The Forge of Men Read online

  Felix had not allowed Nikomedes to spar with the other men, having insisted that only he should instruct him. Nikomedes had come to thirst for the chance to prove himself on the field—just as his father brother had done before him.

  “Nikomedes,” he heard Felix’s voice from his left, and he turned to face his warlord. “Step back from the line and cast javelins until they are upon us. Your aim is truer than any man I have ever seen, and you will be needed in the reserves after the battle is joined.”

  Nikomedes felt his face flush with anger. “You would deny me the honor of the line?” he growled.

  Felix’ hand shot out too fast to see, and he grabbed the younger man by the collar, which he used to pull their faces together until they were mere inches apart. “Your arm might fall a half dozen of them before their spears can claim our brothers,” he spat. “And if it is glory you seek, you need not wait long—in real battles, the reserves often take the heaviest casualties. Now go and lead the reserve line or I will cut you down myself!”

  Nikomedes actually considered striking Felix in that moment, but he reluctantly stepped back and wordlessly made his way to the reserve units, which had already stuck the javelins into the ground to quicken the caster’s draw. He picked one up and tested its balance, still fuming at being pulled from the line mere moments before the battle.

  The battle cry of Kratos’ men ceased, and Nikomedes looked up to see Kratos himself standing at the head of his host. He was cased in some sort of heavy, metal armor. The huge warlord carried no weapons which Nikomedes could see, and he raised his massive fists to the slowly darkening sky before bellowing a blood-curdling, incredibly loud cry across the field.

  The violence that Kratos’ wordless challenge promised actually made the hairs on Nikomedes’ neck stand, and he felt a shiver run through his body. He had heard others speak of such a sensation, but he had never experienced it himself until that moment, and he knew he would never forget it. In a chilling way, it was very much the same sound he had heard the kraken make during their battle two years earlier.

  Kratos took the first massive, lumbering step across the field and his men did likewise. After a handful of steps they were running at a sprint and Nikomedes cradled his javelin over his shoulder, testing its weight in the final moments before his cast.

  Knowing his arm to be stronger and truer than any other in Felix’ army, he also knew that it fell to him to cast first. Before Kratos had actually entered Nikomedes’ maximum range, he timed his cast so that his first javelin would arrive at the outer edge of his range at the same time as Kratos—if he was to be casting javelins from the rear, then he would not waste a single cast on any target but the army’s head.

  He took a pair of hopping steps and launched his javelin. It soared through the air over the open space between the armies and its arc brought it down toward the advancing line of Ice Raiders.

  Nikomedes watched with bitter disappointment when, at the last moment, Kratos veered to the side to avoid the incoming javelin. But the missile took a man behind him in the leg, and he toppled to the ground in a heap before being stampeded by the screaming, undisciplined warriors behind him.

  Determined that his next cast should find its target, he plucked a second javelin from the ground and lined for another throw. This time, the rest of the line cast with him—they had all known that Nikomedes could far outcast any of them, and had wisely waited for his second cast.

  “Cast!” he yelled to the reserves as he took his practiced, hopping steps before launching the second javelin—this one accompanied by over a hundred others.

  Even in the fading light, he tracked his own missile as it hurtled through the air toward Kratos, but just as before Kratos avoided the incoming missile. Nikomedes’ aim had been perfect, but the mammoth warlord had spotted it and adjusted his stance at the last moment to avoid it.

  Like before, a second man was taken—this one in the chest—by Nikomedes’ ‘missed’ javelin. He was stopped in his tracks and dropped his axe, as his hands instinctively clutched at the wound. A moment later he was thrown from his feet by the pressing horde of his rampaging fellows.

  The line of men was still far enough away to allow for another pair of casts, and Nikomedes saw with disappointment that less than one quarter of their javelins had landed true. Most of the hits had been peripheral ones rather than kill shots.

  He took up another long-range javelin and looked down the line of casters. He knew that the next wave would do more damage, but he needed to time their throw to maximize the value of this third, and then their fourth, final cast before the enemy had come to grips with them.

