The Tao Tei roared in frustration and bit down, the thick metal shield already bending and twisting in its powerful jaws. The momentary delay, though, helped save the young warrior’s life. Behind him William had leaped, and though his hands were still bound in front of him, managed to catch the bear warrior’s jettisoned lance as it flew through the air. As he came down from his leap, William spun in an almost balletic parabola, a maneuver that ended with him standing side by side with the young bear warrior, facing the looming Tao Tei. Even as the shield, under enormous pressure from the creature’s massive jaws, began to splinter, William rammed the lance forward directly into the center of the monster’s exposed throat. As the Tao Tei gurgled and staggered back, Pero, who had finally succeeded in freeing his hands, jumped forward with a round, sharp-edged shield, and using it like a massive blade, slammed it with force against the side of the creature’s neck.
The result was spectacular. The creature’s massive head flew from its shoulders, spun into the air and landed with a thud at Pero’s feet. Acting instinctively, Pero leaped back, putting himself out of range of the still chomping teeth, then smashed the head with the heavy shield, as though crushing an oversized bug. The skull cracked and the head caved in, green blood gushing from its mouth as its grinding maw finally became still.
As Pero stepped forward to cut William’s bonds, William glanced at the young bear warrior, who was gaping in shock at the spectacle before him. He could tell instantly, from the boy’s thousand-yard stare, that this was his first experience of battle, and that it had traumatized him.
But there was no time for sentiment or reassurance. All around them the battle was still raging. Looking around for weapons, William spotted a fallen archer, his eyes open in death, his red armour stained redder with blood. Close to his outstretched hand was his crossbow. William scrambled across to it and snatched it up. He examined the weapon for a moment with expert eyes, then smashed the crossbow against the stone ground, knocking its trigger and stock free. When he was done he was holding a weapon he felt far more comfortable with—a conventional bow. As he helped himself to the dead archer’s supply of arrows, Pero rushed up to him, having grabbed a pair of lances.
“Not a time to be choosy, William,” he yelled above the din of battle, his white teeth showing through his beard in a grin of adrenaline-fuelled exhilaration.
“No, just quick,” William said.
As if to prove his point, several Tao Tei suddenly broke through the massed defenses of the warriors in front of them, and charged at the two men.
With weapons in their now unbound hands, William and Pero switched to full fighting mode. Using his experience, skill and versatility, Pero darted and spun, thrusting forward with his lances, aiming for the creatures’ exposed and vulnerable parts—their throats, their eyes. William, meanwhile, showed his prodigious skill with the bow, grabbing a handful of arrows from the dead archer’s purloined quiver and holding them between the fingers of his pull hand, before loading and firing with such dazzling speed and accuracy that his movements were almost a blur.
Between them the men dispatched half a dozen Tao Tei in less than a minute, the creatures’ dead bodies, their eyes reduced to leaking jelly, tumbling so heavily to the ground that the impact seemed to shake the foundations of the Wall itself.
In a momentary lull Pero pointed to his left. William looked, just as a weird, high-pitched scream reached his ears, to see the skinny, cadaverous Westerner scuttling towards them, having apparently been wheedled from his hiding place like a rat from its hole. He had a Tao Tei on his tail, and was running in an odd, panicked zigzag fashion in an obvious attempt to shake his pursuer. Spotting William, who was drawing his bow, he scrambled towards him, but in the act of looking up fell headlong, his skinny arms shooting out. The Tao Tei roared in triumph and sprang towards its helpless prey—just as William let loose one arrow, then another, each of which found their mark, puncturing the creature’s eyes and killing it stone dead.
The Westerner scuttled forward as the Tao Tei fell, barely avoiding being crushed by the creature’s body. He ducked behind the two men and cowered there as they continued the battle, Tao Tei bearing down on them from all angles.
Pero, as skillful and adaptable as he was strong and ferocious, was grabbing anything he could use from the ground, converting whatever he touched into a lethal weapon. He slashed and pummeled and thrust and stabbed, until his body was liberally doused in the stinking green blood of his enemies.
William, meanwhile, continued to grab arrows from the quiver that he had slung over his shoulder, to load and fire them with almost supernatural speed and accuracy into the advancing creatures’ eyes.
But the Tao Tei kept coming. It was an endless tide of jagged teeth, hooked black talons and green, plated flesh. Grabbing another handful of arrows, William heard them clattering about loosely in the quiver behind him, and realized he was running out. And the advancing horde of Tao Tei, now trampling over the heaped bodies of Wall warriors and their fellow creatures alike, were still coming too fast for him to try to retrieve some of the arrows he had already fired.
If we don’t retreat, he thought, we’re finished. But retreat where? They were hemmed in. They had nowhere to go.
He was just wondering whether it was worth leaping for one of the trebuchets, scrambling up it to get a more elevated vantage point, when, without warning, a black-armored warrior in front of him was smashed aside and a massive open mouth came out of nowhere, the multiple rows of jagged teeth stained with human blood.
William raised his bow in a flash, though even as he was doing it he knew he was going to be too late. His vision was full of nothing but teeth when a lance shot past his head from behind, so fast and close that it ruffled his hair and grazed his ear, and plunged unerringly into the creature’s eye.
As the creature shuddered and dropped to the ground directly in front of him, William half-turned. A blue cape swept past his eyes, then settled in rippling folds, revealing its owner, who appeared to have dropped from nowhere. It was the commander of the blue-armored crane warriors who had interrogated him, and who he had last seen standing on top of the battlements just before the Tao Tei had swept up and over it. William barely had time to acknowledge her, however, before another Tao Tei broke through the ranks of soldiers and hurtled towards them.
The crane commander turned, but now she was unarmed, the lance she’d been holding still jutting from the writhing Tao Tei’s eye. Ducking around her, William raised his bow again and fired two arrows in quick succession—one into the advancing creature’s left eye, one into its right. As the Tao Tei dropped like a stone, the crane commander flashed William a look of gratitude. Momentarily he lowered his bow, acknowledging the look with a nod.
Splashed liberally in green blood, General Shao had descended from his command tower, leaving Wang up there alone, and was now standing shoulder to shoulder with the men and women under his orders, embroiled in the heat of battle. Fending off attacking Tao Tei with a lance and shield that were both coated in green blood, he instinctively glanced up as another high, ululating sound rent the air. It was so loud and piercing that it cut through the clashing din of battle as easily as a sword slashing through soft flesh. For a moment everything seemed to stop, Tao Tei and Wall warriors alike temporarily frozen into immobility. Then, without warning, the Tao Tei began to retreat, dragging their dead with them. Before the astonished eyes of General Shao and his fellow warriors, the Tao Tei drained from the battlefield in a green wave, swinging themselves ape-like over the battlements, before descending the Wall and flowing back towards their waiting Queen and the jade mountain beyond.