A Chink in the Armor (2 page)

He’d heard the whispers. He knew his standing, especially among those who did not know him. “Job is arrogant. Cocky,” they said. He once overheard a blacksmith say, “If there’s one chink in Job’s armor, it’s his blind faith in his own abilities.” However, those who knew him best, those who lived and fought side-by-side with him, knew that his confidence—heck, call it arrogance—was justified.

Job knew his limits, and they were few.

His mastery on the field did not go unnoticed. Soon he’d risen through the ranks. For well over a year, Job commanded the armies of the South. His strength drove the enemy back. His power made even the mightiest soldier quiver. Everywhere he roamed, fear walked before him.

But from his men, Job garnered respect. Job led the charge. Job laid waste to all around him and inspired his men to fight and die for the love of their captain.

The war had been bloody and long. Then one day, after months of fighting, the enemy abruptly turned and withdrew—no explanation, no final salvo. In their wake, thousands of brothers, fathers, and sons littered the fields of battle. The armies of the South had triumphed.

Job had triumphed. But something made him uneasy.

He’d left the armies encamped to the south and selected a hundred stout men to pursue the enemy north. He needed to be sure they indeed quit the war. For two weeks, he’d harried the rear guard. For two weeks, he’d nipped at the heels of the retreating enemy. Yet with every day that passed, every hour gone by, Job’s unease grew. He knew to trust his gut. Too many times in the past, it had been correct.

He scanned the encampment. Job’s command tent was set on a slight rise in the middle of camp. His eyes played over the scores of fires circled around him. Shadows huddled close, keeping warm in the cold night air. It seemed unnatural being this cold so early in autumn. But they had chased the retreating armies far to the north—farther from their homeland than Job, or any of his men, had before traveled.

Steam erupted from the horses’ nostrils picketed nearby. In this respect, his forces were stronger. The armies of the North knew nothing of mounted warfare, preferring the strength of numbers on foot. How glorious it was, to launch himself into the midst of battle on a mighty charger, seeing the fear in his enemies’ eyes as he pounded down upon them. Such savages knew nothing of the finer art of war.

The horizon flashed again, and a strange scent rode the wind. He gazed off into the predawn darkness a while longer, then turned to his friends. They had quieted down, sensing their leader was troubled.

“There is something amiss,” he said. “Bildad, I need you to scout north. I do not like that sky.”

The little man nodded, plucked up his short bow and dashed off.

The hours dragged on and the wind picked up. Job knew there would be no morning sunrise. Clouds, which only moments before were wisps across the moon, began to pile upon each other, blown from the frozen reaches of the North.

He did not sleep. He only waited. At the hour when morning should have dawned, he caught a glimpse of darkness streaking across one of the few bare patches of sky. Where the starry host still shone, a brief shadow blotted out the heavenly light, much too fast for cloud.

His instincts screamed and he leapt to his feet. “To arms!”

At the very moment his voice cried out, a thunderous shout sounded from every direction—a bellow from a multitude of throats.

Job’s body reacted before his mind could catch up. He grabbed his sword and a great javelin. “To arms! To arms!”

The sky opened and a torrential rain fell.

Zophar and Eliphaz jumped to their feet, scrambling for their weapons. All around them, Job’s highly trained soldiers rushed to the edges of the encampment to form a defensive perimeter. He quickly assessed the threat.

Torches sprang to life in the darkness beyond their encampment’s dwindling fires. Flame after flame lit northern tribesmen’s faces as fire was passed soldier to soldier. Just out of bowshot stood a vast army, easily ten times their own one hundred men.

How could he have been taken so unawares?

“They’ve drawn us into a trap,” Zophar said.

Job scanned the torchlight looking for a weakness.
Why do they wait?

“There.” Zophar pointed to the southeast, toward a slight lessening in the number of torches.

In that direction, Bildad had reported a trail winding up through the rocky cliffs bordering the plain where they camped. Job was never without an escape plan, and this was it.

“It is our only hope.” Job turned to Zophar and Elliphaz. “Leave two tens to guard our rear flank. The rest will follow me.”

Within seconds, Job had mounted his horse. His men surged around him as flank-on-flank the horses stamped their hooves, eager for battle. In that moment, Job saw his victory. He knew, beyond all odds, he would triumph this night. He would get his men to a better position, and then he would show this northern scum the true metal of the South.

He thrust his fist into the air. “For glory!”

A hundred voices shouted back, “For glory! For glory!”

Job kicked his heels into his charger’s side and the horse launched forward. Already the rain had turned the ground into a muddy slurry under the horses’ hooves. His men flowed behind, forming a wedge with him at the spear’s point. He pushed toward the southwest for a brief moment. Almost imperceptibly, he could see the forces arrayed against him shift in that direction. At their true target, a weakening in the lines opened up and he took advantage, changing course to the southeast.

Horse and man alike sounded the battle cry. So fierce was Job’s onslaught, the enemy faltered. They dropped their torches and fell back, then Job smashed into the first line of soldiers. His javelin caught a man in the throat. He fought two-handed—a sword in one, the javelin in the other.

His horse moved with a nudge of his knees. He heard the terror of the dying all around him—the crunching of bones as the horses trampled the fallen. Within a few heartbeats, Job found himself halfway through the enemy’s ranks. He could see out of the corner of his eye the main bulk of the army surging forward on each side.

