The Hitts tried to bring down mount and man by sheer force of numbers. A dozen of them clung to him and his horse, screaming their war cry. Yeeeeeee-ahhhhhhhhhhh.
Blade fought them off, standing in his stirrups and hacking and slashing and thrusting. He was drenched in Hitt blood. At last he broke free and rode on beyond a line of black tents to a slight rise in the meadow. Here he paused for a moment of breath and viewing. His cavalry was over the line of wagons and the foot soldiers were pressing hard through the center. The edge of the cliff lay but a hundred yards ahead.
Blade summoned another young officer to him. The man arrived gasping and sweating, his sword red with Hitt blood.
«They fight like demons from hell,» he blurted. «I have sabered me five children this day and I had never thought to do that.» Blade, wiping blood and sweat from his eyes, commanded him to take small parties of the horse and seal off the defiles leading down to the beach. He would send foot to reinforce and lend mass.
«I will press on to the cliff and then turn to right and left. We have split them now and it is but a matter of time. But no Hitt must reach the beach from this meadow and no Hitt must come up here from the beach. We must keep them separate.»
The officer nodded in quick understanding. «Aye, Prince. The defiles are narrow and a small party can hold them either way, to front or back.»
«Go and do it then.»
Thane came up with an arrow through one brawny arm. His armor was dented and bloody and his horned helmet slipped askew, but he gave Blade an enormous grin. «Did I not tell you these Hitts could fight? Even when surprised. I am proud of my people.»
Blade regarded him with a faint smile. He nodded at the arrow. «They appear to have given you something to remember them by.»
Thane glanced down at the arrow as though he had just become aware of it. «This? It is nothing. A gift from some tall warrior. I repaid him in full.»
Thane extended his arm. «Break off the head, Blade, so I can pluck it out.»
Blade snapped off the arrowhead and Thane grunted saying, «It does hurt a little-a man needs wine for this.» He pulled out the shaft and flung it away. Blade handed him a cloth and helped him bind the wound.
Thane pointed to Blade's thigh. «They blooded you also.»
«Nothing. Come on. We must get to the cliff edge and give Ogier sight of us. He has borne the real brunt of all this and will be needing encouragement.»
The fighting was spotty now, diminishing as more and more of the Hitts were slain. Some of the hedgehogs still fought back to back, and the cavalry had been called off while machines hurled huge stones into the close-packed Hitts. Infantry advanced slowly on them, ready to move in and finish the job when the hedgehogs broke at last. Blade summoned an officer.
«This is a general order, to all officers. You will take such prisoners as will surrender. Women and children are to be disarmed by force and held prisoner by force-all males will be killed if they do not surrender. See you to it that all officers get this order.»
When the man had ridden off, Thane said, «It is useless, you know. Hitt warriors will not surrender, and to hold the women and children only brings trouble. They will not be slaves. They will kill themselves if they cannot escape, and those that remain you will have to feed and care for.»
Blade looked at him. «What would you have me do? Massacre babes?»
Thane shrugged his great shoulders. «I do not know. It is impossible to deal with Hitts. I know, being one. But look you yonder, Blade, and see what I mean.»
A thin and ragged line of Hitts, the survivors, had retreated to the edge of the cliff. They had flung their last spear, shot their last arrow, hurled their last stone. Now, as the horse and foot soldiers of Zir advanced on them, they turned and, screaming a last defy, leaped out into the void.
Thane said, «They have no leather wings. It is a harsh landing on those rocks below.»
One Hitt remained. Blade and Thane spurred toward him. He was a slinger and he had one stone left. As they drew near he whirled his sling about his head, screeching the harsh yeeeeee-ahhhhhh, and loosed his missile. It buzzed between them. The Hitt spat and made an obscene gesture, then ran to the edge and leaped far out. They could hear his war cry as he fell-yeeeeeeee-ahhhhhhhhhhhhh.
They reined in at the cliff edge and peered down. The narrow beach far below, at no point more than a hundred yards deep and less than a quarter of a mile in length, was an inferno. Blade's first thought was that peering into hell must be very like this.
They still fought down there, so jammed and close-packed that there was little room to swing a weapon. Ogier's troops had carved a beachhead some hundred yards in length and at no place more than fifty feet deep. Ogier had dug trenches in the loose sand and piled corpses before them as barricades. But beyond this perimeter, at the moment, a hundred individual small battle were in progress. Ogier himself, on horseback, rode back and forth at the water's edge and bellowed commands. Behind him and all up and down the beach were the hulks of burning transports. Other barges were leaving the end of the pontoon as they were loaded and made for the shore. The bridge itself was packed with troops for half its length.
Thane urged his horse closer to the edge and strained to see. He shielded his eyes and peered and swore mightily. «I can see Loth Bloodax! He fights yonder and he fights well, as was to be expected. But what of Galligantus? I do not see him. By the gods-if someone else slays him and I am cheated. .»
Blade had called up some of his officers. The battle of the meadow was won, but for mopping up, and now Ogier must be relieved, and speedily.
«Take your foot,» he ordered, «and begin pressure on the defiles. Dismount the cavalry and throw them into it. It will go hard, for those passages are narrow, but use our advantage of numbers and force it. We must move onto the beach at once and take them from two sides.»
There was some grumbling at this, for certain of the officers thought they had finished their day's work, but Blade glared and the muttering ceased. Blade summoned a signaleer, and flags were shown on the cliff. Ogier stared up and lifted his sword in response. Blade thought that the Captain looked weary unto the death.
He moved to where Thane, muttering oaths, still searched in vain for his enemy Galligantus. «He is either slain or fled,» Thane grumbled, «and to give him his due, I do not think him coward. Some bastard has killed him, and if I find out who I will slay him.»
Blade had to laugh at the big Hitt. «You are battle-weary,» he said. «Your thinking is tangled. Forget it and point me out this Loth Bloodax.»
Thane tugged at his yellow beard with blood-stained fingers, then had to laugh at himself. «Yes, you are right. I am a fool. But yonder is Bloodax-see with the ring of Zirnian corpses all about him. I count some twenty at a glance.»
Blade stared. At this point the Zirnians had thrust a narrow salient across the beach to within a few yards of the cliff wall. The wedge was beset on all sides by screaming Hitts, but so far it was holding. The battle here was fiercest, hand to hand and bloody, but Ogier fed in more troops constantly, and as Zirnians fell they were replaced. Blade understood the tactic and nodded in approval. Ogier sought to drive between the Hitts, to divide them on the beach and strengthen his salient until he could face two ways and begin the last drive.