Then suddenly, some of the pressure against his shield abated. To his surprise, the Elamites slowed their advance. Nevertheless, the outcome remained uncertain. Eskkar saw the enemy soldiers glancing to their right, toward the boulders. Through the din, he heard a new sound — the young and higher pitched voices of Shappa’s men. From the heights of the cliff on the Akkadian left flank, slingers and bowmen were hurling their stones or loosing their shafts into the crowded group beneath them.
Eskkar fought on, until those opposing him took a few steps back. Then a group of Muta’s fresh reserves surged into the front rank, interposing themselves between the enemy and their King. Their courage and ferocity allowed Eskkar to disengage from the battle line and assess the situation.
Holding his shield to his eyes, he scanned the field of battle from side to side. The left cliff wall and boulders seemed alive with slingers, all of them screaming and launching their missiles into the mass of Elamites below.
Breathing hard, it took a moment before Eskkar grasped the situation. The slingers must have driven back the Elamite soldiers attempting to force their way through the boulders, and now they had turned their weapons against those enemy soldiers assaulting Eskkar’s left flank. He saw that the Elamite attack on his left had faltered, and the enemy was moving backward, unused to this type of assault from above.
That meant the center needed to stand firm no matter what. “Hold the line!” Eskkar shouted. “Hold the center!”
He glanced to his right, where the battle line had also sagged rearward. The enemy had drawn even with the fighting platform, leaving it almost exposed. But Drakis, commanding on the right side, now hurled his reserves into the line. Muta, too, surged the rest of his archers forward into the center and the right flank. Another blast of arrows, launched directly into the screaming faces of the enemy, halted the surge and drove them back.
In those few moments, the Akkadian spearmen in the center regrouped their line into its normal deadly formation. Some had snatched up fresh spears, and now they rushed forward, thrusting with their weapons and using their shields, driving back the Elamites on the Akkadian left flank.
Alexar had also managed to regroup his spearmen. Despite the heat of battle, he ordered a counterattack, and his men surged forward against the retreating Elamites. But Alexar quickly saw a better opportunity and halted his men’s advance. Instead he bellowed the order that turned them toward the still desperate struggle in the center. With a deep roar, two ranks of Akkadian infantry struck the center of the Elamites.
Eskkar quickly took in the change in tactics. He glanced to his right, and saw Drakis shouting and pushing his men back into position. The right flank was going to hold. Only the danger to the center still threatened to break the line. Eskkar raised his sword. “To me!” His words boomed over his men. Calling out the names of his guards, he moved back into the line, strengthening the center.
Again Eskkar found himself in the forefront, with men attacking him from three sides. But an arrow from Mitrac’s great war bow penetrated one man’s eye, snapping the man’s head back. Eskkar blocked one thrust with his shield and another with his sword. Then a Hawk Clan guard thrust a long spear into the belly of the Elamite on Eskkar’s right. Whirling his heavy blade around, Eskkar struck the forearm of the man pinned against his shield, sending the enemy soldier to his knees with a nearly severed arm.
A small volley of arrows from Mitrac’s archers helped to halt the Elamites, already reeling from Alexar’s charge. The enemy began to give ground, moving backward. Those who still had shields ducked behind them, while others just retreated as quickly as they could.
Those few arrows were more than the Elamites could bear. They had fought bravely enough. But with most of their shields gone, they didn’t have the discipline to smash through the bristling wall of Akkadian spears. Nor did they have sufficient archers to disrupt their enemies.
The now ragged advance stopped, and no amount of orders could drive the Elamites forward again. Too many of their fighters had ducked behind their own men. They knew it was certain death to stay in the front ranks.
In twos and threes, they turned and slipped back through the mass of men who still had not engaged the Akkadians. However small that first retreat, it quickly spread through the remaining ranks of the Elamites. The entire forward movement collapsed, as more and more of the leading elements abandoned the attack and fled, their panic spreading to those behind them.
Now Mitrac’s archers, snatching up their bows once again, finished the ruin of the assault. They targeted anyone who held his ground. Individual Elamite commanders and subcommanders, many still urging their men to resume the fight, died under the onslaught of arrows, some men struck by four and five shafts.
Once started, no effort by the enemy leaders, those few who survived, could hold them back. All the Elamites began to retreat, desperate to get away from the deadly spears, not to mention the never-ending arrows and stones that seemed to find every gap in their shields or armor.
The enemy, unwilling to face Akkad’s reforming shield wall, kept moving backward. Another wave of arrows struck at them, and turned the retreat into a rout. The Elamites broke, lost what little discipline remained, and ran for the rear, ignoring the exhortations of their commanders.
The ground, covered with Elamite dead and wounded, hindered their retreat as much as it had held up their advance. Arrows struck unprotected backs, knocking many of the fleeing men to their knees. The slaughter continued until the Akkadian arrows could no longer reach the disorganized Elamites.
The second Elamite attack had failed.
All the same, the arrow storm that followed the Elamites back down the slope was far less than it had been at the beginning of the attack. Many of the Akkadian archers had dropped their bows to draw swords. Other bowmen had been killed, and some were just too exhausted to fight. Before a man could count to thirty, the Elamites were scrambling out of range.
Eskkar watched the enemy soldiers, once down the slope and out of range, slump to the earth in exhaustion, despair visible in their movements even at that distance. He realized his own arm was shaking, and looked down to find a line of blood dripping from his shoulder. Something, an arrow or a sword, had nicked the upper part of his right arm.
“Bring a bandage for the King,” Chandra called out.
Eskkar glanced at his bodyguard, and saw Chandra swaying on his feet, a bloody gash on his left arm. “Where’s Pekka?”
Chandra shook his head. “He went down with an arrow in his mouth.”
Eskkar grimaced, too tired even to swear at Pekka’s demise. A good man who had served his Lord faithfully for many years.
Hamati, one of the lead bowmen, moved to Eskkar’s side. “Let me clean your sword, My Lord.”
Numbly, Eskkar let Hamati take the weapon from his grasp. Someone handed him a water skin, and Eskkar drank deeply, then splashed water on his face. By then he’d caught his breath.
Alexar and Drakis moved up and down the ranks, steadying their men, and shouting out words of praise for the bravest. Their subcommanders ordered their men, in groups of ten and twenty, back behind the lines to refresh themselves from the water skins.
That water, carried by brute strength up into the Pass from the spring thirty miles distant, now proved its value. The thirsty Akkadians gulped down as much as they could hold, then returned to their positions, permitting another detachment to follow their example.