It was a struggle to keep aligned as they backed across the river silt. Nrao Aveldt had never been so proud in his life.
Oglut felt a surge and a shift. That was odd. His power felt suddenly much greater. He seized it and pushed his will, urging all his slaves into the attack. He was sure he’d acquired a number of Nrao Aveldt’s warriors, who would sow chaos in that very pretty formation, and bring it to a boiling incoherence the rest could overswarm. His warriors and beasts hesitated, regrouped and charged.
It hit him too late what he’d felt. It was not the sudden gain of the attacking Mrem. It was the recovery of some of his slaves, who had actually broken from his mind. He cursed, and flogged them mentally, demanding they charge or face even greater agony. They slowed, but continued.
That was fine, even for the mindweak, because the Mrem were in retreat. They were pulling back across the river now, and lacked the heart and spleen to face his mind and his warriors. He would press now, then pursue. The muck and water would slow them. Their care for their skins would be their end.
Talonmaster Hress Rscil felt strangely calm, despite hot sun, sticky mud and the sun beating down on him. Then he sloshed into the river and felt chill. He sought gaps between pebbles with his feet. A fall now would be disastrous.
Even though their plan called for abandoning the carts and chariots, temporarily, his guts flopped as they did so. The drovers and javelin throwers dismounted and ran, to fall into the ranks where they could. Many did not make it to that relative safety.
Ahead, hundreds of soulless eyes stared at him from Oglut’s mind-ravished slaves. They took little care as they slid down the gullied bank, from tangled grass to sodden mud, then onto loose rocks. They crashed through the growth and over downed limbs, to splash into the water.
It was up to his waist now, and he looked around to monitor progress. It went well enough, but the lines grew ragged as bodies fought the current. The water was cool, though, and cleaned his fur. That probably wasn’t fair exchange for hindered movement. He was in a deeper, slower pool at the bottom of some cascades hissing above him. Others were ankle-deep in rocky, tickling shallows. Some were in rapids between the two.
The other problem became apparent. He cared about holding formation. The cursed Liskash didn’t. They high-stepped and waded and dove into the current, eager to reach the Mrem because the monster in their brains told them to. They threw themselves against javelins, to die and drag those into the water in their bodies.
“Darts!” the talonmaster shouted, and a flurry of bronze-tipped and weighted points arced from the front rank.
The water ran red downstream of him.
Then he was knocked under and felt a spear point tear past him, slicing his arm. Some of the Liskash had made it obliquely up the hill and across the rocks above. Rscil felt three or more, and he struck out with his spear, while clutching at his waist for his battle claws. Another jab missed, but he was still under and being held. His arm burned and his lungs started to.
The spear was jammed in the riverbed, so he could only use it for support, as cold water shoved at his nostrils and throat, sloshed in his ears and pulled at him. He got a fist in his battle claws, though, and raised them with a grin that he restrained just in time to avoid choking.
With a firm thrust and shove, he accomplished two things. He pushed his head above water, and he sliced the guts of his rightmost antagonist into tatters that leaked and bled in a boiling surge of color.
The talonmaster swung his battle claws gleefully around and watched for just a moment as a Liskash’s expressionless face shredded like a wind-ripped tent. The thing convulsed and thrashed and at last made a squealing sound as its feet kicked and it fell away. That freed Rscil’s spear, but he left it in the chest of the third, that clutched at it and drooled blood as Rscil swam downstream, spitting gory water.
Quickly, Rscil assessed. There were other melees in progress, as Oglut’s slaves tried to overwhelm them by sheer numbers. The live Liskash used the twitching dead as stepping stones, and seemed determined to catch every Mrem point they could.
It would work, Rscil realized. They’d run out soon enough, and then, regardless of claws and teeth, they’d be buried under revolting lizard flesh. He watched one catapult itself over its predecessors, clear a gap in the First where no one had any longarms left, to land amid the Dancers, who snarled and howled and ripped it apart with javelins and claws.
Three beats later the Dancers were back in formation, panting and glazed red, but singing and waving.
But a glance back showed that Claws Eight and Seven were scrambling up the north bank, reaching down to help the Dancers ahead of them. There were holes in the front, where the bravest had died, but Aedonniss-and especially Assirra-willing, the rest would get up that bank, and have high ground from which to stab the disgusting lizards.
We’ll be heading north soon enough, he told himself.
Then the talonmaster ordered, “Quick now, and even! Thrust and block! and thrust and block! and step! and thrust! and step! and thrust!” His arm hurt, but he ignored the pain. Almost everyone near him showed small wounds.
At least the nearest heard him over the din of dying Liskash, and swung their points in unison. It worked, creating a wall of bodies again that hindered the advance until the water dislodged some into the shifting ripples.
Then they were all on the silt and debris of the north bank. Sharp gravel had never felt so wonderful. The talonmaster pulled at the nearest warrior and Dancer, shouting, “Keep position! And keep dancing!”
He could hear left feet stomping as the retreating claw took back its position. Those farther back passed forward their spears, keeping their javelins for themselves.
Rscil hadn’t heard that roar before, but he knew what it meant.
“ Retreat at the double! ” he shouted. “ Retreat at the double! ”
He heard someone echo it before the sound was lost.
If they could only get up that slippery bank…
Oglut saw victory. A sheer wave of dispensable slaves, petty criminals and mindweak inferiors hurled themselves against the lead Mrem. They might hide it from his sons, but he saw that the front rank had all the stoutest and best. Beyond that were lesser-built males and even females. Crack that facade and the rest would flee.
They were moving faster, already, eager to retreat from him. They slipped and clambered backward up the bank, using their spears for support and traction. He had them, and now for the kill, and once he tasted their anguish, he would draw them into his fold and make them his. They would entertain him, clean the herd beasts, scrub latrines, all the lowest tasks.
He urged his trunklegs on, drawing his high-wheeled chariot, bedecked in its glittering silver and bluestone, in a bumpy ride down the bank and across the mud. It wasn’t dignified, but none would notice. With enough speed, the animals managed not to mire, though they did struggle. His wheels sank, but dragged and rolled, and then he was in the river, up high, looking down on the puny victims. A wounded one waved an arm before him, and he steered to crush it under the left wheel, feeling a rise and crunch as he ran over its ribs.
It was then another distraction on the left caught his attention. He glanced over, and froze in wonder. Was it magic? Some trick of a storm? But the sky was clear and blue, and a rushing wall of water roared toward him, brown with dirt and spitting froth and weeds.