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"Their what?" I interrupted. He gave me that certain withering look you give to dumbasses who make your life more difficult.
"Gharashni. The scaly flying bird things that the Nazgul ride."
"Thank you, continue."
"They mounted their Gharashni and went haring after them. While they were in pursuit, the Grey Walker himself sallied and drove them off. Non-fatally, of course. "
Well, shit, Sapper, I kinda gathered that from the rumors. "Is there any perspective you can give us as to the fight itself? Are we in danger of being outclassed on the magical side of things?"
Sapper looked haunted for a moment, like he was contemplating a horrible future that he can foresee but not change. "Maybe. It's complicated."
"Put it in layman's terms."
Sapper scowled. "Layman's terms. I swim in the very currents of the universe, manipulating the fabric of reality, and he wants layman's terms. Alright. Imagine you're a swordsman, right?"
"I am a swordsman. I am literally wearing my sword right now."
Another withering look, like I'm the one who said something dumb. "Imagine you're a swordsman. You spend your whole life perfecting your technique, improving your strength and building up stamina. You study all the great fencers and learn several different schools of fighting, eventually finding one that seems to match your strengths. You hone yourself almost as a living blade, swift and sharp and sure. There is no greater swordsman in the world than you, you follow?"
The hell? "Of course."
Sapper leaned back and smiled. "Now imagine you have your sword taken from you and have to enter an unarmed martial arts contest, and if you lose, you die. You follow?"
The hell? "Not even slightly."
"In that analogy, the swordsman is the Nazgul, okay? They are all strongly tainted with the Power, a taint that's been expanded by those damn rings of theirs, and they've had millenium to hone their talent even further. But the Grey Walker, he's not even a sorceror. Did you know that? There wasn't even the slightest hint of the Power when he drove off the Nazgul. But he was packing something, wasn't he? He must have some source other than the Poles of Power. And we none of us can imagine what."
"That other source being the... martial arts thing, right?"
"That was a bad analogy. Ignore it. What we have here is two separate and opposed schools of power duking it out. It won't be which side has the biggest magical muscles, it'll be which side trumps the other, and until they get down and dirty and sort it out no one knows how it'll turn out. Imagine a game of tonk where you bet all the money you have and you're not allowed to look at your cards. You just have to decide when to go down blind and hope your cards are lower."
"...what?"
"Another bad analogy." Sapper shrugged. "Well. I can't dumb it down any further without starting to drool all over myself, so you'll just have to take it at that." Sapper smiled the smile of a man who has confused someone dumber than himself and wandered away to the mess hall.
Gods, wizards are weird.
We're all sure that tomorrow's the day, although nothing official has trickled down. We make the necessary preparations- we seek out the smiths and have new edges put on our blades, we shake out any rust in our armor, we test our crossbow strings for slackness. We neurotically account for every spare dagger or pair of brass knuckles we have, and check and recheck that each strap and buckle is working right. When the stakes of the game are your life, you better believe you'll obsess over doing everything that's in your power. Each man has a suit of chain mail, a helmet, a spear, a sword, and a shield, except for the crossbowmen, who have small axes or a kukri for back-up. Each item is as close to battle ready as human effort can bring it.
Every Company man draws lots, and ten men are selected at random to guard the Annals while we are in combat. The Lieutenant and I find a nice, deserted building to store them in. We think it used to be a nobleman's house, because before the uruks looted and trashed the place it must have looked marvelous. Despite the mess and graffiti and blood on the walls, it was still a nice place. It's a shame I have no interest or knowledge of architecture, because if I did, I think this place would blow me away. The whole city is like that- a stone garden of tranquility and dignity, brought low by war and disaster.
We put our ten chosen men in what used to be a wine cellar, gave them official charge of the Annals, and locked the door from the inside. If nothing survives except the Annals, the Standard, and one man with breath in his lungs, the Black Company will march again.
The darkness of night- it's even darker than usual from all the sorcerous crap in the air from the Witch-king's spell. My squad isn't detached from the main force anymore; we'll be fighting with brothers guarding our backs for the first time in a long time. We're stationed at the northernmost bridge, ready to cross the river once the uruks peel open the defenses.
