Captain Helluh smiled grimly. Those posturing courtiers would take the brunt of the attack. It would be most interesting to see how well the amateurs received it.
They received it well enough. Any species will fight if cornered; besides, they feared Demetrios more than the enemy horsemen.
Almost before he knew it, Demetrios was in among Zenos’ cavalry. His pain-maddened stallion completely bowled over the smaller, lighter mount of an irregular axman. Then the well-trained war horse went to work with teeth and hooves, savaging horseflesh or manflesh impartially. Demetrios turned a lance with his shield and throat-thrust its wielder. A dart clanged off his breastplate, then an unarmored mountain irregular—wild-eyed and bearded—was raining blow after blow with a woodsman’s ax. Demetrios was able to deflect each blow with his battered shield, but found himself unable to use his sword until the stallion sunk big, yellow teeth into his opponent’s unprotected thigh. The ax split the stallion’s skull, but half the length of the sword had already penetrated the axman’s abdomen.
Demetrios was afoot in the midst of a cavalry engagement. There was but one thing to do. Savagely, he sawed loose the armstraps with his bloody sword and dropped the bent and useless shield. A lancer thundered down upon him. Demetrios avoided the point, grasped the shaft, and jerked. Then, while the foeman was still unbalanced, he grabbed the right foot and heaved, then clawed his way up into the empty saddle.
Once on his new horse, the High-Lord found he was headed the right way. What was left of his fifty men, now outnumbered ten to one, was slowly withdrawing. Only a single blow fell upon him as he spurred his horse forward. He supposed most of Zenos’ troopers thought him one of their own.
Herbuht Mai was now in the forefront of the brisk little fight, and all the courtiers were dead, having followed their lord into the enemy’s ranks. The powerful captain used his shieldboss to smash a face to red ruin, while his heavy sword sheared off the arm of a lancer. A buffet on his helm set his head to swimming and he almost struck the High-Lord before he recognized him.
Inch by hard-fought inch, the little band, now less than half their original number, was forced back across the bridge. Not a horse but was wounded and hardly a man; armor and shields were hacked and shattered, swords nicked and dulled. No darts and few lances remained in use; only sword and dirk were fitted to this kind of combat. Footing for Zenos’ troops was treacherous; the bridgebed was bloody-slimy and cobbled with dropped weapons and the trampled corpses of men and horses. The forest archers tried one volley, but so many of their own horsemen suffered for it that another was out of the question.
Demetrios longed for his big, black stallion. The lancer’s roan gelding was not war-trained. He spent as much time fighting to keep the horse in line as he did hacking at the oncoming forces, and only the excellence of his armor had kept biting steel out of bis body. He vowed that, if the roan survived the battle, he would have the cursed beast roasted alive! An irregular came at him with a long-bladed hunting spear, but his small mount stumbled on a still-wriggling body and he struggled to retain his seat. Demetrios stood ia his stirrups and, swinging his wide sword with both hands, decapitated the spearman. So great was the press that the corpse could not fall from his saddle. He remained erect, arms jerking spasmodically, twin streams of blood gushing from what remained of his thick neck.
A war horse snapped at the roan and, panicked, he backed away through the stone-smashed gap in the railing. The horse struggled to regain the bridge and might have made it, had not a stray sword stroke gashed his tender nose. It was thirty feet to the river. Horse and rider struck the water together in a mighty splash. Both weighted with armor and equipment, they quickly sank beneath.
2
“I saw him go over into the river, my lord,” said Captain Mai. “But, at that time, it was all I could do to stay alive. We were eighteen or twenty against three or four hundred; indeed, there are but twelve of us breathing tonight.”
The tall, saturnine man across the camp table raised a hand and assured him, saying, “No one is blaming you, Herbuht, least of all, me. Demetrios is a fool. I can’t imagine what variety of feather got up his arse to try to mount this kind of campaign with an imbalanced and ill-supplied force of the type he assembled. It’s to your everlasting credit that you and Guhsz were able to take what you had at hand and trounce Zenos as badly as you did; you’ll, none of you, be forgotten—my word on it.”
“And mine as well.” The voice came from the tent’s entrance. “I just hope the perverted swine is dead. Do you think he could be, Milo?”
Mai arose so rapidly that he overturned his stool, his dark-haired guest simply turned in his chair. “Hello, Aldora. What kept you?”
The striking woman who entered was as dark as Milo. When she removed her helm and tossed it on Mai’s camp bed, it could be seen that her long, coal-black hair had been braided and then, Horseclans-fashion, coiled about her small head to provide padding. The features of her weather-browned face were fine and regular. Her black eyes flashed in the lamplight. Despite her heavy, thigh-high boots, she moved gracefully to the table and took both of Mai’s calloused hands in her own. “How long has it been, sweet Herbuht?”
Captain Mai flushed deeply, looking at his toes. “Ten … no, eleven years, my lady.”
Milo Morai had seen her play this game with other former lovers. Impatiently, he snapped, “For all you know, Aldora, your husband is lying on the bed of the Luhmbuh River, providing a feast for happy fish. You may hate him, but he is my co-regent and the only one with a hereditary claim to the rulership of Kehnooryos Ehlahs. Besides, he is one of our kind.”
Aldora snorted. “And I hope the fish get more use from Demetrios than ever I did! You know how it’s been between us for the thirty-two years we’ve been married. Emotionally speaking, Demetrios is—was, I pray, Wind—a child, a terribly spoiled brat. Damn it, he looks so masculine, but even if he lives as long as you have, hell never mature into a real man. He can take all the grandiose titles he can think of, deck himself out in the fanciest clothing and armor he can find, and he’ll never be more than a gilded cowpat. He …” “Aldora,” Milo said, “we are not alone.” She shook her head defiantly. “We do not need to be. Herbuht was my lover for four years; he’s heard all I’ve said here and more—much, much more. My husband, the Lord-High Buggerer of Kehnooryos Ehlahs, is as useful to a woman as is a gelding to a mare! I pray to the • Sun and Wind that he be dead. Oh, Wind grant that I am at last freed of him.”
Suddenly, she raised both arms, threw back her head and, with closed eyes, began to chant, “Wind, oh, Wind of all Wind. Wind of the North, Wind of the West, Wind of the South, Wind of the East. Oh, Wind of the oceans, Wind of the mountains, Wind of the plains. Wind of gentleness, Wind of violence. Oh, Wind, hear now thy true daughter, Aldora of Linsee, come to me and grant my prayer. Come to me, oh, Wind. Speak to thy daughter, thy servant, thy bride. Come, oh, Wind. Come, come, come, come, come.”
From the camp about them came shouts of alarm along with much noise from the picket lines—the snortings and whinnyings of terrified horses. Then a roaring commenced, growing louder as it neared. Then it was all around the tent, and suddenly the front flaps billowed inward, while the heavy lamps hung from the ridgepole were swung to and fro like ships tossed on a stormy sea.
Icy air buffeted Milo’s skin and he could not repress a shudder. Aldora’s talents continued to amaze him. Speaking in as calm a voice as he could muster, he admonished, “That’s more than sufficient, Aldora. The men outside may have to fight tomorrow; they need their relaxation, their dinners, their sleep, and so do the horses.”