  He silently calculated the speed of the approaching warriors and the distance remaining between them, and held his javelin above his shoulder as he waited for the opportune moment. When it came, he made ready and cried, “Cast!”

  The javelins flew with more uniformity this time, and it appeared that well over half of them would strike their targets. He watched with grim satisfaction as the missiles arced downward in unison, but Kratos inexplicably stopped in his tracks and presented his back, curling up into a kneeling ball on the ground as he did so. His men did likewise, and the hail of javelins came down on the wave of men with punishing force.

  But there was a strange sound—the thunk of metal on wood—and Nikomedes growled in frustration. The enemy had concealed shields strapped to their backs beneath the cat-skin cloaks!

  Still, there was time for one more cast of the light, long-range javelins, and Nikomedes did not allow himself to be deterred. War is won with strategy, tactics and solid execution, not spur of the moment decisions made in frustration, Nikomedes reminded himself silently.

  Taking the same measure of care with this cast, he readied the third, final wave of long-range javelins and when he saw that the other men had done likewise, he bellowed, “Cast!”

  Kratos’ men, who had resumed their charge shortly after the second wave of javelins had landed, once again presented their armored backs to the incoming missiles. It appeared that this volley had even less effect that the previous, but it was of no concern—the next volley would take a terrible toll, regardless of the enemy’s hidden shields.

  The javelins flew true, and again they struck the enemy in their armored backs. A mere second after impact, the wave of Ice Raiders stood and resumed their murderous charge. From this distance, Nikomedes could see the bloodlust in their eyes, and in that moment he thought he understood Felix’ warning about man’s ‘inner beast’ taking control over a man.

  “Piercers!” Nikomedes bellowed, taking up the last, metal-shafted, short-range javelin into his hand. The enemy was not close enough for them to cast their final ammunition, but Nikomedes knew that they would cause untold carnage on the line of Ice Raiders when they finally did fly.

  While they had not done as much damage as Nikomedes had hoped, the javelins had brought the number of standing Ice Raiders down by nearly a quarter—a decisive blow to be sure, especially since Felix’ men still had the shield and spear wall to show their charging enemies.

  As the Ice Raiders closed nearer to melee range, Nikomedes tightened his grip on the metal haft of the piercer javelin and drew over his shoulder. The technique for casting this particular javelin was more about centrifugal power than grace and accuracy—but he still aimed his at Kratos’ chest as his men fanned out in the final moment before impact. In that moment, the Ice Raiders to the front also shed their cat-skin cloaks dropping their heavy, wooden shields to the ground in the process.

  “Cast!” he roared, and the line did as instructed, with only the leading edge of the shield wall refraining. His own piercer javelin lobbed more ponderously than the lighter, wooden-shafted javelins to which he was accustomed, but it flew true toward Kratos.

  The mammoth warlord’s eyes were locked on Nikomedes as the huge man shifted his weight at the last moment, and the piercer took him in—and through—the left flank as it tore a ragged gash in the man’s side, s
omehow piercing through the behemoth’s metal armor.

  The massive Kratos barely seemed to notice the wound as he smashed into the shield wall. Nikomedes looked around to see that nearly fifty men had fallen to the piercers, while as many others had taken wounds similar to Kratos’ but continued onward, which was a true testament to their fortitude.

  Nikomedes drew his sword and gathered up his shield, while the rest of the reservists did likewise, and he waited while the battle unfolded ten meters away.

  He watched as Kratos smashed his hands into the shields in front of him, and only then did Nikomedes realize that Kratos was not unarmed. He wore a massive, metal gauntlet on his right hand with spikes and wicked, hooked barbs adorning its surface. Attached to that gauntlet was a long piece of chain which was connected to a heavy, iron ball with a handle cast into its surface which he swung with vicious, bone-crushing force in his free, left hand. Nikomedes had never seen such an unconventional weapon, but he quickly understood why Kratos had chosen it.

