Blade snapped his own lance on a mercenary's shield and nearly ran straight into his opponent. The man was wielding a huge straight broadsword, almost large enough to require two hands. Blade saw it shear through one Pendari's leather cap as though it were paper and split the man's skull down to the chin. But Blade slashed at the mercenary's face before he could shift his guard. The man's mouth opened in a scream of agony as blood gushed from his mutilated nose and lips. Half-blinded, he reeled in his saddle. Blade swung again and slashed across. His sword drove under the base of the heavy iron helmet and into the back of the mercenary's neck. It did not penetrate his mail collar, but the impact, with Blade's arm behind it, crushed the spinal cord. The mercenary's eyes rolled up in his head and he toppled stiffly out of his saddle.
Another mercenary rode at Blade. He crouched low in his saddle so that the man's lance went over his head. Then the mercenary was riding past. At last Blade found himself facing Ornilan. He did not try to avoid the combat, for Ornilan at least deserved the honor of a personal encounter.
The Lanyri general wore a short sword at his belt, but there was a broadsword in his hand and a shield on his other arm. If the Lanyri despised horsemen, Blade would never have known it from seeing Ornilan handle his big roan stallion. It towered over the Golden Steed by at least four hands. It reared up and struck out at the smaller horse with both fore-hoofs, but the weary Golden Steed was still fast enough to swing aside, and the smashing hoofs came down on the ground. Then Blade and Ornilan were at too close quarters to be able to do any more maneuvering. It was straight hard fighting.
Blade had no shield. But he was stronger and faster than Ornilan, and his sword had a point as well as a slashing edge. Ornilan's sword clanged against his at each stroke, while his own slashes and thrust sometimes got through Ornilan's guard. Most of these merely grated or scraped the general's armor, but before long two little trickles of blood showed on Ornilan's bare arms, and one on the side of his neck.
Why didn't he strike down Ornilan's horse and then ride the man under? He didn't know. He only knew that Ornilan was fighting with complete honor and complete courage. As both Richard Blade and the Pendarnoth, he had to fight the same way. He no longer found it odd that he was thinking in this almost medieval fashion with both men mounted, their endurance was increased. Because no man on either side cared to interfere, the fight went on, seemingly endless. Blade was vaguely aware that his guardsmen had finally driven the mercenaries back. A good many from both sides now lay dead on the ground around the two duelists.
He was explicitly aware that his arm muscles were beginning to scream in protest at the endless sequence of thrust, slash, and parry. His eyes were stinging from the sweat pouring into them. The same sweat was turning the dust caked on his face into mud. He began to wonder if his greater strength and speed would be enough to carry him through.
For more long minutes the fight went on. Blade's sword was beginning to lose its edge and show so many nicks it looked more like a saw than a sword. And there was blood on his left leg just below the knee, where Ornilan's sword had gashed it. So far the wound had not stiffened or cost him much blood, but it meant that his guard was no longer impenetrable.
It was the Golden Steed that found the strength to neigh, and rear, and lash out with both fore-hoofs. It caught Ornilan's horse on the side of the neck, and the horse stumbled and lurched sideways as its rider launched another stroke at Blade. The stroke missed. Half off-balance, Ornilan was slow to bring his guard back up. Blade's sword flashed out in a thrust, at the full length of Blade's long arm. Its point drove into Ornilan's neck, tearing through skin and flesh. Blood spurted out, and down on the general's armor.
Although he must have known that the wound was mortal, Ornilan dropped his sword and clamped both hands over the wound. For a moment the blood slowed to a trickle. His face pale, he stared at Blade.
«Why, Pendarnoth? Why, when you were offered so much?»
«It wasn't enough, Ornilan.»
«But you are still going to…»
«Lose?» He shook his head. «I think not, Ornilan.»
The words were barely out of Blade's mouth when he heard Pendari horns sounding beyond the Lanyri squares. There were more of them than Blade had ever heard. They sounded in an arc miles wide, from far around on the Lanyri left to equally far around on the right. And behind the harsh music of the horns was the earth-shaking thud of hoofs-not merely thousands, but tens of thousands.
Blade threw back his head and laughed, wildly and triumphantly. «The Pendari are in your rear, Ornilan! How will you get your army clear now? How, I ask you?» He caught himself as he realized there was an almost hysterical note in his voice. Strain and fatigue were catching up with him.
Ornilan made no reply. Hands still over his wound but blood seeping between them, he dug his spurs into his horse. It cantered away and was lost in the cloud of dust spreading across the field as the main army of Pendar went into the attack.
Whether the Lanyri ever learned that their general was dying Blade himself never knew. Certainly they showed no loss of spirit or lack of courage as they stood and fought off one Pendari charge after another. But soon their spears were almost gone, and their arms too weary to throw those that remained-or to hold their shields up, for that matter. Pendari arrows began to find targets, and the Lanyri ranks began to thin. All through the long afternoon of heat and dust they thinned, still standing. It was not until the sun was dipping close to the horizon that the Pendari broke the first square. It was not until well after dark that the last one gave way. And it was not until dawn broke over the battlefield that the killing ended, for the Pendari took no prisoners. Sixty thousand Lanyri soldiers had come onto the field the morning before. Sixty thousand remained there the morning after.
In the gray light of that dawn Blade rode back to Vilesh with Princess Harima. He had his second wind now, or perhaps his third. He talked as they rode along side by side.
«It was odd. The whole point of my being out there was to bait the trap for the Rojags. But they rode straight into it anyway, simply because we had charged them. I'm not sure if more than a handful of them even recognized me. And as for General Ornilan…» He shrugged.
«Well, it doesn't matter whether or not it was necessary this time. You certainly won't have to do it again,» said Harima. She went on, with a note of mock severity in her voice. «Do you think I'd let you, in any case? I don't want to be the Pendarnoth's widow, not for a good many years at least.»
«Widow?»
«Didn't Nefus tell you? Oh, there are times when I want to slap that brother of mine, even if he is a king! I went to him the night before the battle and asked him if I could have you to husband. He consented. He will announce it tonight at the banquet.»
Blade was about to ask, «What banquet?» But then pain stabbed into his head, pulsing savagely for a moment, then fading. The computer was tugging at his brain, seeking him out to snatch him back to Home Dimension. Its grip hadn't tightened on this first lunge, but it would be back. The grip would tighten, and Harima and the battlefield and all of Pendar would sink away into his memories.
As the pain faded and his vision cleared, he saw a familiar face staring up at him from the ground almost at the feet of the Golden Steed, a face white and drained of blood by a gaping wound in the neck. General Ornilan. He was naked-the scavengers had already been at work. Blade beckoned to one of the guardsmen riding with them and pointed down at the body.