Golden Sword

Chapter 17

A brilliant sun arose in the east and in doing so triggered the chain of events so crucial to the humans it illuminated. It had taken the Paradisians twelve days to complete the ramps and siege towers. Drumont castle had already lasted one day longer than Crown Point, but Keika was determined that it would last much longer than that. Everyone in both camps knew this was the day, the beginning of the assault. Their army was deployed for the attack. Thousands of men waited on all three sides of the castle. Standing between Jack and Valerie, Keika watched as the enemy sounded a bugle call for attack and the men carrying assault ladders began to march forward. The loaded siege towers started to groan and creak up the slopes. In their support the four trebuchets were now hurling large stones at the castle. They were not large enough to damage the thick walls, but near hits on the battlement shattered stone into flying shrapnel, killing and maiming when the shots fell close enough to defenders. Jack's trebuchets began to fire back in response, but their targets were the lurching towers.

To shorten building time, the outside of the approaching towers had been covered in wicker and layers of fresh animal hides. Keika had noted that this same method had been used at Crown Point. Normally they should have been covered in more substantial wood planks and animal hides, but that building method was more costly and took more time. Wicker and layered hides were proof against arrows, so the enemy thought the men inside should be adequately protected. Fresh hides prevented fire arrows from catching the structure on fire, as they only smoldered and would not generally burn. But these walls were not proof against missile fire from the ballistae that Keika had ordered Jack to build. A ballista is essentially a powerful, oversized version of the crossbow. It can hurl a large, heavy, bodkin tipped bolt, or a hefty sized round stone, up to five hundred yards away. They were mounted on a stand and swivel on the higher walls and castle towers.

Critically, these were very special ballistae. Once firearms faded from use and the switch had been made back to muscle powered warfare, Otani scientists and technicians had worked for seven years to perfect a legendary siege machine, the repeating ballistae, otherwise known as a polybolos. The Otani designed machines were able to shoot ten bolts a minute and used a wooden magazine system that could be replaced in seconds. For this time in history, they were a revolutionary weapon.

The crews had managed to complete sixteen of them, which worked out perfectly to four per siege tower. In order to avoid detection, they had been covered with tarps and could not be identified from a distance. The Princess knew they would come as a nasty surprise to the men inside those groaning towers, but she wanted their attackers close when the defenders opened up on them with everything they had, to maximize use of the kill zone.

Unlike at Crown Point, however, this time they had built those towers with a crenulated top that held about fifty archers each. These men would be able to fire down upon the defenders as the towers were almost at their goal. They would have to be neutralized before the ballistae were revealed. She could see a mix of the dark brown uniforms of the enhanced archers as well as the light brown of regular bowmen. Already, at about one hundred yards, those archers were beginning to fire on the defenders. Keika had previously issued orders that when the enemy's missile fire started everyone was to take cover, except for her archers, which were to keep up a harassing fire and hide between shots. To their opponents, that made them appear weak and vulnerable......which is what she wanted.

This course of events continued until the towers were within seventy five yards of the castle. Keika turned to Valerie and said, "Ok, let's go......and be careful, move after every shot. Don't let them draw a bead on you." Val laughed at her concern. "Don't worry Kei, I know what to do." and started for the north wall, Keika took the south. Baskets of arrows lined all three walls for use by any friendly archer. Joining the archers she had assigned to this wall, she began to target the archers packed onto the tops of those towers. Their level still below the wall she was on, so she was looking down on them, and could hardly miss even if she tried. On the main western wall she had left a number of handpicked Mercedian archers to start the attack on the towers facing them. They were not as good as either of the girls, but they were still quite skilled. At her word they all stood and began to fire at once. On her side, and she knew on Val's side, they started to drop immediately. Those wearing dark brown were targeted first. They had some protection, but not all of them were able to hide due to the angle of attack and they died in scores. Despite men dying all about them, her foes tried their best to respond, but they were unable to detect incoming missiles like she could. All she had to do was step out of the way. Within minutes Keika and her fellow bowmen had been able to kill everyone on top of the southern tower, but those engines of war continued to creep up to the walls.