Chapter 16: Battle of Duskhollow Cove - Part 1
POV: Corwyn Darke
The sellswords came with the dawn, confident and loud.
From my position behind the shield wall, I counted them as they crested the ridge—a hundred men in mismatched armor, weapons gleaming, moving with the arrogant swagger of professionals who expected easy prey. Their captain rode at the center, a scarred man on a gray horse, surveying the mining district with predatory interest.
[ ⚔️ COMBAT INITIATED ]
[ ENEMY FORCE: 112 FIGHTERS ]
[ FORMATION: LOOSE ASSAULT ]
[ MORALE: OVERCONFIDENT ]
[ TACTICAL ANALYSIS: UNAWARE OF AMBUSH POSITIONS ]
They saw the shield wall blocking the narrow pass—thirty men, shields locked, spears bristling. What they didn't see were the archers on the hillsides, the flanking force hidden in the tree line, the reserves waiting behind the mining buildings.
"Walk into my trap. Please."
The captain raised his sword, shouting something I couldn't hear across the distance. His men broke into a run, the thunder of their boots echoing off the rocky walls of the valley.
"Hold!" Ser Gareth's voice cut through the noise, steady as iron. "Hold until they commit!"
Fifty yards. Forty. Thirty.
The sellswords expected the shield wall to waver. To break. To scatter like the farmers and miners they believed it contained.
Twenty yards.
"BRACE!"
The impact was tremendous.
A hundred pounds of running sellsword slammed into our front line, expecting to punch through by sheer momentum. Instead, they crashed against locked shields, their charge absorbing into the mass of men who'd trained for exactly this moment.
And then our spears went to work.
The second rank thrust through the gaps in the shield wall—short, brutal jabs into the mass of enemies pressed against our line. Men screamed. Blood sprayed. Bodies dropped.
[ FIRST CONTACT: SUCCESSFUL ]
[ ENEMY CASUALTIES: 7 ]
[ FRIENDLY CASUALTIES: 0 ]
[ FORMATION: HOLDING ]
"PUSH!" Gareth roared. "Step forward! Together!"
The shield wall advanced—one step, shields still locked, spears still stabbing. The sellswords fell back, stunned by resistance they hadn't anticipated.
"This is it. This is what we trained for."
POV: Ser Gareth Stone
The wall held.
Gareth had spent the last two weeks hammering discipline into these men, wondering if it would matter when real steel started swinging. Now he knew.
They held.
"Rotate!" he bellowed. "First rank back! Second rank forward!"
The maneuver executed smoothly—exhausted fighters stepping back while fresh ones took their place, maintaining the wall without gap or hesitation. Sellswords who'd been pressing against tired opponents suddenly faced men with full strength.
One tried to exploit the transition, lunging through a momentary opening. Gareth's sword took him in the throat.
"Close that gap! Shields tight!"
The gap vanished. Another sellsword went down to a spear thrust. Then another.
"They're not fighting soldiers. They're fighting a machine."
The sellswords pulled back, regrouping in confused clusters. Their captain screamed orders—flanking attempts, concentrated charges—but every tactic that worked against individual fighters failed against coordinated formation.
"Archers!" Gareth signaled the hillsides. "NOW!"
Twenty bows sang. Arrows punched through leather armor, dropped men mid-stride, turned the space behind the sellsword line into a killing ground. The mercenaries who'd been trying to work around the shield wall suddenly found themselves caught between spears in front and arrows from above.
"HOLD THE LINE!"
They held.
POV: Corwyn Darke
The battle settled into grinding attrition.
I watched from the reserve position, tracking casualties through the System's overlay, waiting for the moment to commit our final gambit. The sellswords attacked in waves—three men, five men, ten men at once—trying to find weakness in our formation.
They found none.
[ BATTLE PROGRESS ]
[ ENEMY CASUALTIES: 19 ]
[ FRIENDLY CASUALTIES: 3 (WOUNDED) ]
[ ENEMY MORALE: DECLINING ]
[ TIME ELAPSED: 47 MINUTES ]
The sellsword captain was no fool. He recognized the trap forming around him—the narrow valley negating his numerical advantage, the disciplined defenders refusing to break, the archers punishing every attempt to spread out.
He ordered withdrawal.
His men began pulling back toward the ridge, trying to escape the kill zone. The smart move. The move that would let him regroup, reassess, find another approach.
I signaled Lord Rykker.
The horn blast echoed across the valley. Twenty-five soldiers emerged from the tree line on the sellswords' left flank, cutting off their retreat. Another horn—ten more from concealment on the right.
Trapped.
The sellsword captain wheeled his horse, face contorting as he realized the extent of the ambush. His men milled in confusion, caught between the advancing shield wall and the flanking forces.
[ TACTICAL ADVANTAGE: MAXIMUM ]
[ ENEMY ESCAPE ROUTES: BLOCKED ]
[ RECOMMENDED ACTION: PRESS ATTACK ]
"Reserves forward!" I drew my sword—the blade Duskhollow's smiths had forged from our own iron, balanced and sharp. "Gareth, advance!"
The shield wall began marching. Not running—marching. Step by step, inexorable as tide, pushing the sellswords back toward Rykker's blocking force.
"No escape. No mercy for those who came to murder my people."
POV: Lord Harras Rykker
Rykker had fought in skirmishes before. Border disputes, bandit clearings, the occasional duel.
Nothing like this.
He watched in grim admiration as Lord Corwyn's tactics unfolded—the trap springing closed, the sellswords realizing too late that they were the prey. His own men held the blocking position with determination born of training and trust.
"They're breaking!" his captain shouted.
It was true. The sellsword formation—such as it was—collapsed into individual fighters seeking survival. Some threw down weapons and raised hands. Others tried to force through the blocking force, meeting spears and swords. A few broke north, scrambling up rocky slopes toward uncertain escape.
"Let none pass!" Rykker ordered. "But take surrenders! Lord Corwyn wants prisoners!"
The prisoners came quickly after that. Men who'd been paid to kill and burn discovering that money meant nothing against coordinated resistance. They knelt in the dirt, hands on heads, watching their comrades die or flee.
The sellsword captain was among the last to fall. He charged Rykker's line personally, sword swinging with desperate fury. Two of Rykker's soldiers took him down—one blocking his blade while the other swept his legs. They had him disarmed and bound in moments.
"It's over," Rykker called across the battlefield. "Throw down your weapons and live, or fight and die!"
The weapons clattered to the ground.
POV: Corwyn Darke
Silence fell over the valley.
I walked through the aftermath, stepping over bodies, checking faces. Sellswords mostly—rough men in cheap armor, their blood soaking into the rocky soil. But some of ours too. Men I'd trained with, eaten with, promised to protect.
[ ⚔️ BATTLE CONCLUDED ]
[ ENEMY CASUALTIES: 67 DEAD, 31 CAPTURED, 14 FLED ]
[ FRIENDLY CASUALTIES: 8 DEAD, 12 WOUNDED ]
[ RESULT: DECISIVE VICTORY ]
[ TACTICAL RATING: EXCEPTIONAL ]
Eight dead. Eight men who'd trusted me to lead them, who'd held formation when every instinct screamed to run, who'd given their lives for a domain they'd only recently joined.
"My lord." Gareth appeared at my side, sword still dripping. His armor was dented in three places, blood streaked across his face—none of it his. "We've won."
"We've won," I agreed. The words tasted strange in my mouth. "Secure the prisoners. And Gareth—our wounded first. Then theirs."
"The sellswords?"
"They're beaten. They're not enemies anymore—they're assets." I sheathed my sword, looking toward the ridge where the enemy had first appeared. "And they're witnesses."
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