The enemy knights had to wheel to face the unexpected threat, and their loose formation began to fall apart.
The right flank archers got several flights into the enemy, and the heavy arrows tore through them, striking the unarmoured rumps of their warhorses. Then Tom put his lance down, tucked his head, and the whole world became the point of his lance and the man in red and gold he had chosen as his target. He roared as his lance struck home, knocking his opponent down, the horse falling sideways, and Tom released his lance – hopelessly tangled in the man’s guts – and took the axe from his pommel as he ducked a lance aimed at him. His axe cut, rose to cover him against the shaft of another lance, and then he was deep into the enemy, past the lance shafts, his axe smashing into them, his battlecry a palpable thing inside his faceplate. He rose in his stirrups, caught a knight unawares with a smashing blow from above that caused the welds in the crown of the helmet to split and his brains to leak out like juices from a split melon. Tom roared joy and his mad laughter rang with his battlecry. Behind him, the picked knights of the company made a hole as large as their wedge, crushing the centre of the enemy charge, and then the wedge split open like a steel bud coming to flower and the enemy mercenaries, pinned between a wagon wall and a madman with an axe, chose the better part of valour and retreated.
Standing on a wagon box, Mag watched the enemy charge develop, tried to cast a single working to force all the horses to her will and lost the thread of it, and then saw the company’s mounted reserve hurl themselves onto the more numerous foe like a palpable salvation. The earth shook. The wagoners hid under their wagons and horses reared and kicked, bit each other – a wagon overturned, panicking the teams on either side, and somewhere a boy was screaming.
Somewhere off in the aethereal a familiar voice asked her to channel power and she reponded before she had time to think but Harmodius is dead.
‘Make what terms you can,’ Jehan growled. ‘Now, while we’ve stung them.’
The Red Knight’s armour was covered in dust and his red surcoat was dirty and he had several wounds he could feel. His hip didn’t seem to be broken, but something was very wrong and he couldn’t face mounting. He could see Duke Andronicus, patiently rallying his men.
But Tom had done it – not just held the enemy knights, but beaten them.
He looked off to his left, and saw the enemy flankers far out on the grass.
‘When he comes again, he’ll gut us.’ Ser Jehan had his visor open, and he panted every word. ‘By Saint George, Captain. Perhaps he won’t. But we can’t stop another charge like that.’
The Red Knight looked at his mentor in the art of war and made himself walk to his horse. ‘You have to. We have to. Whatever mistakes I’ve made today, the company held. We have to win this thing. Hold on.’
Jehan spat.
Cully was looking at his bow. ‘Sixteen shafts left, Cap’n,’ he announced.
The Captain eyed his ugly gelding and then with a desperate and inelegant lunge powered by his left leg, managed to get his right leg mostly over the saddle. The horse didn’t revolt – the Captain waited out the moment of agony and then got his arse into the seat and his right foot into the stirrup. He was up.
‘Jehan, you’re in command. I’m going for the Vardariotes. Don’t lose.’ He managed a smile. ‘That’s all I ask.’
The Duke had rallied the infantry line and men had collected their dropped shields and armed themselves. The enemy archers stood in dangerous silence, shafts visible on their bows, but loosing nothing.
The Duke watched the shattered remnants of the mercenary knights organise themselves, but he knew they wouldn’t charge again. They were unpaid, and fickle at best. He could see Ser Bescanon riding towards him across the crushed grass.
He looked the other way and saw an ashen-faced Aeskepiles doing what looked like shadow boxing. He turned away in disgust.
Close at his side, Ser Christos, remounted, shook his fist at the city. ‘Look! Ungrateful fools!’
The Gates of Ares had opened.
Clad in scarlet, mounted on matched bay horses, the Vardariotes were riding out of the city in a compact column of fours.
One scarlet figure detached itself from the enemy and rode, with a single companion, through the sun-drenched late afternoon, raising a line of dust. He met the red column emerging from the iron gates – and was swallowed by it.
The Red Knight rode to the head of the Vardariotes with only his trumpeter for company.
The officer of the Vardariotes was himself an Easterner – with deeply set eyes and leathery skin that had seen the endless winds and sun of the steppes. The man’s kaftan was red silk embroidered in gold flowers and trimmed in dark brown fur, and he carried a magnificently laquered Chin bow in a case that seemed to be made of pure gold, as well as a gold and enamel mace surmounted with a double-headed eagle worked in blued steel.
He smiled and circled his horse, and he and the Red Knight rode all the way around each other like two birds beginning a complex mating dance.
‘Your horse is crap,’ said the Easterner. ‘You have money?’
‘Your horse is beautiful. And I have money.’ The Red Knight turned his borrowed destrier’s head in and rode at the other man, who did the same, so that they met in a mathematical middle.
‘Radi and Vlach watched your little fight from the walls,’ said the little man. ‘You beat the Moreans hours ago. Where have you been?’
‘Looting,’ said the Red Knight. ‘How do you think I can afford to pay you?’
The Easterner snorted. If it was meant to be a laugh, it sounded more like the bark of a dog. ‘Just so you know, Steel Man. We are loyal to our salt. Some of my Aviladhars might choose to be offended that you think we could be bought.’
The Red Knight flipped up his visor. ‘I didn’t offer to buy you. I offered to cover your arrears of pay. Can we get to business? I want to hand the Duke his arse. Where have you been?’
The mace bearer grinned. ‘I’ve been right on the other side of the gate, watching you. You have a lot to learn about war.’ He barked a cruel laugh. ‘But your people are brave like fuck, eh?’ He extended his hand, and they embraced, hand to elbow. The Vardariotes let out a very un-Morean shriek.
‘Call me Zac,’ said the Easterner.
The Red Knight shook his head. ‘Call me Captain,’ he said.
The Easterner grinned. ‘Cap-tan?’ he asked. ‘Strange name. But sure. Listen, Cap-tan. You want us to do something about our cousins, busy riding around your flank?’
The Red Knight stood in his stirrups, looked at the dust and nodded sharply. ‘Yes,’ he said.
‘Kill them?’ asked the Easterner. ‘Or recruit them?’
The Captain smiled. ‘It could be a busy summer, Zac,’ he said. ‘I’d rather you recruited them.’
‘Sure,’ said Zac. ‘Listen, Cap-tan. We’ll clear them away. What will you do? They have a powerful shaman.’
No argument there, Harmodius said inside the Red Knight’s palace.
More puissant than the mighty Harmodius?
You haven’t seen any lightning strike your knights, have you? I’ll need whatever little reserves of power you have available, if I might.
‘I plan to roll straight forward into bow range, put some arrows into his horses, and make him retreat – now that I can count on my flanks. I’d appreciate your support.’ The Red Knight bowed.
‘Good!’ said the smaller Easterner. ‘I’ll ride around, kill fucking Krulla, who I hate, and then I’ll fall on the Duke’s northern flank, may that fucking traitor rot in the ancient frozen hell of my people. Take good care of our back pay.’ He saluted with his mace, raising the back of his right hand to his forehead in an oddly graceful movement.
‘Krulla?’ asked the Red Knight.