An instant later the doors were flung wide. Thirty feet away was the 40-man formation Calchas had posted to guard the entrance.
“Charge!” Leonidas shouted, and started forward.
The moment Rikki had been waiting for arrived. None of the Spartans were paying attention to him. He could do as he pleased without intervention. The katana leaped from its scabbard as he darted over and joined the column, stepping into place next to Captain Chilon.
The officer glanced at him and smiled.
With Leonidas at the forefront, the column poured out the doorway and charged the formation.
Rikki heard one of the enemy soldiers shouting, but the words were indistinct in the rush of the moment. His total attention was focused on the formation, on the spears and shields toward which he raced at full speed. Lacking a shield of his own, he would have to counter the long lances of his foes in another manner. In three seconds he was close enough to see the pupils in the eyes of Agesilaus’s men, and he raised his katana.
Two spears swung toward him.
The Warrior’s arms were a blur as he swung the gleaming katana down, first slashing to the left, then reversing direction and swinging to the right, the steely edge of his ancient weapon cleaving both spears in half.
Knowing he would be at a disadvantage if he attempted to batter through their shields, he automatically opted to force them to lower their guard by angling his compact form downward in an overhand cut, aiming at their legs. The katana bit into their flesh below the knees. Both Spartans buckled, their shields dropping as their legs gave way.
Rikki had them. He slew both with a single horizontal cutting motion that sliced open both their throats. They fell, spewing their life’s blood, and he waded into the thick of the formation. There were Spartans in front of him, Spartans to the right, and Spartans to his left. He swung and parried, thrust and stabbed, fighting by instinct, pressed on all sides.
Crimson drops splattered his face and clothes, but he paid no heed. He mustn’t think, mustn’t allow himself to be distracted for a millisecond, because distraction meant instant death. He had to swing and swing and swing. Up and down. From side to side. Slicing through spears and foes alike. Never stopping, never permitted the luxury of a breather, transformed into an emotionless killing machine.
Cut to the right.
Cut to the left.
Sweat caked his brow, but he paid no attention. His clothes became damp, but he hardly noticed. His shoulders ached and his hands stung from the impact of metal on metal, but he ignored the discomfort.
In all his years, in all the combat he had seen, Rikki had never known anything like this. Unlike individual clashes, where the fighters could take a measure of each other and their personalities figured as prominently in the outcome as their expertise, in a mass battle there was no personalities, only automatons who fought and fought until they lived through the conflict or lost their lives. There was no middle ground.
The katana became coated with blood. Blood dotted Rikki’s martial arts uniform, custom-made for him by the Family Weavers. Blood formed in puddles on the earth and drenched the red uniforms of the slain Spartans.
Blood was everywhere, as if the universe itself had sprung a crimson leak at that particular spot. The tangy aroma of blood filled the air, and the salty taste of blood touched the lips.
Rikki downed five of the enemy. Eight. Ten. He lost count early, and still the battle waged. For the most part the Spartans died in grim silence.
A few gasped. One of two cried out, more in surprise at their own demise than out of fear.
On and on it went.
And abruptly, to his amazement, Rikki found himself in the clear, temporarily free of soldiers. He looked around and saw bodies littering the field, piled in heaps. Spartans were still fighting, many in man-to-man contests. He realized that all of Leonidas’s men were out of the barracks, and that all of Calchas’s men had converged on the north end of the barracks to do battle.
Calchas.
Even as he entertained the thought, Rikki saw a stocky soldier bearing down on him. The man had a dent in his helmet and blood dripping from his sword. Somewhere along the line he’d lost his shield.
“Outsider!” Calchas bellowed, halting several yards off.
“General,” Rikki responded.
“You and your friends are to blame for this’” Calchas declared bitterly.
“You and your accursed Federation.”
“I don’t know what lies Agesilaus has been feeding you. We came here in peace.”
“You’re the liar! And you shouldn’t have come here at all, because you’re never going to leave.”
“That remains to be seen.”
The general drew himself up, his eyes flashing sheer spite, and attacked.
Rikki never gave ground. He met the assault calmly, passionately, his katana matching the officer’s short sword blow for blow. The Spartan’s anger worked in Rikki’s favor. After half a minute the officer struck in a frenzy, apparently frustrated by his failure to penetrate Rikki’s guard, the swings much wider than were prudent. Rikki countered three of them. On the fourth swipe he made as if to block it, then let the short sword swish past his head as he reversed his own stroke and buried the katana in the general’s chest.
Calchas stiffened and released his weapon, then staggered backwards, pulling loose from the Oriental blade. “Damn you!” he snarled defiantly, and pitched onto his face.
Rikki glanced at the melee all around him and discovered the conflict was winding down.There were fewer Spartans fighting. Someone nearby, he didn’t know who, began to yell stridently.
“General Calchas is dead! General Calchas is dead!”
More of the somber struggles ceased. Soldiers stopped their deadly contests to gaze in the direction of the slam officer and the man in black standing over him.
From out of the intermingled forces came General Leonidas, his features a study of fatigue, the bandage on his shoulder stained red. He walked over to his dead nemesis, then stared at the Warrior. Finally, he turned and raised his sword. “Hear me, men on both sides! With General Calchas gone, there is no longer any reason to continue our conflict. I call on all of those who have served so valiantly under him to sheath your swords and convey his body back to your barracks. Those under my command are not not interfere, I give you my word.”
Rikki waited hopefully for a sign that Calchas’s troops would accept the offer. He’d had enough of blood and gore for one day; for many days, in fact. But a rabid shout from a member of the opposing contingent dashed his hopes on the uncompromising rocks of reality.
“For Agesilaus! Victory or death!”
And suddenly the battle was joined again.
The Warrior turned to confront a new foe, knowing he’d been unduly optimistic. For a moment there he’d forgotten who these men were, Spartans.
“You can take them now,” the soldier announced, his arms extended to hand over the Bowies.
Blade grabbed his knives on the run. Almost immediately the soldier dropped behind him, and he stared at the site of the first test, studying the placement of the bales and the positions of the archers. How could he possibly hope to evade ten skilled bowmen? Given his size, he’d be hard to miss.
There were two factors working in his favor, though. First, the archers were 30 feet from the targets. Arrows weren’t like bullets. They couldn’t travel such a distance almost instantaneously. If the bows were as powerful as they appeared, then the shafts would cover the span in a second and a half to two seconds. Not much of a margin, but it would have to suffice.
The second factor was his speed. None of the Spartans were aware of how fast he could run. Next to Rikki, he was the fastest man in the Family.
He slid the Bowies into their sheaths, glad to have them back. Soon he came in line with the bales and veered from the track to take the required position. He stood next to the last target in the row and glanced to the west at the monarch.