I'm glad we're not the ones in the boats. If something goes wrong, they'll be sitting ducks.
Someone behind me whispers a query to his neighbor. Almost before he's finished Bullet is at his side.
"Goddamnit, Shaggy," I hear Bullet hiss. The man has a whisper like a dragon's breath. "If this plan goes belly-up because you can't keep your mouth shut, I will break every bone in your body. Did you not hear the Lieutenant order everyone to shut the fuck up?"
"Sorry, Sarge."
"What's that in your hand?"
"Nothing, Sarge."
"Open your hand. Is that a pipe? Were you going to light up that fucking pipe now?"
"Wasn't gonna smoke it, Sarge."
"Are you retarded, Shaggy? Is that it? Give me that fucking hashish. You're on charge, Shaggy, and you better be thankful I caught you before you really fucked things up."
I swap glances with Saintly, who's next to me on the line. We both choke back laughter, because it's always funny until it happens to you.
The uruks down on the shore are bringing out the boats. From here, they are looking mighty fragile, but I have faith that what the Captain plans works right. If he reckons the boats won't spill or sink...
No sign that other team is wise to us yet. I grip and regrip my spear shaft, trying to find a spot where my hand won't slip off. My shield is getting heavy and we haven't even moved yet. How am I going to keep it up once I get into the thick of it?
"And the little bastards are... off," Saintly breathes. If Bullet had heard him... but Bullet is on the left rear ranks and Saintly and I are front and to the right. Saintly knows when it's safe to mouth off- it's a talent of his that none of the rest of us can quite imitate.
The boaters are floating softy across the Anduin, as slick as you please. They occasionally put oar to water to maintain their speed or to keep from drifting downstream, but otherwise they are running silent. Our luck is holding; none of the defenders are crying out, there is no rain of missiles, no clank of armed men taking positions. They enter the designated killzone, where any archers on the rooftops can shoot straight down into the boats with no protection offered by the wooden rims of the boats.
Nothing. Not so much as a harsh word from the defenders of Osgiliath.
We all grin to each other in silence. None of us have any objection to an anticlimax like that.
The boats touch the western shore and still no response. From our elevated position, the boats are just dark blobs discharging crouched silhouettes. The second wave of boats takes off from our end. Even if the other side catches on and starts fighting back this exact instant, they can't possibly stop this wave from reaching the beachhead.
The plan is to establish a secure front on the western side, then expand it to include the bridges. Once the bridges are ours, our sneaky little steel plates will let the rest of us in.
Shouts! Metallic clashes, screams of pain, of bloodlust, of primal fear being fed into the fires of rage. The other side has finally woken up. It doesn't matter. We have our beachheads, the battle is ours.
The uruks are assaulting the Gondorian positions on our bridge from the rear, where they're vulnerable. Judging from the sound of battle, the uruks are getting their noses bloodied. Say what you will about the Gondorian army, they know how to fight a war. On the defensive, fighting as unit, they are curb-stomping our boys, not yielding an inch. On the other hand, we can trade up ten dead uruks for one wounded Gondorian and still win the battle by a comfortable margin.
Bullet whispers, somehow loud enough for everyone to hear. "They're distracted. Now."
Our three trolls, who are hauling our thirty foot plate, trot heavily towards the broken bridge ahead of us. We all crowd up behind what cover there is and wait for them to do their thing.
A couple dozen Gondorians see us and holler a warning as the trolls hurl the plate across the bridge. The trolls die quickly but valiantly, shot in the eyes by sure-sighted archers and hamstrung by the swordsmen, but by that time we've already advanced across the bridge, shields raised high and interlocked. Crossbowmen on the roofs above us are sniping any Gondorian who shows his face. The other team is double flanked, run ragged and outclassed, and they know it too.
And yet, as a unit they escape mostly intact. In a display of courage and professionalism that comes close to our own standards, they make a concerted rush at the uruks, who break like a sand castle getting a crossbow quarrel through it. The other team is through the gap and on the streets before we can catch more than a handful of them.
