Stand firm until darkness, thought Gel-Ethlin, that's the style. Why risk breaking ranks to attack? And then come away, leaving the rain to finish the job. As he watched the enemy, among the trees below, re-forming for a fresh attack under the command of a dark, bearded baron with a gold torque on one arm, he thought the idea over and could see nothing wrong with it: and if he could not, presumably his superiors in Bekla would not. He ought not to risk his half-army, cither by attacking unnecessarily or by keeping it out in these hills in the rains. His part should be that of a sound, steady commander; nothing flashy.
And yet – he paused. When they got back to Bekla, Santil-ke-Erketlis, that brilliant opportunist, would probably smile understandingly, sympathize with him for having been obliged to come away without destroying the enemy, and then point out how that destruction could and should have been effected. 'You a commander-in-chief, Gel-Ethlin?' Santil-ke-Erketlis had once said, good-humouredly enough, while they were returning together from a drinking-party. 'Man, you're like an old woman with the housekeeping money. "Oh, I wonder whether I might have beaten him down another meld – or perhaps if I'd gone to that other man round the corner -?" A fine army strikes Like the great cats, my lad -swiftly and once. It's like the wheelwright's work – there comes a moment when you have to say, "Now, hit it." A general who can't see that moment and seize it doesn't deserve victory.' Santil-ke-Erketlis, victor of a score of engagements, who had virtually dictated his own terms at the conclusion of the Slave Wars, could afford to be generous and warm-hearted. 'And how does one seize the moment?' Gel-Ethlin had asked rather tipsily, as they each seized something else and stood against the wall. 'By never stopping to think of all the things that can go wrong,' Santil-kc-Erketlis had replied.
Another attack came up the slope, this time straight towards his centre. The Tonildan contingent, a second-rate lot if ever there was one, were breaking ranks with a kind of nervous anticipation and advancing uncertainly downhill to meet it. Gel-Ethlin ran forward, shouting, 'Stand fast! Stand fast, the Tonilda!' At least no one could say that he had a thin word of command. His voice cut through the din like a hammer splitting a flint. The Tonilda fell back and re-formed line, the rain pouring off their shoulders. A few moments later the Ortelgan attack came rushing across the last few yards and struck like a ram against a wall. Weapons rang and men swayed back and forth, panting and gasping like swimmers struggling in rough water. There was a scream and a man stumbled out of the line clutching his stomach, pitched forward into the mud and lay jerking; resembling, in his unheeded plight, a broken fish cast up and dying on the shore. 'Stand fast, the Tonilda!' shouted Gel-Ethlin again. A red-headed, raw-boned Ortelgan fellow burst through a gap in the line and ran a few steps uncertainly, looking about him and waving his sword. An officer thrust at him, missed his body as he moved unexpectedly and wounded him in the forearm. The man spun round, yelling, and ran back through the gap.
Behind the line Gel-Ethlin, followed by his pennant-bearer, trumpeter and servant, ran to his left until he was beyond the point of attack. Then, pushing through the front rank of the Deelguy mercenaries, he turned and looked back at the fighting on his right The din obliterated every noise else – the rain, his own movements, the voices of those about him and all sounds from the wood below. The Ortelgans, who had evidently now learned – or found a leader with enough sense – to protect the flanks of their assault, had broken through the Tonildan line in a wedge about sixty yards broad. They were fighting, as they had all the evening, with a kind of besotted ferocity, prodigal of life. The trampled, muddy ground which they had won was littered with bodies. His own losses, too, were mounting fast – that was only too plain to be seen. He could recognize some of the men lying-on the ground, among them the son of one of Kapparah's tenants, a decent lad who last winter had acted as his go-between to the girl in Ikat. The attack had become a dangerous one, which would have to be halted and thrown back quickly before the enemy could reinforce it. He turned and made towards the nearest commander in the line – Kreet-Liss, that cryptic and reticent soldier, captain of the Deelguy mercenaries. Kreet-Liss, though anything but a coward, was always liable to turn awkward, an ally suddenly afflicted with difficulty in understanding plain Beklan whenever orders did not suit him. He listened as Gel-Ethlin, whom the noise obliged to shout almost into his ear, told him to withdraw his men, bring them across into the centre and counter-attack the Ortelgans.
'Yoss, yoss,' he shouted back finally. 'Bad owver ther, better trost oss, thot's it, eh?' The three or four black-ringleted young barons standing about him grinned at each other, slapped some of the rain out of their gaudy, bedraggled finery and went to get their men together. As the Deelguy fell back Gel-Ethlin found himself unable, in the failing light, to attract the attention of Shaltnekan, the commander adjacent to their left, whom he wanted to close up and fill the gap. He sent his servant across with the order and as he did so thought suddenly, 'Santil-ke-Erketlis would have sent the Deelguy out in front of the line, to attack the Ortelgans' rear and cut them off.' Yes, but suppose they had proved not strong enough for the job and the Ortelgans had simply cut them to pieces and got out? No, it would have been too much of a risk.
Young Shaltnekan and his men were approaching now, their heads bent against the rain driving into their faces. Gel-Ethlin went to meet them, flailing his arms across his chest, for he was wet through to the skin.
'Can't we break ranks and attack them, sir?' asked Shaltnekan, before his commander could speak. 'My lads are sick of standing on the defensive against that bunch of flea-bitten savages. One good push and they'll break up.'
'Certainly not,' answered Gel-Ethlin. 'How do you know what reserves they may have down in those woods? Our men were tired when they got here and once we break ranks they could be fan-game for anything. We've nothing to do but stand fast. We're blocking the only way down to the plain and once they realize they can't shift us they'll go to pieces.'
'Just as you say, sir,' answered Shaltnekan, 'but it goes against the grain to stand still, when we might be driving the bastards over the hills like goats.'
'Where's the bear?' shouted one of the men. It was evidently a newly-invented catch-phrase, for fifty voices took it up. "E isn't here!' "E's in despair!' continued the joker. "E wouldn't dare!' 'We'll comb 'is 'air!'
'They're still in good spirits, sir, you sec,' said Shaltnekan, 'but all the same, there's one or two good men have been cut up today by those river-frogs and the boys are going to take it very hard if they're not allowed to have a cut at them before it gets too dark.'
'And I say stand fast!' snapped Gel-Ethlin. 'Get back into line, that man!' he shouted to the buffoon who was playing the part of the bear. 'Dress the front rank – sword's length between each man and the next!' 'Stand and bloody shiver,' muttered a voice.