THE AMBUSHMany archers are longsighted. Most perfectionists are loners. And nearly all bandits prefer the ambush to a battle or a duel.
But to be all three you would need to be Stavak.
Even in his early years as a member of the brotherhood of the road, his partners had been at first amused, and later exasperated, and finally enraged, by his insistence on doing everything in a certain way - and that way was usually his way. There were rough and ready rules of thumb of brigandage, but not for Stavak: if things weren't done exactly right ... they weren't worth doing at all.
Merely an eccentric whim in a bandit, perhaps. But Stavak had not only the habit of being right most of the time, but also the even more annoying habit of coldly anolyzing, in a quietly flat, passionless voice, exactly where the planning had gone wrong after every botched raid and ambush. Shouted demands for him to stop pontificating and clowning attempts to be amusing at his expense simply washed over him like water off a duck's back: cutting sneers and finally even naked threats were also treated with the same glacial indifference. Except, perhaps, for that quick flick of the eyes over the one who contradicted him, a single glance that came and went like the flash of far-off lightning.
Few had contradicted him, though. Because he was right most of the time, and because of his penchant for whipping out a few cutting words that would skewer the bombast of loud braggarts to leave them speechless and deflated. But mainly because he'd proven he could kill.
Instantly. Without warning. And with unbelievable speed.
Stavak was very good with the shortsword, and his co-ordination was as seamless as his planning. Facing a belligerent challenge from a leader who had reached and finally passed the boiling point from his criticism, he had calmly and wordlessly walked up to him, then without warning explosively drawn with his right hand the shortsword slung over his back with the handle projecting behind his left shoulder, while instantly going into a crouch and drawing and throwing with his left hand the very heavy, short range broadblade dagger worn on his right hip in a spear throw wrist snap, the two deadly hands whipping over and under each other like the blades of a snapping scissor.
The bandit leader's eyes had been drawn to the shortsword, and he had gone back into a high guard position with his own sword drawn hastily from his waist scabbard: this was why he saw the wide blade of the throwing dagger coming towards his groin a tenth of a second too late, and had only begun to twist out of the way when the blade whipped in just over his belt buckle, slitting open the leather armour, and slid past leather and flesh into his groin and deep and deeper into his belly almost without slowing down, the momentum of its heavy weight keeping it going on and on, deeper and deeper, until finally it slowed and stopped with only its handle jutting out of the bandit's belly.
The explosion of pain and rage released a flood of adrenalin in the bandit leader, and the knowledge that he would die soon made him determined to take his tormentor together with him beyond the beckoning doors of death.
Instantly reversing his grip on his longsword so he was holding it like a dagger, he stabbed down with it like a spear towards the rebel crouching under him, hurling not just his torso but his entire body downwards, not caring or guarding at all for any counter stab by Stavak as he was going to die anyway. The tiny part of his mind that was still rational even smiled at the irony of arriving in Hell seconds before his killer.
His eyes opened wide in shock as Stavak, still with the same fluid movement, rose up instead of crouching down further and punched not the tip, but the hilt and guard of his sword towards the shaft of the longsword plunging down. At the same time his left hand flashed towards the hilt of the dagger still projecting from the leader's belly, grasped it, and pushed upwards.
While the forte of Stavak's shortsword beat aside the downward plunging spear of the longsword the upward thrust of the dagger in the bandit's belly, combined with the weight of his plunging body, ripped apart the bandit from groin to briastbone like a gutted fish, even the leather armour being unable to give any practical resistance. The erstwhile leader collapsed on Stavak's crouching frame and ended up with his longsword locked guard to guard with Stavak's shortsword and his eyes locked a hand's breath away from Stavak's ice blue eyes. Which were wide open. Alert. And completely emotionless.
God that's a cold fish even now he doesn't show anything -As the bandit's eyes glazed over the longsword dropped from his nerveless hands into the rapidly growing lake of bubbling blood, guts, and lost leadership.
