Slowly, slowly, a fracture developed in the mercenary line. El Nadim bellowed with joy, gathered the rest of his reserves and plunged into the fray.
El Murid tried to follow the battle from a remote perch. He could tell little through the dust and heat shimmer. Nevertheless, it felt right. He gathered his officers and told them. They began placing their men.
The Guildsmen fought as well as ever they had, as magnificently in defeat as in victory. El Nadim could not rout them. But he drove them into their camp, then broke off to rest his men and water his mounts.
The victors laughed and congratulated one another, battered though they were. They had beaten Hawkwind! El Nadim withdrew them to their original stations and dared the enemy to try again.
Hawkwind and the Wahlig chose to withdraw. One Guild company contained Hali while the main force moved out, headed west.
In the gloaming a man approached El Murid. "They come, Lord. El Nadim did turn them back."
"The Lord is great." The Disciple could not stifle a grin. "Good. Spread the word."
The clatter of hooves and tramp of boots swelled in the darkness. A sour aura of disappointment reached the Disciple where he crouched, praying. A small unit passed below. The vanguard, he thought. He had to await the main force...
The time came. For a long minute terror paralyzed him. He could not shake his recollections of that fox den... Not again. Never again. Not even for the Lord...
He leapt up and screamed, "There is but one God, and he is our Lord!" And, "Attend me now, O Angel of the Lord!"
His amulet blazed, illuminating the slope. He flung his arm down. Lightning hammered the canyon walls. Boulders flew around like toys at the hand of a petulant child. The earth quivered, shivered, shook. The far slope groaned in protest, then collapsed.
The roar of falling rock obliterated the cries from below.
When the rumbling stopped El Murid ordered the Invincibles down to finish the survivors.
He settled on a stone and wept, releasing all the fear that had plagued him for days.
Chapter Eleven
Lightning Strikes
C ome on, Reskird. You're dogging it."
Haroun cocked his head. That was the one called Bragi. The northern youths argued all the time. The more so since their company had cracked on the battle line. The one called Reskird was wounded. His friends ragged him mercilessly while they helped him walk.
The clang of weapons round the rearguard redoubled. The Disciple's men were keyed to a fever pitch by their success. He wished he could drop back and use his shaghûn's skills, but his father insisted he remain with his Guild charges.
This feuding between northmen was irritating. He dismounted. "Put him on my horse. Then you won't have to carry him."
The one called Haaken grumbled, "Fool probably never learned to ride. You ever been on a horse, Reskird?"
Kildragon's response was as testy. "I know one's arse when I... "
A brilliant light flared on the slope to the south. A man screamed words Haroun did not catch. Then the lightning came.
Boulders thundered into the column. Horses reared, screamed, bolted. Men cried out. Confusion quickly became panic.
Haroun retained his self-control. He faced the light, began mumbling a spell...
A fist-sized stone struck his chest. The wind fled him. He felt bones crack. Red pain flooded him. Hands grabbed him, kept him from falling, hoisted him. He groaned once, then darkness descended.
A sliver of moon hung low in the east. Haroun saw nothing else, and that only as through a glass of murky water...
"He's coming around." That was one of the northerners. He forced his vision to focus, rolled his head. The brothers squatted beside him. Haaken had his arm in a light sling. He appeared to be covered with dried blood.
Around them, now, Haroun discerned other shapes, men sitting quietly, waiting. "What happened?"
Bragi said, "Some sorcerer dumped a mountain on us."
"I know that. After that."
"We threw you on the horse and headed for the wizard just as his men charged us. We cut our way through and wound up here with the General. More men keep turning up. Your father is out looking for strays."
"How bad was it?"
The mercenary shrugged. He was floating on the edge of shock. For that matter, everyone around them seemed dulled, turned inward. It had been bad, then. A major defeat, consuming all the hopes raised by the advent of the Guildsmen.
Haroun tried to rise. Haaken made him lie still. "Broken ribs," he growled. "You'll poke a hole in your lung."
"But my father—"
"Sit on him," Bragi suggested.
Haaken said, "Your old man's gotten along without you so far."
Still Haroun tried to rise. Pain bolted across his chest. Lying still was the only way to beat it.
"That's better," Bragi said.
"You cut your way out? Through the Invincibles?" He vaguely recalled a clash of arms and flashes of men in white.
"They're not so hot when they're not on their horses," Haaken said. "Go to sleep. Getting excited won't do you no good."
Despite himself, Haroun followed that advice. His body insisted.
Yousif was standing over him when next he wakened. His father's left arm was heavily bandaged. His clothing was tattered and bloody. Fuad was there too, apparently unharmed, but Haroun had no eyes for his uncle. Wearily, his father was interrogating the Guildsmen through Megelin Radetic.
His father looked so old! So tired. So filled with despair.
Haroun croaked, "Megelin," overjoyed that fate had not seen fit to slay the old man. His death would have made the disaster complete.
His father knelt and gripped his shoulder, as demonstrative a gesture as the man could manage. Then duty called him elsewhere. Megelin stayed, seated cross-legged, talking softly. Haroun understood only a third of what he heard. The old scholar seemed to be talking about economic forces in one of the western kingdoms and deliberately ignoring present straits. Sleep closed in again.
When next he wakened the sun had risen. He was lying on a rolling litter. He could see no one who was not injured. His mercenary saviors had vanished.
Megelin appeared, drawn by some signal from the bearers. "Where is everybody, Megelin?"
Radetic replied, "Those who are able are trying to stall the pursuit."
"They're close?"
"Very. They smell blood. They want to finish it."
But Sir Tury Hawkwind in defeat proved more magnificent than Sir Tury Hawkwind achieving victory. The defeated column reached el Aswad safely.
Physicians set and bound Haroun's ribs. He was up and around almost immediately, against medical advice, blindly trying to encompass the enormity of the disaster.
Two thirds of the force had been lost. Most had been slain in the landslide and following attack. "But that's history," his father told him. "Now the enemy is at the gate and we don't have enough soldiers to man the walls."
It was true. El Nadim had pressed the chase right to the gate and though he did not have the manpower to undertake a proper siege, he had begun siegework. He had erected a fortified camp and begun constructing engines. His men were digging a ditch and erecting a barricade across the road. That looked like the first step toward circumvallation.
"What are they up to?" Haroun asked Megelin. "Three thousand men can't take el Aswad."
Radetic was glum. "You forget. Nothing is impossible to the True Believer."
"But how?"
"Recall the night attack."
"The lightning. A sorcerer that knocked a mountain down. But El Murid hates sorcery."
"True. Yet one sorcery is entwined in his legend. It hasn't been seen since shortly after he stumbled out of the desert."