"Huzzah!" responded his company, and raised blades. A few horses reared.
Abelar turned to face Ordulin's line. "On me, men and women of Lathander! Ride!"
Trewe sounded another clarion call and Abelar led the charge across the plains. The collective shout of his men sounded like the roar of an ocean wave.
Ordulin's forces scrambled to complete their realignment. Horns sounded and commanders moved frenetically among the men, shouting orders, pointing, but they were too slow. Crossbows sang. One or two of Abelar's men fell but the charge continued.
Disorganized and disheartened, Ordulin's men milled about and large gaps showed in their lines. Their commanders shouted, galloped along the line. Abelar shouted and veered Swiftdawn toward the left side of their ranks. He would hit them on the flank and roll them up.
His force thundered after.
Ordulin's forces readied shields and weapons, and braced for impact. Abelar picked the man he would kill first, a bearded commander on a black mare. He turned Swiftdawn toward him and bore down.
A curtain of flame sprang into existence ten paces before him. The blaze stood twice as tall as a man and stretched the length of the battlefield, blocking the charge of his company. Black smoke poured into the sky as grass and shrubs burned.
"On me!" Abelar shouted, and did not slow.
Trewe's trumpet blew and his company, mounted on battle-trained Saerbian horses, followed his command, riding hard directly at the inferno.
Abelar raised his blazing shield and shouted the words to a counterspell, one of the handful of spells known to him. The heat from the inferno warmed his armor, chapped his face.
He did not slow.
His spell engaged the magic of the wall and tore at its power.
He did not slow.
He felt his eyebrows and beard singe. He bent low and held his shield before his face and against the side of Swiftdawn's head. She snorted, encouraging the other mounts of the company, and jumped at the wall.
His countermagic prevailed and dissolved the magical barrier into harmless smoke. Abelar, his armor and shield trailing smoke, raised his blade in triumph. His men cheered, shouted, and the uncertainty in Ordulin's forces turned to shock.
Abelar's company hit them like a battering ram. Horses shrieked; men shouted; blades rose and fell; blood sprayed and men died.
In the chaos Abelar lost sight of the commander he had targeted, so he slashed with his blade and bashed with his shield at any man within reach who wore a green tabard. "We…" he shouted, and smashed his shield into the face of a young fighter.
"… stand…"
A sword slash tore open his shield arm. He answered with a stab to the chest that split breastplate and breastbone.
"… in the light!"
He parried a flurry of blows with his shield. Swiftdawn reared, kicked, and drove his attacker's mount backward. Abelar drove Swiftdawn after, chopped downward, and cleaved helm and head.
His men around him took up his chant.
"In the light! In the light!"
The words took on the rhythm of a heartbeat and blades and shields rose and fell in time with it. The morale of Abelar's force was swelling; that of Ordulin's forces was collapsing. Abelar took advantage. He swatted Swiftdawn on the flank and shouted, "Clear!"
Swiftdawn reared, kicked, bit, and turned a circle, clearing a space around Abelar. The commander hurriedly recited the words to a spell that would encourage his forces and discourage those of Ordulin. A rosy glow spread out from Abelar's shield in all directions to a distance of a spear toss. It lasted for only a moment but its magic caused all of Abelar's men caught within it to roar with fervor and fight with redoubled effort, while Ordulin's soldiers groaned and temporarily lost their nerve. At almost the same moment, a blazing sphere of luminescence formed above Regg and shed its light on the battlefield. Abelar knew Regg's spell to be a harmless light spell, but it was symbolic and it was enough.
Ordulin's forces broke under the onslaught, first a few, then several, then all of them. Their commanders shouted unheeded orders as men wheeled their mounts and fled in two large groups. A few dropped their weapons and pleaded for mercy.
"Do we pursue, Commander?" shouted Regg, with Firstlight whinnying eagerly.
Abelar watched his enemy flee, considered, and shook his head. "No. Stand the men down."
Regg nodded and gave the orders. Abelar scanned his men for Roen, spotted him, and summoned him to his side. The priest had a dent in his breastplate and bled from a gash in his thigh.
"Lathander watched over his faithful," Roen said.
"Aye," Abelar agreed. "See to the wounded, Roen. Heal ours first, then theirs."
Roen cocked his head. "Theirs? What are we to do with them, commander?"
"Disarm them, get a pledge to give up the fight, and take the thumb from their sword hand to ensure it. Then give them a horse, if we can spare it, and let them go."
Roen's eyes widened, but he nodded.
Abelar had little choice. He had no way to hold prisoners and he would not execute enemies unless he saw no other course. Taking a thumb would make them useless as combatants. It was enough.
"Be quick, Roen," he said. "We ride as soon as it is done."
Half an army was still bearing down on Saerb, on his son.
Cale held his holy symbol in hand and inventoried the spells he had prepared. He had a thirty count to invent a plan. Either that, or he had to shadowwalk out of the Calyx with Riven and Magadon.
Cale? Riven asked.
I am not leaving without doing what we came to do, Magadon said.
Cale agreed. They might not get another attempt on Kesson and if they did not, Magadon would be lost.
We ambush the ambusher, Cale said to his friends. Stay close to me. When we see him, I will isolate us with him. If that fails, we leave-
No, Magadon said. You promised me-
I have not forgotten, Cale snapped. But we leave if that fails, Mags. There are too many.
Magadon said nothing more and Cale decided to take it as acquiescence.
If it succeeds, we will not have much time. Hit him with everything you have. We kill him, take what we came for, and get the Hells out.
Magadon and Riven indicated agreement as they approached the spire.
Cale knew they would face hundreds of shadows, at least a score of shadow giants, and the First Chosen of Mask-the first First Chosen of Mask, selected millennia ago. Their plan would have to go perfectly.
Beside Cale, Riven shook his head and chuckled.
He must have been thinking much the same thing.
Elyril flew high above the earth, her form as insubstantial as the night's breeze. Abandoned villages and fallow fields lay below her. Sembia was dying. Civil war would kill it and the Shadowstorm would desiccate the corpse.
She cradled the book to her chest, reveling in her new form. The tome pulsed against her breast like a heartbeat, whispered truths into her mind, and pulled her toward the rest of it-The Leaves of One Night.
She was one with the darkness, truly Shar's instrument. She could become corporeal should she require it, but she preferred the form of a living shadow.
She saw now that all she had done and experienced-from the night she had murdered her parents to the night she had transcended the Nightseer's betrayal-had been to transform her into shadow and make her worthy of her position as the future consort of Volumvax the Divine One. She would take The Leaves of One Night from the Nightseer and make the book whole. She would cast the spell and summon the Shadowstorm. The Nightseer would be consumed in its violence and she would rule the transformed world beside Volumvax.
She giggled and her voice was like the wind.