Zenak by George S. Pappas Read Free Book Online Page B

time to run for cover. Their bodies, riddled with black arrows, were strewn all through the camp.
    The mercenary camp was in an uproar and disorder was total. Zenak, realizing that he would have to act quickly, ordered the flagmen to relay to his army that they were to fire three rounds of arrows into the dispersed mercenaries and then charge in for the battle. They were also ordered to fire one more round when they could see the horns on the saddles of their enemies’ marks. The flag relay was efficient and swift. The marksmen took their longbows in hand and moved into firing range. Meanwhile Tabilo was trying desperately to get his men back into shape.
    â€œShields up! Shields up!” Tabilo yelled and his captains and flagmen relayed the order throughout the camp. But it was not until the first round from Zenak’s army was fired that the mercenaries reacted to the order. The first round killed 5,000 mercenaries. The second and third rounds were not very effective because the mercenaries had already put up their shields and were crouching behind that defense. Zenak’s army, however, had the advantage of surprise and they also had the advantage of being mounted. As soon as the third round had been released, Zenak’s force charged. The pounding hoof beats, however, alerted the mercenaries that their enemies were charging and they began mounting their marks and readying themselves for the fight. They had no idea, now that Zenak and his men were charging, that another round of arrows would be released. To their chagrin, the king and his men released their lethal arrows when they saw the horns of the saddles of their enemy. At least another 5,000 marks­men fell from this surprise round and the rest of the merce­naries were beset by confusion.
    Seconds after the last round, Zenak’s army struck into the mercenary army with the resounding clash of steel meeting steel. Zenak and his war mark Gam were the first to reach the enemy. Zenak’s broadsword, swinging with deadly precision, was spilling blood and spewing entrails all around him. Since he was the first to penetrate the enemy’s line, Zenak was quickly surrounded, but he never worried for he sat on the greatest war mark in the Island, and he knew his great broad­sword would bring many a mercenary to a grisly end.
    The efficiency of Zenak and Gam was something to be envied by every marksman. Gam would rip out the jugular vein of an enemy’s mark with a slice of his razor-sharp teeth, and Zenak would lop off the marksman’s head as the marksman’s mark fell dead to the ground.
    Blood from fallen war marks and beheaded riders sprayed all over Zenak and Gam. Besides killing all the riders of Gam’s victims, Zenak was busy attending to the many fighting men surrounding him. It was a parry here and a thrust there, a bloody business to be sure.
    An instant after Zenak’s entry, the rest of his men joined in the battle and the odds became about equal. It was mark against mark and warrior against warrior. The clashing of swords was deafening, as each warrior from both sides brought the full force of years of experience into battle. When a sword was broken or wrenched from a man’s hand, he would reach for his dagger and leap from his mark onto the other fighter’s mark to try and drive the dagger home, to send the victim to the dark afterlife that every warrior expected. Arms and legs and heads piled up all over the battlefield as the ebb and flow of battle continued into the day.
    Zenak felt good, it was good to fight again. But so far, the warriors Zenak had slain were not adversaries that made a great fighter proud. Many times Zenak held Gam back from killing his enemy’s mark just so the mercenary would have a chance, but no man could stand up to Zenak wielding his heavy and sharpened broadsword. One, two, three, and it was a cleaved skull down to the teeth or an arm and a shoulder severed from the back,