The Fires of Vulcan - Chapter 4

North-Western Germania

Ky crept through the snow-covered forest, Vandili and Istvaeones tribesmen moving with equal stealth on either side of him. A dozen men in total, they were the ones who’d shown the best marksmanship with the new muskets over the last three weeks of training. Each was seasoned in fighting and hunting in the thick Germanic woods, and five knew this very area like the back of their hands.

It was easy to see their skill with each slow, precise step. Only Ky’s augmented hearing could make out the crunch of snow under their heavily padded boots, which were quiet enough to be drowned out by the sound of the breeze rustling through the snow-capped trees.

The Carthaginians, on the other hand, seemed to be making no attempt to hide their presence. Even without his drone, soaring above the treetops, Ky would have known where the supply-laden wagons and the assigned guards were, a few hundred yards ahead. Horses stomping, loudly complaining men, and the clanking of metal marked their position for the world to hear.

There were about a hundred of them in total, with maybe fifty guards and as many laborers and drivers moving supplies needed for one of the nearby Carthaginian forces his Germanic allies had been shadowing.

A handful of minutes later, Ky could see them himself through the dense foliage. Five carts were slowly being moved by straining four-horse teams, pulling hard at their traces, hauling the laden vehicles over ruts and divots in the horse path. Two soldiers flanked either side of each cart, with the remainder split evenly in front or behind the small supply convoy. They looked miserable in the cold, and by their light brown skin tone, Ky pegged them as conscripted men from the Middle East or North Africa, making them particularly unprepared for working and fighting in these conditions.

Ky understood the reasoning behind sending conscripts far away from areas they were familiar with, to help maintain discipline, but if they were smart they should have swapped Germanics with those areas they controlled near the Ural Mountains, to at least keep from fighting at a disadvantage. Of course, a society like the Carthaginians had other priorities than those Ky would have in their place.

Ky held up a hand, stopping his well-spread-out team. They’d trained for the last week on how to operate as a unit, which had been easier than Ky expected. They were used to fighting like this and weren’t the screaming barbarians that the Romans in his legions had pegged them as. Ky only had to learn their hand signals, which for him and Sophus had been child’s play, to be able to lead them.

After giving one last appraising glance at the convoy, he signaled for five of the men to hold where they were while the rest moved laterally, spreading out to where the wagon train would be in a few minutes. After keeping two men with him, Ky sent the remaining five to where the head of the column would be in a few minutes at their current pace.

Waiting, he glanced at the man nearest him. Wulfram, an Istvaeones under-chieftain, was a towering German with fiery red hair and a beard to match. The man gave Ky a nod in answer to the unspoken question. The tribesmen were ready.

Ky gripped his rifle, noticeably different from the muskets designed after the Napoleonic era patterns due to its slightly longer length and thinner barrel. Kneeling, he raised his rifle, holding it unnaturally steady, as if it sat on a shelf. His allies followed suit, albeit without the same aptitude. Ky could feel their eyes on him as he looked through the trees and the drone simultaneously, Sophus drawing lines marking when the Carthaginians would cross into his trap. The group targeting the rear of the convoy was slightly off and would be partially blocked from their target by the rear wagon, but there was nothing to do about it now.

The crack of his rifle exploded like thunder, shattering the relative stillness of the forest, followed by a dozen muskets firing almost as one. Ten guards in total fell dead, struck by the deadly hail of lead balls erupting from the trees. Only two of his men missed, which was about what Ky had expected. Even with muskets, at this range, it didn’t take a marksman to kill someone.

The harnessed horses shrieked, rearing at the cacophony of gunfire, a sound the beasts had never encountered before. Their handlers fought to control the panicked animals as chaos descended upon the makeshift road.

Guardsmen scrambled for their weapons, but the coordinated volley had caught them completely by surprise. Not that it mattered. Spears and shields offered little defense against Ky’s modern firearms, especially not at this range. Seconds passed while the confused men tried to figure out what was happening. None of them had been among the mostly dead men who they’d fought near the river two months ago, and hearing tales about firearms is very different than experiencing them firsthand for the first time.

The second volley ripped into more guardsmen. Slightly worse accuracy this time, with only eight falling. The tribesmen had their blood up, and excited men tended to have lower accuracy.

By the time Ky and his men had reloaded and a third volley ripped through their targets, the Carthaginians had finally worked out where the attack was coming from. Between the wall of smoke starting to build between the tribesmen and the Carthaginians and the long tongues of flame leaping out of a dozen weapons at once, it shouldn’t have been difficult to work out.

Several of the remaining guards propelled arrows blindly toward the gun smoke, but their shots went wild. Ky had anticipated as much, and his men were well concealed behind dense foliage. Still, two tribesmen cried out as arrows found their marks, though neither injury seemed immediately life-threatening.

