the point of his heavy spear and the beak of his visor rotated back into the deep woods and he went forward.
Nell took the war horse and led it back down the road towards the archers. There was fighting in the woods to the north—the squires. And the archers had all followed the wagon, while the pages had followed Count Zac somewhere.
Nell was all by herself. And there were things moving in the woods south of the road.
After a moment of panicked
lèse-majesté
, she vaulted into Ataelus’s war saddle. The great horse tolerated her, even sidled to allow her to settle her weight. Horses liked her, and Ataelus knew her well enough.
She moved her weight to bring him to a trot.
The thing—she had no words for it—exploded out of the brush to her left, but she had a heartbeat of warning and Ataelus was ready, weight on his rear haunches, and he sent the thing flying with a right-left hoof combination. The dead thing lay like a sack full of raw meat and teeth.
“Good boy. Pretty boy.” Nell soothed the horse, showing as little fear as she could. Ataelus was quivering and Nell quivered with him. A few yards away, Lord Wimarc stood over the prone priest, and farther along the road, two of the knights were spurring their mounts back—towards Wimarc and the captain.
There was a flash behind her. For an instant, her shadow and that of the horse were cast, black as pitch, on the trees to the south of the road. Even at the edge of her vision, the sheer whiteness left spots.
Without volition, she turned her head after flinching.
Fifty paces away, the captain stood between two great trees. Five paces away was a daemon, his red crest fully erect, his grey-green skin glowing with power, his beak a magnificent mosaic of inlays—gold and silver,bronze and bone. He was taller than a war horse and wore a loose cloak of feathers that sparkled with fire—and which seemed to have been torn.
He also had a large splinter of wood through one shoulder and bright red blood leaked around it.
He had an axe of bronze and lapis. He pointed the haft at the Red Knight and a gout of raw power, unformed
ops
, crossed the space.
The Red Knight stood in a guard as if facing a more prosaic opponent. His spearhead was down on his left side, and the haft passed across his hip—
dente di cinghiare.
His spear rose and he seemed—as far as Nell could tell—to catch the unseemly gout of raw power and toss it aside. He stepped forward with a double pass.
The daemon cast again—the same gout of power, this time tinged with green.
The captain didn’t falter. He caught the attack high and flung it down where it burst in a shower of burned leaves and exploding frozen ground.
The lapis axe whirled and a great green shield appeared, heart shaped, traced magnificently in the air by the bronze shaft of the monstrous axe.
The captain closed another pace, spearhead low and haft now high, and as the third attack—three spheres of green-white fire at pin-point intervals—left the axe shaft, the captain’s spear turned a half circle on his forward hand, and the spearhead, glowing a magnificent blue, collected all three spheres in its sweep, and they hurtled into the woods. One blew a head-sized fragment out of an ancient oak tree, one passed all the way through the grove and crossed the road within a few feet of Nell’s head to explode in the thicket behind her, and the third vanished into the sky.
Nell watched her captain close the last pace into engagement range and saw his spear lick out. It passed effortlessly through the daemon’s glowing shield, which vanished with the shriek of an iron gate torn from its hinges. The great saurian, driven to extremes, used his bronze axe-haft to parry the blow.
The
ghiavarina
passed through the axe haft like a cold knife through water. An incredible amount of hoarded
ops
exploded into non-
aethereal
reality.
The storm of power seemed to consume the daemon. It passed the captain the way the sea passes the prow
Nell took the war horse and led it back down the road towards the archers. There was fighting in the woods to the north—the squires. And the archers had all followed the wagon, while the pages had followed Count Zac somewhere.
Nell was all by herself. And there were things moving in the woods south of the road.
After a moment of panicked
lèse-majesté
, she vaulted into Ataelus’s war saddle. The great horse tolerated her, even sidled to allow her to settle her weight. Horses liked her, and Ataelus knew her well enough.
She moved her weight to bring him to a trot.
The thing—she had no words for it—exploded out of the brush to her left, but she had a heartbeat of warning and Ataelus was ready, weight on his rear haunches, and he sent the thing flying with a right-left hoof combination. The dead thing lay like a sack full of raw meat and teeth.
“Good boy. Pretty boy.” Nell soothed the horse, showing as little fear as she could. Ataelus was quivering and Nell quivered with him. A few yards away, Lord Wimarc stood over the prone priest, and farther along the road, two of the knights were spurring their mounts back—towards Wimarc and the captain.
There was a flash behind her. For an instant, her shadow and that of the horse were cast, black as pitch, on the trees to the south of the road. Even at the edge of her vision, the sheer whiteness left spots.
Without volition, she turned her head after flinching.
Fifty paces away, the captain stood between two great trees. Five paces away was a daemon, his red crest fully erect, his grey-green skin glowing with power, his beak a magnificent mosaic of inlays—gold and silver,bronze and bone. He was taller than a war horse and wore a loose cloak of feathers that sparkled with fire—and which seemed to have been torn.
He also had a large splinter of wood through one shoulder and bright red blood leaked around it.
He had an axe of bronze and lapis. He pointed the haft at the Red Knight and a gout of raw power, unformed
ops
, crossed the space.
The Red Knight stood in a guard as if facing a more prosaic opponent. His spearhead was down on his left side, and the haft passed across his hip—
dente di cinghiare.
His spear rose and he seemed—as far as Nell could tell—to catch the unseemly gout of raw power and toss it aside. He stepped forward with a double pass.
The daemon cast again—the same gout of power, this time tinged with green.
The captain didn’t falter. He caught the attack high and flung it down where it burst in a shower of burned leaves and exploding frozen ground.
The lapis axe whirled and a great green shield appeared, heart shaped, traced magnificently in the air by the bronze shaft of the monstrous axe.
The captain closed another pace, spearhead low and haft now high, and as the third attack—three spheres of green-white fire at pin-point intervals—left the axe shaft, the captain’s spear turned a half circle on his forward hand, and the spearhead, glowing a magnificent blue, collected all three spheres in its sweep, and they hurtled into the woods. One blew a head-sized fragment out of an ancient oak tree, one passed all the way through the grove and crossed the road within a few feet of Nell’s head to explode in the thicket behind her, and the third vanished into the sky.
Nell watched her captain close the last pace into engagement range and saw his spear lick out. It passed effortlessly through the daemon’s glowing shield, which vanished with the shriek of an iron gate torn from its hinges. The great saurian, driven to extremes, used his bronze axe-haft to parry the blow.
The
ghiavarina
passed through the axe haft like a cold knife through water. An incredible amount of hoarded
ops
exploded into non-
aethereal
reality.
The storm of power seemed to consume the daemon. It passed the captain the way the sea passes the prow
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