Our bridge is taken, the enemy is rooted out, and we suffered only minimal casualties. And yet, it feels somehow like we got outplayed here.
"Did you see that tall fellow in charge?" I ask Aya Bastard, slightly out of breath from the quick march in armor.
"The guy with the long dark hair?"
I nodded. "I think that was the guy the Nazgul were chasing before. Can't be sure, but..."
"Yeah, I was thinking that. We'd have gotten the lot if it weren't for him. Son of a bitch." It was true. That fucker was born to command. I didn't think they had a chance at breaking out, not under attack from both sides.
All along the river front, it was the same story. Chaos followed by clashes of our boys and theirs, then a fast but dignified Gondorian retreat to the western edge of the city, and from there to the wall around the Pelennor fields. We move forward, in case an enemy unit decides to stay for a last stand. None do, which makes our task a lot easier.
There are comparatively few bodies in Gondorian black and silver, whereas there are small mountains of uruks lying around. The other team's armor is really making the difference when it comes to confused brawling. We paid a steep price for this small victory, but then, we can afford it. And it would have been a hell of a lot worse if we tried to rush the bridges. They probably lost seven hundred men all figured, and we, ten times that many. Still a net gain for us.
Bullet sends Sapper out ahead to do some good, which meant I am sent out again with my special squad. We prowl the streets like thugs at midnight, looking for trouble. Where we find it, Sapper works his mojo and the trouble dissolves like sugar candy. These Gondorians have no conception of how to counter small unit sorcery. Forward momentum is maintained.
For the first time in three and a half years, the Black Company picked up a new recruit.
It was after the rush of uruks drove the Gondorians out. The Witch-king wanted to savage them good before they got back to the walls of Minas Tirith, so he pressed the chase hard, harder than he should have. Once the retreat crossed the wall into the Pelennor fields, the Gondorian cavalry, previously dismissed as being too small to worry about, counter attacked to cover their comrades' retreat. My squad got to watch four hundred armored knights pulp about 2,000 uruks caught on open ground in loose formation. It was like watching a heavyweight take the ring with a featherweight, except the featherweight wasn't allowed to block. I don't think the other team lost so much as thirty men, while no more than three hundred uruks made it back to the safety of the city. The only good news was that the Witch-king managed to stick the Gondorian commander with a poisoned dart before getting driven off by the Grey Walker again. Someone had better figure out a way to scrag that old man before the Nazgul get trashed again. After watching the brief debacle, me and my squad skipped on back to the river where our rendezvous point was. On the way we saw a small company of uruks trying to smash down an oak door.
We were in no particular hurry, so we stopped and watched.
There was this big ornate building, clearly another nobleman's house like the one we were keeping our Annals in. Real spacious and elegant. As they splintered the door and rushed inside, we heard screams and shouts from within.
"Looks like a couple of them boys got cut off from the retreat," Reader remarked. We all mumbled agreement.
Another scream, louder than and higher than the snarls of the uruks. A woman was inside. We all froze, unsure of how we stand.
Company tradition forbids the usual custom in war of raping women. We can even pinpoint at what part of our history we adopted our unorthodox attitude- the Book of Tobo describes the draconian levels of punishment that Captain Lady resorted to in order to stop the practice. Lady used to be our employer- sort of the Lidless Eye of her day. She knew how to force people to quit their habits- there's the heated blade, the spike, the crucifix... At 85 years of leadership, she was the longest lasting Captain we've ever had, and she left an indelible mark on Company practice. You do not rape in the Black Company. Full stop. There will always be rankers who try and often succeed in getting away with a bit of involuntary seduction, but official policy is to hang them when caught.
However, tradition is much hazier on whether we are obligated to intervene to save a woman from our allies. There is precedent, but no requirement.
I catch my boys' eyes one by one to gauge their reactions. I've known these men for most of a decade- fought with them, slept by their sides, lived with them day after day for years. I know them better than most men know their own brothers. I can usually tell what's going on inside them.
Blink doesn't care. He's tired, sore, and has an arrow head in his chainmail rubbing into his side. He just wants to go back to the rendezvous point and lie down and hibernate.
