Chapter Twenty-One Guthnyr #2
However, the Nihlvarians were swift to disappoint him.
After the shock of the initial attack faded, their captains rapidly restored order.
Shields were unslung and the column began to broaden into a true battle line.
It was a more protracted business on so uncertain a surface than it would have been on land.
Many slipped on the blood of fallen comrades or were sent sprawling by the flailing limbs of the wounded.
If not for the shrieks of pain it might have made for a comical spectacle.
Soon, horns began to sound from the rear of the Nihlvarian host whereupon their untidy battle line spurred into a charge.
Guthnyr had worried the enemy might take the cautious if costly choice of retreating under the withering lash of the arrow storm, but it seemed their commander was aggressive as well as clever.
With his host so close to their objective and the line of retreat so endangered, he had decided to cast his dice on an all-out attack.
Had he known this land better, he would surely have thought twice, for the steepness of the bank now became Guthnyr’s best ally.
The leading companies came on at a steady run, many losing their footing but most managing to keep upright in an untidy mass.
Having learned a vicious lesson regarding the deadliness of their foemen’s arrows, those in front kept their shields extended from their chests and heads lowered.
Still the Morvek and Travka archers continued to exact a heavy toll before the Nihlvarians reached the bank, whereupon Guthnyr raised another cry.
“Death to the Vortigurn’s dogs!” he roared, the exhortation taken up by what sounded like the entire menda. “DEATH TO THE VORTIGURN’S DOGS!”
Rushing forward, Guthnyr brought Kohrvayl down upon the head of a Nihlvarian warrior attempting to haul himself from the ice to the rocky shore.
The kelvehr blade split his helm and the skull beneath, all the way down to his chin.
Another warrior, helm-less with a bleeding scar across his forehead and an arrow jutting from shoulder, came at Guthnyr with a raised sword, screaming in both panic and challenge.
Sygurn stepped into his path, hacking the Nihlvarian down with one blow of his axe.
“Silfaer’s tits, but these things do work!” he exclaimed in appreciation, holding up the gore-spattered but undamaged axe blade.
“Have a care,” Guthnyr warned, shoving the smith aside to stab Kohrvayl into the chest of another foemen blundering up the incline, slashing madly with a long dagger.
More Nihlvarians followed, struggling up the slope only to be met by Morvek wielding kelvehr hatchets and spears.
The line of battle quickly spread along the riverbank, a long procession of combat of which Guthnyr could see only a portion.
He hacked down one foe after another, catching glimpses of companies diverting to the flanks, seeking a way around the unyielding barrier of enemies.
Having tested the ice to either side of this stretch of riverbank, Guthnyr thought little of their chances.
Others were marshalled by their captains into a dense wedge and hurled at the centre of the struggle.
Those in front were swiftly cut down but the Nihlvarians came on undaunted, gradually clawing their way up the slope.
The Travka fought back with ferocious tenacity but Guthnyr knew the signs of imminent breakthrough.
“Hold here,” he told Sygurn before turning and running to where he had stationed Torfyn with his personal band of fighters.
About two-hundred strong, these were all hard-eyed cut-throats who had fetched up at the Wehrtrova after a lifetime of villainy.
He found Torfyn once again clutching his chest, although his resolve appeared undimmed.
At his side, Halvor brandished his newly forged sword, the blood channel engraved with the name Klarvahst: Foe Smiter.
“Are we finally allowed to fight, then?” the youth asked Guthnyr. “Thought you’d decided to keep all the glory for yourself, Blue-face.”
“There’s plenty still to be had,” Guthnyr grunted. Wiping blood from his brow, he pointed Kohrvayl at the bowed line of Travka a hundred paces off. “We take them head on. Lose this fight and we lose the day.”
Without waiting for a response, he fixed both hands to Kohrvayl’s handle and charged towards the fray.
As he ran, thoughts of Deyna and Aleida rose clear and sharp in his mind, lending speed and summoning a growl to his lips.
By the time he hurled himself at the Nihlvarians pushing through the thinning cordon of Travka, it had become a roar of hungry challenge.
Armour and flesh parted with every stroke of his blade, cleaved warriors falling to either side as he hacked his way into the dense ranks of the enemy wedge.
The embattled Travka were quick to take heart from his presence and his fury, surging forward with renewed violence.
Guthnyr had experienced the disorientation of battle before, but never fully lost himself in its frenzy, until now.
Time fractured, becoming a disjointed parade of vague, bloody encounters.
A warrior lunging at him, mouth gaping and eyes wild with desperate terror, the face sliced apart by a flash of his kelvehr steel.
Another thrusting at him from the ground, blood already gushing from a smashed leg.
Guthnyr stamped on his head until it became a red smear on the churned earth.
He knew neither caution nor fatigue, Kohrvayl crafting crimson arcs as he carved a path through the enemy throng.
Reason returned only when he noticed that he trod upon ice.
The sight of red streaks on the white surface served to banish his fury.
The blood pooled in places and smeared in others where the maimed tried to crawl free of the fray.
Glancing back at the riverbank, he saw the Nihlvarian line had been repulsed all along its length.
Some milled about in confusion while others fled, slipping and sliding on the gore.
Sensing victory, the Travka began an unbidden counter charge.
Surging from the trees, they set upon their wavering foes, their efforts quickly joined by the Morvek.
Faced with the onslaught, the Nihlvarians abandoned all semblance of fortitude and the battle became a rout.
To the flanks, Guthnyr saw warriors tumble amid shards of ice as it gave way under their weight.
Arms flailing, armour and weapons soon bore them down.
As the fury of combat ebbed, fatigue descended.
Guthnyr dragged chill air into his lungs and shifted his gaze to the far bank.
The mist still concealed much of the landscape, but had thinned enough for him to discern a line of carts and a milling group of mounted warriors.
Shaking his head to clear away the fog of combat, he hefted Kohrvayl and began to run, the spikes on his boots digging into the ice.
Fleeing Nihlvarians scattered from his path, some even casting their weapons away and raising hands in a plea for mercy.
He ignored them and kept running, reaching the opposite shore amid a gaggle of panicked Nihlvarians.
Freed from the treacherous grip of the ice, they pelted for the low hills south of the river, many blundering into the path of mounted warriors.
These were circling the carts of the host’s baggage train, their movements conveying a curious mix of both wariness and determined rage.
He watched one warrior spur his mount towards a cart near the front of the line, sword raised, only for his horse to abruptly buck and tip him from the saddle.
Looking to the cart, Guthnyr let out a sigh of relief at finding Aleida and Deyna perched atop it.
The former Tuhlvyr had acquired a spear from somewhere and swung it menacingly at any rider who came near.
Aleida bore no weapon, her intense gaze constantly slipping from one horse to another.