From that day on Stavak was the leader, but the ache of dissatisfaction never left him. It gave no joy to lead a group of obedient yet suspicious inferiors whose dull intellect was matched only by their perpetual, yet contemptibly transparent attempts to overthrow him. After a year and three executions he had enough: one night he simply poisoned them all on a beach at low tide, methodically stripped them all of their weapons and armour through the night, then piled all his loot on high ground and contemplatively watched the high tide drag all the naked bodies out to sea. He had thoughtfully gutted them just before, and seeking the naked and slowly bleeding bodies being dragged out to sea by the undertow he knew that the blood would soon attract mudcrabs and sharks.
Loot recovered one hundred percent, evidence disposed one hundred percent, risk to self zero, witnesses zero. An excellent piece of work.Now Stavak hunted alone, and nothing gave him more satisfaction.
Like today's upcoming ambush.
Stavak believed in efficiency: the maximum amount of loot with the minimum chance of either risk of damage to self or discovery in the act, with its concomitant notoriety and posted reward attracting bounty hunters. And there was one ambush weapon that fitted all these slots to perfection: his longbow.
This bow, and its cousin the reserve bow he had back at his hideout, had been made from a single piece of yew that he himself had selected and aged for over one and a half years before he started on the task of fashioning it into two bows, a patient task that took another year. During these two and a half years he had built his hideout, scouted out the land for miles around, and prepared over a thousand handcrafted arrows, built from hardwood with tremendous strength and stiffness so that they would not snap even when taking the shock of smashing into plate armour.
He had fashioned the bow into a rectangular instead of a D-shaped cross section, for he knew that this would lighten the bow while still keeping its ability to take loads and then flex back into shape. With its sapwood outer side and heartwood inner side, it was a handsome bow, but it looked sinister due to the dull black waterproof resin and varnish coating he had applied on it: the colour was chosen because he did not want even the smallest amount of light glinting from it in his ambushes. For bowstrings he used only silk: this was expensive, yet totally waterproof.
He was strong and tall enough to handle a 150 lb bow, yet he had deliberately chosen to keep the draw weight of his two bows to 120 lbs. The small tradeoff in power had been chosen so that the draw of the bow would be 27 inches instead of 30, and he had also added an invention of his own: a handgrip, shaped to the contour of his hand, that was solidly attached to the midpoint of the bow and projected nine inches behind it. With this nine inch advantage over other longbows the actual draw was now only 18 inches.
Which meant that instead of having to draw the string to his cheek or even his ear he now needed to draw the string only to his nose, so that he could sight straight down the line of the arrow instead of having to sight offset to one side. This tremendous increase in accuracy was, in his estimation, worth far more than the thirty pounds of draw weight he had sacrificed.
For today's ambush he had picked his attack and observation point on the top of a small hill around which the road snaked in a hairpin bend. This offered many advantages. He could see travelers as they moved around the hill on both sides, and the length of the road allowed him plenty of time to observe the travelers and make sure that they were not being followed by the bane of the bandit's existence - following travelers who usually arrived just when the job was done and the looting begun, and who became either a new battle or witnesses who would flee and alert the nearest Imperial garrison or some other do-gooder organization or adventurers. Once he had satisfied himself that his prospective prey was not being shadowed, he would also have the advantage of shooting downhill, and even if there was a battle enemy bowmen would have to shoot uphill, and enemy melee fighters would have to charge uphill.
He had the advantage.
But, being Stavak, these already good advantages weren't good enough for him.
Stavak had four powerful guard and work dogs, and he had trained them to respond to specific commands in response to a small, silver flute that whistled notes too high for the human ear to see. He planned to use one of these dogs as a distraction before the attack.
And in addition to being a an excellent bowyer and fletcher, Stavak was an good woodworker and passable tailor as well. Which was why the dummy archer he had constructed which was now lying flat on the ground, held back from springing upright from the tension of a bent wooden stave by a trigger controlled by a string leading to Stavak thirty feet away, was more than adequate to fool an enemy looking up from the road.
His tailoring skills had also made the Ghillie suit in which he was now resting on top of the hill, hiding in plain sight. He had deliberately stripped the top of the hill bare, cutting down trees and removing large boulders, so that all travelers who glanced at the top of the hill would see it bare and be lulled into a false sense of security, failing to recognize the lump on moss on top of a rock as an archer waiting in ambush. As he was waiting now.
