whole units came. Civilians came, men who had no part in the battle at Tambluff but had heard about Sinking Canyons and wanted to play a role. Some came believing Steren was king. Others came believing Aidan would be king, believing they were among the first recruits of the Wilderking’s army. Indeed, many of these stragglers suspected the Sinking Canyons army would be mostly feechies.
With every new group that came, Aidan studied the faces, hoping Steren was among them. And at last, the fourth morning after the Tambluff battle, Steren rode up at the head of a cavalry unit, a dashing figure on a black horse.
Aidan bowed before his old friend. “King Steren! You are welcome to Sinking Canyons. We are yours to command.”
Steren leaped from his horse and, pulling Aidan to his feet, embraced him as a brother.
“I am sorry to hear about your father,” said Aidan. “We are all sorry.”
“Thank you,” Steren said. “He was beautiful, Aidan. I wish you could have seen him on that last day. He was first in the attack and last in the retreat. He was worthy of Corenwald that day, Aidan, and I shall always remember him that way, astride his black horse, tilting toward the enemy.”
“Then I will remember him that way too,” said Aidan.
“The Pyrthens aren’t far behind me,” said Steren. “They’ll start arriving later today. They may attack as early as tomorrow. I need to review the troops immediately so we can prepare for battle. How many men do we have?”
“Seven or eight thousand foot soldiers,” Aidan answered. “Then there’s your cavalry unit and a second cavalry unit we’ve cobbled together from individual horsemen who have arrived in the last two days and men riding horses captured from the Pyrthens.”
“Seven or eight thousand,” Steren mused. “The enemy is probably twice that at least. Well then, we shall make do with what we have.”
The rest of the day was spent in preparation for the coming battle. Scouts gave the officers a tour of the canyons’ terrain. King Steren organized the new recruits into makeshift units and assigned them to officers. Late in the afternoon, the scouts at the canyon rim reported the arrival of the first Pyrthen units on the north side of the canyon. The Pyrthens kept coming well into the night.
Outside the tunnel complex, the five Errolsons and Dobro sat in a circle with King Steren. There were no fires on the canyon floor that night. Men circled around fires would have made easy targets for the Pyrthen archers, who were surely in position already at the north rim of the canyon. The Corenwalder scouts on the south rim could see hundreds and hundreds of Pyrthen campfires flickering across the plain on the other side.
Aidan was explaining his plan to the others. “We could hold these canyons forever if we had to,” he said. “Archers can’t really hurt us. Any archer who was in position to shoot down on us from the rim would be very exposed himself. We could pick them off like flies.
“They’d have to come in after us, down to the canyon floor. And they couldn’t roust us out that way even if they had a hundred thousand men. We know every crevice of these canyons and every hideyhole. They’d be fighting an invisible enemy. We could ambush them from a different spot every day.”
“They could starve us out,” Brennus observed.
“We could attack their supply trains, carry off their food,” Aidan said. “We could eat better than they do.”
“Fine,” Steren said. “We can hold the canyons. Then what? The Pyrthens have Corenwald’s army contained in Sinking Canyons. As long as they get to keep the rest of Corenwald, I think they’ll be happy to make that trade.”
“But don’t you see?” Aidan said. “From here we could wreak havoc on the Pyrthens. Their supply train will have to stretch from Middenmarsh all the way to Tambluff. Our raiding parties could hit them anywhere on the Western Road, then beat it back here to the canyons. We can organize resistance in the villages, create a whole country of insurgents. Eventually we could win Corenwald back.”
“Eventually?” Steren said. “Eventually? Aidan, you’re still thinking like an outlaw: Hide out, bide your time, wait for something good to happen. Eventually!” He nearly spat the word. “Meanwhile, our people are living under the oppression of the Pyrthens. That’s no way for my people to live, Aidan. I am king of Corenwald. I won’t lead an insurgency in my own kingdom. We’re not a band of outlaws. We’re an army. We’re the army of Corenwald.”
But Aidan had spent a lot of time planning his insurgency. He had also dug a lot of tunnels. He wasn’t ready to give up so easily. “We know every nook and cranny of these canyons,” he said, his voice rising. “Do you have any idea of the advantage-”
King Steren raised a finger to his lips for quiet. “What’s that sound?” he asked. All night they had heard the murmur of Pyrthen voices and the jingle of horse tack, the occasional clank of weapons being moved or stacked. But now there were new noises coming from the northern rim-great metallic groans and iron squeaks, the blowing and stamping of horses under strain, the barks of the horse masters.
Maynard had heard these sounds many times before in his travels with the Pyrthen army. “Gun carriages,” he said. “They’re putting gun carriages in place.”
The term was unfamiliar to the Corenwalders. “Remember the thunder-tubes the Pyrthens used at Bonifay?” he said. “The Pyrthens call them cannons. They’re lining them up on the other rim.” The moon hadn’t risen yet, but by starlight the Corenwalders could just make out the silhouettes of men, horses, and thunder-tubes on the canyon rim directly across from them. A peninsula of land jutted out into the canyon, a huge semicircular stage with the canyon for an orchestra pit. Teams of draft horses pulled a dozen guns close to the edge, where the foot lanterns would be if it really were a stage.
“They’ve done a good scouting job,” Percy remarked. “They seem to know our position exactly.”
“We can’t hold this position,” said Maynard.
“We can go deep in the tunnels…” Aidan began, but Maynard just shook his head.
“We could hold these canyons forever against archers, infantry, cavalry-against any fighting force we Corenwalders are used to fighting against. But you haven’t considered what cannons can do to a place like this. Those iron balls will pulverize this canyon wall. These tunnels will collapse at the first impact. Anybody inside will be buried alive. Those who are outside will have one less place to hide. I saw those cannoneers blow a rocky cliff to bits on one of the eastern isles, where pirates were hiding. That was solid granite. You don’t want to see what they could do to this sand and clay.”
Aidan envisioned his own hopes and plans blown away by the Pyrthen guns like the pirates’ granite hideout.
“We’ll split the army,” Steren announced without any preamble.
“We’ll what?” asked Aidan.
“We’ll split the army for a night march. Aidan, you’ll lead half the men and one cavalry unit up the canyon. I’ll lead the rest of the men and the other cavalry unit down the canyon. What is it, a league upstream to the end of the canyon?”
“A league and a half,” said Jasper.
“And a little less than that to the downstream end, if I remember correctly,” said Steren. “Aidan, when you get out of the canyon, you’ll double back along the canyon rim, or as close as you can get without attracting the sentries’ notice. I’ll do the same thing from the other end.
“In the morning, when they open up those thunder-tubes on this spot, you boys will hit them on their right flank, and we’ll hit them on their left.”
“Like a pair of tongs,” said Brennus.
“Exactly,” Steren answered. “This is no time to be playing defense. If we can engage the enemy, they can’t use their thunder-tubes without shooting into their own men. If everything goes well, we can just fold them up, back their right flank into their left flank. Then they’ll have to fight us in front and behind at the same time.”
Aidan shook his head. “You’re talking about some sort of last stand?”
Steren shrugged. “I hope not. No, I’m talking about winning this battle.”
“But, Steren, we’re such a small force already. I just don’t think splitting up is a good idea.”
“Aidan, I have already had your advice, and I thank you for it. Now I need your obedience.” He was every bit a king.
“Yes,” said Aidan. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
