The Sapphire Rose

‘When do those mangonels come into play?’

‘Probably when several of the towers are firmly in place against the walls.’

‘Won’t they be dropping boulders on their own men?’

‘The men in the towers aren’t very important. A lot of them are Rendors – like the ones out there who got killed clearing away the obstructions. The man who’s in charge of that army isn’t exactly what you’d call a humanitarian.’

‘Do you know him?’

‘Oh, yes. Very well.’

‘And you want to kill him, don’t you?’ Delada asked shrewdly.

‘The thought’s crossed my mind a few times.’

One of the towers was now quite close to the wall, and the defenders, trying to dodge the hail of arrows and crossbow bolts, threw grappling hooks on long ropes over the roof of the lumbering structure. Then they began to pull on the ropes. The tower swayed, rocked back and forth and finally toppled with a resounding crash. The men inside began to scream, some in pain and some in terror. They knew what came next. The fall of the tower had broken the planks, and the tower lay open like a shattered egg. The cauldrons of pitch and naphtha poured down upon the wreckage and the struggling men, and the torches set the boiling liquid on fire.

Delada swallowed hard as the despairing screams of the burning men came shockingly up from the base of the wall. ‘Does that happen very often?’ he asked in a sick voice.

‘We hope so,’ Sparhawk said bleakly. ‘Every one of them we kill outside the walls is one less who gets inside.’ Sparhawk wove a quick spell and spoke to Sephrenia, who was waiting inside the chapterhouse. ‘We’re just about ready to engage out here, little mother,’ he reported. ‘Any hints of Martel yet?’

‘Nothing, dear one.’ Her voice seemed almost to whisper in his ear. ‘Be very careful, Sparhawk. Aphrael will be very cross with you if you allow yourself to be killed.’

‘Tell her she’s welcome to lend a hand, if she’d like.’

‘Sparhawk!’ The tone was half-shocked and half-amused.

‘To whom were you speaking, Sir Sparhawk?’ Delada’s voice was baffled, and he was looking around to see if anyone were near them.

‘You’re relatively devout, aren’t you, Colonel?’ Sparhawk asked him.

‘I’m a son of the Church, Sparhawk.’

‘It might upset you if I told you, then. The militant orders have permission to go beyond what’s allowed to ordinary members of the Elene faith. Why don’t we just let it go at that.’

Despite the best efforts of the defenders, several towers reached the wall, and the drawbridges at their tops swung down onto the battlements. One of the towers touched the wall just beside the gate, and Sparhawk’s friends were ready for it. Tynian led their charge as they dashed across the drawbridge and into the tower itself. Sparhawk held his breath as his friends struggled inside the tower out of his sight. The sounds from within bespoke the ferocity of the fight. There was the crash of arms and screams and groans. Then Tynian and Kalten came back out, ran across the thick-planked drawbridge and seized a large bubbling cauldron of boiling pitch and naphtha in their steel-clad arms. They lurched back across the drawbridge with it and disappeared inside again. The screams from within suddenly intensified as they dumped the pitch down into the faces of the men on ladders inside the tower.

The knights emerged from the tower. When Kalten reached the wall, he took up a torch and flipped it into the structure with a negligent-appearing toss. The tower acted much like a chimney. Black smoke billowed from the gaping doorway the drawbridge had covered, and then dark orange flame boiled out through the roof. The screaming inside the tower increased, and then it died out.

The counter-attacks of the knights along the walls were sufficient to ward off the first wave of attackers, but the defence of the battlements had cost many lives. The sheets of arrows and the heavier bolts from the crossbows had raked the tops of the walls in a virtual storm, and many of the church soldiers and not a few of the knights had fallen prey to them.

‘They’ll come again?’ Delada asked sombrely.

‘Of course,’ Sparhawk said shortly. ‘The siege engines will pound the walls for a time now, and then more towers will come across that open area.’

‘How long can we hold out?’

‘Four – maybe five of those attacks. Then the mangonels will start to break down the walls. The fighting will start inside the city at that point.’

‘We can’t possibly win, can we, Sparhawk?’

‘Probably not.’

‘Chyrellos is doomed then?’

‘Chyrellos was doomed the moment those two armies appeared, Delada. The strategy behind the attack on the city was very thorough – you might almost say brilliant.’

“That’s a peculiar attitude under these circumstances, Sparhawk.’

‘It’s called professionalism. One’s supposed to admire the genius of one’s opponent. It’s a pose, of course, but it helps to build a certain abstraction. Last stands are very gloomy, and you need something to keep your spirits up.’

Then Berit clambered up through the trap-door on the roof upon which Sparhawk and Delada stood. The novice’s eyes were wide, seemingly slightly unfocused, and his head was jerking. ‘Sir Sparhawk!’ he exclaimed, his voice unnecessarily loud.

‘Yes, Berit?’

‘What did you say?’

Sparhawk looked at him more closely. ‘What’s the matter, Berit?’ he asked.

‘I’m sorry, Sir Sparhawk. I can’t hear you. They rang the bells in the Basilica when the attack started. All the bells are up in the cupola on top of the dome. You never heard so much noise.’ Berit reached up and thumped the heel of his hand against the side of his head.

Sparhawk took him by the shoulders and looked directly into his face. ‘What’s happening?’ he bellowed, exaggeratedly mouthing the words.

‘Oh, I’m sorry, Sir Sparhawk. The bells sort of rattled me. There are thousands of torches coming across the meadows on the other side of the River Arruk. I thought you ought to know.’

‘Reinforcements?’ Delada said hopefully.

‘I’m sure they are,’ Sparhawk replied, ‘but for which army?’

There was a heavy, booming crash behind them, and a fair-sized house collapsed in on itself as a huge boulder caved in its roof.

‘God!’ Delada exclaimed. ‘That boulder was enormous! These walls will never withstand that kind of pounding.’