  The first shield which Kratos struck with the massive, iron ball shattered into splinters, and he tore his gauntleted hand across the neck of the man who held the ruined shield. Blood sprayed into the air as the warrior fell to the ground clutching the death wound, and the huge warlord continued his frenzied onslaught as he slammed the iron ball into a nearby soldier’s helmet, cracking his neck with audible ferocity and sending the man to the ground in a boneless heap.

  Kratos kicked out sideways and Nikomedes saw his target’s knee shatter, sending him to the ground. Before he fell, a pair of Ice Raiders leapt onto him and tore his neck and shoulders to pieces with a series of short, ripping axe swipes. They were already into the second line of the shield wall, and Nikomedes knew that it was his duty to reinforce the weakened section of the line, so he pointed his sword to the collapsing section of the wall.

  “Two units to the center!” he bellowed, and a pair of units moved forward to do as he had ordered. Felix had been explicit in his instructions: Nikomedes was to direct the reserves, not charge headlong into the fray—despite his nearly overpowering urge to do so.

  He stole a glance toward the right flank, which appeared to be holding form against the brutal wave of Ice Raiders. His gaze—which, of its own accord, wanted nothing more than to watch the furious Kratos in action—swept down the line until it came to the left flank where Felix was stationed.

  The line there had accepted the charge of Ice Raiders, and unbelievably had driven forward a dozen paces with Felix swinging Glacier Splitter in wide, devastating arcs as he went out before his men’s curving shield line. The Ice Raiders fought for all they were worth, but Glacier Splitter brought a man down with each deadly visit it made to their ranks.

  Nikomedes looked back to the center, where the reinforcements had arrived not a moment too soon. Kratos and his cohorts had already driven through most of the shield wall’s third, final line. The line itself bowed and flexed to avoid breaking entirely, and the reserves pressed forward with their spears thrusting out, scoring hit after hit against the tide of frenzied, barbaric Ice Raiders.

  Nikomedes made eye contact with another pair of reserve commanders. “Two companies: reinforce the center from the middle outward,” he barked, and the two nodded curtly as they ran forward to do as he had bidden. “Two more are to provide support as needed,” he shouted, and another pair of commanders directed their units to the center of the battle. The shield wall was bowed dangerously thin, and if he did not get more bodies in there it would shatter under the weight of the attack.

  Kratos continued his savage onslaught, bringing men down with each thunderous strike of his chained ball, which seemed to shatter anything it struck. It had to weigh at least three stone—maybe closer to four—and Nikomedes knew there was no armor designed by human hands that could defend against such a weapon.

  Kratos’ armor, on the other hand, appeared very nearly impregnable. Spear tips skittered off it, and swords barely seemed to scratch its surface—in fact, the only clean hit had come from Nikomedes’ piercer javelin. But Kratos was the only Ice Raider to be armored in such a fashion, as most of his fellows wore nothing but simple, leather armor.

  In fact, now that Nikomedes took a glance, many of the Ice Raiders now pressing against the center were still wearing their cat-skin cloaks—and there were no shields hidden beneath them. He counted nearly a hundred of them, and they fought with a practiced ferocity like he had only ever seen in his warlord, Felix. They were clearly the elites of the army, and had allowed the regulars to take the brunt of the initial push.

  A flash of movement caught Nikomedes’ eye to the right, and he looked down the shield wall to see that it was beginning to collapse near the flank. He saw a cloaked Ice Raider drive through the back rank of the line, and the reserves sprang into action even before he could direct them to do so.

  Nikomedes gave a long look at the center which, despite Kratos’ devastating onslaught, appeared to be pushing back well enough against his cohorts in this, the initial wave. He reluctantly decided to reinforce the right flank, seeing as the bulk of the reserves were already committed.

  He sprinted thirty yards to the breach in the shield wall and saw that another handful of Ice Raiders had already penetrated the line. The reservists who had already arrived were engaged in a furious, chaotic melee—the exact type of fight the Ice Raiders wanted.

