S. Stirling - Dies The Fire

The Devil Dog leader in the horned helmet screamed out an order and turned his horse, waving his long sword overhead as he charged. Havel didn't bother to give Signe a verbal command, just jerked a hand in the opposite direction; she put the trumpet to her lips and sounded: Parthian retreat and Form line abreast on the commander.

They all turned their horses right, a unified surge of motion at ninety degrees to their previous course; that gave him a fierce satisfaction. A lot of hard work was paying off. The Devil Dogs rode in a dense clump as they pursued the neatly spaced Bearkiller line; they were roaring again, gaining on their tormentors: . and then the Bearkillers turned in the saddle and began to shoot again, back over the horses' rumps.

Forty bows snapped. This time the range was close. Close enough to see men shout, close enough to see blood fly in sun-bright drops when an arrow punched into flesh. Close enough to hear the high shrill screams of wounded horses, unbearably loud.

Half a dozen Devil Dog mounts went down as if they had run into an invisible wall, throwing riders or rolling over them. Even then, Havel winced inwardly. He hated having to hurt the horses, but there really wasn't any alternative.

And then the enemy broke; one moment attacking, the next spurring off in every direction, like spatters of butter dropping on a hot skillet. For once, panic was making people do the less-bad thing-stop being a big clumped-up target at point-blank range.

"Sound Pursuit by squads, and Rally in one hour," Havel said, and Signe gave the call.

Woburn's men led, whooping with bloodthirsty glee; Havel's followed more sedately. He drew rein himself, turning his head to make sure all the Bearkillers were sticking to their four-fighter squads rather than hairing off individually. Unconsciously he made a slight shrug with his shoulders and a hunff sound as he looked back over the battlefield.

They were the same gestures his father had used back on the Havel homeplace when he shifted a big rock from a field drain, or got a tree down just the way he wanted. Hard dangerous work, done right.

Eric was part of the headquarters squad, along with Lu-anne and Signe.

"Well, that was easier than I expected," he said, flexing his right hand with a creak of leather and rustle of chain mail; pulling a bow to full draw over and over again was hard work.

"It's not over yet," Havel replied. "But yeah, so far. We surprised them badly. That always makes things a lot easier. Get inside someone's decision loop, and he's always reacting to what you do-usually badly-instead of doing something himself and making you react."

Luanne spoke: "Was there anything they could do?"

"Couple of things," Havel said. "Scatter right away; a fair number of them would have escaped. Fort up on a rise until dark-maybe kill their horses for barricades. Once the sun went down, we couldn't find most of them, and it's only about six hours' walk to their base. Or: well, they didn't have the leisure to think about it, and they got spooked when we showed 'em we could hit them without their being able to hit back. Plus I suspect their honcho just wasn't very bright. Anyone stupid enough to put horns on their helmet, where they'd catch a blade: "

"Ooopsie, speak of the devil," Signe said, pointing. "I think that's their command group, and they've stopped."

"No rest for the wicked," Havel said, turning Gustav forward.

They spread out into a loose line abreast. The wind was from Havel's right hand, hot and full of grassy smells.

That also made it possible for Signe to speak to him without the others hearing:

"Are we the wicked, Mike?" she said; he could hear a shiver in her voice below the steady beat of the hooves. "I'm: I couldn't have imagined doing: this: before the Change."

He looked at her with a crooked smile. "Nah, askling, we're not the wicked. We're the people who keep guys like Duke Iron Rod-who really is wicked-away from people like: oh, Jane Waters and her kids."

His smile grew to a grin: "Like Aragorn son of Arathorn, in those books of Astrid's. Or those two guys in the Iliad."

"You read the Iliad?" she said, surprised.

"Some of it, a long while ago. And your dad and I were talking about it, just the other day. There's this bit, where two guys-soldiers-are talking, and one of them says something like: "

He paused to think: "Why is it, my friend, that our people give us the best they have, the vineyard and the good land down by the river, and honor us next to the immortal Gods? Because we put our bodies between our homeland and the war's desolation."

"Speaking of which," he said in his ordinary voice.

Five of the enemy had halted-one because his horse had keeled over, with arrow-feathers showing against its side behind the girth; as they looked it gave a final kick, voided and died.

A horse took a surprising amount of time to bleed out, if you didn't hit something immediately vital.

The rider looked to have come off unexpectedly and hard. Two others were trying to get him up, and nearly succeeding. Another two were riding double, seemingly arguing with each other.

All of them were too busy to keep lookout. When they saw what was approaching, the man on the double-ridden horse struck backward with his head, throwing his partner half-off, then pushing and shoving and beating at him with one fist as the horse swung in circles, rolling its eyes and getting ready to buck.

It did buck once as the second man came loose, and then starfished and crow-hopped sideways across the knee-high wheat; that spooked the mounts of the two trying to lift their fallen commander. They let him drop for a second to snatch for their reins, while the Devil Dog who'd shed his friend hammered at his mount with his heels until it lumbered back into a weary gallop.

Havel snorted. "Hope to God I never have to depend on a buddy like that," he said. "Eric, Luanne, take him. Be careful."

"You said it," Eric said grimly. "Haakkaa paalle! Let's go!"

He drew his backsword; Luanne reached behind and lifted the lance from its tubular scabbard at the right rear of her saddle, hefting it with a toss to grab it by the rawhide-wound grip section. Their horses rocked into a lope after the diminishing dot of the fleeing outlaw.

Havel squinted against the sun, shading his eyes with one hand and considering the three Devil Dogs grouped around the enemy commander. He was on his feet again, if a little shaky, and he'd kept one of the big kite-shaped shields his gang favored, decorated with the winged skull and twin runic thunderbolts. The other two had only their swords; one had lost his helmet.

"How are you doing for arrows?" Havel asked.

"Twelve left," Signe said, reaching over her shoulder to check with her fingers; you couldn't see them, of course.

"I've got eight," Havel said.

He looked around; nobody close-in fact, nobody in sight, except for the balloon. A cavalry battle in open country was a lot like one at sea; distances could open out fast.

"Ummmm: Mike, shouldn't we offer them a chance to surrender?" Signe said, nodding towards the three men a hundred yards away.

"I wish they would surrender," Havel said. "We could get some useful intelligence. But they won't."

"Why not?"

"Woburn, for starters. Remember that gallows he's building, in front of the county courthouse?"

"Yeah," she said, wincing slightly. "You know, before the Change, I was big against capital punishment."

"Well, we've all had to give up luxuries," he chuckled. "And considering these guys' records in the armed robbery, murder, arson and rape department: "

"Yeah," she said, her face hardening. "There is that."

They were two hundred yards away now. Worth a try, Havel thought. It really would be useful to get one for interrogation before we try conclusions with Duke Iron Rod. Is he really going to sit still while we trundle the doorknockers up to his front porch?