David Weber - War Maid's choice

Her finely focused, steely purpose never faltered, but despair welled up behind it. All three of them were armored, whereas she could already feel the blood flowing down her left side in proof that she was completely un armored, and they advanced on her with coordinated menace.

She backed slowly, unable now to pay attention to the larger fight, watching them, poised to take any opening, however tiny, however fleeting. But they gave her no opening, and she felt the edge of the veranda looming up behind her. She drew a deep breath, and then The mercenary at the left end of the short, advancing line, screamed. He rose on his toes, then stumbled forward, going to his knees, and Sir Jerhas Macebearer’s riding boot slammed between his shoulder blades, kicking him out of the way. The white-haired Prime Councilor slid through the gap he’d created, his back protected by the lodge’s front wall, slotting in at Leeana’s left, and she noticed that he’d left his cane behind.

Despite his age, he was past the mercenaries, covering her left side, before they even realized he was there, and the worn, wetly gleaming saber in his right hand was rocksteady.

Leeana noted all of that from the corner of her left eye, her attention locked on the men in front of her. They hesitated-only for an instant, barely noticeable to any observer-as their brains adjusted to the old warrior’s unexpected appearance, and in that instant, she attacked. She uncoiled in a full-extension lunge that drove her right-hand sword through the closer mercenary’s mouth and into his brain, and he dropped like a string-cut puppet. But her sword stuck briefly in the wound. It pulled her arm down, dragged her off balance, opened her to his remaining companion’s attack, and it was his turn to lunge forward.

He never completed that lunge. In the instant that he launched it, Macebearer’s bloody saber flicked into his helmet opening. There was no nasal, and the saber chopped through the bridge of the mercenary’s nose. It struck his forehead with stunning force, not quite cleanly enough to cut through the bone, and the would-be assassin went down on one knee. He retained his sword, but his left hand clutched at his mangled face. Leeana couldn’t tell if it was a simple reaction to the pain or if he was trying to clear his eyes of the sudden flow of blood, and it didn’t matter. In the instant he was blind, the Prime Councilor’s wrist turned, and the blade the mercenary never even saw drove through his unguarded throat from the side.

Tellian and Dathgar rounded the corner of the stable block first.

The courtyard was a chaos of bodies and blood. There were no more mercenaries coming over the wall, but at least sixty of them were already inside it, driving in on the main lodge…and the King. More than a dozen of Swordshank’s armsmen were down, lying amid the bodies of their enemies, and the survivors had been pushed back against the lodge, fighting furiously to hold the doors. At least two of the unarmored courtiers of the King’s party lay with those still, twisted armsmen, and others fought to hold the building’s windows.

And on the veranda, fighting before the front door itself, was his daughter, the left side of her white shirt soaked in blood, with the Kingdom’s white-haired Prime Councilor at her side.

Bodies sprawled in front of them, but even as he caught sight of them, another clutch of mercenaries separated itself from the confusion and charged towards them, seeking to rush the door.

Something screamed beside him like a wounded direcat, and then Gayrfressa went bounding forward like a chestnut demon.

There was no time to discuss it with Dathgar…nor was there any need. They were one, and as the mare charged, they thundered out into the courtyard behind her with Hathan and Gayrhalan at their side.

Leeana felt Gayrfressa coming, but she dared not look away from the fresh attackers swarming across the veranda towards her and Sir Jerhas.

“Take it to them, Milady!” a sharp, clear voice said from beside her. “I’ve got your back!”

She didn’t waste time nodding. She simply went to meet her foes, and Sir Jerhas Macebearer came behind her.

Their sudden advance took the mercenaries by surprise, and Leeana pressed that fleeting advantage ruthlessly. She feinted to her left, then drove forward with her right, and another assassin collapsed as she thrust eight inches of steel into his thigh and his leg folded beneath him. Her booted heel came down on his sword wrist with bone-shattering force as he hit the veranda’s bloodsoaked planks, and she pivoted left, taking the man she’d first feinted towards from his suddenly unprotected flank. He gave ground, interposing his own sword frantically, but her left foot came up. The toe of her boot slammed up between his legs, and he cried out, staggering in sudden anguish. She tore through his wavering guard, ripping out his throat with both blades at once, and he sprawled across the man she’d crippled.

She recovered with desperate speed, aware of yet another opponent coming at her from the right, but Sir Jerhas was there. His saber engaged the mercenary’s heavier longsword in a flurry of steel that would have done credit to a man half his age, turning the other’s attack. Steel belled on steel in a lightning exchange of cuts and parries, but the younger, stronger mercenary pushed the older man back.

Not quickly enough. Leeana Hanathafressa was a war maid, and just as ruthlessly pragmatic as her husband. Honor was undoubtedly all very well, but she saw no reason to let the unarmored Prime Councilor fight it out with a man half his age and armored to boot. As Sir Jerhas gave ground, backing past her, she swiveled and struck with a viper’s speed, driving a short sword home just below the mercenary’s ear.

Gayrfressa was crimson to the knees, and more blood streaked her throat and blew in a scarlet froth from her nostrils, as she took the mercenaries in the courtyard from the rear. Two tons of chestnut fury rolled over them like a boulder, pounding them into the dirt, crushing anyone who stood between her and her chosen sister, and Dathgar and Gayrhalan fanned out behind her.

One moment, the attackers had known they hovered on the brink of success, despite far heavier losses than they’d ever anticipated. At least half the King’s armsmen were down and they were driving remorselessly forward, fighting in the very doorway of the lodge with the defenders melting like snow before them. And then, with no warning, three bloodsoaked juggernauts slammed into them.

The coursers rampaged through them, killing as they came, and the mercenaries in that courtyard were in no better state to meet them than the ones they’d trapped between the stables and the outer wall. The only difference was that these mercenaries had room to run, and they did. The shock of that sudden, unexpected attack broke them, and the survivors fled madly towards the gate, flinging up the bar, spilling through it with Dathgar and Gayrhalan thundering in pursuit.

Less than thirty of them made it.

Cassan Axehammer sat on a fallen tree at the top of a steep bank, trying not to fidget impatiently as his armsmen watered their horses from the chuckling stream at the foot of the slope. He begrudged the halt, and the tension within him was coiling ever tighter as they drew closer to the hunting lodge. Despite that, he could scarcely fault Stoneblade or Horsemaster. They’d made remarkably good time since he’d informed them of his “suspicions,” and they had a Sothoii’s eye for their horses. It would no more occur to them to arrive for a fight on blown, exhausted mounts than it would to leave their swords at home, and they were right, if not simply for the reasons they knew about. If all went well, they’d be riding after the fleeing assassins soon enough, and they’d need horses capable of overhauling them.