seething forward and backward, giving way, and pressing back, the men at the beach were seeking flight. Had these lines of skilled, hardened men, selected with care by the Pani, veterans, mercenaries, killers, bandits, brigands, and pirates, from enlisted crews, rural gangs, disbanded cohorts, and scattered free companies, not checked the enemy, few if any of our forces would have escaped death. To be sure, these particular men were not so different from the others. That these particular men were where they were was, I supposed, as much an accident of battle as anything else. It doubtless depended on where the enemy had first struck. They knew that if they turned their backs, they would die. They constituted the fragile, dangerous wall behind which swirled panic- stricken rout, the wall without which our forces would be slaughtered, like penned verr, against the sea. I feared the defensive lines might break. A moment of panic, an unpredictable loss of nerve, can, in a moment, turn rows of desperate, brave men into disorganized, fugitive, vulnerable prey. One man in flight, followed by another, and another, can break a line. To be sure, it is reputed infamy to die with a wound in one’s back. Indeed, in some cities, men returning with such wounds are put to death. I was at Cabot’s side, to protect his left. And, as a man fell, he was at the left of a Pani warrior, with a large, horned, face-concealing helmet. The Pani warrior clutched a long, curved sword with two hands. A glaive struck at him, and one of the hands that bore it flew to the side, blood spurting from the severed wrist. Two foes lay at his feet, impeding the approach of others toward him. I thrust aside a glaive and tried to reach the fellow who wielded it, but it was drawn back. Another was striking downward and I managed to bend forward and catch it behind the blade, though I was forced down to one knee. I lunged upward and caught this darkly clad figure in the throat, below the black helmet. Blood ran upon the overlapping plates of leather mail. It was only later that I realized this was the attack of the doubled glaive, in which the first thrusts horizontally, and the second, on the chance that the defender’s attention is distracted, strikes downward. I had a moment’s respite. Such things oddly, intermittently, occur, inexplicable eddies in the crashing surf of war. I sensed the line a few feet to my right was, like an ebbing wave, washing back.
“Hold! Hold!” called a familiar voice and the wave held, and washed a bit forward, and I knew he in the great, horned helmet was Lord Nishida. Some Pani were about him, to his immediate right. I now have little doubt that it was his firmness, and leadership, and those of his fellows, Pani and others, which had organized and stiffened that resolute defense behind which the frenzied withdrawal of our primary forces, apparently ambushed, charged, and outnumbered, was in desperate progress. As the line had begun to constrict and hold, bodies, ours and theirs, had begun to encumber the immediate field. Four bodies, sprawled and dark, now lay between Cabot and Lord Nishida. I sensed that some of the dark figures before us were now reluctant to approach those two. Far off in the defile, above the beach, I could see, as before, a large number of torches. These, as it turned out, and as I feared, were lifted amongst ample reserves, not yet committed. A hundred yards or so, toward the defile, I heard the command drums of the enemy. Slowly, before us, facing us, the lines of the present enemy began to back away.
“Hold!” called Lord Nishida. I gathered he knew war, and would not permit his line to move forward, against a methodically retreating, ready foe. This withdrawal tactic is designed to encourage a line to break forward, in pursuit, after which its irregularity may be exploited by an even, frontal counter and pursuit. A similar danger is to pursue a broken foe, or an apparently broken foe, while the foe’s marshaled reserves, ready at hand, or even hidden at hand, as in trenches, or amongst trees, are ready to strike from the flank. At this point, I might have ordered a careful, patient withdrawal, by means of which to tighten our line and more closely approach the sea, where lay our avenue of escape, if there were to be any such. But Lord Nishida did not order such a withdrawal. I shortly understood why. Availing myself of this lull, I looked back, toward the sea. I was pleased to see that the three galleys had now returned. They were being boarded by dozens of men. The apparent retreat of the enemy halted some twenty yards before us, toward the defile. If we had turned and fled, as I was tempted to do, we could have been caught against the sea and cut down before we could embark. I heard the drum again, now pounding with an intensity that literally suggested vexation, the drummer perhaps having caught the anger, disappointment, or frustration of whoever might be in charge of dictating the signals. For a few Ehn the two forces faced one another, in the strange light of the torch bearers. Shortly thereafter I understood why Lord Nishida had not ordered the seemingly judicious retreat I would have expected. The original ambush in the defile had begun