Chapter Twenty-Five #3
By the time Bram returned to the landward wall, the attack there had reached a ferocity greater than anything Raghnall had attempted that morning.
Ladders crowded the stone on either side of the gatehouse, arrows came so thickly that men scarcely dared show themselves between the merlons, and the abandoned timber had been lifted once more and driven against the gate by men who seemed to possess little concern for whether they survived long enough to strike it twice.
Bram understood then what the boats had been intended to accomplish. Raghnall had not necessarily expected men climbing a cliff to take Craig na Coille from the sea. He had needed only to draw defenders from the landward wall long enough to make one final attempt here.
It failed, though not quickly, and not without cost. For the better part of another half hour the fighting continued as more and more of Raghnall’s men managed to reach the parapet, until Bram’s sword arm had gone to a deep, grinding ache that made every swing feel late and he was stepping over bodies to find footing.
But the gates remained barred, every ladder that reached the wall was eventually cast down, and the few men who succeeded in gaining the parapet died there.
Then something changed. Bram saw it first—a hesitation in the next wave of attackers. They came at a trot, not a run. One group advanced halfway, took a single volley of arrows, and broke back toward the village.
“Look at them,” Harsain said, his voice rough with exhaustion. “They’re nae fighting anymore, just dying.”
Bram watched them retreat, not yet willing to believe it. “Mayhap.”
Opening the gates now would be a fool’s errand. Craig na Coille’s walls were their greatest advantage, and he would not throw that away on a hunch. Raghnall could have another fifty men waiting beyond the rise, ready for the moment Bram was stupid enough to ride out.
“We hold,” he said.
And so they did.
Another quarter hour passed. The assaults were no longer charges, but half-hearted advances.
Raghnall sent men forward twice more. The first group broke under a single volley from the wall.
The second reached the abandoned ladders and then dissolved, men melting back toward the cottages.
Shouts from the village drove some forward again, but they moved in loose, hesitant clusters, unwilling to close the gaps in their line.
One man simply stopped, shield raised but feet rooted to the earth, until a comrade dragged him back.
Then others followed, no longer needing to be pulled.
Bram watched it all without giving the command to pursue.
Raghnall might be desperate, but desperation did not make him harmless, and Bram had already been surprised once that morning by the boats appearing beneath his seaward wall.
He would not allow impatience—or the satisfaction of seeing his enemy finally bloodied—to make him careless now.
Gradually, however, it became impossible to mistake what was happening. Raghnall’s men were no longer falling back between assaults or waiting to be sent forward again. They were abandoning the fight.
No fresh ranks emerged from the village to replace those retreating from the field, and men who had already withdrawn showed no inclination to return.
Raghnall’s voice carried above the confusion from somewhere among the cottages, first bellowing orders for them to hold, then commanding them back into formation.
He couldn't hear the words, but he saw Raghnall's fury.
The traitor seized a retreating man by the collar, shoving him back toward the fight.
The man stumbled, regained his balance, and simply walked away, his back to his commander.
His archers were leaving as well. Some abandoned their positions among the cottages in small groups, bows slung across their backs, while others simply disappeared toward the far road.
Below the seaward wall, the last boat had pushed away from shore and was laboring toward deeper water, carrying those fortunate enough to have survived the disastrous landing.
Men appeared between the cottages leading horses, some stopping to gather wounded companions while others left everything behind but their weapons and whatever they could carry.
Raghnall shouted again, and this time Bram saw him among them, wheeling the gray horse across the road as he attempted to bar the path of several men determined to leave. One went around him. Another followed. Within moments the others had done the same.
Raghnall had brought an army to Craig na Coille that morning. Now Bram watched men peel away in ones and twos, drifting toward the tree line, not running, just gone.
Still Bram waited.
Then Raghnall’s banner moved. It passed behind one cottage, appeared briefly in the road beyond another, and continued steadily away from Craig na Coille. A moment later Bram glimpsed the gray horse beneath it.
“He's running,” Domnall said.
Bram watched Raghnall's banner disappearing beyond the farthest cottages and knew this time there was no feint in it.
The bastard had spent scores of men against Craig na Coille, failed to breach either wall, and was now doing the one thing his own desperation had made inevitable once victory became impossible.
He was saving himself.
Bram’s decision was instant. “Harsain. The keep is yours.”
Harsain turned sharply toward him. “Laird—”
“The walls remain manned and the gates remain barred until I return.”
Bram turned toward the stairs. “Domnall! Three dozen men. Mounted.”
Harsain’s eyes widened. “Ye canna fight the hundred that remain with naught but three dozen men!”
Bram looked once more beyond the wall, toward the road upon which Raghnall was retreating.
“I dinna need to take on hundreds—they’ll nae fight for him again. I need only to reach him.”