A handful of the guards, not armed with ranged weapons, regrouped, rallying with shouts and gesturing angrily with spears as they attempted to launch a counterattack. Their courage was admirable but misplaced. Muskets erupted again, cutting the would-be attackers down before they’d advanced more than a few paces. The rest wavered, exchanging panicked glances, unwilling to share their comrades’ fate.

With the bulk of the guards dead or wounded, the survivors abandoned any thought of a second charge. Their only hope lay in escape or defense. The guards and the mostly unscathed laborers scrambled behind the wagons, using the vehicles as makeshift barricades. The few armed with bows loosed another futile volley, more to distract their attackers than out of any real hope of inflicting damage.

They, however, didn’t move before yet another volley of fire exploded into their midst, killing even more guards. Only ten guards remained, plus roughly fifty unarmed laborers and wagon drivers. Ky watched the guards take up defensive positions behind the wagons through the drone footage as he reloaded, considering their positions.

One of the injured tribesmen had already picked his musket back up, an arrow sticking out of his side, giving Ky eleven men. He was starting to formulate a plan to surround the Carthaginians and demand their surrender when his new allies took the decision out of his hands.

Ky cursed under his breath as the tribesmen surged forward with a roar.

“Hold,” he called out in the Anglii dialect, the language the selected men all shared.

They ignored him completely, crashing through the foliage, axes, and bayonets held high. The guards rallied, bracing to meet the oncoming tide of fur-clad barbarians while the laborers and wagon drivers shrieked, some running and others diving under the wagons, hoping for some kind of cover. The lead horse team apparently decided the sight of screaming warriors was too much and bolted down the path, taking the wagon with it. The men unlucky enough to seek shelter under that particular wagon were then trampled or crushed to death by hooves and wagon wheels, leaving mangled bodies behind.

Ky emerged from the tree line, rifle raised, but there was little he could do now except wade into the fray. The tribesmen fell upon the guards with a fury, fueled by years of privation and abuse suffered at the hands of the Carthaginians. Axes and bayonets clashed with spears and shields.

Wulfram leaped forward, his massive axe swinging to hack a guardsman’s shield in two, following through to bury the blade in the man’s chest. He wrenched it free, roaring triumphantly, only to jerk as a spear caught him in the thigh. The red-bearded German stumbled but remained standing as Ky brought up his rifle and fired, sending the assailant tumbling backward into the trees on the other side of the path.

In a matter of moments, the guards were all cut down. Ky could see that one other tribesman had been hit, this one fatally with a spear in the chest, but that was the extent of the Germanic losses. The guardsmen had fallen to a man.

Then they moved on to the laborers, who were shown no mercy as they were cut down without a chance to flee or beg for their lives. Ky shoved through the combatants, trying to halt the slaughter, but it was a losing battle.

In minutes, the fighting was over. A few of the unarmed men managed to surrender, and a few more made it into the trees, running for their lives, but more than eighty men lay dead. Bodies and wreckage littered the forest floor, staining the snow and mud crimson. The tribesmen stood amid the carnage, chests heaving, weapons and furs splattered with gore.

Seeing there were no more men to kill, they raised their axes and muskets into the air, shouting their triumph. Ky was never one to back down from a fight, but after the guards were dead, this stopped being a battle and became a massacre. He knew he’d have to accept some brutality, fighting in a war in this time period, especially this war where one side had brutalized the other for so long, and he knew he would be hard-pressed to find a single combatant without a score to settle.

“Let me look at your leg,” Ky said to Wulfram, pointing at the bleeding appendage.

“It’s nothing,” the tribesman said, slapping Ky on the back. “Enjoy the victory. We slaughtered them like animals, and these supplies will feed several villages through the winter. Today is a great day, and your weapons have proven to be as powerful as you promised.”

“It won’t always be this easy,” Ky said. “They’re still shocked when they hear firearms for the first time. As they get used to fighting against them, they’ll realize the limits of the damage we can do and how long it takes us to reload. Had they charged after the first volley, we would have only been able to get off one more round, and then we would have been engaged by three times our number in hand-to-hand combat. Even your warriors, as great as they are, wouldn’t stand up to those numbers.”

“Then we bring more men,” Wulfram said. “You said the best thing we could do to contribute to the war, if we didn’t want to fight in your silly lines, is to raid their supplies and smaller units when we find them. We will do that. With your muskets, we will slaughter them by the hundreds. Their gods will weep at the sight.”

“These weapons aren’t magic, Wulfram. Give yourself more room; don’t try to wipe them out every time. It worked this time only because of their surprise. Unless you have superior numbers, hit them and fade away. Even with these guns, you can still lose if you’re overconfident.”

