Bekka ran as hard as he could, gasping for breath. Then he flung himself behind a rise in the ground. Unegen, gulping air into his body, dropped to the ground beside him.
“We failed.” Bekka uttered the bitter words.
“At least we’re alive,” Unegen said.
“Yes, at least we’re alive,” Bekka answered. “For now.”
From the northern end of the warrior advance, Thutmose-sin watched the attack. For some reason, Bekka had started his assault early. The center force had also pushed its way forward and into the stream and launched their attack, and now the far side of the water roiled as men charged up the bank and flung themselves at the hated dirt eaters. He couldn’t see much, but the noise of the conflict had risen, the echoes bouncing off the cliffs and hills and adding to the din.
“We must attack now!” Bar’rack had moved to Thutmose-sin’s side. “The warriors have not broken the line.”
“It’s almost time. Get back to your men,” he hissed. “Await my signal.”
Thutmose-sin lifted himself from the ground, to get a better look at the fighting. The splashes in the stream had almost ceased, so he knew all of Bekka’s warriors had crossed the water. He glimpsed Akkadians moving behind their line. If the dirt eaters had shifted their fighters, it was indeed time to attack.
“Bar’rack! Warriors! Attack! Attack!”
He rose to his feet and raced toward the stream, voicing the age old battle cry of the Alur Meriki, the undulating wail that had never failed to strike terror into the hearts of their enemies.
Up on the cliff face that overlooked the northern end of the stream, over twenty slingers clung to the steep sides, crouching in crevices or kneeling on tiny ledges scarcely wide enough for a foot hold. Luka, a leader of twenty, commanded these men. When the attack began at the far end of the stream, they’d moved from their hiding places into more open positions, finding their footing and seeking advantageous outcroppings where they could use their slings. They were more exposed, but they could fight more efficiently.
Even before the attack, Luka had seen the ground, nearly thirty paces below, slowly shift. Looking down, he glimpsed movement everywhere, and what looked like a mass of shadows writhing across the rocky ground directly beneath him. It took a moment before he realized that a large number of Alur Meriki were creeping toward the stream.
When the attack began, he’d expected the barbarians below him to rise up and join their companions. However these warriors held back, either waiting for orders or for some other unknown reason. Whatever held them back, Luka stayed his own hand. He wanted clear targets for his precious bronze bullets, and didn’t want to waste a single one on what might be a shadow.
A voice from the shadows below shouted something in the barbarian tongue. Instantly the ground came alive, as a mass of men rose up and raced toward the stream. For a moment, Luka stared open-mouthed at the warriors, surprised at their numbers. How could so many men have gotten so close to the stream? He had paid too much attention to the attacks on the rest of the line.
“Now! Throw!” Luka’s words launched the first wave of stones. He spun his own weapon, hurling a bronze bullet into the moving mass of men below him. Before the sling had completed its revolution, he had a second missile in position. His left hand caught the still moving leather pouch, and the loose cord whipped up as he seated the stone. Another savage snap of his wrist and shoulder sent the second heavy pellet toward the barbarians below.
His few men could not hope to stem the flow, but by now arrows from the Akkadian ranks at the base of the cliff began shooting as well. The barbarians loosed their own shafts as they charged. Screams and curses floated up into the air from both sides of the attack. Luka ignored them all as he worked his sling.
Despite the battle rage, years of training kept the stones flying from his weapon. He soon realized the warriors below showed no interest in the handful of slingers atop the cliff, so Luka and his men stood upright and hurled their missiles with even greater force at the barbarians now splashing across the stream, shouting their unnerving war cries.
From his place behind the archers, Eskkar heard the barbarian war cries, and saw the mass of Alur Meriki warriors charging toward the stream. He’d already dispatched some of the northernmost men to help out in the center and southern part of the defense line, and there was no time to get them back. Eskkar drew his sword as the first wave of barbarian warriors burst into the water, their churning feet sending splashes high into the air, almost as if asking the water to conceal their movements.
At least he had no need to bellow orders. The archers and cavalry men loosed their arrows as fast as they could. Many launched ten or more arrows before the first wave of the enemy charged up from the stream and hurled themselves at the Akkadians.
But the barbarians found more than archers waiting for them. Akkadian spearmen stood there. They had not formed the solid ranks they preferred. Eskkar hadn’t brought enough of them for that. But every fourth man in that part of the line carried a shield and a spear, and the sharp tips of their weapons glistened in the moonlight.
None of the spearmen waited for the Alur Meriki to reach them. Nearly every spearman impaled a warrior with his first thrust, stepping forward with a long stride and using their bodies and extending their arms to ram home the long weapon, often brushing aside an enemy sword or lance.
Some of Eskkar’s spearmen lost the use of their weapon with that first kill, as dying men and clinging flesh clamped themselves on the weapons. But the Akkadians, trained for that occurrence, too, and drew swords from their scabbards even as they took a step back and raised their shields up to their eyes.
With their shoulders lowered behind the shield, the spearmen stood firm, hacking and jabbing at their enemy. Unlike the Alur Meriki warriors, who preferred to swing their swords overhead and in a downward arc, Gatus had trained the Akkadians to hold their swords low and thrust up, taking a step forward at the same time, and aiming for belly wounds.
When the barbarians swung their swords, the spearmen took a step back, then moved forward and lunged again. That gave the spearmen another advantage, as they could execute two or more thrusting attacks for every overhead swing of the enemy warriors.
Meanwhile, behind and between the Akkadian ranks, arrows shot at eye level, both from the longbows and the shorter cavalry weapons, wreaked deadly damage on the charging attackers.
Eskkar glanced up and down the line. He glimpsed Hathor, his supply of lances expended, wading into the line, sword in hand. Mitrac had started with three quivers of arrows, and he still loosed his shafts, their powerful sting searching out the most ferocious barbarians, and probably killing a man with each arrow.
Despite the Akkadians’ efforts, the northern portion of their line weakened under the ferocious onslaught, but Shappa arrived, returning from the southern end of the battle line. He brought fifty or so slingers with him. He’d collected Markesh’s men after they regrouped back on the Akkadian side of the stream, and now led them at a run to the northern end of the line. Unable to use their preferred weapons against such a crowded mass, the slingers carried their long knives in hand.
Wherever the line of defenders appeared weak, Shappa shoved his men forward to reinforce those points. Young and fearless, they relied on their quickness and agility to avoid their stronger and larger opponents. While his men lacked the size and weight to battle a warrior face to face, they could slip in, strike low, duck under any enemy thrust, and dart back as they’d trained, taking a man down with a thrust to the thigh, stomach, or groin.