Root & Branch

The personal diary of Darig, son of Lorraine, part 20

When we arrive near Ygg the rangers are already in place and aerial scouts from the forward camp have signalled to them. We are about 9 miles from Ygg, after a brief hiatus, some troops seeming disorientated, we march.

At Ygg we start to establish a perimeter, the engineers we sent in advance had already assessed the ground to take what little advantage we can from the terrain, though too many commanders underestimate the importance of knowing where the latrines drain to! Just as this is done, William’s command appears, marching out of the breaking dawn.

I listen to the reports, the Serpent men are not far away, the city Yanyoga is about 12 hours march towards Chaos. Bleys arrives and starts giving orders, he is a fine cavalry commander but is not thinking of the overall layout of the camp, if he put his troops where he plans, he will break the perimeter and, whilst I am not looking for a battle defending the camp, giving up even a minor advantage of terrain is foolish. I exchange glances with William and go to explain to Bleys, technically still my superior, that he needs to establish his part of the camp a mere 200 yards nearer to Ygg. He seems inclined to refuse until Fiona, emerging from her tent, advises him to go with the flow.

As Bleys is amending his orders, a large eagle glides into camp, its head turning into that of a human. William introduces him as Alitta, Dirk’s demon. The report is that there are lizard troops forming up between here and their city; there are pteranodons flying above to give them air cover. Knowing this, we redeploy the archers slightly and plant spare spears and lances as glider-poles, not enough of the whole camp is covered but it will prevent them landing directly on the frontline or the command tents. For now, we position the Dragoons as a response force, but Caine is due very soon with the Marines and a lot of archers.

Reports have already come in that Deirdre and her troops have arrived in the area. I despatch Rhodri to warn Deirdre that air attack is possible, then go to Bleys and suggest that he takes a large cavalry force to respond and ensure the safety of Caine’s, Corwin’s and Ben’s troops as they arrive. He leaps at the chance, his sort of action. He has a formidable force of hussars, guards, Sapphire troops and Spahis.

William is meanwhile finding any air scouts that we can send up ourselves, there are some among the Chaos troops, especially if there are vampires who can fly. The units coming in now seem to be a bit more scattered so the air scouts can guide any strays in and advise Bleys if necessary.

Deirdre arrives with her troops having seen nothing of the enemy, Caine’s troops escorted in by Bleys but there had only been a minor skirmish with enemy scouts, more it seems because the Amber troops materialised nearly on top of them. Bleys rides out again, Corwin arrives, again no trouble, and finally Benedict, accompanied by King Melvyn and a selection of Rimlords.

More reports in: the Lizards’ main army are forming up some twenty-five miles away, not attacking but being re-enforced as ever more troops march out of the city. They are sensibly sitting beneath their air cover until the army can amass its full strength. On a sad note I hear that, of the injured, one of the Centaurs and two Satyrs could not be saved and have had to die, incurable after getting poisoned wounds.

The Chaos lords are forming to leave, I take the chance to have a word with Melvyn. He had not heard of the death of Kalavryta and asks if I will seek to deal with this through his Legal Attaché, the ambassador’s aide.

The camp is ready to receive the influx of new troops, lines have been pegged to show the units where they are to camp, where possible tents are already up, and hot food is waiting. No one thinks to dispute this now and Ben looks, pauses and gives a grunt of approval. All the Divisional Commanders, along with Fiona and Llewella, are summoned to a Council of War.

The original plan has gone, though we can use Pattern Fiona cannot access it in such a way as to transport the army. Scrying has revealed that much of Amber has fallen into the sea. Llewella can travel through mirrors, but they need to be of exceptional quality and size, so to make them is difficult, which really means we need to find somewhere that has one.

We are not going to be able to move the army out for several days. We are already digging in and making the perimeter as secure as we can. Most of the trees have been cleared here but the local scrub is quite thorny so there is at least an abatis around the whole camp.

Our aerial scouts report that the enemy outnumber us slightly, but their numbers continue to grow. We could do with more information about what is inside the city, any guess as to its population is based on a human city of similar size but the Lizards might like open space or have dwellings deep underground, anything more we can learn will be invaluable. Deirdre reports that Sorashi can mount some form of a spirit recon.

Once the council is over, I go and visit the engineers and Elektra. The engineers are now in their element and seem happy despite working flat out. They are supervising the building of defences and the necessary functions of the camp. The boxes of ballista parts we have carried so far are being assembled, as far as we can with the timber available, and will add another layer of defence against the Pteranodons, especially if the camp is attacked whilst most troop are committed to the battle.

