.45 Caliber Soul

Chapter 9 – The Tower of the Wolf

There was once a road from the floor of the pass up to the Tower of the Wolf. It was overgrown with brush and weeds, and suffering from deferred maintenance, but we could still use it. The tower was a small keep, originally about three or four stories tall, but partially collapsed, and about fifty feet in diameter, with a courtyard that was enclosed by a wall maybe thirty feet high. The hillside it sat on was extremely steep. The courtyard was between the tower and the slope of the mountain, and the road ran uphill along the wall to a gate on the hill side of the enclosure.

Clever design, that. An attacker could try to scale the tower on the downhill side, but only if he has six-story scaling ladders. If he decides to go around to the back to try and force the gate, he parades past three sides of the outer wall on his way there, with people dropping arrows and boiling oil on him the whole way, and then there's not enough space between the hill and the gate to get a really good start with the battering ram. With a half-decent garrison, it's near impregnable for any army not equipped with howitzers or A-10s.

Behind us, the cavalry and the thunderstorm rolled up the valley together. The storm clouds had that nasty look they get in tornado weather. The gloom made the approaching cavalry look pretty menacing in its own right.

Well, at least they didn't have howitzers or A-10s. Too bad we didn't have a garrison—or an A-10 of our own.

The gate was weakened by age, but still enough on its hinges that we could sort of close it behind us. The bad guys could open it right back up, but they'd have to dismount to do it.

The courtyard was maybe thirty yards square. It had once had some wooden buildings in it along the walls, but they'd long ago collapsed. The door to the keep still worked. It wouldn't slow the bad guys down for long, but every little bit helps.

The keep had a heavy wood door which was partially rotted, but still swung on its hinges, and could be blocked from the inside with some scrap timber. Inside, there was a single chamber with a high ceiling. There was a narrow slit in the wall to either side of the entrance so archers could harass anyone trying to force the door. Along the back wall, there was a stone stairway leading up to the second floor. It was full of junk; old piles of wood and what might have once been rags. Upstairs was more of the same; lucky for us the floor was still sound when I walked across it. There was another open chamber, and on the other side, a short ladder and an opening leading to the parapet. The fourth floor had collapsed in on the third, so this was as high as you could go.

I went out on the parapet and looked down the valley. The bad guys were three or four minutes out. That was all the time we had to get ready.

The plan, as plans go, was pretty simple. The cavalry wouldn't have scaling ladders, and I doubted that too many of them were handy enough with a rope to rock-climb the walls. That meant they were coming through the gate, and that let us take advantage of the fact that this place was designed to defend against an assault on the gate. Raphael and I were going up on the wall, on the side they'd have to pass to get to the gate, since we had all the firearms. When the cav came up the road, he and I would potshot them from the walls for as long as it was worthwhile to do so, then retire into the keep. Sister Nadeza and the kids were on the second floor, out of the way, so the first floor was a free-fire zone. Raphael, Xianghua, and Mitsurugi up front, engaging the hostiles with swords once they forced the door. Me and the .45, we were the second layer. Talim, at the base of the steps, was the reserve, ready to stop the ones that get through the first two layers.

I had no illusions about this; someone's going to get through, and there's going to be friendly casualties. There's too may of them and not enough of us.

We crouched behind the parapet. It got darker and darker, like deep twilight. The sky was positively nasty. Solid overcast, and I'd swear the clouds were olive green. Not gray; green.

Over the noise of the wind, I heard the sound of horses. I looked over the wall. The bad guys were maybe fifty yards off, moving deliberately up the old road to the castle.

"Get ready," I told Raphael. "Open fire at thirty yards." He nodded.

I was hiding behind one of the crenellations in the castle wall, the .45 at the ready. I had a full magazine, with an extra round in the chamber. "They are close," Raphael said.

I sneaked a peek around the edge of the stonework. They were just about there:

"Let's roll!"

I'm around the corner and aiming at the center of a mass of guys on horseback. It's so gloomy now I can't see individual targets, and I really don't need to. Just aim for the center; I'll hit something.