“We’re not afraid to die,” he said, puffing out.

“I know that, and I’m not doubting your bravery. I’d prefer, however, that you didn’t die. To paraphrase someone from my homeland, instead of dying for your people, I’d rather you make those bastards die instead.”

“Ha,” Wulfram said, slapping Ky hard on the back. “That’s good. Yes, we will make them die. And these supplies will feed several villages that the death worshipers stripped bare. A few more victories like this and some of our people might even make it through the winter.”

Even as he talked, his men, at least those not stripping the dead of valuables, were getting the remaining wagons turned around, starting them back north.

“Be careful. I wasn’t expecting them to have this many men in this area, or that they would have collected this much from the local villages. There must be a larger force out here than we expected, and they must be pushing toward our armies even though winter has set in. Spread your patrols out more and try to cover a larger area, but be careful. You could easily stumble onto a force too large to handle.”

“We’ll be careful. These people don’t know how to operate in the winter or in forests. They stumble along, loud and blind. We can hear them long before we see them, and only an idiot would be surprised by them.”

“Not all of them will be like that. If they have some of their core troops, they will be more skilled than this. They might also have people who are used to this kind of terrain. Don’t get overconfident.”

Wulfram just shrugged and limped off, essentially ending their conversation. Ky, however, was still concerned. They only had a limited number of muskets, most of which had gone to the Anglii, who were being rolled into the legions. Eventually, they’d replace those with rifles, and their muskets could go to the irregular forces, but they needed time, which was something they might not get if the Carthaginians were continuing their operations into the winter.

His only hope was that these guerrilla attacks would slow them down, or that their force was small enough that he would have time to prepare for them and to finish their new allies’ training.

****

Devnum

Valdar looked at his commanders as the last of the captains, minus Hakon, whose ship was currently assigned to guard Port Invictus, arrived in the dockside meeting hall. They were an odd collection. Mostly Scandi, although a few Romans and Caledonians had managed to prove knowledgeable enough about the sea to make their way into the small but growing ranks of new shipmasters.

It had taken those Romans some time to forget the nonsense they learned about oars and galleys and to learn to sail a real ship, but any of the men selected to sail one of the Britannic Empire’s new caravels had to show they were adaptable enough to master the skills. Although trade continued, the waters became more treacherous with an increase in large storms and even some icebergs as you sailed up the Scandi coast. That, coupled with additional hazards caused by ice buildup aboard the ships, would slow the pace of naval operations considerably over the next several months.

Valdar wasn’t one to waste time, however. If they weren’t going to be chasing and sinking Carthaginians, he was going to get in as much training as possible while time allowed. Some of the newer ships’ crews had only been working their vessels for a few months, which had their ships lagging behind in fleet-scale operations.

“Thank you for joining us,” Valdar said as the last two captains finally arrived, shaking water and frost off their large fur coats. “I trust winter has not dulled your spirits too greatly.”

“This isn’t winter,” Einar, captain of the Aquila, said. “I was thinking about sitting on the sand and basking in the warmth of the sun.”

“Yes, we get it. The north is cold and our winters are for old women,” Fabius, one of the newest captains and the only Roman among them, grumbled.

Fabius was slated to be the captain of one of the new caravels available in the spring, and he and his crew had been training with Einar on the Aquila. The Roman was too stuck in tradition and still held a lot of the old prejudices about Roman superiority, which had led to Einar’s continual taunting of him. Although it hadn’t come to blows, Valdar was moving Fabius and his men to the Seadreki next week to train with Dag, who had more patience with that kind of thing.

Honestly, if the Empress hadn’t requested he begin finding placements from Romans, Caledonians, and even Germanics to command some of the ships, he would have put Fabius back on the beach. As it was, he had little choice. Fabius, for all his prejudices and flaws, was still the best ship captain the Romans could muster and had been quick to adapt from galley-style ship mastering to that of the new, deep-hulled, sail-driven vessels.

“There isn’t time for that anyway,” Valdar said, brushing past the small spat. “Lucan tells me the new caravels will be launched by spring, meaning our fleet will be up to twelve ships, giving us enough to leave some here to patrol and support the invasion forces, and to have the rest start wider operations against the Carthaginians.”

“So we finally get to fight,” Alfhildr, the only woman and most aggressive of their number, said.

“We get to take the fight to them, yes. To do that, however, we need to be ready to begin as soon as the newest ships launch. Provisioning our forces in the north won’t be an issue, but stretching our lines to supply Port Invictus and the Middle Sea may prove to be difficult. Additionally, running supplies and reinforcements to the legions, guarding shipping routes, and launching an expedition as far as the Middle Sea is going to spread us thin.”