He heard them before they came into sight.
Sound carries on the wind, and the wind was blowing towards him. The clop of hooves, the rhythm of those clops, and the chink of metal told him much even before sight clicked in.
Travelers. Traveling far or heavy, horses at a slow canter. At least one warrior in the party.
Half a minute later they came into view, growing steadily larger as they neared his hill.
One warrior in front. He sat easy on a good but not exceptional horse, his head rhythmically sweeping the road on both sides and up the hill, his hand on his sword. A medium sword, not too long. Chain mail armour, good helmet, buckler shield, gauntlets and greaves. A veteran.
Two men dressed in even better mail rode behind, but despite their armour and the swords they wore Stavak instantly marked them down as merchants. Their thick legged horses, chosen more for strength than for speed, and the heavy saddlebags they were carrying was the proof, and if even more proof was needed, it was in the fact that they were not carrying shields to match their longswords. Stavak smiled. Civilians always hated the weight and encumbrance of shields.
The last man, riding slightly too far behind, made Stavak frown slightly under his Ghillie suit. An archer. Clad in a wide brimmed hat, back brim down, front brim upturned, holding the reins casually in his left hand while his right hand loosely held...what? aha, a recurve bow! And with four arrows on a rack just in front of the handgrip for fast shooting!
Stavak's lips twitched briefly under his camouflage. This would be good.
While the group were slowly rounding the hill to his ambush point he drew up his plan.
Hit the two merchants first, with the slow poison. This will drop them, but seeing that their bosses appear to be only wounded the two bodyguards will not run but come up to attack me. Hit the archer next, with fast poison. Kill the swordsman last as he rushes up the hill. The warrior had now rounded the hairpin, and was approaching the ambush point. Stavak waited for the warrior and the rest of the convoy to enter the killing field, noted the strength of the brisk breeze blowing from his right to his left, then took a deep breath, and pushed it through his silent silver dog whistle.
Tiger, the visually arresting striped Mastiff, arose in response to the signal and crossed the road to the reward he had waited for all evening, a fresh haunch of meat. The sight of a large dog, in particular an unusually striped dog crossing the road in front will draw any normal human eye to it, and the four in the convoy were but normal. All four eyes swiveled towards Tiger.
While all four sets of eyes were away from the hill Stavak pulled back the bow nocked with the slowpoison arrow and sighted on the lead merchant, adjusting for the breeze and the downhill shot...held his breath, released the arrow and let fly at the lead merchant. As soon as the arrow left the bow he simultaneously stepped on the trigger releasing the dummy, , and reached forward for another slowpoison arrow among the arrows he had already arranged in front of him, stuck in the ground.
The loud, musical sound of a bow is a sound that even the novice soldier never forgets after having heard it once, and the warriors on the road were veterans. While the second merchant was still staring at the dog, his mind still not registering the significance of the harsh, powerful yet musical twang, the two warriors' heads had snapped towards the noise and their bodies were already in motion.
Both the warriors were drawn to the sight of the standing and still vibrating dummy archer, as was meant to be. The swordsman had drawn and was already charging his horse up the hill, while the archer had dismounted on the far side of the sound with a fluidity that spoke of deep battle experience.
While the first arrow was still in flight Stavak was already bending down to take the second, and by the time it had struck the lead merchant he was already bending the bow. The second merchant, only now beginning to turn towards the sound of the bow, swivelled his head towards his colleague who was now staring stupidly at the arrow that was protruding from his hip, just where the chainmail armour split into front and back skirts to allow freedom of movement for the legs. Both merchants opened their mouths to scream.
The already loud second merchant's scream became even louder when Stavak's second arrow struck him on his unarmoured thigh. For a moment both men were screaming on their horses, then the combination of the bolting of their frightened horses and the pain in their sides made them fall off their horses.
