Glen Cook - With Mercy Towards None

"He thought on his feet," Bragi replied. "He outguessed us. We've got to pay the price. Let's just hope this trick is something he's not expecting. Come on, Reskird!" he shouted. "Quit screwing around over there. They're coming." He could see most of the curved street running from the gate. Horsemen swept toward them like a sudden spring flood, forced on by those behind them.

Alperin was typical of towns that spent centuries constrained within walls. It had had to grow upward and together instead of spreading. Its streets were narrow and twisted. Its buildings stood three, four and sometimes five storeys high, often overhanging the cobbled streets.

It was a bad place for horsemen to engage bowmen who had taken to the rooftops.

Arrows swarmed down onto the Invincibles and their animals. The desert warriors tried fighting back with their saddle bows, but could find few targets. The Guildsmen exposed themselves only long enough to loose their shafts.

The Invincibles still entering the town kept forcing their fellows into the deadly streets.

"Keep it up! Keep it up!" Bragi screamed. He scuttled across a steep slate roof. "We're going to do it, Haaken! We're going to do it! They don't know what's happening."

He was right. The Invincibles, absolutely certain of victory and unable, because of the twisting streets, to see that the slaughter was not localized, kept driving into the killing rain.

"Haaken, I'm going to find that Altean captain. What was his name?"

"Karathel."

"Yeah. Maybe he can rally his men and grab the gates again. We can trap them in here and murder them all."

"Bragi."

"What?"

"Don't push your luck. Things can change. They still outnumber us a skillion to one. We should just worry about getting out alive. Just make them back off."

"Yeah. Okay." But Bragi was not listening. He was too excited to accept the possibility of disaster. He had thought on his feet too. He had turned Nassef s trap into a counter-trap. He was flying high. "Be back in a few minutes."

He scrambled from roof to roof, moving toward the wall, parallel to the street. He paused occasionally to loose an arrow. He had told his men to concentrate on leaders. Confused followers could be dispatched later.

Nowhere did he see anything to warrant Haaken's pessimism. The streets were filled with dead men. It was a target shoot.

His trip proved needless. Karathel's thinking paralleled his own. His was counterattacking when Bragi arrived. The Invincibles at the gate were hard pressed. Then more Invincibles attacked from outside. They overran the Alteans while Bragi watched, feeling completely helpless.

"Damn!" he snarled. "Damn! Damn! Damn! We had it in the palm of our hand."

Haaken's warning came back. Nassef had thousands of men in Altea. If they kept converging nothing could prevent their victory.

He could see Haroun's men on their hill, watching, unable to help. He sighed. "Just not enough people."

Below, the new wave of Invincibles surged into the deathtrap streets. It was time to rejoin Haaken. If this was the end, they should go down together.

He found his path barred. Some not too bright Invincible had fired a building in hopes of driving the Guildsmen off its roof. He had overlooked the fact that the fire would be as hard on the men in the narrow street. Bragi decided to descend and circle round the burning house. He dropped into a tight alleyway lying behind a long row of shops and houses. He had taken no more than a dozen steps when horsemen overtook him

He whirled, let an arrow fly. A man groaned. He loosed a second shaft into the flesh under a man's chin as a horse reared over his head. He fumbled for a third arrow, dropped it, clawed at his sword. The certainty of death nearly paralyzed him.

The third rider let out a strangled wail and fled, though he had been in perfect position to split Bragi's head with his saber.

Bragi stood there a moment, stunned. "What the hell?" He glanced at the men he had downed. The Invincible was still alive, groaning. The other was stone dead.

"What the hell?" Bragi said again. Then he shrugged. "Why look the old gift horse in the mouth?" He ran while the running was good.

"Something's happened," Haaken said when Bragi finally found him. "Look how they're howling and carrying on. And hardly fighting back."

Regnarson looked into the street. He loosed an arrow. "Looks like they've gone crazy. I don't get it. But keep hitting them."

"We won't be able to much longer. We're about out of arrows."

"Use them all. We'll worry about what to do next when we have to."

The arrow shortage never mattered. Within minutes those Invincibles who could were flying out the gate, where Haroun's men took advantage of their confusion and despair to hurt them further.

Haroun rode into the jubilant town an hour later. "Look at his face," Bragi whispered to Kildragon. "He's glowing. I never saw anybody look like that."

"I don't know how you did it, my friend," Haroun said softly, awed. "I don't even care. But today will live in memory ever green."

"What? Come on. We didn't... We survived, that's all."

"No. You did more. Much more. Today El Murid lost his war. The Invincibles have been broken. Now it's only a matter of time till the Disciple has been destroyed."

"What the hell are you raving about? So we finally won one. It didn't amount to that much. And the rest of them will be after us in a day or two."

Bin Yousif considered him momentarily. "You really don't know, do you? I forget, you don't speak my language well. Listen, my friend. Outside. That's a death song the Invincibles are singing. And inside, that's a victory song by my people. They're not singing for today, but for the war. You did two things. You destroyed the biggest band of Invincibles El Murid had left. And you slew the Scourge of God. You. Yourself."

"That man in the alley... ?" Bragi muttered to himself. "But... " He sat down on a stone wall surrounding a fountain. "Really?"

"Really. And it'll change the whole shape of the war."

THE ENTERTAINER

T he fat youth crouched in the scraggly brush and studied the enemy encampment. Fifty Invincibles guarding two children. What made them so important?

He had come close to stumbling into them. He had made cover just in time. His curiosity was aroused. Two children!

He had been headed north, skirting the edge of the Sahel, making for Altea, where he hoped to rejoin bin Yousif. But now the north had fled his mind. This might be a chance to strike a real blow on behalf of Sparen and Gouch.

He shook. "Fat one, O flabby friend, am in no wise able to brave fifty swords of enemies implacable as Lady Death Herself. Only fool would do same.

"Pusillanimous pretender," he answered himself. "Is potential opportunity of unparalleled magnitude. Must at least investigate. Establish identity of protected children. Same might be of tremendous value. Elimination of same might be mighty blow against fell empire of madman El Murid."

Mocker was easily frightened. Sajac had kept him afraid for years. But the constant pressure had schooled him to control his fear.

He was scared silly when he led his donkey into the encampment, pretending less familiarity with the desert tongue than he possessed.

"Go away, vagabond," a sentry told him.

Mocker just looked puzzled and, more brokenly than usual, claimed a right to use the spring. He offered to entertain the band in return for his supper.

He had learned some of the desert tongue during his half-forgotten trek down the coast of the Sea of Kotsum, and had picked up more while traveling with Haroun. He understood most of what was being said around him.

Thus it was that, shortly after the Invincible commander let him lay out his bedroll, he learned who the children were.