I let off eight rounds, fast as I can without throwing off my aim. Raphael gets off a shot with the musket and he ducks back behind the wall reloading. Soon as the slide locks I'm back behind the wall myself. I hear shouts, screams, horses in pain.

I slap in another magazine, move over one space and come back up. The cav has recovered from the surprise, and they're double-timing it up to the gate. A couple of them return fire with pistols. I get off another four or five shots, and Raphael gets in another round of his own, before the range is longer than I like.

So far, we're doing good. There's some dark shapes lying on the road, and a riderless horse milling around.

I can hear them working on the main gate now. There's no parapet on the inner face of the wall, and I don't want to be out here with no cover, so I signal Raphael to get inside and downstairs.

A moment later, I'm inside. Raphael's got the musket slung and he's halfway down the steps. Citrad is in the middle of the room, with a piece of timber in his hands, nervously watching the stairway. Give the kid credit, he's got the right instincts.

I look back to see if I'm being followed. Great. I hadn't thought about the hostiles coming in along the wall until now, and I don't have anyone I can assign to flank security except an eleven-year old kid with a two-by-four. "Over here," I called to him. "Watch this way; if you see bad guys coming along the wall, you yell real loud."

He nods. To the steps I go; I do a tactical reload on the way downstairs, swapping out my partially-loaded magazine for a full one. Counting the one in the chamber, I'm back to eight rounds.

The bad guys are banging on the main door with some sort of battering ram. Mitsurugi and Xianghua are back from the door about ten feet, swords ready. Raphael is looking out the right-hand firing slit with the musket ready. The bad guys back off for another run and he shoots. He starts to reload, but before he gets very far he suddenly spins back away from the slit, back up against the wall. A second later, someone fires a pistol in through the slot.

"Stay clear," I tell him. The door is splintering; they'll be through on the next try. Raphael puts the musket down and draws his rapier. I move a little to the right, off-axis from the doorway. Xianghua sees where I am, moves left herself to clear the field of fire.

Here they come again.

The door finally gives out, and a large, timeworn timber surges into the room, carried by a team of six men. They weren't expecting it to give quite so soon, so they're off balance as they come in, and the lead guy on the near side trips on some debris.

I've got as good a sight picture as I'm going to get. I put two rounds into the middle guy on the near side. Raphael swings his rapier around and cuts the legs out from under the third one; just as quick, he's out and around in a fighting stance, ready for whoever is coming behind the battering ram guys.

Xianghua gives the lead guy on the far side a flying kick to the upper body, tumbling him back onto the timber, then follows up with her sword.

Mitsurugi brings his katana around in a swirl and takes the other two guys on that side down.

There's a whole squad coming in behind the battering ram, and I send the other six rounds out the door at them. Two or three go down; it's hard to tell in all the confusion. Slide-lock; time to reload. Sure hope I grabbed a full magazine, and not the one that's only partly filled.

Xianghua is engaging the last of the battering ram guys, and Mitsurugi and Raphael are jamming the rest up in the doorway.

"Seamus!" I hear Citrad yell from upstairs. "There are men on the wall!"

Time to commit the reserves. I look over at Talim. "Get upstairs; I'm right behind you."

Talim takes the steps two at a time, whipping out her blades as she goes. I slap in a fresh magazine and thumb the release; the slide returns to battery.

I reach the top of the steps, and Talim has the first bad guy engaged. He's got a cavalry saber, and he's expecting a European-style swordfight; Talim is showing him something completely different. She double-punches at him from just beyond arm's reach, flipping her blades at him at the end of each stroke. The first one is in the guy's face; it misses, but he flinches and gives her an opening, and she steps in and around the sword and nails him square in the chest with the second blade. She's better than I thought.

Second bad guy is coming at Citrad, who's backed away from the door, trying to ward the baddie off with his two-by-four. I bring the .45 up and engage him; two shots; he's down.

Another one has jumped in at Talim. She swings one leg around in a flying side kick that knocks him into the wall, then finishes him with a vicious slash from one of her blades.

Next bad guy is at the door; I get off a couple of rounds and he falls back and away.

I see movement at the door. Another shot; don't know if I hit or not.

Someone fires a pistol into the room. I hear Talim squeal, and she collapses.

