“My Lord!” a voice called. Ituralde’s guard split to let a young boy ride up, panting. “My Lord, it’s Lieutenant Lidrin!”
“He’s fallen?” Ituralde demanded.
“No, my Lord. He’s…” The boy looked over his shoulder. In the pike line nearby, the soldiers were bulging forward toward the Trolloc wave, rather than falling back.
“What in the Light?” Ituralde said, heeling Dawnweave into motion. The white gelding galloped forward, Ituralde’s guard and the young messenger joining him in a thunder of hooves.
He could hear Lidrin’s yells despite the roar of the battlefield. The young Domani officer was out in front of the pike lines, attacking the Trollocs with sword and shield, bellowing. Lidrin’s men had pushed through to defend him, leaving the pikemen confused and disoriented.
“Lidrin, you fool.” Ituralde reined his horse to a halt.
“Come!” Lidrin bellowed, raising his sword up before the Trollocs. He laughed loudly, voice half-mad, face splattered with blood. “Come! I will face you all! My sword thirsts!”
“Lidrin!” Ituralde screamed. “Lidrin!”
The man glanced over his shoulder. His eyes were wide with a crazed kind of glee. Ituralde had seen it before, in the eyes of soldiers who fought too long, too hard. “We’re going to die, Rodel,” Lidrin called. “This way, I get to take them with me! One or two at least! Join me!”
“Lidrin, get back here and—”
The man ignored him, turning back and pressing forward.
“Get his men back here,” Ituralde yelled, gesturing. “Close the pike ranks! Quickly. We can’t…”
The Trollocs surged forward. Lidrin fell in a spray of blood, laughing. His men were too strongly pressed, and they split down the middle. The pikemen reset themselves, but a fist of Trollocs crashed into them. Some Trollocs fell.
Most didn’t.
The nearby creatures screeched and howled at seeing the hole in the defenses. They came, scrambling over bodies at the base of the hill, throwing themselves at the pikemen.
Ituralde cursed, then pushed Dawnweave forward. In war, as in farming, you sometimes had to step in and get knee-deep in the muck. He bellowed as he crashed into the Trollocs. His guard rode in around him, closing the gap. The air became a crashing tempest of metal on metal and grunts of pain.
Dawnweave snorted and danced as Ituralde lashed out with his sword. The warhorse disliked being so close to the Shadowspawn, but he was well trained, a gift from one of Bashere’s men. He had claimed that a general on the Borderlands needed an animal who had fought Trollocs before. Ituralde blessed that soldier now.
The fighting was brutal. The leading rank of pikemen, and those behind, began buckling. Ituralde briefly heard Ankaer’s voice taking command, screaming at the men to get back into line. He sounded frantic. That was bad.
Ituralde swung, doing Heron on the Stump—a horseback sword form—and taking a bull-headed Trolloc across the throat. A spray of fetid brownish blood spurted forth, and the creature fell back against a boar-headed monster. A large red standard—depicting a goat’s skull with a fire burning behind it—rose atop the hill. The symbol of the Ghob’hlin Band.
Ituralde turned his horse, dancing out of the way of a wicked axe blow, then urged his mount forward, driving his sword into the Trolloc’s side. Around him, Whelborn and Lehynen—two of his best—died as they defended his flank. Light burn the Trollocs!
The entire line was breaking apart. He and his men were too few, but most of his forces had already pulled back. No, no, no! Ituralde thought, trying to extricate himself from the battle and take over the command. But if he pulled back, the Trollocs would break through.
He’d have to risk it. He was ready for problems like this.
A trumpet sounded retreat.
Ituralde froze, listening with horror to the haunted sound rolling across the battlefield. The horns weren’t supposed to blow unless he, or a member of his guard, gave the order personally! It was too soon, far too soon.
Some of the other trumpeters heard the call and took it up, though others did not. They could see that it was far too soon. Unfortunately, that was worse. It meant that half of the pikemen began to pull back while the other half held their position.
The lines around Ituralde burst, men scattering as the Trollocs swarmed over them. It was a disaster, as bad a disaster as Ituralde had ever been part of. His fingers felt limp.
If we fall, Shadowspawn destroy Arad Doman.
Ituralde roared, yanking on the reins of his horse and galloping back away from the surging Trollocs. The remaining members of his guard followed.
“Helmke and Cutaris,” Ituralde yelled to two of his men, sturdy, long-limbed Domani. “Get to Durhem’s cavalry and tell them to attack the center as soon as an opening appears! Kappre, head to Alin’s cavalry. Order him to assault the Trollocs on the eastern flank. Sorrentin, go to those Asha’man! I want the Trollocs to go up in flame!”
The horsemen galloped off. Ituralde rode westward, to the place where the pikemen were still holding. He started to rally one of the back ranks and bring it to the bulging section. He almost had it working. But then the Myrddraal came, sliding through the Trolloc ranks like snakes, striking with oily speed, and a flight of Draghkar descended.
Ituralde found himself fighting for his life.
Around him, the battlefield was a terrible mess: ranks destroyed, Trollocs roaming freely for easy kills, Myrddraal trying to whip them into attacking the few remaining pike formations instead.
Fires flew in the air as the Asha’man aimed for the Trollocs, but their fires were smaller, weaker than they had been days ago. Men screamed, weapons clanged, and beasts roared in the smoke beneath a sky of too-black clouds.
Ituralde was breathing hard. His guards had fallen. At least he had seen Staven and Rett die. What of the others? He didn’t see them. So many dying. So many. There was sweat in his eyes.
Light, he thought. At least we gave them a fight. Held out longer than I thought possible.
There were columns of smoke to the north. Well, one thing had gone well—that Asha’man Tymoth had done his job. The second set of siege equipment was burning. Some of his officers had called it madness to send away one of his Asha’man, but one more channeler wouldn’t have mattered in this disaster. And when the Trollocs attacked Maradon, the lack of those catapults wou
