by Troy Denning
“They’re trying to lay another trap for us,” Jochibi warned.
“A good plan,” Batu observed. “If not for your sharp eyes, it would have worked.”
The Shou returned his gaze to the battlefield, searching for a way to turn the enemy’s cleverness against him. For the first time in months, his mind was completely absorbed in something other than his own feelings.
Finally, Batu’s eyes lit on the steep walls of the valley. An idea occurred to him. “Send half the reserve to each side of the valley,” he said. “They are to climb as far up the mountainsides as they can, taking their bows and all their arrows.”
Jochibi raised an eyebrow. “What do you have in mind?”
“I’ve seen the khahan execute a false retreat,” the Shou answered. “I assume this is a standard tactic?”
“It is.”
“Good” Batu replied. He did a little quick math, then said, “We’ll attack each gnoll company with two arbans.”
Batu did not like the odds. An arban consisted of ten men, so that meant his troops would be outnumbered by a little more than two-to-one as they attacked. However, the khahan was fond of bragging that one of his warriors was a match for any four enemies. Now, the Tuigan would have a chance to prove it.
The renegade Shou continued explaining his plan. “After we’ve convinced the enemy of our sincerity, we’ll feign a rout and disengage. Our retreat path will be along the canyon walls.”
Jochibi smiled. “Beneath the arrow cover offered by our reserves.”
“If this plan is to work, timing is everything,” Batu continued. “We must begin the retreat at the center. You’ll ride toward the northern side of the canyon, and I’ll ride toward the southern. As we pass each group of soldiers, the drummers will signal for them to disengage. It will be important for us not to turn away from the gnoll line until we’ve collected the last of our troops from both flanks.”
Batu paused to allow Jochibi to ask questions. When the Tuigan remained silent, the Shou finished explaining his plan. “The flying cavalry will almost certainly pursue, and we’ll lead them beneath the arrows of our reserves, too.”
Jochibi frowned and rubbed the back of his neck. Finally he said, “I don’t like it. You’re splitting the army. It’s too risky”
“It is an intricate maneuver,” Batu allowed, a note of eagerness creeping into his voice. “But the reward is worth it. As we ride in front of the enemy line, we’ll shower them with arrows. By the time we reach the end, we’ll have twenty archers for every target. Their flanks will be annihilated!”
“Only if every detail goes well,” Jochibi objected. He met his superior’s gaze with steady eyes. “I hesitate to send good men to their deaths on such a chancy plan.”
“These men are soldiers!” Batu snapped. “I would not think a Tuigan needed to be reminded of this.”
The adjutant scowled. “As you wish,” he replied.
Jochibi turned and passed Batu’s plan along to five messengers, being careful not to let his own doubts show. After the messengers rode off, Batu and the Tuigan officer waited in bitter silence. Finally, twenty minutes later, the messengers returned with confirmations from the commanders of the five minghans that made up the five-thousand-man army.
Batu drew his sword. Instead of the heavy tao he had taken from Kei Bot, he now carried the slightly curved saber of a Tuigan horseman. It felt warm and natural in his hand.
He turned to Jochibi, who was staring at the battle lines in stoic silence. “Can I rely on you?”
Jochibi drew his gleaming weapon, then kissed its golden quillon. “Your boldness frightens me, Shou. But the orders are issued. I’ll do what I must to win the battle.”
Batu remembered a similar assurance from Kei Bot. That assurance had turned into betrayal and cost him the victory at Shou Kuan. Jochibi was no Kei Bot, however. The Tuigan had always seemed a selfless and dedicated officer, so Batu thought he could believe the man’s words.
“You are a good soldier, Jochibi,” Batu said. “With your support, this plan will work—I promise.”
“That’s the emptiest promise anyone ever made to me,” the Tuigan said, smiling grimly. “If your plan fails, who’ll be left to punish you for breaking your word?”
“There’s no place in the eighteen hells where I could hide from you, I’m sure,” Batu replied.
With that, Batu spurred his horse forward. Screaming the Tuigan war cry, the hundred members of his bodyguard followed. As they passed through the forward line, the drummers sounded the advance. Within a minute thousands of barbarian warriors were galloping toward the enemy in a long thin line.
Almost immediately, crude arrows began to rain down on the Tuigan. Fortunately, the gnolls were not nearly as accurate with their weapons as the horsewarriors were with theirs. Out of the corner of his eyes, Batu saw only a few men falling, and it was a rare thing for a gray shaft to flash past his own face.
