He pushed back his helmet by the nasal; the new headgear gave more protection than his old bone-strapped leather cap, but you couldn't see as well. The Earthers were standing oddly-in a line, the way Hwalkarz taught. In two lines, one just over the crest of the hill, another behind it on the highest ground. More strangeness; on the edge of their line was a clump all with spears, then a larger one only with bows. Foolishness-a man with a spear had some chance of stopping a chariot at close quarters. They were counting on those little spears driven into the earth, but he had a cure for that.
"When we get to flung-spear distance, turn right," he barked to the nephew who drove his chariot. "Take their line at a slant, so."
He pointed with a javelin, and blew the cowhorn again. That way the breasts of the horses would take the sides of the poles, not the points-and now their breasts were protected by armor too. We'll lose some to the arrows, he knew. Perhaps he'd be killed himself. Well, he had sons and nephews enough to carry on his blood, and Sky Father would greet him in the halls of the sun, perhaps grant him rebirth. That was the way for a man to die, at another warrior's hands, not in his sleeping-straw like a woman. He lifted the javelin, ready to cast. And the sun will be in their eyes, anyway.
Nearer. Behind him the tribesmen were snarling, roaring into the hollows of their shields, shaking axes and spears and screaming out threats and the savage war cries of their clans. Now the driver shook out the reins, and the horses rocked into a gallop, the other chariots spreading out on either side of him like the wings of a bird-like the wings of a falcon, stooping on its prey! His heart lifted, but he crouched down slightly and brought his shield forward on the left, ready to protect himself and the driver as well. The javelin cocked back.
The front rank of Fiernans were raising their bows, drawing to the ear… but none were shooting! What is this? The enemy grew nearer, nearer, nearly close enough to cast. Behind him the charge of the chariots was a groaning thunder, the whoops and shrieks of their drivers the howling of a pack.
Then someone shouted on the slope ahead. Arrows rose into the air-first those of the Earthers he could see, then more, impossibly many and all at once, swarming up from the hollow behind the ridge. All headed at him. A deep-toned thrumming rose and died, and over it a wailing, whistling sound.
Arrows cracked into his shield, half a dozen of them, driving his crouch down into an almost-squat. Points jammed through sheet steel and leather and wood, glittering on the inside of the curve. Another whacked off the side of his helmet and skittered away. Three hit the driver, sulking feather-deep into his unarmored torso. Too many to count struck in the frame of the chariot, and as many more into the horses that drew it. Merenthraur was far too shocked to react consciously, but a lifetime's training curled him for the impact as the war-car went over at speed. Still something wrenched with blinding pain in his leg as he landed, an explosion of stars in his head and the taste of blood and dust in his open mouth. He spat a tooth and dragged the shield over him as arrows sprouted in the ground all around him, driving into the turf with multiple shink sounds.
He could see the iron-tipped rain falling on his men. The chariots were mostly down, or wheeling back. Behind them the footmen faltered and stopped, doing precisely the wrong thing-hesitating between courage and fear. Rage filled Merenthraur; what trick was this? Arrows came at you one at a time, as the archer drew and loosed! Not in a single blasting storm, so thick no man could dodge or shield himself.
Above him a man's voice bellowed. He didn't know the Fiernan Bohulugi language. If he had, the words would still have sounded odd, in an accent like that of his sorcerer-lord. Three words, shouted over and over again: draw… all together… shoot!
The footmen broke and ran, the few surviving chariots among them. Merenthraur pushed himself to his feet with his shield, shouting incoherently against the piteous squealing of wounded horses. The Fiernan spearmen were rushing out into the wreck of the chariots, points busy. He drew his sword and set himself as two attacked him, one a youth and one with a grown man's beard; his blade chopped a shaft aside, but his knee betrayed him when he tried to follow through with a blow of the shield, and he toppled sideways.
He had just enough time to realize the youth was a woman before the point of her spear grated through his face and into his brain. The sound of splintering bone was the last he ever heard.
"Shit, shit, shit," Alston swore under her breath. "Rapczewicz, you're in charge here until I get back. Shit!"
She ran down the slope and flung herself into the saddle, barely conscious of how six months' practice had made that possible-not easy, she realized as she groped for a stirrup and the animal squealed and surged sideways, but possible. Then she was galloping southward along the front of the line, ignoring the cheers, barely conscious of Swindapa's form beside her with the banner in one hand and the butt braced on her stirrup iron.
"Back!" she shouted. "Back, damn you all, back."
The milling chaos that had been the right wing of her line slowed and stopped. "They flee!" one man shouted, pointing back toward the easterners line. "They run in fear!"
Alston stood in the stirrups, the flag beside her and her height on horseback drawing eyes. "Back! It's a trick-" not now it isn't, but it might be next time-"and you'll fight when I tell you, not before. So you swore! Is your oath good?"
Swindapa came in on her heels, in a torrent of Fiernan Bohulugi. Slowly, the general rush stopped and then turned back toward their positions. Just then there was a huge flat whunk sound, and a rising screech came at her, the horse rearing as something plowed up the turf not twenty feet away. Alston slugged the reins and forced it trembling back to all fours; it tried to turn in a circle and then subsided. A glance over her shoulder showed the plume of dirty-white gunpowder smoke rising from the enemy line.
"Stay in your positions until you're told!" she shouted, and repeated the message as they cantered back to the original position. "Stay! Hold them!"
"That was a fucking fiasco," Walker muttered, tracking with his binoculars. "Refusing the slope-Alston has me pegged as Napoleon, but I'm not that crazy yet."
She must have the archers standing on the opposite side of that rise, just out of sight. The old trick the British had used in the war against Napoleon's marshals, keeping their infantry out of cannon fire until the last moment.
He went on in Iraiina: "It's not the first blow that settles a fight," he said confidently, and moved over to the cannon. "They may-yes, they're giving us a target. Lay her so."
Two men at the end of the first gun's trail heaved, and the muzzle swiveled around. The gunner turned the elevating screw and stepped aside, poising the linstock and its glowing slow match. Walker raised his glasses again. The Fiernans were swarming forward to the attack.
"Yup, can't stand seeing someone run away… Oh, good, it's the black bitch herself. There's your aiming point, men-that flag. Now."
The crew were practiced enough, but he'd only had enough powder for a few live firings. The massive whump sound set horses rearing and men starting in fear down the long ragged line of the Iraiina-led host. He watched the fall of shot and swore softly as the streaming Stars and Stripes came galloping out of the plume of dirt plowed up by the roundshot. Cheering ran along the enemy line as the two riders made their way back along it.