“We can't just leave him for the Kazeri,” said Kiel.
“He's not walking for us or the Kazeri,” Sasha replied. At those words, the horse crumpled on shaky knees and lay on the trail. Sasha's throat hurt to look at his desperate pain. She'd loved horses since she was a little girl and, unlike people, they'd never asked for a fate like this.
“He's finished,” Rhillian sighed, and slid off her own horse, drawing her sword. Sasha shook her head. “Sasha, it's kinder.”
“Just give him a chance. He may recover, and go down to the stream. Just give him a chance.”
Rhillian looked at her for a moment. Then sheathed her blade and remounted her horse. Sasha poured water over the suffering animal's neck, then tried to make him drink the rest.
“Go that way, you big fool,” she said, trying to turn his head toward the valley. The horse just lay, too distressed to move. The others rode past, and Sasha remounted to follow, wiping her eyes. Bergen, mounted on the captured Kazeri horse, offered her his flask. He was a big man, with battle scars on his arms.
“That's my seventh,” he said. “I remember all their names. My son is named after my favourite.”
Sasha recalled her Peg, now safe somewhere in a Pazira stable in Torovan. Thank the spirits he couldn't fit on the boat to Tracato.
The top of the ridge presented them with a view of the Kazeri following them. They were much closer now. Another valley bottom and another drink and brief wash provided more relief, but climbing out of that valley, Sasha's horse slipped and fell nose-first into the trail with a thud.
Sasha leaped off and examined the animal, but could barely find a pulse. Cursing, she pulled a few useful possessions from her saddlebags, while Bergen did the duties with his sword. Another time, Sasha might have protested that she was not so weak she couldn't do it herself. Now, she had only gratitude.
She joined Aisha, the lightest rider, and her horse perhaps the largest and fittest, but the mare did not welcome the extra weight. “They're riding our horses into the ground,” Sasha muttered.
By midday, huge thunderclouds were gathering above the mountains, thunder grumbling and echoing through the steep valleys. In no time at all, the rain was on them, turning the rocky trails treacherous with wet rocks and loose mud.
Rhillian was not pleased by the change. “The Kazeri will go faster now. We'll not keel over so fast in the rain, and the Ipshaal is nearly before us.”
It was indeed. At the top of the next ridge, through a mist of rain, the party looked down upon a huge canyon. Spanning it was the widest bridge Sasha had ever seen. It was little more than a road of planks, suspended from huge ropes that soared across the span, affixed to four giant stone pillars.
To the side of the bridge, and at both ends, was a small guard post with a tower and crenellations for archers. “Don't the Steel border guards have to keep to their side of the river only?” Sasha asked Aisha as they descended toward the bridge.
“Enora does not bother to defend this border,” Aisha replied. “Only the Ilduuri remain suspicious enough to guard borders with their so-called friends. They can build forts on either side, no one cares.”
Aisha had barely looked at the bridge or the canyon, her eyes only on Daish. “Nearly there,” she told him. “Just down the hill, then you can rest.”
Approaching the bridge, Sasha saw that a stone wall stretched from the guard post at the canyon's edge to the natural cliff face of the opposing slope. In the wall was a tall gate. Thus the guard post controlled all entry to the bridge, and into Ilduur.
“Hello!” Rhillian called up at the small tower, walking her horse out before the others. “I am Rhillian. Four of this party are serrin, talmaad of Saalshen. The others are friends of ours. In the name of two centuries of friendship between Saalshen and Ilduur, I ask passage.”
There came no reply, nor hint of movement. Rain washed down the dark stone walls. Sasha had climbed rocks before, but never a wall this smooth, and certainly not wet.
“Enemies from Kazerak pursue us!” Rhillian tried again. “If we are not admitted immediately, we shall be trapped out here!”
There was no reply but the hissing rain, and the roll and boom of nearby thunder. Rhillian turned her horse and came back.
“Deserted?” Sasha asked.
“No, I saw movement through a window.” Rhillian looked grim. “It seems the Steel are under instruction not to admit the likes of us.”
And there was no way around, and no retracing their steps. No one needed to say it. This was the only bridge for several days’ ride.
“Well,” said Rhillian, with a hard exhale, “there's little choice. At least here there is room for a fight.”
Sasha was exasperated. If they'd known it would be a fight, they'd have held a high pass and forced the Kazeri to come at them single file up a hill. But now they were trapped against a wall at the base of a slope, with the Kazeri coming down on top of them.
The party positioned themselves. Daish dismounted and slumped in the gateway with his sword, while Sasha took his horse and readied her shield. The four serrin took the flanks: Arendelle and Aisha to the left by the canyon edge, Rhillian and Kiel on the right against the cliff wall. Bergen held the centre, a Steel cavalryman with shield, sword and armour all suited to the task, but now on a smaller, unfamiliar horse. On his right was Sasha, on his left, Yasmyn. Their horses were all exhausted. It seemed ridiculous.
“Seven against a hundred,” Sasha announced. “This has the makings of a fireside tale.”
“Don't you mean a song?” Rhillian wondered.
“Lenays don't sing much.”
“We Enorans like to sing,” said Bergen. “Don't we, Aisha?”
“I'd love to write a song,” said Aisha, testing the pull of her bow, and how much her wet fingers slipped against the string. “But I'll get Sasha to write the words. Lenays do that sort of thing better than anyone.”
“Hush, you lot,” said Rhillian. She glanced at Sasha. They smiled. There was no need to say more.
They waited. Thunder crackled and boomed. The rain grew heavier. Sasha heard hooves further up the trail. On the flanks, the serrin pulled their bowstrings. The hooves stopped. Then turned back. A scout, hidden amongst the trees. Sasha wondered how much he'd seen.
The attack, when it came, was sudden. Kazeri horsemen plunged off the trail fifty paces short of the trail mouth, precariously above the canyon. Others rushed down the trail, and at points in between.
The serrin drew and fired. Yelling Kazeri fell from their horses at the trail mouth, and others behind reined up in fear as the first four, then six, died quickly. Then the riders coming off the trail edge rushed in, and only Aisha and Arendelle had a good angle on those. Aisha missed once, but Arendelle never did, drawing fast and felling one rider after another.
Now the blockage on the trail was clearing, and more Kazeri charged from the trees. But their path was obstructed by the confused, riderless horses of the first wave. Rhillian and Kiel's combined fire shot more tumbling from their saddles, as those behind desperately sought a way through, evading and colliding with their fellows. Kiel had more success.
Then the Kazeri bearing down on Arendelle and Aisha came too close, Arendelle killing one last rider before both serrin were forced to drop bows and draw swords. The volume of arrow fire halved, and the Kazeri came on faster.
Bergen charged. Sasha followed on his right, and saw him crash a Kazeri straight from the saddle with a massive blow. With perfect balance, he swung his unfamiliar horse into a side step that brought him exactly into line with a second, whose sword arm was severed whilst trying to defend.
Then Sasha had a rider in her way. She ducked onto his weak side with a kick of heels, shield high to deflect his overhead whilst timing her own swing a little later, catching him on the pass. Then there were riderless horses running into hers, blocking her from the next Kazeri, one of whom took an arrow through the side as Kiel and Rhillian continued to fire.