Nassef and El Murid raised the Lord's standard atop a low hill a mile south of the oasis, and an equal distance from the wadi. They studied the enemy, who was waiting on horseback.
"They don't seem impressed by our numbers," Nassef observed.
"What do you suggest?"
"It seems straightforward. Hold the Invincibles here, in reserve. Send the rest in one wave and overwhelm them."
"This is a strange land, Nassef. It's so silent."
The stillness did seem supernatural. Thirty thousand men and nearly as many animals faced one another, and even the flies were quiet.
El Murid glanced at the wadi. It was a shadowy forest of grotesque sandstone formations: steeples, pylons, giant dumbbells standing on end. He shuddered as he considered that devil's playground.
"We're ready," Nassef said.
"Go ahead."
Nassef turned to Karim, el-Kader and the others. "On my signal."
His captains trotted their horses down to the divisions they commanded.
Nassef gave his signal.
The horde surged forward.
Yousif's men waited without moving. They had arrows ready on the strings of their saddle bows.
"Something's wrong," the Scourge of God muttered. "I can feel it."
"Nassef?" El Murid queried in a voice gone small and tentative. "Do you hear drums?"
"It's the hoofbeats... . "
El Murid did hear drums. "Nassef!" His right arm stabbed out like a javelin thrust.
The devil's garden of Wadi el Kuf had begun to disgorge a demon horde.
"Oh, my God!" Nassef moaned. "My God, no."
King Aboud had harkened to Yousif's importunities at last. He had sent Prince Farid to Wadi el Kuf with five thousand of the desert's finest soldiers, many of them equipped after the fashion of western knights. With Farid, in tactical command, was Sir Tury Hawkwind of the Mercenary's Guild. Hawkwind had brought a thousand of his brethren. They were arrayed in western-style lances of a heavy cavalryman, his esquire, two light and one heavy infantrymen.
Nassef had time to think, to react. Heavy cavalry could not charge at breakneck speed across a mile of desert and up a slight hill. And Hawkwind obviously meant to bring his shock power to bear.
"What do we do?" El Murid asked.
"I think it's time for the amulet," Nassef replied. "That's the only weapon that will help now."
El Murid raised his arm. Without a word he showed Nassef his naked wrist.
"Where the hell is it?" Nassef demanded.
Softly, "At Sebil el Selib. I left it. I was so excited about coming, I forgot it." He had not worn the amulet for years, preferring to keep it safe within the shrines.
Nassef sighed, shook his head wearily. "Lord, choose a company of Invincibles and flee. I'll buy you all the time I can."
"Flee? Are you mad?"
"This battle is lost, Lord. All that remains is to salvage as much as we can. Don't stay, and deprive the movement of its reason for existing."
El Murid shook his head stubbornly. "I see no defeat. Only more trouble than we anticipated originally. We still outnumber them, Nassef. And no matter what, I won't leave the field while men are dying for me. Not when they have it in their hearts that I am commanding them. What would they think of my courage?"
Nassef shrugged. "We can but die with honor, then. I suggest you form the Invincibles to meet the coming charge." A moment later, after studying the enemy banners, he murmured thoughtfully, "I wonder what Hawkwind is doing here."
"Trust in the Lord, Nassef. He will deliver them unto us. We have the numbers, and Him on our side. What more could we ask?"
Nassef stifled an angry response. He helped guide the Invincibles into a new disposition.
At the oasis, at feast, it seemed that El Murid's confidence was justified. Yousif's force was surrounded.
"Who's this Hawkwind?"
"A Guildsman. Perhaps their best general."
"Guildsman?" El Murid's ignorance of the world outside Hammad al Nakir was immense.
"A brotherhood of warriors. Not unlike the Invincibles. Called the Mercenary's Guild. They're also a little like the Harish, and yet like nothing we know. They own no allegiance except to one another. After Itaskia, they're probably the greatest military power in the west, yet they have no homeland but a castle called High Crag. When their generals frown, princes cringe. Just their decision to fight for someone sometimes stops a war before it starts."
"How do you know? When have you ever had time to learn?"
"I pay people to learn things for me. I've got spies all over the west."
"Why?"
"Because you want to go there someday. I'm preparing the way. But it's all irrelevant if we don't get out of this alive."
Hawkwind's force was close enough to start increasing its pace.
None of the Invincibles had seen knights before. They neither understood nor sufficiently feared what they faced. When their master gave the signal, they charged. They trusted in the Lord and their name. Hawkwind increased his pace again.
The long lances and heavy horses hit the Invincibles like a stone wall. The Royalists passed through and over them, and crushed them, and in ten minutes were turning and forming for a charge into the rear of the horde beleaguering Yousif.
Neither Nassef nor El Murid said a word. It was even worse than Nassef had expected. The Wahlig of el Aswad was in a bad way. But once help arrived the battle became a rebel slaughter.
Hawkwind placed a screen of infantry between himself and the remnants of the Invincibles. He placed another of light horse between himself and the oasis, with extended and slightly C-shaped wings. Then he started hammering with his armored horsemen. Charge. Melee. Withdraw. Reform. Charge.
El Murid was too stubborn to accept reality. Nassef's troops, down in the witch's cauldron, were too confused to realize what was happening.
Hawkwind set about systematically exterminating them.
At one point Nassef wept. "My Lord," he pleaded, "let me go down there. Let me try to break them out."
"We can't lose," El Murid murmured in reply, more to himself than to his war general. "We have the numbers. The Lord is with us."
Nassef cursed softly.
The sun moved to the west. Hawkwind extended his wings, completing a thin encirclement against which Nassef's warriors collided randomly, like flies against the walls of a bottle. He put more and more strength into the circle, daring El Murid to try something with his battered Invincibles. The Wahlig's men filtered out of the cauldron and became part of the circle.
Some of Nassef's men tried to surrender, but Prince Farid had ordered his to take no prisoners.
"They have taken away our last ounce of choice," Nassef moaned. "We have to throw these pitiful few hundreds in to give those men down there a chance to escape."
"Nassef?"
"What?" The voice of the Scourge of God was both sorrowful and angry.
"I'm sorry. I was wrong. The time wasn't right. I listened to myself instead of to the Voice of God. Take command. Do what you can to save what you can. O Lord Almighty, forgive me for my arrogance. Pardon me for my vanity."
"No."
"What? Why?"
"I'll tell you what to do, but you do the leading. This is no time to show weakness. Salvage some respect from the disaster. Do that and we can always say that they tricked us, that the Evil One blinded our eyes."
"Nassef! You're right, of course. What should we do?"
Fifteen minutes later the survivors of the Invincibles hurled themselves against Hawkwind's circle. They did not strike toward the center, but cut a shallow chord meant to break the widest possible gap.
Nassef's warriors began flooding through while the gap was still opening.