The Lady in the White Tower
By
UCSBdad
Disclaimer: I own neither towers nor castles. Rating: K Time: In an AU future, or perhaps an AU past.
"Won't do any good." Long Jehan said. "They heard all about Lady Kate and Filstrup. They figure the only reason a mighty sorceress and an army would come this way is to conquer them and make them slaves."
"That's absurd. Can I talk to them?"
Long Jehan shook his head. "I rode out to talk to them under a flag of truce. They told me they'll die rather than let us pass. And they said they won't talk to anyone any more for fear of wizardry."
"Let's go see what we're facing." Castle said and rode off, followed by Lady Kate and Long Jehan.
They arrived at the top of a small rise and saw the enemy arrayed against them.
"There are a damned lot of them." Castle said.
"That there are, Baron. I'd say about twelve hundred horse and two thousand foot, easily."
"Can we just go around them?" Lady Kate asked.
"No. Their warriors have no armor and light weapons. We have armored cavalry with heavy men in heavy armor on big horses. Even our horse archers have some armor, and we have supply wagons, spare horses, families and God knows what else with us. No matter where we went, their horsemen would always get ahead of us and their foot wouldn't be far behind."
"Then we have to fight them?" Castle asked.
"I see no way around it unless Lady Kate has some magic that can move them, or change their minds."
Both men looked at Kate, who just shook her head.
"You have nothing that can help?" Castle asked.
"Nothing. And I cannot watch what happens next." She turned her horse and rode back to her wagons.
Castle took out his binoculars and studied the enemy army.
"I see lots of spears, not all with metal spearheads, and I see swords, but not a lot of bows. They don't seem to be organized very well. Their horse is mixed in with their foot."
"True, Baron Castle. The Ashtandoleans like to get up close when they fight. They think it's a more manly way to fight, and they're organized by clan. Each clan, with their horsemen and foot are grouped together."
"And I think winning is the most manly way to fight." He turned his horse around. "I need to gather my officers and plan the battle."
It took little time for Castle and his officers to plan the battle. They were professional and had done this many times before.
The armored cavalry rode our and stopped a good five hundred yards from the Ashtandoleans. They were only one rank deep so that they very slightly overlapped the Ashtandoleans who were massed together five or six deep.
The horse archers rode out and took their place on the left of the line.
Seeing their enemies get ready for battle, the Ashtandoleans began screaming and shouting their battle cries. The Imperials remained silent.
A blast on a horn started the horse archers moving towards the enemy. But, at two hundred yards from them, they turned and began to ride parallel to the lines of Ashtandoleans. As they trotted past, the three hundred or so archers fired well over a thousand arrows into the mass of the enemy. The unarmored natives suffered greatly. Then the archers turned their horses away and rode back to their own lines.
Castle used his binoculars to check on the enemy. He could see many were wounded and many were dead.
He rode to where his horse archers were stopped, resting their horses, taking a drink, checking their bows and getting replacement arrows.
Castle stood up in his stirrups the better to see and be seen.
"They know our tactics now, so I'm betting they won't just stand there and allow themselves to be shot to pieces. When they see you coming again, they'll come out after you. I want you alive and them dead, so don't worry about running away. In fact, there's nothing I'd like better than to have you draw some of them out. Now, rest your mounts for another five minutes and we'll do it all over again."
This time they didn't just stand there and take it, but their attacks were disjointed and not planned at all. Groups ran out from the Ashtandolean's lines and every horse archer in range shot at them, driving them back. Then another group would charge and be driven back. The net result was than in exchange for hundreds of Ashtandolean casualties, Castle's men suffered three lightly wounded men and one wounded horse.
Castle rode out front and studied the enemy with his binoculars. Then he rode back.
"I can see what I take to be their officers, war chiefs, or whatever, trying to organize them. I think this time when our archers charge, they'll all countercharge. That's when I'll turn loose the armored cavalry. You've done this before, so you all know what to do."
The men cheered. They knew exactly what to do.
The Ashtandolean's charge was better organized this time, but not by much. Because their horsemen and foot soldiers were all mixed together, the horsemen couldn't deliver a hard hitting charge and the foot kept getting slowed down by running into the horses.
Castle's horse archers rode out only a few yards in front of the rest of the cavalry. The archers fired as fast as they could which caused the approaching mob to start to break up. Some headed for the flanks, some stopped, some dropped back and a few brave men charged ahead to reach the archers who were tormenting them.
Baron Castle put himself at the head of a column of armored cavalry that was ten horsemen wide and thirty deep. He led them to the right and then charged at full speed into the flank of the Ashtandoleans. A few horses were brought down and their riders killed, but most smashed through the enemy ranks, shattering them. The Ashtandoleans turned and ran. Those that could still run.