Reader looks concerned, like he heard some bad news but isn't sure whether it affects him. Whether we intervene or walk away, he'll back either option.
Spike and Bop are agitated. If they didn't have self-discipline, they'd be whipping out their longswords and rushing the company of uruks right now, chopping and slashing in perfect unison. I found out later that they had had a sister who was snatched from them when they were children, before they ever took up arms. Theirs was the rage of love soured.
Saintly is, and there's no other word I can think of that fit him better, cold. He's standing stock-still, staring at the uruks, breathing under complete control. I can't figure out if he's so enraged he's almost at the bursting point, or if he's as utterly indifferent as he looks.
Sapper's just spent half an hour shooting fireballs at people, so he's at peace with the world. He's not at all concerned about the woman, but I think he'll take any excuse to get into another scrap.
And for myself? Do I take my ethical cues from my surroundings, a moral chameleon? Or did I have an unbreakable moral code that was forcing me to take a stand? I can't say exactly. The Black Company teaches us that good and evil are relative, depending entirely on which side of the fight you're on. One man's hero is another man's monster. Drawing a line in the sand and declaring that only your side is right is stupid and pointless. Honor exists only between ourselves, so we do not rob, betray or abandon our brothers. Outside of ourselves, honor consists of following our contract and not breaking faith with the client. The Company has been mother and father to me, and like the good son I adopt its values. But...
Damn it, you try listening to a woman's screams for mercy and try to tell yourself that there's no such thing as objective good. Your solid, dependable sense of moral ambiguity tends to fall apart at the oddest times.
My stance on the matter is, I want to help. But I wasn't going to get involved unless my brothers would back me up. From what I could tell, at least five of them would. So we saved the woman.
The uruks had dragged her out in the street. She was kicking and hollering and her eyes were wide with fear and horror. Judging by the smell of the place, and the fact that we heard only screams and no telltale clashing of steel from inside, this had been the field hospital. Wounded men, noncombatants. The woman was presumably a nurse, or possibly a doctor, depending on whether Gondorian culture tolerated that sort of thing. The wholesale slaughter of the wounded didn't bother us- killing your enemies when they couldn't fight back was another long-held Company tradition. It's odd- we've encountered several cultures on our long march north that regard the sexual exploitation of woman as a cultural norm, yet would regard slaying an unarmed man as unspeakably vile. If I had been raised there instead of further south, I might now be sending in my boys to save the Gondorians and ignoring the woman. Which frankly is where the black and white morality falls apart.
I don't know what they were going to do with her- ravish her or torture her or what- but I am proud to say they never got a chance. On my command, Blink puts a quarrel through the chief uruk's forehead. Spike and Bop yelp their bizarre war-cries and leaped in immediately, carving up three of them. Spike covers his twin while Bop hauled the woman to her feet and they beat a hasty and triumphant retreat while me, Saintly and Reader shield-bash a couple of uruks who try to rush us to avenge their friends. It happens so quickly that Sapper doesn't even have time to uncork something nasty on them, so he entertains himself by giving a couple of them a magical hotfoot. How he howls with glee watching them hop around trying to extinguish their flaming ironshod feet...
Well, as you can imagine, this does not go over well. But then, we were better fighters and we had a wizard.
"What's your name, lass?"
She doesn't answer. She's a young thing, couldn't be much more than eighteen. Long brown hair; heart-shaped pale face; a gory apron covering up a simple light-blue dress; tanned hands callused from a lifetime of work. She wasn't no nobleman's daughter, not with hands like that. She's staring dully at the shouting uruks, sometimes lifting her gaze to the hospital that was being converted to a charnel house. She doesn't seem to hear me. More uruks are coming, drawn by their comrades' cries. Our situation is deteriorating rapidly- what the fuck had I been thinking? My little special squad is outnumbered ten to one, and more uruks are coming while we stand and jaw.
"Lass. We're going to fucking die here unless your mouth starts running. What's your name?"