The next guy jumps in, and he's huge. Taller than me, with a wild shock of blonde hair and the body of an NFL linebacker, he's obviously the leader of the detachment. He's wearing some sort of armor that doesn't look quite right for the Thirty Years War. In his left hand is the pistol he shot Talim with; in his right, what ought to be a two-handed sword, but he's using it one-handed and making it look easy.

He takes a step toward Citrad and the other kids, then looks back at Talim and starts to raise his sword like he's going to finish her off. "Hey, loser!" I yell. He decides to come straight at me.

I shoot him. Twice.

He's not slowing down. I don't know if the armor stopped the rounds, or if he's just really determined to chop me in half.

Another shot, another hit, and he's still not slowing down; he's close enough I almost couldn't miss if I wanted to. That sword of his is swinging over his head and down toward mine.

I put the last round into him and dodge to the side. The sword misses my left arm by a good inch or so.

He knocks me sideways with his shoulder and lunges to the top of the steps, then collapses and tumbles down.

Reload, back to the doorway. There's a bad guy looking in; he sees me sighting in on him and he ducks away.

I darted over to where I could see out the door. The bad guy was in retreat, bailing off the wall as fast as he could. All I could hear was a couple of the little kids crying. Couldn't blame them for that.

I went over to the steps; Xianghua was standing over the big blond guy, pointing her sword at his neck in case he had any ideas about getting up. It was pretty obvious, though, that he wouldn't be getting up again, ever.

"You guys okay down there?" I asked. Xianghua nodded. She looked unhurt, which was a relief.

"They have retreated," Mitsurugi called to me.

I turned around and went to check on Talim. She was sitting on the floor, clutching at her left arm, which was bleeding, and trying not to cry. Citrad was standing over her, wanting to do something.

I knelt down beside her. The pistol shot had ripped a nice gash across her upper arm. It was ugly and probably hurt like hell, but there was no arterial bleeding and no fragments stuck in her that I could see. "You're gonna be fine, princess," I told her. I had some gauze patches in my first aid kit, but this wound was too big for those. "Get me a blanket or something," I directed Citrad.

He was back momentarily with one of the little kids' blankets. Wasn't exactly hospital-grade sterile, but it would have to do. I got out my knife and started cutting it into several patches about six inches square and a strip to tie around her arm. The kids were gathering around, worried about Talim and curious what was going on.

I fished the Neosporin out of my pocket first-aid kit. I wiped off the wound with a piece of the blanket and squirted some of the ointment on. I slapped one of the cloth patches over it and pressed down. "Here, one of you . . . Rickena,here, hold this on here. Put pressure on it . . . that's a girl, that's what stops the bleeding, keep pushing."

I stowed the ointment. "What is that?" Georg asked.

"It's . . . stuff that helps it heal faster." I wasn't quite up to explaining the germ theory of disease right then.

"It's soaking through," Rickena complained.

I handed her another piece of the blanket. "Here—no, don't pull the other one off, put this over it and keep pressing. Reinforce, don't replace." I got a strip of blanket long enough to go around Talim's arm twice. "Okay, now, you keep holding that there while I tie this on."

"So you are a physician also?" It was Raphael, standing somewhere behind me.

I tied the strip in a nice square not, just like I learned in Scouts. "No, this is just basic first aid. How you holding up, Talim?"

"It hurts," she complained.

"It's gonna," I said. "I think I can give you something for the pain here in a minute." I was pretty sure there were some Advils in the first aid kit somewhere. I looked her straight in the eyes. "By the way, you did good."

She looked over at the corpse of one of the guys she'd been fighting, then back at me. I knew what she was feeling; it was just what I'd felt after my first engagement. It's a complicated emotion, a mixture of guilt and relief and bravado and mourning, and count yourself blessed if you never have to experience it.

I looked back at Raphael. He was standing a couple of steps below the top, with Xianghua right behind him.

The next thing I knew, the room was awash in a bright purple-orange light, flooding in from the courtyard and from the room below. It was the same light I'd seen on my little reconnaissance the night before.

Whatever it was, it was coming in through the front door.

. . . to be continued . . .