“The Nasi-Keth will not stand for it! The Ilduuri Nasi-Keth have been protectors of the Remischtuul for two centuries; even now we gather former Nasi-Keth from all walks, common city folk who train still with the svaalverd, and will fight to regain it. I am warning you, we can gather more Ilduuris who are not afraid to fight, and even the Steel cannot stand against the might of all Ilduuris together, fighting for their freedom.”
“Would be the first time you ever felt the need to do that,” Arken remarked drily. “Until now you've left that all to us.”
“Don't be stupid,” Sasha told Rael. “You are not warriors, you've shown that already.”
“Any man can be a warrior,” Rael growled, “if he is deprived of something that he loves so dearly as his freedom.”
“If you'd arrived at that conclusion a century or two ago, I might believe you. But this love of freedom you profess, this is an old and shrivelled thing, like an old man's sword arm, withered from lack of use. What you describe is passion. Love for something larger than yourself. This is something you must practise, like swordwork itself. Like courage. You cannot just rediscover courage when it suits you, or honour, any more than you can neglect svaalverd for years and expect it to all come rushing back from memory when you need it.
“You must work at it tirelessly, and with discipline. This is true for great warriors and for great civilisations; even the serrin do this, serrin who believe mostly in peace-they practise it. They debate and philosophise, and they learn arts and study and heal, they know that peace is a difficult and elusive thing that must be pursued relentlessly and with passion. You don't have it. Or perhaps once you did, but now it lies long forgotten.”
“We shall see,” Rael growled. He signalled his companions, and they turned to stride away. Sasha watched them go.
“You must become Queen of Lenayin!” Yasmyn said with fierce satisfaction. “It is your destiny.” Yasmyn, of course, had not understood a word Sasha had said.
“Many are upset to see the Remischtuul fall even though they were not upset merely to see Stamentaast dying,” said Arken. “They did not come out in numbers then, but they may now, with the Nasi-Keth leading. They may not believe that the Steel will kill them, and if there are so many, I fear they may be right.”
“There cannot be an uprising,” said Sasha, with certainty. “We will not have reinforcements from the rest of the Steel for days. We cannot allow it.”
Arken nodded. “What is your order?”
The sun had barely moved in the sky when several hundred Steel and talmaad fell upon the Tol'rhen. Great gatherings of locals, Nasi-Keth, and Stamentaast scattered before the fast thrust of armoured soldiers from the surrounding streets, moving at a full run so as not to give the lookouts more than a moment of advance warning.
Arrow fire came back from across the courtyard, as startled men with bows sought vantage atop steps or from Tol'rhen windows. Most arrows or crossbow bolts cracked off the Steel's massed shields, and did not slow them. Sasha moved in the rear, surrounded by her own company of Steel infantry, eleven strong including herself. She could not see much as they crossed the courtyards, her small shield filling a space between the big ones that protected them from random arrows. It was not as easy as it looked, to move in formation, to make oneself an identical brick in a wall of bricks, and not allow any gap. She was here to command, not to fight, but from behind the wall of shields she could barely see.
In frustration she moved her shield aside enough to see ahead: men were running up the Tol'rhen stairs before the leading line of Steel, others fighting and falling, arrows zipping and clattering about. Around her, men panted harder than she, for running those roads in armour was testing.
The first wave of Steel simply ran over any defenders on the steps and plunged into the Tol'rhen. Now from behind came a mad sprint of talmaad, serrin with bows in hand and swords on their backs racing across the pavings in the Steel's wake. Sasha stopped her squad behind the trees of a courtyard garden, and from that cover sought a view.
Then she saw them-the cavalry, emerging from the courtyard's far side, slipping on the pavings yet blocking the crowd's retreat with their charge. Now most townsmen were running rather than fighting, some huddling for cover, cowering with arms over their heads amidst thrashing hooves and stomping boots. Others fought, and were cut down. Someone was blowing a trumpet, in a vain attempt to muster defenders on the southern side of the courtyard, furthest from the lake.
“There!” Sasha yelled. “Trumpet! I want cavalry on the left! On the left, over here!” The man with the trumpet blew some ear-splitting notes, and repeated, and repeated. Sasha could not see any immediate response-cavalry had their hands full stopping the retreat from the first attack, as had been the initial plan. Cavalry soldiers seemed to be looking for their officers, for confirmation of the trumpet call, only to find their officers busy, or to not find them at all.
Sasha swore. “Go, go! Let's get into them ourselves, the others will follow!” Her men redeployed quickly, herself in the middle, holding her spot in the line. Eleven strong, they made a line abreast, and charged. It was not a mad run like Lenay warriors might make, but a crouched run with small steps, balanced so as not to let the shields bounce around and expose them to arrows. Sasha glimpsed past her shield a force of men running at them rather than standing and waiting.
“Five!” yelled her squad's formation sergeant, and Sasha, warned of this technique, sprinted the last five steps and threw herself into that collision with her shield. She hit someone, felt him stagger back, heard yells and falling bodies as their opponents reeled, caught off guard by the wall of shields that suddenly accelerated into them. Her comrades were moving and striking, jostling her as she tried to control her shield.
She tried an overhead strike, yet now their opponents were coming back, many armed with shields of their own, and an impact sent her reeling back a step.
“Hold!” yelled the man next to her. “Hold and push!” Stab, and a shriek, a man falling bloodily. “Hold and push!” He might have been yelling at her, Sasha thought, but she could not tell. She complied, and an opponent slashed under the shield, she barely slammed it down in time, then a shoulder ram drove her back again…only the soldier beside her anticipated it, and drove his blade through that man's neck.
Something else hit her shield with force enough to jar her arm, and she tried to coordinate a stab with the movements of the man to her right, but he was fast, and the target uncooperative. A spear thrust nearly took her eye out, and a sword edge left a deep gash in her shield rim, and she realised they were being pushed back, eleven against whatever-it-was, and surely now in danger of being outflanked…
And suddenly there were cavalry ploughing through their opponents, striking left and right, and men were scattering. For a moment she thought it was over, until she saw that only a few horses had made the break to assist, and though some men had run, others were circling and coming back, shouting for their comrades to stand firm.
“Circle!” yelled the squad sergeant, and the formation's flanks swung neatly about to make that shape with their shields, as enemies now ran around and at them from behind.
“Fucking stupid!” Sasha announced her displeasure with that, and shrugged the shield off her arm with relief. Free at last, she ran at her opponents on open ground before they could form up. She fake-stepped one, killed him when he guessed wrong, danced out of range of a second's swing, ducked easily inside a spear thrust and ripped him at close range. Uncoordinated attacks came at her, Nasi-Keth now, seeing the chance to claim her outside the shield wall and mistakenly thinking that made an easier task.