She looks at me, and dear gods, she's like something out of the legends. In olden days, nobler men might well have battled through hell for a token of her affection. Heroes have downgraded in recent years; all she's got these days is a pack of sellswords willing to cut up some creeps. Her lips form the word slowly, like she has to think about it.
"Zimraphel."
"Repeat after me, Zim. I, your name."
She doesn't respond. I slap her upside the head. Blink is reloaded, and cursing me under his breath. We've formed a half circle, weapons up, and the uruks don't have the guts to rush us. Yet. This girl really needs to start listening.
"Come on, stay with me. I, your name."
"I, Zimraphel."
"Do solemnly swear..."
So, haltingly, I swear her in. I'm breaking protocol here- when we recruit, it's supposed to include all the officers and senior members of the Company- the Old Man, the Lieutenant, Bullet, Croc, Papa Jack, Sapper, and myself. But now she's one of us, and in the army of Mordor that means no one, not the uruks or the Easterlings, not the trolls or the Haradrim, not even the Witch-king himself can lay a finger on her without reprisals. The Captain made sure to put that clause in the contract. The Black Company is to be free from all molestation.
The crowd of uruks is coming closer. Sapper is whispering to himself, fingers writhing and wreathed with green flames. I have no talent in any sorcerous direction, but even I can tell he's concocting something nifty. The uruks start throwing rocks, which clang loudly off our shields. Reader knocks a thrown stone out of the air with his hammer, and it streaks off above the uruks' heads. I sheath my sword and raise my hand in the air, and soon the hubbub lessens a bit. I exit the shield wall, and bellow, "Which one of you fucking freaks is in charge here?"
A brief moment of silence, then renewed snarling and threats. I sidestep another thrown rock. "You boys screwed up worse than you know. The Nazgul are going to eat your livers for what you did here."
Nazgul. The magic word. Aggressive, hulking beasts are turned to frightened sheep at the mere mention of them. One uruk, bigger and broader than the rest, steps forward.
"I am Sarzan," he hisses. "I'm the fucking boss around here. Where Nazgul come on to this, fuckface?" He didn't speak our lingo very well, exactly, though apparently he got the hang of cussing pretty good.
"You see this woman here? Huh? You see her? She's one of ours. She's luftig-hai burzum, do you comprehend me, boy-o?" That was the uruks' name for us- luftig-hai burzum roughly translates to Soldiers of Darkness. It is more amusing than it should be to watch his squinty little eyes grow wide. He barks out a harsh curse in the Black Speech of Mordor and spits to the side.
"So," I tell him, beaming at the yellow freak, "you dumb bastards just bought yourself a world of trouble. Brawling with your allies? Trying to murder a brother of the Company? Oh, the Eye will gnaw your bones, Sarzan."
He glares. I haven't seen such blatant hostility since... well, since Bullet confiscated Shaggy's hash. "She was tendering the pissing, rotting tarks. Giving succor. Wrapping maggot holes with clothes. She's not luftig-hai. Not with the Eye. She's the thrice-damned, everfucking enemy, and that is where you're the traitor."
"Bullshit," I boom. "She's taken the oath." The Captain would personally impale me if I had lied about her membership. There is a clear divide in this world between us and them, and anything to threatens that line is to be immediately terminated. We don't tolerate threats to our heritage. "She's been with us for years. Probably got captured and was forced at swordpoint to tend to the wounded." On the other hand, lying your ass off to save a brother is perfectly acceptable. I turn back and call over my shoulder, "Ain't that right, Zim?"
The girl clearly doesn't understand the legal niceties of Mordor, but she's a smart lass. She can sense that we're all that's between her and a messy fate, so she puts on her bravest mask and nods.
"See?" I tell Sarzan. "She's Company, through and through. If you insist on attacking us again, not only will we cut your throats, but the Dark Lord will call up all of your shades and torture them throughout eternity for your transgression." For all I know, the Eye can really do that.
Sarzan hems and haws, but we all can tell he doesn't have the balls to press us farther. We specifically point out that our protection does not extend to the wounded Gondorians inside, and that cheers him up a bit.
So, yeah. We saved a damsel in distress, and got away with it. I just know that the Old Man's gonna kill me for this.
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