Castle's regiment chased them for a mile or so and then Castle brought his men to a halt.
"Enough killing for one day."
As he rode back, he saw Lady Kate riding towards him. Her face was pale and she looked straight ahead, not looking at the carnage all around her.
"Baron Castle, you will gather up all of the wounded, all of them and bring them to me. My ladies and I will tend the wounded of both sides."
Castle nodded. "I'll have Brother Ryan assist you. He also has a few men and women who've assisted him in the past. They'll do what they can, but there is little hope for many of those men."
"Needless to say, I will do my best."
"Do you have any magic that can help them?"
She shook her head. "No magic, but I do know a few things."
They stayed near the battlefield for five days. Lady Kate and her ladies and Brother Ryan and his people worked day and night tending the wounded. Lady Kate did seem to know a few things, because a dozen or more men that Brother Ryan said were beyond saving did live. But hundreds died, almost all were Ashtandoleans.
On the sixth day they began moving again.
By the eleventh day, those Ashtandoleans who had survived were judged by Lady Kate to be capable of going back to their people. She gathered them around her and spoke.
"You are alive because I and my people tended to your wounds. We did not ask to fight you and we did not come to your lands to enslave you or take anything from you. We came in peace and you offered us only war. I want you to return to your people and tell them of how you were treated by me and my people. If and when we come this way again, I sincerely hope we will be met peacefully."
The senior surviving chief thanked Lady Kate and promised that when she returned, all would be peaceful.
They crossed the seemingly endless prairie for another two weeks and hardly saw a soul. Scouting parties would occasionally see a rider or two on the horizon, but they would quickly ride off.
Lady Kate wanted to know why they came no closer.
"They've heard about us. They've heard about you, mostly. Oh, they know what you said to the Ashtandoleans and they know how we patched up their wounded. They also know how many of them we killed. Now maybe we're good people and the Ashtandoleans just made a dumb mistake, but they've decided that it'd be better for them to stay well away from us." Long Jehan laughed. "Now we don't have to hand over any steel weapons and tools to anyone to cross their lands, and we can send hunting parties out for longhorn deer and qualtas, which are good eating. On the downside, we don't get any news about what may be ahead and we can't trade for things like fish or vegetables and fruits. But, on the whole, we're doing good."
"Is there anything ahead that we'd want to know about?" Castle asked.
Long Jehan shrugged. "There's always news that's good to know. In another week, we'll be at the Ershtabula River. Big old river it is, too. Probably ain't in flood, but it'd be nice to know what the water level is like, or if any fish are running. We'll have to make rafts to get across, most likely and it'd be nice to have some river folks around to help. We can build 'em by ourselves if we have to, of course."
They got to the river and found that that the banks were covered in forests, several miles wide on either side of the river. The water level was reasonably low, but they'd still need rafts and boats to cross. The river was just too wide to try to swim the horses across.
There were also villages of river folk along the banks of the river. They had heard both good and bad about the newcomers, but generous gifts of swords and spearheads, as well as axes and saws as well as other steel tools quickly make them quite friendly. They began at once to help the newcomers build rafts and boats to cross the river.
Castle had no knowledge of boat building and found he had little to do. One day, he decided to take a walk through the woods to see what there was to see.
All at once a huge hand covered his mouth. "Lady Katherine is in deadly peril. We must rescue her." A voice growled in his ear.
It took him a second to realize the hand that covered his mouth was furry, with black and white stripes.
"Lotus? You can talk?"
"Obviously, Baron Castle. Now get on my back. We need to save Lady Katherine."
As odd as the situation was, Castle pulled himself up on the tigery's back and they went off through the woods.
"What kind of danger is she in?"
"A group of outcasts, bandits, have pushed her into a stand off poison vines. She's a very strong human being, but eventually, she'll he helpless and they'll have her."
"Is there some reason you couldn't help? Did you have to go find me?"
"Humans can stand dozens, even hundreds of strikes by the vines, my race can stand one or two before we collapse and another one or two before we die."
Castle could hear voices ahead and Lotus stopped and let him off. "They're just behind those bushes. We'll both attack. You'll need to grab Lady Kate. Leave the others to me."
As they burst through the bushes, Castle took in what was happening. Four shabbily dressed outlaws were using the butts of their spears to push Kate back into the vines. The vines were moving rapidly and every time Kate came within range, a vine snapped out and struck her with some kind of thorn at the end of the vine. He could see that Kate was bleeding from dozens and dozens of small cuts, but was starting to stagger.
TBC