But then the trailing edge of the talon line, in a rare display of insight, apparently began to understand the ploy. Remembering the commands of their warlock leader-that the road was their primary goal-more than half the force cut back behind the riders, once again aiming for the south.
Only Rhiannon stood to stop them.
Meriwindle could not guess how much of the blood that covered his body was his own. He was still in the saddle, one of the few who could make that claim. But three talons had fallen for every soldier, and, more importantly, the charge had been halted, and the elf looked back now at Corning to see the last of the refugees being ushered through the gates.
But any smile that might have crossed Meriwindle’s face was short-lived, for in the other direction, down the western road, now came the main force of Thalasi’s army.
“To the town!” Meriwindle cried, and those soldiers who could manage to break away turned back for home. Meriwindle scooped up two of the men, their horses torn apart from under them, and carried them along on the retreat.
“By the Colonnae,” Mayor Tuloos muttered from his spot on the wall, for beyond the fighting, all the western field had gone dark, a writhing mass of wretched talons. The boom of their drums and their battle cry rumbled out ominously, drowning all other sounds.
“Men die!”
Tuloos watched a spur of the talon force break to the north, another to the south, and knew at once that his town would be surrounded in a matter of minutes. He could break out now with his garrison, back through the eastern gate and down the road. But then the refugees would have no chance of survival, and the talon army would continue its run unhindered after the remainder of the helpless fleeing people.
“Secure the gates!” Tuloos roared with all the strength he could muster. “To arms!”
A moment later Meriwindle was back by his side. As soon as the elf looked around at the spurs of the talon force, he understood the wisdom of the mayor’s decision to close the town. A continuing flow out the eastern gate would only fall easy prey to the circling talons. Still, looking at the overwhelming mass of the Black Warlock’s force, Meriwindle had to wonder what hope the walls offered.
Tuloos shared those feelings, the elf knew. The mayor leaned heavily on the wall, watching the events unfolding around him. “We will stop them,” he said to Meriwindle.
“We must,” the elf replied.
“And reinforcements will arrive!” the mayor went on, mustering courage despite his doubts to the truth of his words. “Andovar will return with the army of Pallendara at his back!”
“Indeed!” said Meriwindle, and his face brightened. He clapped the mayor on the shoulder and turned back to the field, taking care to keep his true feelings of their doom from showing on his delicate elven features.
The talon army rolled on, not even slowing at the sight of Corning’s high walls.
“Arm every man, woman, and child,” Tuloos instructed.
Meriwindle understood; talons took no prisoners.
She never even thought of fleeing. Her duty was to the helpless souls on the road to the south, and to the valiant ranger and his troops battling the odds so bravely.
And as the talon cavalry approached, Rhiannon felt again that strange sense of power flowing up from the earth itself and gathering within her. “Go back!” she demanded in a voice so suddenly powerful that it caught the attention of Belexus, far off and moving away. He managed to look back over his shoulder to see the young woman standing so resolute against the flowing tide.
Belexus didn’t care that his plan had apparently failed; he didn’t care for anything beyond the figure of Rhiannon and the charge of talon cavalry that would gobble her up long before he could get to her side.
But as Belexus would now learn, and as the daughter of the witch herself would now learn, Rhiannon was far from helpless.
Power surged through her body and flowed down into her mount. She tugged on the beast’s mane, rearing it up. And when it slammed its hooves back to the ground, there came a flash as bright as a bolt of lightning and an explosion that rocked the plain for miles around. In front of the lead talons the earth split wide, gobbling up those whose beasts could not stop their rush. The rest of the talon force swung abruptly to the east to join their kin, fleeing the power bared before them.
But Rhiannon spurred her steed to the east and chased after them. Each stride of the enchanted horse continued the thunderous rumbling, and the crack in the earth, too, took up the pursuit.
Hope came back to the ranger in the form of awe and even fear. Most vividly of all, Belexus saw Rhiannon’s determined ride. She kept just behind the lead of the talon line, using the split in the ground to prevent the monsters from turning south.
Then Belexus realized that Rhiannon meant to carry the split all the way past his force.
“To the south!” he cried to his men, cleaving another talon down the middle. He charged back and forth, herding the soldiers out of the approaching gully.
Talons, also recognizing the danger, pursued the Corning force, carrying the fight to the other side of the coming divide.
But then, suddenly, the battle came to a standstill, a hacking mob of confusion. Rhiannon kept her charge straight in, knowing that if she veered to the south, she would take her chasm with her and strand Belexus and the others in the midst of the entire talon force.
Belexus saw her intent and tried to get beside her, but the press was too great, and the ranger could only watch in horror as a group of talons formed a line in her path to intercept.
“Fly!” Rhiannon whispered to her horse, and the horse leaped high into the air, soared higher than a horse could possibly leap, clearing the stunned talons beyond even the reach of their weapons.
And the ensuing thunder when the black and white steed’s hooves crashed back down to the ground rolled the plain like waves in an ocean. Lizard and horse, talon and human, tumbled to the ground, stunned and blinded by an upheaval of dust and clumps of earth.
But Rhiannon, her face streaked with sweat and grime, her black mane matted to her neck and shoulders, emerged from that cloud, charging along her route. And to Belexus, watching her courageous ride, she seemed no less beautiful.
They crashed into the walls, clawing and hacking with wild abandon, ignoring the hail of arrows or the burning death of boiling oil. Possessed with the fury of Morgan Thalasi, the talons knew no fear.
Meriwindle charged about the parapets, spurring his soldiers on. And when a few of the wretched talons managed to gain a foothold over a wall, they inevitably found the noble elf in their faces, slashing away with his sword.
And so it continued for half an hour, the talons blindly fighting to appease their master and their own hunger for man-flesh. And the proud people of Corning fighting back for their lives, and for the lives of those who had fled for the river.
Tuloos knocked one talon from the wall, only to find two others taking its place. The mayor stumbled backward and fell, and the hulking forms towered over him. He cried out, thinking that the moment of his death was upon him.
But then a sword flicked above him, once and then again, and both talons dropped. Meriwindle pulled Tuloos back to his feet.
The elf was a garish sight indeed, and Tuloos could not understand how Meriwindle was even standing with his life-blood flowing from so many grievous wounds.
“We are holding them!” Meriwindle cried, and all fear flew from Tuloos at the sheer determination in Meriwindle’s voice. Here was the elf who had stood beside Arien Silverleaf on the field of Mountaingate, the warrior who had survived the centuries in the jagged shadows of the Great Crystal Mountains.