“Heave!” the kender shouted, more or less at once.
Leaning on the pry bars, they tipped the cauldrons still farther. Streams of liquid spilled from the pots, first in thin drizzles, then building into deluges that drenched the attackers below. Shrieking and clutching at themselves, the wall’s assailants fell to the ground. They writhed a while in the mud, then were still.
But it wasn’t enough. The attackers kept on coming. More debris hammered down on them from the walls. “That’s it!” Brimble bellowed. “Keep at ‘em! Don’t stop to watch them fall! Grab something else to throw!”
Suddenly, a new chorus of shouting sounded from below. Another wave of attackers surged forward, these ones carrying long ladders. They charged the wall, yelling wildly, and though the kender on the battlements felled many of them as they ran, more than half of them evaded the defenders’ bombardment. A dozen ladders slammed down into the dirt, then swung up toward the top of the wall. Hollering attackers lunged up the ladders before they were even in place, brandishing weapons and taking the rungs two at a time.
“Stop them!” Brimble shouted. “They’ll take the wall! Move!”
The defenders grabbed up pitchforks, billhooks, and other pole arms, and used them to push the tops of the ladders away from the wall. One by one, the ladders tipped over, swinging back away from the wall and crashing down to the ground.
It wasn’t enough, though. Two ladders stayed up long enough for the attackers to reach the top. Quickly the attackers cleared away the wall’s defenders, more of them coming up every second. The defenders backed away, forced to give up more and more ground.
“Come on, you mangy, lazy halfwits!” Brimble was roaring. “Keep them back! Contain them, or they’ll take the whole bloody wall! Move, or I’ll-”
Suddenly, one of the attackers broke past the wall’s defenders and charged across the battlements. Before anyone could stop him, or even knew what he was doing, he grabbed Brimble and threw him off the wall. The old kender howled furiously, cursing the air blue, as he fell.
The kender atop the wall watched him drop. The attackers did not. All at once, the faltering defenses crumbled. Attackers boiled across the battlements, knocking down Kendermore’s defenders or shoving them off the catwalk. Soon there was no one left on the wall but attackers.
“Stop!” shouted Riverwind from atop the battlements. At once, the attack ceased.
“All right, everyone get up,” the Plainsman commanded. “Including the ones who are dead. Come on.”
Kender who had lain unmoving on the catwalk, or on courtyard below the wall, pushed themselves sorely to their feet and started to clean up the mess left by the attack. They scraped up the red pulp of the kurpa melons the kender atop the wall had thrown, and mopped up the water that had poured down from the cauldrons. Those who had caught the brunt of the cauldrons’ deluge wrung out their topknots and wiped mud from their faces and clothes.
They all started to talk at once. The predominant topics were how much fun Riverwind’s war games were, how interesting it was to pretend to be under siege, and how weird it was to pretend to be under siege on the inside of the wall when, technically, they really were under siege on the outside.
Riverwind and Brimble had been conducting drills for three weeks. One brigade of kender would assail the inside of the wall, while another would attempt to fend them off. It was not going well.
Scowling sourly, Brimble Redfeather fought his way out of the haystack he’d landed in when he’d fallen. He muttered to himself, picking straw out of his hair as he made his way up the stairs to the battlements. He went to meet Riverwind, who stood solemnly, his strong arms folded across his chest.
“All right!” Brimble snarled. “Listen up!”
A few of the kender became quiet, but most kept jabbering, bragging about how well they’d fought and teasing those who had “died.”
Brimble rooted in his belt pouch, pulled out a tin whistle, and blew as hard as he could. The whistle’s shrill note split the air like a hatchet. Even so, Brimble had to sound two more blasts before things finally settled down to something like silence.
“That was better,” Riverwind announced with a sigh.
The kender cheered for themselves.
“Shut up, all of you!” Brimble barked back.
“However, you lost the wall,” the Plainsman continued. “Think about what that would mean if it had been ogres instead of other kender attacking. You’d be dead, and Kurthak’s horde would run rampant through Kendermore, killing your families and burning your homes.
“This may seem like a game,” Riverwind added, “but it’s not. You’ve got to do things right, or you’ll end up dead when the ogres attack.”
The kender stared at their shoes. Beside Riverwind, Brimble groaned in exasperation. The Plainsman rested a silencing hand on the old veteran’s shoulder.
He waved his arm behind him, out across the meadow. “All of Kendermore is depending on you to stop that horde out there. There’s no room for mistakes or sloppiness. Now, everyone can rest for an hour, and then we’ll do this again.”
Exhausted groans rose all around him as Riverwind turned and strode away along the battlements, following the catwalk to where Kronn and Paxina stood. He was pale and haggard, his white hair pasted to his forehead with sweat. Involuntarily, he pressed his hand against his stomach.
“Are you all right, Riverwind?” Paxina asked.
The Plainsman looked at her sharply, moving his hand away from his belly as he drew up to them.
“I’m fine,” he murmured.
Concern flashed in their eyes, and he looked away irritably, staring out toward the Kenderwood. Across the meadow, the towering figures of the ogres moved restlessly about their camps. Their snarling, bestial voices carried across the field.
“They’re certainly taking their time,” Kronn observed. “Are all sieges this blasted boring?”
“Most of them,” Riverwind replied, smiling. “The battle was over quickly at Kalaman, but I’ve heard of sieges that lasted for months-even years.”
“Years,” Paxina echoed, wondering. “We can’t hold out that long. We’ve barely enough food stocked to last us the winter, even if we ration.”
“I wouldn’t worry about that too much,” Riverwind replied. “I doubt the ogres have that kind of patience. They’ll come soon enough. I just hope there’s enough time to get ready.” He turned, glancing back along the wall. Brimble Redfeather was berating the other kender, trying to get them to set up for the next drill. Riverwind heaved a leaden sigh.
“They’ll be ready,” Kronn told the Plainsman. “I’ve been watching them, especially the past few days. They really are improving-just not very quickly, is all.”
“Plus those drills you’re doing aren’t completely fair,” Paxina chimed in. “The melons make good rocks, and the water in the cauldrons is all right, but we’ll have them, too.” She nodded down toward the base of the wall, where a makeshift archery range was set up. Kender took turns firing arrows at straw dummies. More often than not, the shafts struck them in places that would kill a man-or an ogre. Watching them shoot, Riverwind marveled at the archers’ skill.
Down a few blocks, a second group of kender stood in line, facing a row of catapults. Riverwind watched as they loaded slingstones into the pouches of their hoopaks, then held them poised. A moment passed, then the catapults’ arms sprang forward, launching a volley of clay discs into the air. One by one they swung their hoopaks forward, flinging their stones at the discs. The targets shattered, raining down on the ground in pieces.
The old Plainsman nodded pensively, watching the slingers whoop in exultation as the catapult operators prepared their engines for another volley. “True,” he said. “The archers and slingers will kill many ogres before they even get near the wall. But even so…” He shrugged, looking away toward the Kenderwood once more.
“You don’t think we can hold them back?” Kronn asked.
Riverwind didn’t reply. He gazed out across the meadow. “The forest will be dead soon,” he observed.
Over the weeks since his arrival, the weather had continued to worsen. The heat had become even more intense and dry as an oven. The winds that swept over the town were much closer to the siroccos that scoured the sands of Khur than the damp, rainy gusts Paxina said were normal for autumn in Goodlund. Last year, she had said, it had rained for two-thirds of the month of Bleakcold, including a stretch of nine days without sunshine. Now, though, Bleakcold was nearly done, and not a drop had fallen.
