The Autumn Republic

Andriya disemboweled a Kez infantryman and sprinted toward the nearest stairs up to the wall. His rifle was spent and probably useless, covered in blood, and he used the bayonet as a spear as he battled his way up the stairs.

Tamas followed in his path, kicking the dead and dying off the stairs in Andriya’s wake. They entered the second floor of the gatehouse and fought their way through the soldiers within. A moment later they were out in the sun.

The scene took Tamas’s breath away. His thousands were churning forward, their bayonets bristling, and the tops of the walls swarmed with the green-on-tan coats of the Kez infantry. His men came over the wall in their hundreds, but he could see the ranks at the base of the wall wavering. His men would break if they weren’t spurred on.

Tamas tore the Kez flag from its holder above the gates and flung it from the heights. It arched downward and toward the embattled armies like a spear. He watched it fall until a Kez grenadier, easily twice his size, charged at him with an indecipherable war cry. Tamas slammed the end of his flagpole into the grenadier’s chin, toppling the Kez, before raising it high above his head and waving it. A shout resounded among the infantry on the ground and he saw them surge forward with renewed vigor.

“Take this!” Tamas said to an Adran infantryman as he climbed over the wall. “Don’t let it drop while you still draw breath.”

“Yes sir!”

Tamas leapt to the grenadier whom he had beaten down and grabbed the man by the hair, dragging him backward into the second floor of the gatehouse.

“Where’s Ipille?” Tamas shouted in Kez.

The grenadier spit in his face and drew his boot knife. Empowered by his powder trance, Tamas lifted him bodily with one hand and snatched his wrist with the other, feeling the bones snap beneath his palm. He slammed the grenadier into the wall hard enough to bring dust down from the rafters.

“Where is your king?”

The grenadier screamed and swung a fist. Tamas caught it, twisting the grenadier and tossing him down the gatehouse stairs. He ducked back out into the sunlight to find the flag still waving and more of his men pouring over the wall.

It wouldn’t be enough.

“Andriya, find out where Ipille is!” Tamas bounded back down the stairs and leapt into his saddle. “Lances!”

Most of the cuirassiers had fought their way past the courtyard and into the street. Tamas counted over a dozen empty saddles, but there were still plenty on their mounts. Tamas fought his way to them, his eye on the current of the fight. He watched the ebb and flow of the Kez infantry, an experienced eye pulling the pattern out of the chaos. He saw them advance, back off, then advance again.

“Formation!”

As the Kez infantry fell back, his cavalry regrouped, pulling tight into formation, lances at the ready. Gavril fell in beside Tamas. “We need to capture Ipille. We won’t be able to take these walls.”

“We will take these walls if I have to do it myself. Lances, wheel left!”

Only about a third of his cavalry still had their lances. They moved to the middle of the formation while the rest took the sides, fighting off the advancing infantry with their heavy sabers.

“Charge!”

The whole group surged forward, slamming into the disorganized crowd of infantry. Even without the lances, there was more to work with in the open avenue. Infantry went down beneath the armored breast of Tamas’s horse and he leaned forward in the saddle, swinging his saber.

A bullet took the cuirassier to Tamas’s right out of his saddle. Another fell with a strangled cry to the enemy bayonets. Their charge ground to a halt after just a hundred paces, but Tamas could see that it was enough.

The breach farther on down the wall seethed with blue uniforms. His own infantry fought their way in, heavy grenadiers at the front. Tamas’s charge had grabbed the Kez’s attention so that his men could take the opening, and like a dam that had formed a crack, the whole tide of the battle broke.

Tamas felt a knock against his breastplate and suddenly his world turned upside down. He threw himself away from his falling horse, rolled beneath the hooves of another, and struggled to his feet, numbness in one leg.

He raised his sword in time to fend off the stroke of a Kez officer. He parried twice and lunged forward for the kill, but his leg gave out beneath him and he tumbled forward, the officer’s sword crashing against his helmet. He raised his sword to fend off another thrust, but a bayonet erupted from the officer’s stomach and the body was thrust aside.

“On your feet, sir!” Andriya snatched Tamas under the arm and helped him up. “There’s more to kill!”

Tamas took the opportunity to check himself. A deep gash ran along his left thigh-it would be a bad one-and his breastplate bore no fewer than five deep scratches that would otherwise have seen him killed.

“You move too slowly in that thing,” Andriya said.

“That’s just because I’m getting old. The king?”