“A cannon-stone must have clipped one of those lovely chimneys. A sad loss to posterity…” He brushed a few specks of plaster from his shoulder plate. Pauldron, was that the word? Or vambrace? He got them mixed up.
“Your Majesty!” piped Gorst. “You should withdraw!”
“Nonsense, Colonel, things are just getting interesting.”
A ridiculous affectation, of course, things had gone beyond horrifying some time ago and did not look like coming back. But why attend a battle at all if you’re not going to say at least one heroically imperturbable thing?
He held Lord Hoff out of the way to allow a stretcher to pass, hauled by a heavyset man in a blood-spattered apron and a gasping woman with hair sweat-stuck across her face. “Well done!” he called after them. “Well done!”
Contrary to all logic, Orso felt no fear at all. A great deal less than usual, in fact. He sometimes could hardly face breakfast, was alarmed by the notion of choosing a shirt, but epic disaster appeared to have finally brought out the best in him.
Even as the Northmen came pouring through the wheat to the east, then the Open Council through the orchards to the west. Even as the army of Angland advanced across the fields and engaged the Crown Prince’s Division in a vicious melee, then drove them back. Even as the rebels’ cannons started firing on Stoffenbeck. Even as the wounded crawled back through the streets, and the fires sprang up across the town, and the smoke billowed around the clock tower, his mood had continued to lift. As if he was somehow balanced on a set of scales against everybody else, and as their doubt and terror grew his own spirits soared.
He hoped that it looked like immense bravery, but it felt like nothing to be proud of. Immense stupidity, maybe. Immense arrogance. Perhaps that was all courage really was. Being so convinced of one’s own importance one came to believe death was something only other people need worry about.
“Your Majesty!” squeaked Hoff, his voice even higher than Gorst’s now. “You really must withdraw!”
“You can, by all means,” said Orso. “I’ll catch you up.”
He squatted beside a cowering boy, not an easy operation in full armour. “Up you get, now.” The lad’s eyes went from wide with fear to even wider with astonishment as he realised who was helping him to his feet. “You have my permission to head for the rear.” He ruffled the lad’s hair, sending down a shower of broken plaster. “Consider it a royal edict!”
Quite possibly his last, the way things were going. The thought almost brought up a snort of laughter. The Fates help him, he was enjoying himself. Was he mad?
“At least put your helmet on, Your Majesty,” whined an officer, holding out the plumed royal headpiece.
Orso waved it away. “A king needs to be seen. And to be seen to be seen.” A woman was cringing in a doorway with her tangled blonde hair full of dust, gripping a drawing board tightly with one fist while she desperately sketched the carnage before her with the other. “Make sure you get my good side!” Orso called to her. “Can’t actually remember which it is, mind you…”
His father had once told him that a king’s job was generally just to stand there, but it was still a job one could do badly. At that moment, he felt he was doing it rather damn well. He gave his best salute as a column of spearmen clattered past, heading, he was pleased to see, towards the fighting rather than away.
“Heroes!” he called to them. “Every one of you!”
They looked amazed to see him there but pleased, too. Proud, even. They trotted past the faster, soon lost in the rolling smoke. It appeared the rebels were using some new kind of cannon-stone which not only smashed buildings to pieces but set those pieces on fire. There’s progress for you.
“Enemies!” someone screeched.
“Protect the king!” squealed Gorst, stepping in front of Orso with his shield up. He was astonished to see Tunny flinging himself into the path of danger on the other side, Steadfast Standard in one hand and sword in the other. Horsemen were indeed moving through the murk. Orso inflated his chest indignantly, exactly the way his mother might have when faced with an impudent maid.
“Friendlies!” squeaked Gorst.
Several officers from one of the Crown Prince’s regiments, in fact, red jackets so soot-smeared they were hard to tell from dark Angland uniforms.
“Your Majesty! We’re being driven back in the centre. The Anglanders won’t stop coming!”
“Very well, Major. Give ground. Withdraw into Stoffenbeck and form another perimeter. Fight them in the streets if you must. Any chance of help from Lord Marshal Forest?” he asked as the officers clattered off to their likely dooms.
“He sent a messenger asking for help from us,” said Tunny, sheathing his sword.
“Damn it.” Orso would never forgive himself if anything happened to Hildi. “What about Lord Marshal Rucksted? Any sign?”
Gorst grimly shook his head. Perhaps Vick dan Teufel had been right, the Breakers had risen up in Keln and their last hope had never even left.
“My leg! My leg!” A man was carried past, arms over the shoulders of two others, his leg most clearly missing below the knee. A cannon-stone struck a roof on the other side of the square and sent an avalanche of broken slates raining down, people diving for cover in all directions.
A soft touch on Orso’s arm, a soft voice in his ear. “Your Majesty.” Sulfur, leaning close. “You really must withdraw.”
“Protecting your master’s investment?” asked Orso.
“It will do no one any good if the king is killed by falling masonry.”
Orso took a breath and nodded. “Especially not me.” And, he had to admit, things were starting to take on a subtle, but very distinct, flavour of defeat. “We’ll fall back a few hundred strides! No more.”
“Very good, Your Majesty,” said Tunny, hoisting the Steadfast Standard onto his shoulder.
“One moment.” Orso looked up at it. The white horse of Casamir still pranced as proudly as ever, and the golden sun of the Union still shone as radiantly. More so, if anything, in the midst of all this blood, grime and chaos. Leo dan Brock had been so very taken with it when they led that parade through Adua together, had looked so admiringly upon it at dinner. A man who placed a lot of faith in flags, one way or another. Orso slowly began to smile. “I think my standard should probably remain.”
“But, Your Majesty…” A captain cleared his throat, as though to explain the obvious to a dullard. “It must be wherever you are. How else will you be found on the battlefield?”
“Well, exactly,” said Orso. “We have a few cannon left over, don’t we?”
That footman was still following him, his purple livery thoroughly besmirched, cringing at the occasional impacts, his tray sheltered under one arm rather than balanced on his fingertips.
“Another sherry… Your Majesty?” he managed to whimper.
Orso smiled about at his entourage. “I rather think the time has come for something stronger.”
Vick had little military experience, but when it came to self-preservation she was an expert, and as far as she could tell, they were fucked.
She dumbly twisted the buds of rag out of her sore ears. Even without them, everything was muffled. One of the cannons had burst, killing half its crew. Three others were cracked and useless. Three more had warped so badly they couldn’t be fired. Another had jumped from its trestles and rolled down the hill, crushing two men before they could get out of the way. The rest had run out of stones and powder, their soot-blackened crews sprawled spent on the hillside like escapees from hell.