, and always coming closer and closer to the walls.
“Choose your target and stay with him!” Cort bawled. The soldiers did as he told them, then threw their spears. Some struck home, and a few more Hawks fell from their saddles. Most missed their targets by scant inches. The Hawks shouted triumph and pulled up by the walls, climbing onto their saddles, then leaping for handholds and footholds to take them up to their quarry.
The Blue Company braced their spears and waited, thin-lipped. They were still outnumbered two to one.
Then more hooves thundered, and sixty horsemen rode into the ruined courtyard with a slender officer at their fore who cried, “Loose high!” in a clear tenor, and bowstrings thrummed. A storm of arrows rattled on the walls. A few ricocheted and struck Hawk men; others struck flakes that fell into their eyes. The Hawks let go with an oath and leaped down to the ground, turning with naked swords—to face sixty drawn bows, the archers crowding their horses forward around their officer.
“Leave this place at once!” the tenor cried. “Mount and ride back beyond the river, for everything between it and this ruin is part of the territory of Quilichen!”