When 'arf your bullets fly wide in the ditch,
Don’t call your Martini a cross-eyed old bitch;
She’s human as you are – you treat her as sich
An’ she’ll fight for the young British soldier
Rudyard Kipling, The Young British Soldier
From inside the tent, Elizabeth sat frozen, listening to the sounds of the impi chanting on the Heights.
Lindani had begged her to leave but she would not. And now she was trapped down here, with Jack in the field anyway.
She’d heard the thunder of hooves, the excited shouting about Zulus, and had not been surprised when Jack took so long to return, but with the Zulu battle calls ringing out from the hills, she realized now he wasn’t cloistered away in a meeting, but out forming a defensive line with his men.
The chanting changed to a hoarse cry, and she shivered. The guns boomed, the rifles cracked. The impi was spilling over the Heights.
The line of fire sounded far out, extended towards the dongas.
How could she be so helpless?
She jerked at the rope, but Jack had done a thorough job. There was no way she could get free of this without him untying her. And she had failed miserably to convince him to do that.
She weighed up the chances of release if she called out. Chambers was issuing orders not that far from the tent. She opened her mouth to shout.
Closed it again.
What could she say?
There was no way he’d untie her without talking with Jack first, and Jack would be in the field. Killing Zulus.
Her lover trying to kill her brother.
Elizabeth began to struggle against her ropes again.
It was past midday and they were pinned down by the gunfire. Lindani felt calmer now, the effects of the muti not as strong. He remembered the day Inyoni shot the old rifle Malusi had given her, and how it had blasted through the shield.
She’d tried to warn them, but they thought they knew better. They hadn’t wanted to hear it.
These whitemen had even better rifles than the one she’d used. Rifles that shot bullets strong enough to go through a warrior and kill the warrior behind him, as well.
For the moment, though, he was safe. Gone to ground in the network of dongas at the bottom of the Heights with whoever else had made it down the slope.
They were safe, but they were trapped. Every time a warrior tried to climb out of the natural trench and advance on the line, they came under a hail of fire.
The onslaught of noise, smoke and blood was a hell Lindani had not found in his darkest nightmares.
There was a murmur of interest among the men, and Lindani looked left, almost reeling back when he saw Bangizwe staring at him, raw hatred in his eyes. His uncle was following him still. Dogging him through this battle as best he could.
But even his uncle could not resist the pull of the action coming up from the east, and he too turned his head left.
A group of NNC men were retreating back to the camp, the troops that had gone east earlier that morning with the big gun, now fleeing in the face of the Zulu’s left horn. The big gun they’d taken with them was missing, and Lindani felt a flare of pride in the warriors of the horn, to have overcome such a powerful weapon. That single boom from earlier was the only shot the whitemen had managed to get off.
The retreating NNC troops were firing behind them as they went, harassed by the left horn, although Lindani was sure it was only a breakaway group of warriors. The others would still be racing to get beyond the camp and meet up with the right horn to form a neat circle.
The mounted NNC men reached the line of dongas in which Lindani and the rest of the ibutho lay and plunged their mounts into the far left trenches for cover. They kept up their fire on the warriors chasing them for only a few minutes, then they rose up over the ditches and ran, without their horses, to form an extension of the camp line.
More and more men from the uMbonambi ibutho made it down the hill and joined him and the others in the donga, and a general started shouting there was a gap, that between the NNC men who’d taken up a position on the far left of the camp line and the redcoats, there was open ground. That in the moment before the smoke cleared from a round of fire, they could sneak through.
Spurred on by this, some of the men leapt out of the donga and ran forward, and Lindani watched in horror as they were cut down by fire from both the NNC and the redcoats.
“Bring me some cattle,” the general shouted, and a few of the warriors scrambled off to carry out his order.
Lindani saw with shock one of the big indunas, the general of the uKhandempemvu ibutho, run down the slope to join his men, and urge them on.
He ran back and forth in front of them, as if unconcerned by the bullets flying all around, castigating his men for hiding in the dongas.
Lindani heard him start to sing a praise song to the King just as a small herd of cattle, terrified to the point of collapse by the noise, was forced into the deep gulley where he lay.
“Who will run with the cattle towards the line?” their induna called, and before Lindani could even think to move, ten men rushed forward, eager for the honour.
They forced the small herd up and over the donga, driving it straight at the British line, hiding amongst the petrified beasts.
The guns were very powerful, because their bullets felled the cattle, exposing the men hiding behind them. But still, three warriors moved far enough forward and were suddenly behind the enemy line.
With a whoop of victory, the uMbonambi began to leap over the donga.
