Then, like a wraith trailing clouds of mist, the First Oralist flowed to her feet, her graceful movements matched by Sinnia’s. She stroked the mane of one of the sequestered mares, murmuring the Claim in its ear. The horse shifted to nuzzle her shoulder, and Khashayar saw that the mares were linked together, held by a single lead. He motioned to the Companions to retreat, wrapping the lead around his wrist. His powerful body nudged the lead mare up the slope, his sharp eyes trained on the soldiers guarding the horses.
Still no movement, no awareness.
But the pace up the dune was perilously slow, the horses kicking up sand with the fussy placement of their hooves. He swore to himself, sweat breaking out on his forehead. His side was exposed to the Rising Nineteen, and he’d been forced to sheathe his sword. The horses were moving too slowly, but a signal from the First Oralist warned him against careless haste.
When the Companions reached the crest, the tension in his muscles lessened. The First Oralist took the lead rein from his hands. He fell back, counting the mares. They wouldn’t need them all. A dozen would be enough; the rest could be repastured. He waited until twelve of the horses had been led down the far side of the hill before he moved to sever the lead.
But when he slid between two of the horses, he made the mistake of choosing a fierce young stallion. The freed horse reared up. When its forelegs crashed down again, they narrowly missed his head. He rolled out from under the stallion’s hooves, but his unexpected movement incited panic.
The stallion wheeled, nipping the haunches of the mare he was tied to. The mares on the upslope screamed, the piercing noise cutting through the sharp-edged notes of the Claim. The mirage of emptiness faded. The soldiers closest to the hillock sprang to their feet, swords ripped from their scabbards.
Khashayar whirled to face them, even as his archers began to cut down his pursuers.
“Run!” he shouted to the Companions. “Leave the field to us!”
He made his stand at the top of the hill, sword in one hand, dagger in the other, archers at either side. Without the protection of the Claim, his men couldn’t hold against so many. They were cut down on the sands where they stood. Khashayar’s quick glance down at the Companions found them encircled, the horses they had stolen recaptured by the Nineteen.
“Hold!”
A powerful voice shouted the command. The Rising Nineteen went still on both sides of the hill. Taking advantage of the distraction, Khashayar plunged down the slope. When none of the soldiers attacked, he pushed the Companions behind him, his sword poised in one hand.
A member of the Nineteen stepped forward, his dark eyes gleaming under the hood of a dusty blue burnoose. He threw back his hood to show his face. An older man with rich brown skin, the hair at his temples streaked with gray that matched his beard, his posture one of a man used to having his orders obeyed. When he loosened his cloak to show them his armor, Khashayar caught his breath.
Then he counted the number of soldiers who stood behind the man.
THE ZHAYEDAN GATE STOOD FIRM THROUGH THE NIGHT. THE TEERANDAZ archers of Ashfall held it, knowing that the Cataphracts, the army’s shock troops, were needed at the Emissary Gate. Cassandane, the Captain of the Teerandaz, had used her archers sparingly. She was waiting to target the sappers, who gathered at the southern wall to chip away at the foundations that fortified the Zhayedan Gate. When a line of sappers advanced, Cassandane moved archers to either side of her position.
A line to meet a line, a tactic Arsalan had taught her. She glanced down at the courtyard. The Commander of the Zhayedan was with his soldiers, cutting through the chaos with instructions to fortify defenses at all three of the city’s gates. He knew his soldiers to a man. He knew the range of weapons stored in the capital’s armory. Best of all, he knew when and where to disperse them. As he moved among the Cataphracts, his presence imparted calm. Without a commander like Arsalan, the city would have been lost.
A jarring noise. The gate shuddered so heavily that the ground under Cassandane’s feet trembled. A Zhayedan catapult had destroyed the first battering ram; now the Talisman had brought another. The men who urged it forward were giants, heavy with muscle and just as brutally armored. The Talisman had been warned against the skill of Cassandane’s archers. There were no obvious openings for her archers to target.
We will find them, she thought. First the sappers, then the brutes behind the ram.
She raised a hand, and the archers fired two swift strikes, their movements so rapid they blurred. The first was aimed at the soldiers who gave the sappers cover. They needed to be unseated, to open up the real targets. The second aimed at the sappers; this was the killing strike.
A return volley was aimed at the archers above the gate. But the Teerandaz were shielded by a defensive line of their own: Zhayedan soldiers whose lives were committed to them. With the first break in fire, the soldiers knelt and the Teerandaz fired again, this time with silver-tipped arrows aimed at the men who approached the gate at a run, their battering ram held aloft.
The arrows were aimed at their unprotected heads. If the soldiers survived the blows, they would try to shield their heads with their hands. The poison at the tips of the arrows would spread no matter how they tried to protect themselves, and the ram would tumble to the ground.
And so it proved.
The next rain of Teerandaz arrows carried fire. The giant wooden ram sparked and blazed to life as it burned. The assault on the gate had failed. Cassandane held up a hand. The archers waited, poised, as their captain chose another target.
Several hours later, Cassandane made a quick detour to the Black Khan’s war room to meet with the army’s commanders. Arsalan gave her a welcoming nod and signaled to the others to report. When it was her turn, she was quick and concise. Her actions should have earned her praise. But the tension in the room erupted into low-voiced murmuring, even as Arsalan commended her strategy.
“Well done, Captain Cassandane. How many archers did you lose?”
“None, Commander.”
The murmurs of displeasure intensified. She caught the assessing glance that Maysam, Captain of the Cataphracts, shot at her. He’d wanted her to support his maneuvers to defend the Emissary Gate. She’d refused, considering the attempt on the Zhayedan Gate the greater threat. No doubt that decision had cost her Maysam’s favor.
“It won’t last,” she went on, ignoring the mutinous whispers. “The Talisman have numbers on their side. We’ll need more than archers to hold.”
Maysam shifted into her line of sight. He was six and a half feet tall, his body heavy with muscle, though for a man of such bulk, he moved with deceptive swiftness, his mind agile, his calculations complex. He was a commander of fierce ability, given to weighing the odds. Beyond these talents, he was skilled with weaponry—the sword, the axe, the fire-lance, the mace—which made him the right man to lead shock troops into battle. But more than a decade older than Cassandane, he viewed her rank as an insult to his soldiers, some nearly as skilled as her own.
Nearly. That was the critical difference.
“You have two dozen Zhayedan defending your women. No others can be spared.”
Women,
