Harkah only stared sickly at him, and Sean turned his branahlk and trotted into the center of his shallow square. He was too outnumbered to hold back a reserve; aside from individual squads to cover the smaller streets opening onto the Place of Martyrs in his rear, all three regiments of the First Brigade were in firing line, and the Guardsmen had paused. Even from here he could see their surprise at the speed with which the Malagorans had fallen into formation, and he swept his eyes over his own men.
"All right, boys! We're in the shit, and the only way out is through those bastards over there! Are you with me?"
"Aye!" The answer was a hard, angry bellow, and he grinned fiercely.
"Fix bayonets!" Metal clicked all about him as bayonets glittered in the morning light. "No one fires until I give the word!" he shouted, and drew his sword. "Pipers, give 'em a tune!"
Vroxhan cursed in fury as the heretics snapped from an extended, vulnerable column into a compact, bayonet-bristling square in what seemed a single heartbeat. He'd seen the Guard at drill enough to recognize the lethal speed with which the demon-worshipers had reacted, and he snarled another curse at his own commanders for their hesitation. Why weren't they charging? Why weren't they closing with the heretics to finish them before they got set?
And then, clear in the stillness, he heard their accursed bagpipes wailing the song which had been banned since the Schismatic Wars, and swore more vilely yet as he recognized the wild, defiant music of "Malagor the Free."
"Here they come!" Sean shouted as the Guard pikes swept down. "Wait for the word!"
"God wills it!"
The deep, bass thunder of the Guard's battle cry roared its challenge, and the phalanx lunged forward in a column eighty men across and a hundred men deep. That formation wasn't even a hammer; it was an unstoppable battering ram, hurled straight at the heart of Sean's square in a forest of bitter pikeheads driven by the mass of eight thousand charging bodies. Something primitive and terrified gibbered deep within him with the sure and certain knowledge that it couldn't be stopped, that it had to break through, shatter the formation that spelled survival, and he felt the pound of his heart and the fountains' spray on his cheek as his eyes darted to where Sandy sat taut and silent on her own branahlk at his side. A terrible spasm of fear for the woman he loved twisted him, but he drove it down. He couldn't afford it, and his eyes hardened and moved back to the oncoming enemy.
"All right, boys!" He raised his voice but kept it calm, almost conversational. "Let 'em get a little closer. Wait for it. Wait for it! Wait—" His brain whirred like a computer as the range dropped to two hundred meters, and then he rose in his stirrups and his sword slashed down.
"By platoons—fire!"
The sudden, stupendous concussion rocked the Temple, and a pall of smoke choked the morning. First Brigade had sixteen hundred men, a total of eighty platoons, in a line four hundred meters long and two ranks deep, and the standard reload time for Sean's riflemen was seventeen seconds. But that was the minimum the drill sergeants demanded; an experienced man could do it in less under the right conditions of weather and motivation, and today, Folmak's brigade did it in twelve. The fire and smoke started at the line's extreme left and rolled down its face like the wrath of God, each platoon firing its own volley on the heels of its neighbor to the left; by the time the rolling explosion reached the line's right end, the left end had already reloaded and the lethal ballet began afresh.
One hundred and twenty shots crashed out each second—all aimed at a target only eighty men wide. Only superbly trained troops with iron discipline could have done it, but First Brigade was the Old Brigade. It had the training and discipline, and cringing ears heard nothing but the thunder, not even the wail of the pipes or the screams as whole ranks of Guardsmen went down in writhing tangles. Sheer weight of numbers kept the men behind them coming, but the shattering volleys were one smashing, unending drumroll. Waves of flame blasted out from the square like a hurricane, and the Guard had never experienced anything like it. The shock value of such massed, continuous, rifle fire was unspeakable, and the Guard's charge came apart in panic and dead men.
High-Captain Kerist's head whipped up. The whiplash crack of massed volleys was faint with distance, but he'd seen too many battlefields to mistake it. He jerked up out of his camp chair, wine goblet spilling from his fingers, and twisted around to stare in horror at the Temple's walls.
He was still staring when another sound, lower but much closer to hand, snapped his eyes back to his immediate surroundings, and he paled. The sound had been the cocking of gunlocks as an entire regiment of heretics appeared out of the very ground, and he looked straight into the muzzles of their bayoneted weapons.
The honor guard froze, and sweat beaded Kerist's brow. Horrified gasps went up from the priests and bishops, but the Guard officers among the hostages stood as frozen as Kerist, and unbearable tension hovered as a Malagoran officer stepped forward.
"Drop your weapons!" The honor guard hesitated, and the Malagoran snarled. "Drop them or die!" he barked.
The guards' commander turned to Kerist in raw appeal, and the high-captain swallowed.
"Obey," he rasped, and watched the Malagoran riflemen tautly as his men dropped their weapons.
"Move away from them," the Malagoran officer said harshly, and the Guardsmen backed up. "Any man who's still armed, step forward and drop your weapons. If we find them on you later, we'll kill you where you stand!"
Kerist squared his shoulders and moved forward. His sword was peace-bonded into its sheath, and he slipped the baldric over his head and bent to lay it with the discarded pikes and joharns, then turned to his officers.
"You heard the order!" His own voice was as harsh as the Malagoran's, and he breathed a silent prayer of thanks as the senior Guardsmen walked slowly forward to obey and no shots were fired. The Malagoran waited until every sword had been surrendered, then raised his voice once more.
"Now, all of you, back to the central pavilion!" The hostages and their disarmed guards obeyed, stumbling in fear and confusion. Only Kerist held his position, and the Malagoran officer's lip curled dangerously. He advanced on the high-captain with sword in one hand and pistol in the other. "Perhaps you didn't hear me." His voice was cold, and metal clicked as he cocked the pistol and aimed it squarely between Kerist's eyes.
"I heard, and I will obey," Kerist said as levelly as he could, "but I ask what you intend to do with us?"
A faint flicker of respect glimmered in the Malagoran's eyes. He lowered his pistol, but his face was hard and hating.
"For now, nothing," he grated. "But if Lord Sean and Lord Tamman are killed, you'll all answer with your lives for your treachery."
"Captain," Kerist said quietly over the distant musketry, "I swear to you that I know nothing of what's happening. Lord Marshal Surak himself assured me your envoys would be safe."
"Then he lied to you!" the Malagoran spat. "Now go with the others!"
Kerist held the other man's eyes a moment longer, then turned away. He marched back to the huddled, frightened hostages, his spine straight as a sword, and men scattered aside as he made his way directly to Bishop Corada. He could smell the terror about him, yet there was no terror, not even any fear, in Corada's eyes, and somehow that was the most terrifying thing of all.
"Your Grace?" The high-captain's voice was flat, its very lack of emphasis a demand for an explanation, and Corada smiled sadly at him.
"Forgive us, Kerist, but it was necessary."