“Supplying the northern army shouldn’t be difficult,” Einar said. “They are only a few days’ sail at most, and our people control most of those waters. Other than some minor piracy, there isn’t much to guard in that area, especially now that Ysar is making merchant runs in his armed schooner through there.”

“If we push into the Middle Sea, do we need to protect our shipping routes?” Kvasir, captain of the Pollux, asked. “Especially if they have the new sails, they should be able to outrun any pirates or Carthaginians they come across.”

“Even if we push into the Middle Sea, the ocean is a big place. We won’t be able to stop the Carthaginians if they decide to keep bringing the fight here.”

“At least not until more of those schooners are ready. If more of our merchants had armed ships, they would be able to fight off anyone who might come for them,” Ingvarr, the man selected to lead the Hrafn, one of the new caravels, said.

“At two to three a year, it will be a long time before that’s reality,” Lucan, the imperial shipwright, said.

“What about outfitting more of the existing merchants with the new sail plans? Can we increase their speed without slowing the new construction?”

“Possibly,” Lucan said, looking off as he began mental calculations. “We’re working on setting up a refitting section on the Londinium docks, since we’re limited on how much more we can expand here. It will be some time before we can do any new construction there, but we can at least move most of the maintenance and upgrading work there. It should be ready in the next month. We face some challenges. Every industry is demanding more resources, and Hortensius has begun negotiations with some of the cloth manufacturers, which could slow down getting the sails we need, let alone putting them on ships. He has the ear of the Empress and is one of her favorites, so if he asks for it, she will probably give it to him. That isn’t our biggest problem, however. Our biggest problem is going to be manpower. The entire Empire is short-staffed, from the legions to the factories to the fields. We’re still getting a fair number of immigrants, but it takes time for the Praetorians to weed out possible Carthaginian infiltrators, and everyone is fighting over those laborers who do get through the evaluation.”

“This will be a problem for a while, and we need to get more creative with our solutions. What if you sent an agent to the continent itself, in areas already cleared by the northern army? It’s dangerous, but they could go to villages and recruit workers directly. Since they’re recruiting from the villages, the chance of infiltrators would be low, meaning we could probably convince Faenius to allow them in without going through one of the relocation points. We could also start incentivizing the workers who are coming in now, or even some that are in other industries. Offering higher pay, lodging, whatever.”

“As soon as we start doing that, Hortensius and the rest will match what we do, driving up costs while only boosting our manpower a little bit in the beginning before they match us.”

“But it will give us a boost. Unlike the shipbuilding, the refitting isn’t infinite. Eventually, all the Roman, Ulaid, and Caledonian ships that already existed will be converted,” Valdar pointed out.

“At which point we will have to build more capacity for building new ships in Londinium, since the refitting is only a temporary measure. The Consul has already promised larger merchant vessels that will dwarf even the caravels. If demand for the schooners is any indication, we will never run out of requests for new ships, especially if the Empire keeps footing the bill for their construction as it is now.”

“Doesn’t that agreement force the captains getting new ships to be conscripted for work by us anytime we need them?” Egil, captain of the Bolvastr, asked.

“For a time,” Lucan confirmed. “But not indefinitely, and that setup was only a stopgap. I don’t know how long the Empress is going to continue to make that offer. With everything that’s happening, the treasury must already be running a little thin.”

“That isn’t our problem,” Valdar said. “Our problem is dealing with the mission assigned to us. Protect Britannic shipping, support the armies on the continent, and sink as much Carthaginian shipping as possible, and we need to find a way to do this.”

“I’ll look into sending someone to start bringing in our own workforce. It won’t be long before the various manufacturers follow us in doing that, and I can’t imagine what the Germanic reaction will be as we start siphoning off their labor, but it will help us a little. I think we can shave a few weeks off the construction of the new slips in Londinium and maybe get a dozen ships retrofitted a month.”

“Do the best you can,” Valdar said. “I’ll talk to the treasurer and, if possible, the Empress to see if I can’t free up some supplies and manpower. I’ll also talk to them about Hortensius and the weavers. I might not have her ear the way Hortensius does, but she knows how critical what we’re doing is. I can only hope she listens to us. Until then, captains, make sure your ships are ready to sail as soon as the ice thaws and have our new crews as prepared as possible when their ships roll off the docks. They need to be able to sail and shoot as well as any of our existing crews by then. I want to be on the sail by spring, and I don’t want to hear any excuses as to why we aren’t ready. Steal, beg, or borrow anything you have to. Do you understand?”

The captains all nodded their agreement, although Lucan was looking much less confident. To be fair, he’d be left here, on this island with the people they’d be begging and stealing from, while his captains could put an ocean between themselves and the angry manufacturers left behind.

“Good. Then let’s get to it.”