I talk to Sorashi, she can send out a spirit scout. His name is Ganges, he lives in a rum bottle, and he can be bribed into scouting with rum and brown sugar, the former is still fairly plentiful in the army, the latter was thought to be unobtainable until Flora sacrificed half her personal supply.

Ben has said that he wants a whole night’s sleep before the battle. William and I will share the watch, at least getting a few hours when we can. Alitta is going out scouting, in owl form this time.

When she reports back it is to say, the enemy are still pouring out of their city, none seem to have bows, nor, though harder to be sure, slings. They have numerous javelins and seem to have many shamans of some kind. William and I look at the sketch map of the city she makes and the plans of enemy deployment. This is no preparation of the scared, they would be safer behind their walls; this is preparation for a full-scale battle. I leave William to walk the lines and get my head down.

In the small hours William wakes me, he has brought me a large mug of coffee, now that is civilised! My watch is quiet until the very moment of dawn. Screams are coming from Llewella’s tent. William has just awoken so I send him to find out what is happening, the guards are already alert for any dawn attack, I hold the night shift, doubling the numbers until William comes back. Apparently the Nidhogg is coming, the soulless lizards are linking to the Great Serpent through the tree, which fits with previous reports.

Fiona suggests that we counter this threat and asks for the map that we drew from Alitta’s description, and, as soon as she has eaten, she will need energy, she will start a scrying spell. A team will be needed to fly into the city, we think that William’s sword would be more suitable that my spear, anyway the message has already come that Benedict wants me to take the vanguard.

Our air scouts are already up, and Rachael comes in to warn us that there is and air attack coming in. Most of our flyers are not equal to this fight and are far too valuable to lose, their orders are to stay safe. Our archers take their posts and as the Pteranodons fly in it is in to longer range missile fire than they were expecting. Their leader pursues Alitta over the archers and, whilst staying above javelin range, is shot with countless arrows and crashes down just beyond the camp. High above, Surpanakha shreds another of them with remarkable ease. After that the Pteranodons fly far higher and stay back from the camp. The ballistae can put a fifty-arrow bundle into the air but are actually unlikely to hit but have an obvious fear effect. Lacking wood, only two of the ballistae are working, but we hope the enemy don’t notice that.

Benedict orders us to form up outside the camp, the vanguard is ready. The Jasper Yeomanry are remaining to defend the camp. The enemy are advancing, and Fiona estimate the raid behind enemy lines has only about five hours to stop the serpent rising.

We march about ten miles, arriving at Benedict’s chosen battlefield just in time to deploy in the face of the enemy, they outnumber us but, in this location, cannot easily flank us as we have a stand of remaining woodland on our left and a steep scree to our right. Initial fierce skirmishes are mostly on the left flank, for some reason the Lizardmen seem wary of the Rangers, but their attacks on Caine’s marines cost them heavily.

Their centre has formed, if they cannot go around, they are planning to go through, they are big bastards, some of the officers in the heavy troops stand above eight foot tall. Thousands of them, packed shoulder to shoulder, big shields in the front and pike behind. The shields have skins of the neanderthals stretched across them. The formation is an interesting cross of phalanx and boar snout, or perhaps a variant of the tercio, whichever, given their size and armour this will sting. A few shamans crouch three ranks back. Caine has already message that some of his marines have been struck blind.

Behind the enemy there seem to be beams of light forming, somehow unclean, almost viscous. Light should pierce the clouds, not drag them sullenly along. These are moving slowly forwards, some sort of a spell; I hope we can counter this as their centre is starting to advance.

Then the lights vanish, some of their shamans fall, screaming and writhing; their scouts start to flee. Even the heavy troop opposite seem to huddle together rather than pressed forward in formation. Their advance falters, some of the shields are dropped, other units are starting to break, and the javelin men from each flank of the wedge are getting away as fast as their legs will carry them.

Our infantry hold fast, horns sound, our cavalry sweep forwards. I cannot believe this flight is feigned but we must take this chance. At the advance of our cavalry the enemy break utterly, their formation shatters and they run! A few of the big guys stand to fight but only because the crush behind them is so great they cannot run. Then it is a chase, a slaughter, I have the halt sounded as we reach the end of the battlefield.

Our casualties number only in the dozens, a handful of marines, mostly due to the unpleasant poison on the javelins, the blinding seems to be temporary but one poor ranger has been shrivelled like a dried fruit. Several men and more horses are suffering snakebites there seem to be snakes everywhere at first, their fangs fortunately do not usually pierce a military boot.