Then the arrows began to fall.

The only sure defense against the horsemen was a barrage of arrows—death from the sky. Unconcerned for the loss of life on their own side, the armies of the north unleashed a hail of death against Job’s men.

Horses screamed. His men died.

Still, he led the charge forward. He must break through. He lost his javelin in the chest of a soldier, but only a handful of men stood between him and the safety of the hills.

His horse shrieked. A shaft stuck out from its neck, and the charger stumbled, hurtling Job through the air.

He slammed into a surprised northerner. Before the soldier could react, Job grabbed the man’s helmet and twisted, then let the northerner slump to the ground of his own weight. Job’s first thought was gratitude for the soldier’s body, which kept him from the brunt of the mud.

He leapt to his feet and swung around.

Only a handful of men remained mounted. They hacked their way toward him.

“To me!” he yelled. Job strode forward with his great sword and opened a path to his men. It was his duty, his strength that would give his soldiers victory this day. The northerners fell around him like wheat under a sickle. So great was his assault, the enemy fell back in shock and fear.

A horseman surged forward, and Job caught the tack and swung up into the saddle—behind Zophar.

“You shouldn’t be out in weather like this without a horse,” Zophar said.

“Unfortunately, my horse decided to take a nap.”

Zophar swung his horse back toward the fighting. The remainder of Job’s men—no more than a score—broke through the last of the attackers. Turning his mount, Zophar charged toward the dark gap between two outcroppings of stone, and the last of Job’s men flocked around them.

And right on their heels: the army of the North.

Job could see the cut in the cliff. Bildad’s trail. If he could just make it another few hundred yards, they’d at least have a chance. He thought for a moment about his small friend.
Most likely dead.
A pain burned inside him, but he pushed it aside.
There’ll be time to grieve the lost later.

A shout erupted from the northerners behind.

Job looked over his shoulder to see them fall back. “Why do they hesitate? They had us in their grasp.”

“I know not,” Zophar said.

“Continue on.”

The rock on either side rose around them until Job’s men had to form a single-file line. The horses were a bit skittish, but at least the cliff walls afforded some protection from wind and rain.

The terrain lifted, and Job could sense a slight lightening of the sky above. Somewhere behind the dark clouds, the sun had risen. They had made it through the night. Job knew his men required rest. Many had injuries that needed tending, but he wanted to get them to higher ground—to a better vantage point overlooking their enemy.

He pushed onward.

When they finally climbed out of the small slash in the land and up onto a flat, rocky area, he called a halt. The land tumbled off to their left, and to the right a jagged spire of rock lifted up toward the churning sky.

Eliphaz was last to come out of the cleft in the stone. Always faithful, he had taken up the rear. He rode toward them as Job and Zophar dismounted. “I count twenty-three remaining.”

“Where did that army come from?” Zophar said. “It was as if they appeared from the dust of the ground.”

“There’s no time to speculate.” Job looked at the bedraggled men sliding from their saddles to splash in the mud. “Eliphaz, gather five men who faired the best and go back down the trail. Not far, but enough to ensure we aren’t surprised again.”

Eliphaz nodded once and turned his mount around.

“Zophar, I need you with me. Let’s go see what the enemy is up to.”

“But your arm, sir.”

Job looked down. An arrow had pierced his right arm, just behind the bicep. “When did that happen?” He reached over and snapped off the shaft. “I’ll take care of it when we return.”

He turned and scrambled up a broken mound of rock piled along the lip of the small plateau.

Zophar followed.

By the time they reached a location suitable for seeing the army, Job wished he had done something about the arrow embedded in his arm. But what was a trifle when nearly a thousand soldiers filled the plain below?

“What see you, Zophar?”

His friend studied the army. In the rain and morning gloom, they’d be barely visible, except for the torches the soldiers still held. “They are simply standing there waiting.”

“Waiting for what?” Job began to feel uneasy again, as if the sense of impending doom he felt before the attack had nothing to do with the army that ambushed them. He shook his head at such foolishness. What could be more devastating than what they just faced?

He turned from the spectacle below. “Let’s see to those men. We need to move—”

A horrible roar filled the air, echoing over the plains.

Job threw his hands over his ears and shot his gaze back toward the army below. The orderly lines of soldiers fell back from the cliffs where he and Zophar stood. The front soldiers dropped their torches and collided with those behind as they tried to scramble away.

Again, a noise akin to thunder, but a hundred times louder, rent the air.

Job turned. The spire of rock that rose behind his men seemed to have grown. His eyes betrayed him as two massive wings, somewhat like a bat’s, but larger than a great ship’s sails, unfurled from the stony monolith.

The horses bucked and tore at their pickets. Job stared in disbelief as a dark form detached itself from the rock and dropped toward his men. The sheer immensity of the beast overwhelmed him. A snout, the size of a farmer’s wagon, split wide open. Teeth like rows of swords gleamed in the feeble light. A bellow echoed off the stony walls. For a heartbeat longer, Job stood frozen in place, but then fire lit the sodden ground as a ball of flame engulfed two men. His men.

Job yanked his sword from the sheath at his side and charged over the rocky boulders, into the heart of danger.