Witchmarked (World's First Wizard Book 1) by Aaron Schneider (my reading book .txt) 📕

Another light winked out, followed by another rifle crack, and the rest of the camp began to stir. Men shouted in German and tent flaps fluttered as the remaining lights raked the surrounding hills. A siren’s blaring wail sounded and was soon echoing off the surrounding hills in strange, unsettling tones.

“Move it,” Ambrose snarled, tossing Milo out in front of him.

Ambrose had a rifle in his hands. It looked like the Gewehr 98s some of the older Federated Regiments carried, but it somehow seemed a little thicker, almost blocky. A bandolier festooned with five-round clips hung across his huge chest.

“Where are we going?” Milo shouted as a handful of soldiers raced past them.

“That way,” the big man barked and stabbed a thick finger at the crown of the craggy hill.

Milo fumbled to get his pistol from his belt, realizing his rifle had been left in the tent. He’d been outfitted with the Luger P08 back in Poland, but Ambrose had acquired a rifle for him during their march since his training had been exclusively with rifles in the Mud-Snakes. Now staggering in the dark toward a looming face of rock, it seemed Ambrose’s gift would be wasted.

The sporadic pops of smaller, more excitable arms and marksman sounded along both flanks of the camp.

“We’re surrounded!” Milo called back to Ambrose, whose crushing presence kept driving him forward for fear of being flattened.

“Shut up and move, boy!” the bodyguard bellowed in a voice that made Milo’s bones feel like water. He somehow quickened his pace.

Like a lion at bay, the 33rd roared to life, and the Prussians sent rippling volleys across the undulating hillocks around the camp. Slipping bladelike through the gaps in the cacophony of wailing sirens and gunfire, men could be heard dying on those hills. Only two searchlights remained and they swept over the jagged terrain, picking out a crumpled form here and there. The 33rd gave a cheer at the sight, only for more sporadic fire to draw their eyes and rifle barrels to another lump of earth.

“Sounds like we are winning,” Milo panted as they reached the foot of a rough hill that was nearly a cliff.

“Sounds like you and the Prussians are all fools,” Ambrose growled and stabbed his finger forward. “Those miserable idiots in the hills are a distraction.”

Milo wanted to question how he was going to get up the rough wall of stone, but when he looked at it in the moonlight, he saw rough shelves of stone jutting out in a zigzagging pattern up the face of the cliff. Drawing a breath, he started up the stone staircase, throwing one last look over his shoulder.

More of the 33rd was pouring out to the left and right of the camp in lethal, disciplined order. Under the streaking, searching lights, he saw the Afghan raiders attempting to flee, some having abandoned their rifles in haste. Everyone he saw illuminated in the stark light of the searchlights toppled in seconds like stringless marionettes as the 33rd’s rifles bayed for more.

Milo, torn between cheering and hollering at Ambrose in rebuke, found his mouth hanging open as his eyes were drawn to the front of the camp. A second after he saw the rushing, gleaming shapes, he heard the thunder of their hooves.

A contingent of horsemen mounted on spry-footed steeds was pouring into the camp, angry red sparks flickering in their hands.

Leaping the low tents or trampling them underfoot, they made for the center of the camp. The men of the 33rd, intent on their chastising of the flanking ambushers, were slow to realize the true attack. Officers bellowed, but the sounds that filled the valley were the shrill screams of riders and horses, triumphant as they plunged like arrows into the heart of the camp.

“Keep climbing!” Ambrose shouted to Milo, who sluggishly obeyed. “And keep your eyes open when you get to the top.”

His limbs felt like lead as he saw sullen sparks fly from the riders’ hands. The tiny flames nestled amongst command tents and stockpiles of munitions and fuel before bursting into flames. The incendiaries lit the entire plain, stretching the shadows of the wheeling, shrieking horsemen across the camp like huge specters of death. Swords, lances, and pistols flashed in their hands as they set about striking and hewing at men or machines that lay within reach.

Milo felt his arms begin to burn while below him, the gutted camp smoldered.

The 33rd had turned about-face and was pouring into the camp, their faces grim and hard in the light of their decimated caches and tents. Some opened fire, smiting horse and rider, while others had affixed bayonets and charged in for a more visceral retribution.

Milo had just mounted the crown of the hill when he saw the lunging, wailing riders begin to flee. They’d lost nearly a quarter of their number, but the devastation they had wrought on the material resources of the 33rd was substantial.

“Well, those boys earned their coin,” Ambrose growled as he joined Milo at the top of the hill. “Perhaps a touch too eager to bask in their handiwork, but I can’t say that I blame them.”

Milo looked down, a mix of horrified awe and guilty gratitude inside him. One rider whose horse had kindled in the leaping flames took a smattering of shots to the chest and he fell, dragging the burning animal down with him. Together they smashed down on Milo’s tent, and in seconds, their death throes had set the whole thing ablaze.

His mouth tasted of ash as the acrid smell of burning canvas and oil washed over the hill in a foul wind.

“How did you know?” Milo asked, his eyes still watching the last of his tent crumble into cinders.

Ambrose spat and turned away from the sight.

“It’s a bold but sensible plan if you’ve got a doughty company of foot soldiers like the 33rd,” the big man explained as he moved farther back on the moon-painted top of the hill. “Especially if you’ve got the proper