Stavak's eyes were not on the merchants, however. His eyes were seeking out the archer, and they widened slightly when he saw that the archer had already placed his horse between himself and hill, and had already loosed off his first arrow at the dummy. Out of the corner of his eye he also saw that the charging swordsman on the horse had seen Stavak's movement as he had bent to pick his arrow, shattering the camouflage, and now the horse and rider were angling hard towards him instead of the dummy.
Change of plan. Horseman first. Archer later. Instantly choosing from his ground-stuck arrows a short range, heavy broadhead arrow instead of the long range poison bodkin he had originally chosen for the archer, he nocked and aimed at the charging swordsman. Whom as soon as he saw Stavak aim, proved he was a veteran be angling his horse slightly off to Stavak's right while swivelling his body down to the right of the horse, thus using the body of the horse to hide himself from Stavak's arrow.
At the same time Stavak saw the Archer's first shot miss the dummy by a hand's span on the left.
Stavak pulled and fired at the chest of the galloping horse in one fluid movement, and reached for the special arrow he kept for close range emergencies even as his shot was flying.
The heavy broadhead hit the Chest of the horse and smashed through muscle and sinew to stop just short of the heart. It was enough, however, for the huge wound it had created shocked the horse so that it collapsed, but even as it did the swordsman had thrown himself clear, hit the ground, somersaulted up to a crouch and was now coming forward fast in a crab like crouch, buckler held forward, and almost no unarmoured flesh visible.
Stavak saw the Archer's second shot hit the Dummy.
That one is good. Stavak pulled hard at his special arrow nocked to his bow, aimed at the fast approaching swordsman's head, and let fly. The swordsman saw the shot being aimed, and pulled up his buckler to cover his face.
Which was an exercise in futility.
Stavak's special was an all-steel arrow, made of high quality steel sharpened to an armour piercing, bodkin point and not only very heavy but exorbitantly expensive. It would fly only forty yards on a good day even at high angles, and this was a no-angle shot - but the swordsman was only five yards away.
The relatively slow moving heavy arrow hit the buckler with a deep THWACK, and went through it as if it had been paper. Passing through the buckler, it reached beyond it, towards the face of the swordsman, and entered his face just below his right eye. Splitting the cheekbone, it moved up towards the path of least resistance, and gouged out the eye from below.
No man, not even a veteran, can take that type of pain and not react, and the swordsman reacted by rearing back and dropping his sword, clutching at the arrow with his hand which was now free.
Which gave Stavak time to reach for the poisoned bodkin arrow, and shoot it though the swordman's chest, through the chain mail and into the heart. At this range the lightweight bodkin, while not capable of punching through armour of plate mail strength such as the buckler, was still capable of going through chain mail.
Even as the swordsman was falling Stavak felt a stunning blow from an arrow strike his head, and while he was falling he thought
- I knew that one was good -............
The archer saw a body in a ghilly suit fall on the hill, then come slowly tumbling down the hill, hands and legs in the rag doll flexibility of death.
He was a careful man. He waited for the body to reach the road and stop moving, and then he stood up, aimed carefully, and shot an arrow into the body with full force. It twitched, and was immobile again. Another arrow followed, and yet another.
A minute went bay, and the archer still stared at the body in the ghilly suit. Satisfied, he walked towards the body with three arrows sticking out of it, and looked down.
He was still looking down when the broadhead split his skull from behind.
................
Stavak pulled off the hood of the Ghilly suit, and felt the steel helmet worn underneath it. There was a small dent where the arrow had struck. He whistled. That archer had been more than good - excellent was the only word to describe him. His shooting of three arrows into Stavak's reserve ghilly suit clad dummy which he had shoved down the hill as he fell proved that.
Smiling, he walked down to the road towards the now dead merchants, and saw in the distance the two laden horses coming back towards him, shepherded expertly by the two sheepdogs he had positioned further up the road in anticipation.
Techniques are passed on by the survivors. But if there are no survivors and no witnesses, techniques are the property of the developer. He whistled a soundless tune.
» Sat May 28, 2011 10:59 pm 
I couldn't resist showing off the penetration ability of a well shaped, heavy, armour piercing tool. And again, all, yes, it can be done, and in fact was done - in history - with crossbows firing a steel bolt. See crossbow history. 
