Lawrence Watt-Evans: The Seven Altars of Dusarra

Koros was in the next yard, its head lowered out of sight; the warbeast's back was low enough that he had not noticed it before. Two crossbow bolts were lodged in its fur, but Garth saw no sign that it was seriously injured.

That explained what had happened to half the crossbowmen; the other half must have fled in terror, he surmised. It left the whereabouts of Frima and his supplies a mystery, though. He kept a cautious watch as he crossed the yard and leaned against the wall, watching his mount.

Koros was eating ravenously, and Garth remembered, with a trace of chagrin, that he had neglected the beast's feeding since arriving in Marra. There were corpses or fragments of five or six men scattered at the monster's feet; Garth judged that that would be plenty, as it had not been all that long since it was fed. Ordinarily it would not have disobeyed his orders so soon. It must have been irritable with hunger, and became annoyed enough with the Dыsarran soldiery to forget its order to stay and guard.

It was quite likely still irritable, and Garth had no intention of bothering it until it had eaten its fill of its victims. He watched as it ripped apart sturdy mail with its fangs to get at the soft flesh beneath, and marveled anew at the sheer power of the beast.

The sound of clanking armor from beyond the stableyard wall suddenly reminded him that his goods and captive were still unaccounted for; he vaulted up onto the lower wall between the private courts, the sword of Bheleu in his hand, giving himself a good view of the red-tiled roof of the stable and some sight of the stableyard.

Men were marching; he could see little more than their helmets, but it seemed clear they were heading for the stall where he had left Frima. As if in confirmation of his conclusion, his captive's voice called out, "Koros!"

Wasting no further time, Garth launched himself up onto the roof and ran clattering across the tiles. The helmeted men looked up at the sound to see a bellowing overman, spattered with blood, swinging a huge broadsword around his head.

It provided an excellent distraction; they stopped short, the leader a pace or two from the door of the stall. That foremost man even obligingly took two steps back, the better to view this newcomer.

A cry went up. "The overman! The overman!" There was a commotion in the street and more men poured through the arch in response. Garth bellowed again, shouting, "I'a bheluye! I am destruction!" He knew that the psychologically correct action at this moment would be to leap down into the men before him, slashing about with the sword; such an assault would almost certainly drive them all back out through the archway. Unfortunately, he could not bring himself to cause such unprovoked bloodshed, and instead merely whirled the blade about his head again, so that it flashed redly as it caught the last light of the setting sun.

The men stared up at him open-mouthed; none advanced-but none retreated, either, though there were some who shuffled uneasily. He was not going to awe them into flight unless he attacked, but he could not bring himself to do so. Quite aside from his aversion to such wanton aggression, it was a long leap down from the roof; even if he made it without injuring himself, which shouldn't prove too difficult, he would most likely stumble or fall upon landing, which would destroy his dignity and ruin the effect of his entrance by revealing him as merely mortal, leaving him open to a concerted counterattack.

The solution to his quandary arrived suddenly, just as the perfect moment passed and the men began to recover their nerve; in a single silent bound, Koros cleared the stable wall, rebounded from the roof with a spray of shards of tile shattered by its weight, and landed atop three of the Dыsarrans. They died without knowing what had hit them, as the warbeast's claws shredded robes, armor, and flesh; the crunching of bone was audible throughout the stableyard over the triumphant roar that Koros released as it struck. The swords the three men had held flew from their hands and clattered on the armor of their companions behind them; one laid open a man's scalp before falling aside.

Not satisfied with the single attack, Koros leapt again, a short, powerful pounce that smashed another man to the ground so suddenly that the man behind him went down as well, his leg trapped beneath the falling body even as he turned to flee. The first man was ripped open from forehead to groin by a slash of the warbeast's fangs as the second lay screaming, pinned beneath the weight of the monster's forepaws on his companion's corpse. As an afterthought, one of those great velvet-padded paws licked out, in a motion identical with that of a kitten batting a ball of yarn, and the beast's curving claws snatched the screamer's head off, spraying blood across the heels of his fleeing comrades.

Garth stood on the rooftop, virtually forgotten, and watched as the crowd of warriors vanished back through the arch into the street. The huge broadsword hung loosely in his hands as Koros, with a brief gaze at the fleeing Dыsarrans, declined to pursue and settled down to feast on the five it had slain. It licked its claws daintily, cast a glance of its slit-pupilled eyes at its overman master, and began eating.

When a moment had passed with no further attention paid him and no sign of a renewed assault from without, Garth tossed the sword to the ground, then cautiously lowered himself over the eaves and dropped down into the yard.

The gathering dusk had shrouded the stables in semi-darkness, and he had no way of making a light; he peered through the gray gloom at the familiar stall, and made out the pale oval of Frima's face above the door. He strode up to her, and found she was staring fixedly, mouth gaping, at Koros as it chewed contentedly on a human thighbone.

"We must get out of the city," he said.

She said nothing, but continued to stare. Her mouth closed; her throat worked, making no sound, and her jaw fell open again.

"Our best hope is to ride Koros. It can probably carry both of us faster than we could move on foot, and we need not worry about separation."

She was silent for a second longer, then blinked and turned toward the overman. "Ride that?" Her voice was hoarse.

"Yes. It is the same animal you petted yesterday, and now that it has eaten, it should give us no trouble."

Her gaze turned back to Koros who, having eaten its fill, was licking its paws clean, then traveled across the fragmentary remains of its victims, to rest at last on the severed head that had rolled, unwanted and unnoticed, across the yard, to lie against the wall beside the arch. Her mouth twitched, and she turned away to vomit on the dirty straw that floored the stall.

Garth waited patiently until she had finished, then said, "It would be helpful if you would aid in loading the supplies."

Although it was plain from the rattle of armor, the mutter of voices, and an occasional quick glimpse through the arch that a considerable body of armed men lurked in the street in front of the inn, there were no further attacks nor attempts to enter the stableyard. Koros was completely docile once he had eaten his fill, and Garth had no trouble in loading and tying down all his remaining supplies and the sack containing the assorted loot from the first five temples-excluding Frima, who remained nervous and reluctant to approach the warbeast. When that was done, he found a place for the great sword, slipping it into the harness in such a way that its oversized blade ran along the beast's right flank, with the hilt at its neck. It would not be very accessible, but it would be secure; Garth was much more willing to trust their defense to Koros than he was to try and hang onto the awkward weapon while riding at high speed. When that was in place, he lifted Frima onto the back of the saddle, and swung himself up into position in front of her.