Beyond the Shadows - Brent Weeks [236]
At length, the few remaining defenders were driven back to bunch in front of the entrance. Stryke led the onslaught against them, shoulder to shoulder with Coilla, Haskeer and Jup.
Yanking his blade free of the final protector’s innards, Stryke spun and gazed around the compound. He saw what he needed at the corral’s fence. “Haskeer! Get one of those beams for a ram!”
The sergeant hurried away, barking orders. Seven or eight troopers peeled off to run after him, tugging hatchets from their belts.
Stryke beckoned a footsoldier. The private took two steps and collapsed, a slender shaft projecting from his throat.
“Archers!” Jup yelled, waving his blade at the building’s upper storey.
The band dispersed as a hail of arrows peppered them from an open window above. One Wolverine went down, felled by a shot to the head. Another was hit in the shoulder and pulled to cover by his comrades.
Coilla and Stryke, nearest the house, ran forward to take shelter under the building’s overhang, pressing themselves to the wall on either side of the door.
“How many bowmen have we?” she asked.
“We just lost one, so three.”
He looked across the farmyard. Haskeer’s crew seemed to be taking the brunt of the archers’ fire. As arrows whistled around them, troopers gamely hacked at the uprights supporting one of the livestock pen’s immense timbers.
Jup and most of the others sprawled on the ground nearby. Braving the volleys, Corporal Alfray knelt as he improvised a binding for the trooper’s pierced shoulder. Stryke was about to call over when he saw the three archers were stringing their short bows.
Lying full-length was a less than ideal firing position. They had to turn the bows sideways and aim upwards while lifting their chests. Yet they quickly began unleashing shafts in a steady stream.
From their uncertain sanctuary Stryke and Coilla were powerless to do anything except watch as arrows winged up to the floor above and others came down in exchange. After a minute or two a ragged cheer broke out from the warband, obviously in response to a hit. But the two-way flow of bolts continued, confirming that at least one more archer was in the building.
“Why not tip the shafts with fire?” Coilla suggested.
“Don’t want the place to burn till we get what we’re after.”
A weighty crash came from the corral. Haskeer’s unit had freed the beam. Troopers set to lifting it, still wary of enemy fire, though it was now less frequent.
Another triumphant roar from the pinned-down grunts was followed by a commotion upstairs. An archer fell, smacking to the ground in front of Stryke and Coilla. The arrow jutting from its chest was snapped in half by the impact.
At the livestock pen, Jup was on his feet, signalling that the upper storey was clear.
Haskeer’s crew ran over with the beam, muscles taut and faces strained with the effort of shifting its mass. All hands to the improvised ram, the warband began pounding the reinforced door, splintering shards of wood. After a dozen blows it gave with a loud report and exploded inwards.
A trio of defenders were waiting for them. One leapt forward, killing the lead rammer with a single stroke. Stryke felled the creature, clambered over the discarded timber and laid into the next. A brief, frenzied trading of blows pitched it lifeless to the floor. But the distraction left Stryke open to the third defender. It closed in, its blade pulling up and back, ready to deliver a decapitating swipe.
A throwing knife thudded hard into its chest. It gave a throaty rasp, dropped the sword and fell headlong.
Stryke’s grunt was all Coilla could expect in the way of thanks.
She retrieved the knife from her victim and drew another to fill her empty hand, preferring a blade in both