“But you’re thinking, if you settle in these parts, are you going to have to defend yourselves-or will the Lady of the Land protect you? She will, sir-that I can promise as her loyal follower these twenty years.
And for the rest of your journey-why don’t you ride with us back to the castle? No bandits are going to attack a troop of Lady Lilith’s army!”
It was exactly what Astra had had no idea of how
to accomplish. The officer, whose name was Brodik, was about the same age as Trel, and in half an hour the two men were fast friends. Kimma, and even Seela, flirted gently with some of the men, and they rode at a steady pace which Astra saw would put them near the castle at about the same time Vortius’
troops arrived.
They were still far outnumbered, and she feared that there would not be time to get inside the castle and bar the gate against the invaders-but they had brought twenty armed and well-trained men to join forces with Lilith’s retainers. Of the people in the castle, she could Read none in league with Drav- but he still manned the watchtower, relaying false messages that all was well, supposedly coming from the lookout post where Vortius had killed Yakov. The two guards he had sent for a break had resumed their posts outside Amicus’ and Corns’ rooms, with no idea that their charges now lay dead inside.
Zanos rode steadily, with the tension she recognized as the fighter’s pitch, ready to move at the first threat. He had nothing to say-perhaps because some of the soldiers riding beside their little troupe might hear.
Wishing he could Read, she reached across and put her hand on his. He looked over and gave her an encouraging smile-and she knew he thought she was frightened.
And for the first time, she realized she wasn’t.
No-it wasn’t that she had no fear. Indeed, her stomach knotted when she thought that she might be killed, or Zanos might-and surely not all of their new friends could escape unscathed from the upcoming battle.
But it was a different kind of fear from the anxiety she had known all her life. She had made a choice-
and she had absolutely no fear that it was wrong! Even if Vortius won, she still knew she would have no doubt that she had chosen right. Her self-doubts were gone.
So she squeezed Zanos’ hand. “I’m all right,” she said. “No matter what happens, I’m all right-and I love you.”
“As I love you, ” he replied. “We’re going to win, Astra-we’ll get rid of Vortius, and then you and I are going to have a long and happy life together.”
And she Read that his desire for vengeance, if not gone, was outweighed by his concern and love for her.
She sent out her own thoughts, even if he could not Read them-and the look in his blue eyes told her that he understood enough without Reading-
The moment was shattered by an outcry ahead, and the sound of galloping horses. Astra Read the castle, which was now just up the steep road they were climbing, the watchtower already in view.
The road from the north converged with this one near the castle gates-and someone had seen from a castle window Vortius’ unreported army approaching!
Two men swarmed up to the watchtower, looked out-and one of them grabbed up the horn and blew a mighty blast as the other shook Drav, demanding, “What’s the matter with you? Why didn’t you sound the alarm?!” Then he flung Drav down the ladder, where he lay stunned for a moment-then drew his knife and started to throw it at his attacker. But the other guard flung a spear from the tower, and Drav was dead.
“Close the gates!” shouted one of the guards-but the other grasped his arm and pointed toward Brodik’s troop approaching from the south, bearing the banners with Lilith’s blue lion.
” Guard the gates!” came the revised order. “Let the troops in, but keep out the attackers!”
Easier said than done. By this time, Brodik was aware that something was happening at the castle-he had heard the horn, and Astra couldn’t be sure, since she had Read them, whether the guards’
instructions were audible from here.
They all spurred their horses-but so did Vortius
and his troops, arriving at almost the same time where the two roads widened into a sort of plaza before the castle gates.
The first of Brodik’s trained soldiers spread themselves in a diagonal from the gate across the northern road, allowing everyone else to ride into the castle behind their barrier-giving their lives blocking the way of the attackers, but taking a sizeable number with them into death.
The troupe from the Settlement and Brodik’s surviving soldiers leaped down from their horses. “Bar those gates!’ Brodik shouted as people swarmed up onto the castle walls and began to rain arrows down on the attackers.
Zanos had not seen Vortius in the attacking army, but of course he would not expose himself in the front ranks. Nor had he come unprepared for barred gates.
The moment Zanos climbed up to the platform from which he could look over the wall, he saw a battering ram being moved up from the rear of Vortius’ entourage. Men in armor heavy enough to deflect arrows slowly hauled the heavy instrument forward, up against the gate, where they shoved blocks under its wheels, then wound the thing back with pulleys to the limit of the straps it hung in. The armored point hit the gates with a splintering thud, but they held. The first time.
Arrows and spears had little effect on the armored men winding the instrument back for a second blow.
Zanos tried to stop the heart of one of the men-but he was moving, the target too hard to concentrate on. Although he staggered, his misstep was not enough to stop the progress of the battering ram.
Then he remembered something Mallen had done against him. He concentrated on the man’s armor, thinking of the metal parts being hot as iron in a forge, burning through the padding beneath-
His victim screamed and dropped out of his place, tearing at his armor-and Zanos looked to the man next to him, trying the same technique.
But it was too slow-and by the time the second man leaped away from his task, the first was back at his despite his smarting burns.
The ram was a log as thick as a man was tall, solid, and freshly cut, heavy with sap. There was no hope of setting it aflame-
And as Zanos was still pondering some way to keep the gates from being battered down, the ram struck a second time-and the center of the gates splintered, knocking the heavy bar halfway across the courtyard.
With a mighty cheer, Vortius’ troops charged around the battering ram and into the yard.
Zanos turned, looking for Astra-but before he could find her he was faced with two men climbing the ladder to the platform, trying to get at him. It was a permanent ladder-he couldn’t kick it over- but it was easy enough to kick the first man in the face, knocking him down on top of his fellow.
They were both up by the time Zanos leaped to the ground, but they were semitrained, hacking and slashing at him and wasting their strength. He slid easily in under one man’s guard for a slash to the thigh that left him lying gasping in pain. The other had a potbelly. His breastplate, obviously stolen from armor designed for a thinner man, rode high-and Zanos skewered him through the middle, jumping back as his guts spewed forth when he pulled out the sword.
Still, he could not see Astra! The courtyard was filled with fighting, the castle’s defenders being driven back by the sheer numbers of attackers. More poured through the gateway every moment.
Slashing right and left, ever alert for attack from behind, Zanos started to work his way to the center of the courtyard, hoping to find his wife.
But it was not Astra he found when a woman’s cry of anguish made him turn-it was Lanna!
Ard was clumsily slashing at one of Brodik’s soldiers-and Lanna saw that he was outmatched. She leaped on his opponent, clawing at his eyes, and with that moment’s advantage Ard managed to run the man through… only to turn and face vengeance incarnate.