Lindani heard another cry of victory to the right, and saw the great general had finally convinced the uKhandempemvu to run straight into the teeth of the guns.
As he watched, the great man ran forward one step, two steps, with his men, then fell, stopped by a bullet straight through his forehead.
His heart lurched. If so mighty a warrior could be struck down, what chance had he? And yet, his sense of purpose was back. He watched the British line falter, unhinged by the rush of thousands of warriors in the face of their cruel fire. Watched them start to step back, and then turn and run.
Now was his chance to find Inyoni, and get her off the battlefield.
And he would take pleasure in killing every whiteman who got in his way.
Fire and load, fire and load. Jack couldn’t remember when he’d been doing anything else. And still the warriors kept coming down the slopes, going down into the dongas out of range.
Those who made it.
The slaughter was horrific. The warriors had to jump over the bodies of the fallen to get to safety, and Jack could see the horror on their faces at their losses.
Yet it did not stop them coming. They had an edge in this fight. The British soldiers were following orders, but the Zulus were fighting for their country. For their sovereignty.
And it showed.
As he called the load and fire commands to his men, ‘Ready’ and ‘Present’, he wondered how much longer they could keep this up.
The ammunition was coming. Ten minutes ago Chambers himself ran up with boxes of it, but the cart drivers were also making themselves useful, running up to the line in a steady stream.
Jack used the butt of his Martini-Henry to smash the lid of a box open, and loaded up on more bullets.
If they stopped firing for even a moment, if there was even the slightest pause, one or two of the warriors trying to breach the line would succeed, and then God help them.
God help Elizabeth.
He certainly hadn’t, even when he had the chance. His inability to let her go meant she was caught in a trap.
If the line broke, and Jack didn’t see how it couldn’t, his first duty was to free Elizabeth, protect her.
He saw a company of the NNC had taken up the line to the right of him, but the men were not armed with Martini-Henrys and only the few white officers among them had pistols. The short-sightedness of the staff in failing to train and arm their Native Contingent came home to him in a very personal way.
The sound of gunfire to his right made him focus east, and he saw Durnford retreating with his men before an advancing party of Zulu warriors. Like a long arm extended in a column to the right of the camp, they pushed forward, driving Durnford before them.
There was no sign of the rocket battery.
Remembering the single boom of fire, Jack realized it must have been overcome.
These Zulus could fight.
Durnford was already in line with the Zulu force that had gone to ground in the dongas at the bottom of the Heights, and he and his men leapt into one of them, using it to return fire at the wall of men coming at them.
But despite their massive losses the warriors were not deterred, and Jack saw Durnford’s company abandon their horses and run up the slope towards the far right.
“Burdell, support Durnford,” one of the senior officers shouted to him, and Jack was forced to extended his line even more, moving his company, strung out like wide-spaced pearls on a necklace, across to the far right, passing behind the NNC men.
They had just taken up position, covering Durnford’s flank and stopping the Zulu’s advance, when a herd of cattle was chased over the dongas, straight at them, and at the same moment, Durnford’s men fell back.
“Durnford! Why are you pulling back?” Jack watched in horror as he and his men were suddenly left swinging in the proverbial breeze. Their position over-exposed and vulnerable.
“We have no more ammo,” Durnford yelled back. “I’m going to confer with Pulleine. Retreat. Everyone retreat.”
Jack looked at the three unopened boxes of ammunition at his feet and shook his head. What in God’s name was going on?
He raised his Martini again but as he did, he saw the middle-aged Zulu general who had been running up and down, encouraging his troops, had succeeded.
In the face of firing so hot, his ears were ringing with it, the warriors leapt over the dongas, straight for the line. As if they were immortal.
It was the most incredible thing he'd ever seen.
Their bravery seemed to sting the rest of the impi into action, and all along the Zulu line, the warriors poured out of their trenches and rushed the camp.
“God and the Saints preserve us,” a junior officer wailed, and Jack knew they had lost.
From the camp, the bugler sounded ‘The Retire’.
“Retreat. Form together,” Jack called out.
His men moved into a box formation, and started back, keeping the fire rate up.
“Sir.” A private grabbed Jack’s sleeve, and Jack looked up to where he pointed.
The Royal Artillery guns had answered the bugle’s call and were moving back, and as the gunners ran beside the cannons, a wave of Zulu warriors engulfed them. Jack saw the first man fall. Stabbed through with an assegai, screaming as he died.
From now on, the fighting would be hand to hand. And the Zulus would have their revenge for the many thousands of their brothers, slaughtered on the slopes of the Inyoni Heights.
Like the battlefields of old, bayonet against assegai, cold steel on steel.