David Weber - Hell Hath No Fury

He broke off suddenly, and his eyes dropped abruptly back into focus. They were suddenly once again the clear, gray eyes of a young man, not the eyes of an avatar of legends.

"It's here."

His voice had changed, too. It was almost-almost-normal again.

"Good luck, Sir," he said, and his hands locked on chan Skrithik's tunic. The regiment-captain's eyes just had time to begin to widen, and then Janaki picked him bodily up and threw him off the gun platform.

Chan Skrithik landed so hard, so awkwardly, he broke the bones in his left forearm into gravel.

He scarcely noticed the white-hot agony of those snapping, shattered bones. It was so small, so unimportant, in comparison.

Janaki chan Calirath never even turned his head. He was still looking at chan Skrithik when the gryphon he'd never seen with his physical eyes at all hit him from behind and killed him instantly.

The gryphons hit Fort Salby like a tidal wave of ferocity wrapped up in feathers, talons, and fur.

The men on the fort's walls had never seen anything like them. But then, they'd never seen anything like quite a lot of what they were seeing this day. And if they'd never seen them before, at least they'd had them described to them by officers who had been briefed by Crown Prince Janaki. Those briefings defused much of the terror of the unknown. They didn't magically banish fear, didn't make dragons or gryphons any less monstrous, any less unnatural. But they set aside the paralyzing shock complete surprise might have achieved, and the men of Fort Salby were angry.

They knew about the negotiations. They knew the Crown Prince was right, that the Arcanans must have been carefully planning their offensive the entire time they'd been talking about negotiations and peaceful settlements. They'd drawn their own conclusions about what must have happened to the Voices down-chain from Traisum, and they knew they'd been supposed to be taken by surprise themselves and massacred in what they thought was peacetime.

They'd already smashed the first attack. The price might have been high, but they'd knocked those stupendous dragons out of the air, proven the Arcanans' magical creatures were indeed mortal, however wondrous they might appear. And so, as the gryphons swept down upon them, swinging wide to avoid overflying the infantry positions west of the fort, they were ready.

Rifle fire flamed across the parapet. The heavy machine guns which had wreaked such havoc against the dragons couldn't traverse quickly enough to engage the smaller, fleeter gryphons effectively, and even the rifles were less than completely effective. As good as the Model 10 was, it was still a bolt-action rifle engaging flying targets coming in at speeds of well over two hundred miles an hour.

Here and there, a gryphon's wings suddenly faltered, a beast fell out of the oncoming cloud of killers, but the rest kept coming.

The overhead cover which had been erected to protect the firing steps from fireballs proved at least partly effective against gryphons, as well. Some of the beasts flung themselves upon the sandbags, ripping at them, shredding them to get at the fragile human bodies beneath them. Others hurled themselves straight into the faces of the defenders, coming over the parapet, swarming into the gap between the overhead and the tops of the fort's walls. Still others swept past the parapets entirely, stooping on the unprotected men on the fort parade ground and in the gun pits.

Fourteen-inch bayonets turned rifles into short spears, thrusting frantically as two-foot beaks snapped like headsmen's axes. Here and there, wicked talons gripped rifles, snatching them aside, and everywhere men screamed in agony as bellies were opened, throats were ripped out, heads simply disappeared.

Revolvers cracked and shotguns began to bellow, thundering in rapid fire, spitting buckshot into tawnyhided killers, and gryphons shrieked in agony of their own. It was all one mad, swirling sea of chaos.

Rof chan Skrithik saw the gryphon which had killed his prince. The creature flung back its head, bloody beak gaping in a scream of triumph, and then a feathered thunderbolt struck from above. Janaki's falcon hurled itself into the monster's face with a hissing shriek of pure fury, and the guillotine beak snapped ferociously as its small tormentor ripped bleeding furrows across its face and blinded one eye.

Taleena distracted the gryphon just long enough for chan Skrithik to drag out his revolver. The regimentcaptain was aware of his prince, bleeding under the gryphon's ferocious talons, and he bared his teeth in savage hatred as his thumb cocked the hammer and the heavy weapon roared.

The gryphon screamed in fresh pain as the heavy bullet smashed into it. It turned away from Taleena, back towards chan Skrithik, and the regiment-captain shot it again. And again!

It went down at last with the fourth shot, and chan Skrithik felt hands pulling him back to his feet.

It was Senior-Armsman Isia, bleeding from a deep cut in his right cheek, his eyes wild.

"Sir! Are you all right, Sir?"

Chan Skrithik stared at the Flicker for two or three eternal heartbeats. All right? How could he ever be

'all right' again? He ripped his eyes away from Isia, and they burned with unshed tears as he looked down at the dead young man at his feet. But then he shook himself. His prince had died to give him his final orders, and his lips drew back.

"Message!" he barked at Isia.

"Yes, Sir!"

Isia dragged out his notepad, holding it to one side to avoid bleeding on it.

"I want Platoon-Captain chan Noth over at the southeastern tower-now! He's to do whatever it takes to hold that wall!"

"Yes, Sir!"

Isia's pencil slashed at the pad. He stuffed the hastily written order into a message canister and Flicked it on its way.

"Message to Sunlord Markan," chan Skrithik continued without a break. "Begin: Expect heavy cavalry attack from southeast. Expect fire-throwers. Imperative the enemy not reach the fort's walls with blasting spells."

He thought about adding specific instructions, but there was no need. Uromathian or not, Markan was smart and experienced. He'd know what to do.

Isia Flicked that message to its destination, as well, then took chan Skrithik's revolver and quickly replaced the expended rounds for the suddenly one-handed regiment-captain. Chan Skrithik thanked him absently and reholstered the weapon, then started down the steps from the parapet. He hated leaving that vantage point-and hated, almost as much, the feeling that he was somehow abandoning his prince-but with Janaki dead, he needed access to chan Forcal.

Movement jarred the shattered bones in his left forearm. A part of him almost welcomed the physical pain as a distraction from the anguish within, but he couldn't afford to be distracted by either of them.

And so he pushed both of them aside, cradling his broken arm with his good one in an effort to at least minimize the hurt and trying not to think about what another fall might do to that arm while he ran down the steps faster than he really should have.

All about him he heard screams, rifle shots, shotguns, and pistols. Bodies and pieces of men's bodies fell from the walls. Sprays of blood and feathers seemed to be everywhere, and gryphons-most dead, some only wounded and even more dangerous for that-littered the parade ground.

Chan Skrithik let go of his left arm and drew his revolver once more as he and Isia headed out across that parade ground. Twice, wounded gryphons slashed at him with beaks or talons, and twice the heavy H amp;W revolver roared in his hand.

Then, ahead of him, he saw Company-Captain Mesaion. The New Farnalian company-captain had moved down to the ground level gun pits and he'd brought his Distance Viewer with him.