The Regent's opening attack had failed. The first soldiers had retreated down the slope to seek cover and await a proper massing of their forces, leaving scores of bodies on the grass and rocks. Sasha rode along the first line of deployed Ilduuri archers, and listened to the yells of massing soldiery halfway down the slope below.
“They're mustering archers!” one Ilduuri sergeant called up to her as she rode past.
“They'll be firing uphill!” Sasha yelled so most could hear her. “You'll be firing downhill! They'll have to get so close to hurt you, you could spit on them!”
Men laughed. It was not humour, but confidence and spirit. Her Ilduuris looked confident, archers now wielding shorter Ilduuri bows, and some with huge serrin ones they'd traded for. Ilduuris typically fought light, but here some had figured a larger bow would be worth the trade in weight and awkwardness.
Further ahead, away from the valley mouth, a steep shoulder of hillside was being massed with soldiers. Had they not artillery primed on that site, it would have been alarming. An artillery captain followed her, with a trumpeter to his side, awaiting her order. Andreyis and Yasmyn followed after-she'd already sent Daish racing back to Kessligh to tell him what unfolded. Now she summoned Andreyis to her side.
“Andrey, go to Damon. Tell him that Balthaar is spread thin all along the river. Their artillery is not here yet. Our one chance to do him massive damage here is for the Army of Lenayin to charge, and split him in half. Tell him that I can see all the Regent's ranks from up here, and I think the Army of Lenayin can actually reach the river, and divide a force ten times their size. Tell him to go immediately, before they acquire more depth. I do not expect we shall have any spare artillery to help him, but if we do, we shall. Got that?”
“I've got it.”
Sasha was almost surprised at his calm confidence. But truly, it was more pleasure than surprise. And pride as well. “We can do this, Andrey. The Army of Lenayin can do it, tell him that.”
“I'll believe it if you say so,” he replied. “Prince Damon will too.” He turned and urged his horse to a gallop, back through waiting ranks of Ilduuri, fast along the ridgeline.
Sasha considered the hillside once more. The ground in the middle was rocky and steep, with little chance of advance there. The attacking forces were mustered primarily to the far left, where a broad shoulder of tree-covered land made a natural path across the face of the slope, and here directly above Hama town, where a riding trail climbed a manageable ascent. If she lost either side, she would rather it be the left, as the trail back along the ridgeline behind, overlooking the Dhemerhill Valley, came directly above the town, and could be cut off. But better if she lost neither.
Then, with a crescendo of yells, they were coming again. Thousands of men erupted from cover and scrambled uphill.
“Second rank!” Sasha yelled, and a new line of Ilduuri archers rushed forward to join the first rank already in position. The first rank kneeled, and moved a little down the slope so that the second could stand above them, and aim down. Suddenly the men below were faced with twice as many archers as they'd thought there were. “Artillery, all fire!”
The artillery captain sounded a rapid tune on his trumpet. A moment later, the air was filled with whistling ballista fire. Heavy bolts arced high into the air, then fell at a steeper angle-ballistas were firing crosswise over the slope, to accommodate that sudden drop in trajectory that would otherwise make targeting the far side of a blind slope impossible. Given that all of the artillery was behind them, upon the ridge overlooking the Dhemerhill Valley, it meant that here upon the right flank, there could be no close support from artillery fire without the risk of dropping some short on friendly heads.
“Fire!” yelled the archery captain, and now the air filled with arrows. Men coming up the slope tried to hide behind shields that were quickly feathered, but others fell in tens and dozens, the lighter armour that had made them suitable for climbing having little chance against the downward velocity of Ilduuri arrows, and less still against serrin bows.
Men with bigger shields formed protective clusters and kept coming, some bravely holding place despite arrows through exposed legs. Other men formed up behind those, and climbed higher behind that line of protection. Upon the left flank, Sasha could see huge numbers advancing well, thrusting up toward the Ilduuri line. Only now, the real artillery arrived.
Burning hellfire hit squarely in the midst of those advancing on the left, and Sasha shielded her eyes against the horror. When the glare faded, hundreds of men were burning and shrieking, entire sections of hill ablaze, whole trees flaming like torches. A great many attackers were too close to the Ildu-uris to be safely targeted, but they were now alone, as those advancing behind abruptly died, and those behind them recoiled in horror.
Ilduuri archers on the left flank fell back, and the first wave of attackers crested the hill with a mixture of triumph and sheer relief to be clear of the hellfire…and ran headlong into the line of Ilduuri Steel infantry that they had not yet seen in their advance up the hill. Ilduuri fell upon them in a wall, and in a short flurry of blows with sword and shield, the first attacking wave were falling back down the hillside, leaving many dead on the ground behind.
Another wave of hellfire landed, this time further down the slope, turning more men and trees to flame. Before Sasha's own position, here on the right flank above Hama, there was no hellfire, as there was no suitable flat ground over to the left upon which catapults could rest.
The catapults could shoot further, however, and now did, dropping hellfire onto Hama down below, and beyond it. A house exploded in flame, then a field to the left of the town. Then the central square took a hit, and columns of men still advancing through it, or sheltering behind its walls from ballista fire, took to running. It was sad to destroy a pretty town the Ilduuris would much rather have saved. But there would be far sadder things to see before this fight was done.
With bigger shields to the fore, and no hellfire to decimate them, enough attackers coming up the slope were surviving to press home the advance. Arrows began soaring up from below as archers finally got close enough to put fire onto Ilduuri positions.
“Archers back!” Sasha yelled. “Shield line, front rank, forward!”
She wheeled her horse through a gap as they came past her, and the archers faded back from the edge. With a roar, hundreds of attackers began cresting the ridge, followed by thousands more, across a stretch of hillside several hundred paces wide. As on the left, they came headlong onto Ilduuri shields and swords, and so the new form of dying began.
“She wants us to charge?” Damon stared at the messenger-Andreyis, he recalled the young man's name, Sasha's friend from Baerlyn.
“They are spread across the valley mouth but thin,” Andreyis repeated urgently. “The river is at their backs, and their artillery is not yet present.”
“It is perfect,” Markan agreed. His cheek bore a nasty cut where Sasha's stanch had sliced him, but the swelling was now gone sufficiently that he could wear a helm. “They do not expect it, and their position is weak. The Synnich-ahn's judgement is sound.”
It was too predictable coming from Markan, and Damon did not trust it. From this far up the valley, the Army of Lenayin could barely see the valley mouth or the forces that gathered there, but they could hear them. It was the sound that an awful lot of soldiers made when they moved and shouted orders all at once. A distant roar, like a singular mass. Attacking one hundred thousand men with fourteen thousand was crazy.
And yet, as a tactic, Damon could not fault it. Dangerous tactics were only wrong when there were better options available. Sitting back and waiting for the Regent to get organised was far worse, particularly if his artillery made the journey up the valley with him. The Steel was an army built for defence, but the Army of Lenayin was not. It was best on the move, and preferably on the attack, where momentum could shatter an opponent's formation and create the fighting space within which individual Lenay warriors excelled. Attacking was desperate, but then, the situation was desperate.