“Stupid drants!” I yelled. “Come and get it!” I was really in the spirit of things so I jabbed my sword up into the air, too.

Delik Slin smiled. “Nice.” He said quietly. “Let us send them back to Drantor!” He yelled, holding his sword in front of his face in a formal salute.”

I laughed. “Nice, yourself.” Then, we waited. But not for long.

The first drant reached the top about ten feet to our right, closer to the gatehouse. One of the men closest to him hacked at his hand as it hung on to the top of the stone wall. The drant kept coming until he was stabbed in the face as soon as it appeared. He fell away screaming. Then there were drants climbing over the wall in a lot of places, so we all went to work.

We tried to hurl them off the wall before they could get all the way over the parapet and onto the walkway, and that worked for a few minutes but soon there were just too many of them. Since Delik Slin is a great swordsman and I’m still better than most common soldiers we decided to focus on killing the ones who made it all the way onto the top of the wall. Some of them had already killed at least one defender just to get here and we didn’t want their best fighters laying into our comrades.

At first, we had the opportunity to gang up on them, which was great, but soon enough there were too many gaining the top and we each had to focus on our own drants. Both of us were wielding our swords with both hands to get as much power as we could into our attacks and defensive moves. Stupid drants are all strong and these seemed to be the strongest and most athletic. If we couldn’t kill them before they got their balance when they first made it up here it could take some doing. I cut deep into a particularly large drant’s neck, killing it, but got a cut on my left shoulder for my trouble. I moved as quickly as I could the few feet to our officer and started yelling at him. “We’re getting overrun! There’s too many! Where are the stupid mages?” I didn’t actually say ‘stupid mages’, it was something a lot worse but that was in the heat of battle and I don’t want to offend anyone with such impolite talk now that it’s all in the past.

Our fearless leader looked around then nodded and headed for the gatehouse. I didn’t wait to see what he did because there were more drants arriving topside every second, or so it seemed to me. I waded back in and shoved one drant of the wall from behind with my shoulder as he crested the wall before hacking off the arm of another and kicking a third hard in the stomach. As he fell, I shoved my sword in his gut with as much force as I could. I had to brace my left foot on him just so I could get it back out. My sword was going to need a really thorough cleaning when this was all over. So was I, and my clothes, I realized. Laughing, I got back to it.

My world shrank down to attacking and defending, trying to remember, and use, everything I had been taught by all my blade teachers over the years, including Delik Slin. I’m not sure how long it was before some mages showed up and started helping but it sure seemed like a very long time. Several days, I would have guessed. Drants started bursting into flame and getting hit by lightning even though the sky was clear. I hobbled over to my assistant spymaster and helped him throw some of the dead drants back over the wall to join their friends. I knew it was only going to help them with their ramp, but I didn’t want them up there with us. You know how bad they stink and dead drants smell much worse than living ones. We finally slumped down against the wall to rest. Not far from where we had sat before the fun started.

“I hope our mages can do something to get rid of all the bodies of the dead drants.” Delik Slin said in between deep breaths. “I have no desire to make it easier for them to get up here next time.”

I nodded but didn’t say anything. I was too focused on trying to breathe normally.

The mages did do something to the flesh ramps, and they were as disgusting as that sounds. They burned them to a crisp. That didn’t stop another attack from coming after a couple of hours but at least we had time to dispose of our own dead in a more respectful manner. We also got to eat, drink and get bandaged. More arrows were delivered, and some new soldiers showed up too.

The second attack was a lot like the first except I was a little slower and got different injuries, including the scar on my neck that, although faded, I still have today. The mages got involved a little sooner this time, so the fighting didn’t last as long. By late afternoon we were back at my office and having dinner with the whole journey to Aandarvi gang. All of them had fought on the wall, too. I gave Venzik and the guards the night off and enough money for a nice dinner or we wouldn’t have had enough room for everybody. It was crowded but we were all exhausted and nobody complained, much. Not even me.

That became the pattern of my days. Killing drants on the wall whenever they attacked and planning our spring campaign when they weren’t. I also slept and ate and used the jakes, of course, but that seemed like it was everything.

Except for Imprid.