with a rain of arrow fire, which had taken a heavy toll on our fellows, Pani and otherwise. Archery, later, as the forces had come together, had been substantially discontinued, save for occasional desultory fire, largely undirected, over the heads of the combatants, at generally unseen targets, often out of range, toward the beach. Now, however, to a new drum signal, hurrying between suddenly opening, evenly spaced gaps in the enemy forces, we saw what must have been one hundred to one hundred and fifty archers, with the large Pani bows. These men were not even in position when Lord Nishida signaled to his left flank and right flank, the left commanded by Tajima, of his retinue, whom I knew primarily as a Pani tarnsman, liaison to, or lieutenant to, Cabot, in the tarn cavalry, and the strange warrior, Nodachi, commanding the right flank. I now realized the reason for holding the line as it was, for the bodies with which the field in our vicinity, before us and behind us, was strewn were lifted up, held up, even piled on one another. A given body, held erect, constituted a post, barrier, or hurdle, behind which a column of crouching men might shelter themselves. A number of such bodies, aligned, constituted a set of palings between which it was difficult to find targets. The Pani archers took up their position some fifteen to seventeen yards before our line, some five to three before the infantry of the enemy. This would allow them to withdraw conveniently to the protection of their own forces before we could reach them, if charging. Four bodies were placed before Cabot and Lord Nishida, held by four men, and I, as they, took advantage of this shelter. The Pani bow is powerful but, like the common peasant bow, it, given the lightness of its missile, and that it is drawn by the strength of a human arm, can rarely tear its way through a human body, and its force, even if passing through an arm or throat, is largely spent in its passage. It is unlike an engine-driven shaft, as on a ballista, which might shatter a wall. The thrust spear, of course, impelled by the force of a strong man, may penetrate a four-layered shield or a human body, but then the spear is lost until its retraction. So deep a thrust, like the deep thrust of a blade, is foolish, unless intended to, say, encumber a shield, rendering it useless, preparatory to a blade attack. I heard, for the first time at this range, the sudden, unmistakable sound, so solid, so quick and frightening, of an arrow striking a body, and then its repetition, again, and again. Some of the arrows passed over us, the fletching streaking in the wind, like a darting bird, a whisper of light, almost invisible. Then, again and again, I heard the striking of arrows, one following on another, into the inert barriers, once alive, interposed between us and the Pani bowmen. Certain arrows skinned others, with a shaving, splintering sound. Few arrows found their desiderated marks; arrows bristled from the tragic barriers before us. I thought no single marksman, given the liberty of his judgment, would have continued to fire arrows with such little effect, but, I gathered, this action, with its largely futile waste of missiles, was in accord with the command of the drum, the captain of which, most likely, was well behind the lines, and ignorant, at least now, of the situation in the field. Training and discipline, and obedience to command, is usually, undeniably, of enormous military value. At other times, in altered situations, it is wasteful, unproductive, even stupid. Men who will lose their heads if they do not obey are likely to obey, even if the command is awry, uninformed, foolish, even dangerous.
Again I heard the drum.
Some sense of the situation at the front must have now been relayed to the rear echelons. A channel of communication, after all, is of little value unless it, like a road or river, can be symmetrically traversed.
Although I could not read the signal, its import was clear.
An archer charge is hazardous, of course, unless directed upon an inert enemy. The whole rationale of the war bow is to strike from the safety of distance.
The archers, many of their quivers almost emptied, now began to edge forward.
It would be difficult to elude the shafts at close range. Few had brought shields ashore.
There was a sudden cry from Lord Nishida and our fellows cast aside the bodies, bristling with arrows, and leaped upon the startled, disconcerted archers, only feet away, few of whom could train or loose more than a single arrow before dying. I saw more than one quiver empty, a last arrow spilled beside a fallen bow in the moist, scarlet dust. Some archers fled back, but the ranks had now been closed against them. Some were slain with thrusts of glaives, others with swords. Several knelt docilely before their own men, shamed, and a headsman went from figure to figure, I gathered, restoring their honor.
By now it seemed, with the return and departure of the galleys, many of our men might have been returned to the ship.
I saw Tarl Cabot leave his position beside Lord Nishida, and move to the rear, where I sensed some stirring, doubtless amongst some of our men.
I did not understand the point of his departure.