  Roaring in rage, Nikomedes pushed past a pair of his allies and came face to face with one of the cat-skin elites. The man wielded a pair of wickedly barbed axes, which he spun in his hands as he came toward Nikomedes with unbridled fury in his eyes.

  Nikomedes blocked the initial trio of blows with his shield and lunged forward with his sword aimed at the man’s hips. The Ice Raider parried with one of his axes and brought the other up in a vertical arc against Nikomedes’ shield, trying to expose his legs by unbalancing him.

  Nikomedes knew from his countless sparring sessions with Felix—who had employed various weapons during those sessions, including a pair of similar axes—that sacrificing the shield created the quickest path to victory, so he allowed the axe’s power to carry the shield up and out of position while he released his grip on it and lunged forward with his shoulder lowered.

  The Ice Raider was caught momentarily off-guard, and that was all Nikomedes needed to slam into him with enough force to send him backpedaling backward a pair of steps. Before the cat-skin warrior regained his footing, Nikomedes kicked his feet out from under him with a practiced, sweeping motion and no sooner had the Ice Raider had landed on the ground than the sixteen year old plunged his sword into the man’s chest, pinning his spasming body to the ground.

  Nikomedes immediately stomped his foe on the throat with his metal-cleated boots, and was satisfied by the crunching, gurgling noise the Ice Raider made as his dying breath rattled up from his chest.

  Picking up his shield, Nikomedes looked up just in time to see another Ice Raider lunging toward him—this one bearing a much larger, two-handed axe with a long, curved spike opposite the serrated axe-head. The Ice Raider elite brought the huge weapon down toward Nikomedes’ leg, and it was all the younger man could do to throw himself clear of the attack while keeping his feet beneath him.

  Landing on the balls of his feet and quickly regaining his balance, Nikomedes lowered himself into a crouch as the Ice Raider spun the huge weapon—which was nearly the size of Glacier Splitter—over his head and bellowed a challenge as he charged forward.

  Nikomedes had seen Felix perform a similarly foolhardy attack many times—and it had been quite some time since he had learned it was nothing but a feint intended to draw him out of position with an equally foolish thrust at the Ice Raider’s overly exposed midsection. Don’t focus on the axe, he reminded himself calmly, watch the hips.

  He did as he had learned to do, and waited while the man closed the distance between them. When the Ice Raider’s hips flexed as he prepared to pull up short of his brutal, seemingly mindless charge,
Nikomedes saw his opening and he lunged forward with his shield smashing into the man’s chest. The Ice Raider brought the axe’s huge, thick haft down to prevent the shield from smashing into his face, but Nikomedes had seized the initiative and created the opening he needed.

  He slashed across the Ice Raider’s exposed left leg with his sword and then drove forward with all his might. The cat-skin elite’s leg gave out momentarily, and before he could recover his footing Nikomedes brought his sword’s tip up against the bottom of his opponent’s ribcage and drove upward until it emerged from the opposite side of the man’s neck.

  The Ice Raider looked down at Nikomedes in his final moment and Nikomedes saw the furious hatred fade, only to be replaced with something he did not recognize before the man slumped to the ground lifelessly.

  Nikomedes pulled his blade free and heard something whistle past his head. He spun reflexively and saw one of his fellows fall to the ground twitching spasmodically with a curved, bone dagger protruding from his eye socket—a dagger that had likely been meant for Nikomedes.

  He instinctively returned to his crouch and brought the shield up just in time to deflect another dagger from doing the same to him, and that dagger sank deep into his shield. Nikomedes peeked around his shield briefly to see the source of the missile, and narrowed his eyes as he saw the author calmly readying another projectile in his right hand while he held a short sword in his left.

  Nikomedes quickly considered his options, and he tested the weight of his own blade in his hand. His left leg exploded in pain, and he looked down to see one of the daggers protruding from the small opening between his shin bracer and the heavy, armored top of his boot. He tested the ankle briefly and, satisfied that it would still function, he stood tall and brought his sword back.