L. Modesitt - Colors of Chaos

Cerryl frowned. The archers were at the edge of his range, especially for accuracy, but he didn’t want them getting too close.

Still more than a kay away, the blue lancers split into groups of perhaps four riders and spread from one another as they walked their mounts slowly uphill and across the gentle slope of the rise. The hot sun glinted from their bared blades.

“They be not together,” mumbled Ferek.

“I thought that might happen.” Cerryl nodded. The Spidlarians knew or suspected that the Fairhaven forces had a White wizard; so they would not charge in mass where a single firebolt could wreak damage on more than a handful. Still, they would have to mass at some point before they reached Cerryl’s force…but that could be almost at the last moment on the gentle meadow. They wouldn’t be able to keep that spread out once they reached the narrower section of the vale the road traveled between the hills to the southeast.

“There are a lot more of them…” ventured Ferek.

Cerryl smiled faintly. “When they get to those bushes, down by the dead tree, we’ll turn and ride back along the road.”

Ferek frowned. “Why’d we ride up this far?”

“So they wouldn’t see how the road goes through that narrow place behind us.” Cerryl repressed a sigh. He’d already told Ferek once. “All right, have the men follow me back to the second hill-all but the two squads with Hiser.” He paused. “You ready, Hiser?”

“Yes, ser.” The subofficer gave a quick nod, his eyes going to the lancers who flanked him.

Whhssst! Cerryl arched another fireball toward the Spidlarians. It fell well short, as he knew it would, but the lancers slowed as the green grass burned for a time, with a thick grayish smoke that quickly faded and then dissipated. “Let’s fall back.” Cerryl turned the gelding. “Hiser…have your group hold here as long as you can without losing anyone, then ride back to our position.”

That would spend the horses more than Cerryl would have liked, but he didn’t want a fallback to turn into a pell-mell retreat, and having two squads remaining to “hold” the lower rise might ensure a more orderly retreat. If you’re lucky .

“We’ll hold ’em long enough for you to re-form, ser,” Hiser promised.

“Don’t hold too long,” Cerryl answered. “The idea is to avoid losing men.”

Hiser nodded.

Cerryl wanted to wince. “I meant that.”

“Yes, ser.”

With a nod, Cerryl turned the chestnut and rode alongside Ferek, glancing over his shoulder. With the “retreat” of the White Lancers, the Spidlarian forces began to urge their mounts into a quick trot up the hillside.

Cerryl reined up, then cast a last firebolt. Whhsttt!

“Aeiii…”

More by luck than skill, the wobbly sphere of chaos fire enveloped a blue lancer more than twenty cubits in front of the others. Cerryl was gratified to note that the blues’ advance slowed.

Almost with each of the gelding’s hoofbeats on the road through the vale toward the higher hill to the southeast Cerryl looked back over his shoulder, nearly bouncing off the trotting mount. The dust burned his eyes, and his throat felt almost clogged with the reddish stuff.

After what seemed the entire afternoon, Ferek’s lancers turned and re-formed on the higher hillcrest, barely getting into formation before Hiser’s squad galloped back uphill, at least several men short.

“Lost a few, ser,” Hiser said as he wheeled and drew up beside Cerryl. “The blues are a-coming fast.”

“Let’s hope they’re coming fast enough.” Cerryl began to muster chaos around him, so much that he could feel the air tingle.

Although the quick-moving Spidlarians were still more than half a kay away from Cerryl’s position on a still relatively low crest, now more than twenty cubits higher than the road below, the first Spidlarian lancers found themselves riding closer and closer together, forced nearer and nearer to one another by the narrowing of the swale that wasn’t really even a true valley.

Whhsstt! The firebolt arced into the middle of the horsemen, flaring into a mushroom-shaped flame.

The screams were faint and quick, but the riders swerved around the blazing figures and the grass on either side of the road, and the Spidlarian advance slowed just slightly.

“Darkness…he got near on a score…”

More like half that . Cerryl concentrated and loosed a second firebolt. Whhssstt!

Some of the riders saw the chaos fire, and those at the edge of the Spidlarian formation split off and galloped up the lower hill to the south of Cerryl’s force, then turned back to the west.

Abruptly, at the trumpet triplet that rang out across the hill, the remainder of the riders turned away.

“Why they do that? Just because of a few blasts of flame?” Ferek scratched his white-streaked red beard.

“I figure they lost near on a score right there,” suggested Hiser. “They saw the trap and backed off. They’ll look for another way to get at us.”

Cerryl knew the younger subofficer was right. He just had to figure out how and where the Spidlarians would strike again. If you can .

OVERHEAD, A HANDFUL of widely scattered and white puffy clouds barely moved through the green-blue sky. The air was hot and damp from the soaking rains of the day before, and the road clay remained dark, but not sloppy, except in the handful of places where muddy water had puddled.

The road ran from east to west along a low ridge that bisected a meadow and formed the southern boundary of the vale. A stream, surrounded by wet ground and intermittent marshy spots, wound back and forth across the center of the lower ground. Irregular clumps of low bushes dotted the marshy ground.

On the far west end of the open valley were a half-score cots, outbuildings, and cultivated fields that showed lines of green. A handful of figures appeared to be toiling in those fields, and a thin line of smoke rose from the chimney of one cot. The presence of peasants was a measure of just how far north he and his lancers had followed the Spidlarians, Cerryl reflected.

The White mage reined up and studied the vale, trying to ignore the damp midday heat and the sweat that bathed him.

Cerryl could see the Spidlarian forces on the western end of the ridge that formed the northern horizon. “Looks like they’re all there.”

“If we try to get to them, we’ll have to ride down into the valley and back up the other side,” Ferek pointed out. “We ride to them…and we’ll lose men. They got archers.”

“We don’t try right now,” suggested Cerryl. “Just let them see that we’re here. They’d have to ride through the marshy ground below to reach us, and they won’t do that.” Just like we won’t. Besides, if they tried it, you wouldn’t have any trouble dropping more firebolts on them, and they know that .

“No way to fight.”

“We’re not interested in fighting unless we can win,” Cerryl pointed out. “We’re keeping them from getting to the supply wagons and from harassing any levies traveling to support the High Wizard.” If any more ever show up .

Cerryl shifted his weight in the saddle and studied the blue-clad figures on the far ridge. After a time, he shifted his weight again. The Spidlarians did not move. A brief whisper of a breeze passed over the White mage. Then the air was still and sodden once more.

Finally, Cerryl dismounted.

“Ser?” asked Hiser.

“I want to see if they’re all really there.” Cerryl took out the leather case and set the mirror on the grass. He knelt beside it and concentrated.

Ferek and Hiser dismounted and stood on the road behind Cerryl. From there they could see the screeing glass.