He had begun feeling the weight of time upon him, his lack of a past. His life he had devoted to helping Bragi build Bragi's dreams. Now he realized he had never spun a dream of his own.
The noise from the front was different tonight. Badalamen was up to something. He rushed toward the clamor, torch in one hand, sword in the other. He didn't fear the savan dalage. He had met them before. A torch could hold them at bay till Radeachar arrived.
Badalamen drove through the juncture of Iwa Skolovdan forces with those of Dvar, into the Itaskians behind. Men of all three countries shrieked questions, got no intelligible answers. Some fought one another in their confusion.
A solid, single black column poured through.
Blackfang, through sheer lungpower, assembled company commanders, calmed panic, gave orders, led the counterattack.
Pikemen and arrows. A deadly storm tore at the legions, opening gaps. The Iwa Skolovdans insinuated themselves, broke the unity of the column. Blackfang, howling, brought more men to bear. That part of Shinsan's advance devolved into melee. Haaken, with a woodcutter's axe, inspired those near enough to see. Always, when not shouting other orders, he called for torches and fires.
Forty-five minutes later the gap was gone. The line was secure. He turned his attention to the thousands who had broken through.
The headquarters hill was aflame. It looked bad for its defenders.
Though near exhaustion, Blackfang ran to help his brother.
The savan dalage caught him halfway. There were three ofthem. He couldn't swing his torch fast enough. He went down cursing his killers.
The dwarf kicked the roc into a screaming, sliding dive. Fear and exhilaration contested for his soul. One dragon side-slipped winging over, the air rippling its wings. They fluttered and cracked like loose tent canvas in a high wind. The monster vanished in the darkness.
"One away," Marco crowed. "Come on, you bastards."
The other two held the turn and took the dive, wingtip to wingtip, precisely, their serpentine necks outthrust like the indicting fingers of doom. They were old and cunning, those two.
The fire and fury of the battlefield expanded swiftly, rocking and spinning as the roc maneuvered. To Marco it seemed someone had hurled him at a living painting of the floor of Hell. The roar swelled. His heart hammered. This was his last chance. A do or die game of chicken. They had to pull up first....
They were old and wise and knew every molecule of the wind. They stayed with him. Their wings beat like brazen gongs when they broke their fall.
Marco glimpsed startled faces turned suddenly upward. Screams. A dragon shriek when one pursuer's wingtip dipped too low and snagged a tent top.
"Eee-yah!" Marco screamed over his shoulder. "Let's go, you scaly whoreson. You and me. We got a horse race now." One on one he could outfly the granddaddy dragon of them all.
He didn't see the winged horse quartering in. He didn't see the spear of light.
He felt pain, and an instant of surprise when he realized there was nothing but air beneath him. The stars tumbled and went out.
Six columns of two thousand men each followed scattered trails, captained by old killers named Rahman, El Senoussi, Beloul. A seventh's path defined their base course.
It was tired, deserted country they rode. The few survivors vanished at the sound of hooves.
The young King had led his tired, grumbling old terrorists through night-march after night-march till, now, they saw dragons scorching the northern sky.
"It's begun," Megelin sighed. He planted his standard and waited for his commanders.
He fell asleep wondering if his gesture had merit, if his father's ghost would approve.
The night stalkers pursued the creature calling himself the Silent, who for centuries had been anything but. He hated light almost as much as they, but in his terror spelled anything to keep them at bay. Balls of flame floated overhead. He flailed about with swords of fire.
The long span of his arrogant bluster was scheduled to end. The Norns had scribbled-in Palmisano as the destination that ended his life-road.
The nearness of savan dalage stampeded a herd of war-horses. In the fractional second while they distracted him, Zindahjira died.
The stampeding mounts battered Ragnar. He scuttled beneath a haywagon. It nearly capsized in the equine tide.
The smell of savan dalage overrode that of horse fear and manure. Sweat soaked Ragnar's clothing. He had no torch. "Hakes!" He heard Blittschau bellowing, but the Altean didn't hear him. The clang of metal on metal rose against the drumming of hooves.
Shinsan's men had reached the horses.
The last screaming, lathered stallion hurtled past....
Ragnar rose slowly, his palm cold and moist on his sword hilt. A tiger-masked Tervola and three dark soldiers advanced with scarlet swords.
The wagon frame ground into his back....
The western line bent, bowed, withdrew a hundred yards under Badalamen's predawn general attack. But he committed auxiliaries and allies, spending their lives to tire and weaken his toes. They didn't break through. The panic of the night hadn't gotten out of hand.
Ragnarson, having shed his tears, rose from beside his dead. He shook off Reskird's sympathetic hand. "I'm all right." His voice was cold and calm. He glanced at the crown of the hill where, till last night, his headquarters had stood. The surviving attackers were heightening their earthworks.
They had completed their mission. Now they would await relief from their commander.
Visigodred departed the tent concealing the remains of his oldest and dearest antagonist. Mist held him momentarily, whispering. Radeachar had just found Marco.
Like scenes were occurring everywhere. A dozen national ensigns flew with hastily stitched black borders. Death had shown few favorites during her midnight rampage.
Bragi glimpsed a winged horse settling into the remains of the Imperial fortress. He growled, "We begin."
Trumpet voices filed the air. Drums responded. The knights advanced. Their pennons waved bright and bold. Their spirits were high. King Wieslaw of Iwa Skolovda had made a speech to stir the souls of veterans as old as and cynical as Tantamagoraand Alacran.
This would be their finest hour, the battle remembered a thousand years. The greatest charge in history.
An infantryman walked at each stirrup. Some were the knights' men. Most were doughty fighters Ragnarson had assigned: Trolledygnjans, Kaveliners, Guildsmen, veteran swordsmen who had been withheld from the front. They were rested and ready.
Aisles opened through the pikes and bows. Arrows darkened the air. Mangonels and trebuchets released.
The Iwa Skolovdan battle pennon dipped, signaling thecharge.
How bright their crests and pennons! How bold the gleam of their armor! How brilliant their countless shields! The earth groaned beneath their hooves. The sun itself seemed to quake as the army shouted with a hundred thousand throats.
The drums changed voice as Wieslaw spurred his charger. Lockstep, the men in black marched backward.
Not many pits appeared, but enough to blunt the charge.
"Damn!" Ragnarson growled, watching the gleaming tide break on the black wall, slow, and swirl like paints mixing.
The knights abandoned their lances, flailed with swords or maces. The men who had run at their stirrups guarded thehorses.
The bowmen, unable to ply their weapons without killing friends, grabbed swords, axes, hammers, mauls, rushed into the melee.
Bragi had kept no reserve but the pickets round last night's raiders, and the pikemen, who would screen any withdrawal.
From river to river the slaughter stretched, awesome in scale.