The Tuigan drums stirred a wild exhilaration in man and beast alike. Nevertheless, Batu did not feel carried away by his mount, as he had at Shou Kuan. Even with his bodyguard behind him, there were far fewer horses crowded into a small area, and the Tuigan were experts at controlling their mounts. The big black stallion simply kept pace with the other horses, advancing at a steady, rhythmic gait.
At one hundred yards, the Tuigan archers began to return the gnolls’ fire, and to guide their horses toward companies of dog-men. Though the horsewarriors were firing on the move, many of their arrows found their marks. A few of the furry brutes began to drop, clawing furiously at feathered shafts protruding from their simple leather armor. To Batu’s amazement, others simply broke off the shafts and nocked another arrow in their own bows. The archery of the wounded gnolls was weak and inaccurate, but Batu was impressed that they continued to fight at all.
As the Tuigan neared the enemy lines, Batu looked toward the flying specks Jochibi had pointed out. They had already moved closer, and the renegade could see that each one looked like a tiny “V.” For him to see their wings from so far away, he realized, the creatures had to be much larger than any bird. They were flying toward the center of the battlefield, probably hoping to break the Tuigan line.
Batu smiled. They could not have picked a strategy better suited to his plan.
The sudden eruption of a fireball jarred him out of his elation. A glob of flame appeared to his left, engulfing four riders in its orange sphere. Batu’s horse whinnied in fright and stumbled, but the Shou kicked its flanks and the beast recovered its footing.
A moment later, a dozen red streaks flared out of the closest gnoll company. They flashed past the Shou’s head, each one striking a rider and leaving a burning hole in the man’s chest. The magicians had started to do their work.
Batu glimpsed a red robe in the company directly ahead. He pointed at it. “The wizard!” he cried, screaming as loud as he could to make himself heard over the drums. “Shoot the wizard!”
No sooner had he screamed than a dozen Tuigan arrows flew directly at the figure. They smashed into an invisible barrier and fell to the ground. In the next instant, the wizard vanished.
It did not matter, for magic would not stop the charge now. The Tuigan were so close that the gnolls—at least the ones who still stood—were dropping their bows in favor of battle-axes and morning stars. Batu noted that his own troops were holstering their bows and drawing sabers. In another instant, the charging horsewarriors would smash into the gnoll companies and the melee would begin.
Batu used that instant to check the progress of the flying cavalry. The formation was so close that he could see the mounts did not resemble horses at all. Each beast had the head, wings, and forequarters of a giant eagle, while the tail and hindquarters were those of a huge lion. Although he had heard stories about such creatures and knew they were called griffins, he had always believed the animals to be little more than imaginary.
On each griffin’s back rode a red-robed wizard and a rider armed with a lance
and bow. Batu noted with pleasure that neither the rider nor his passenger wore armor, undoubtedly to avoid burdening the griffin with extra weight.
He had no more time to study the fliers. Batu’s horse crashed into a gnoll company, and he was engulfed in a mass of gray fur. A pair of huge hairy hands reached for him from the left side. The dog-man’s breath filled the air with the stench of carrion and half-digested meat. The beast was barking commands to another gnoll in a coarse, guttural language.
Batu slashed at the beast’s hands. A huge fist fell to the ground, leaving nothing but a bloody stump behind. The wounded gnoll growled and lunged for the Shou. The renegade pulled his foot from the stirrup and kicked the dog-man square in the forehead. The blow would have felled a man, but the gnoll only snarled and knocked Batu’s leg aside.
Batu slashed with his sword again, this time opening a gash in the beast’s hairy throat. The gnoll roared, then slapped his good hand over the wound and backed away. The Shou turned to his right, just in time to see the flanged head of an iron morning star sailing at his face. Batu ducked, but knew his reflexes would be too slow.
A sword flashed past his ear, then connected with the morning star’s chain. The deadly ball looped around the blade, a flange slicing Batu’s cheek open. The rest of the weapon missed his face by less than an inch.
In the next instant, Jochibi wrenched the morning star from the hands of Batu’s attacker, then urged his horse forward to trample the growling brute.
“Thanks, Jo—”
Before Batu completed his acknowledgement, a powerful hand seized his belt. Already unsteady from his narrow brush with the morning star, the Shou nearly lost his balance and slipped from his horse. Grasping the saddle’s pommel, he jerked himself back into the seat, then kicked at his unseen attacker without removing his foot from the stirrup. His heel connected with an armored chest, then Batu swung around and ran his saber through the yellow-toothed gnoll’s throat.
As he pulled his blade free, a shadow passed over the battle. Six golden balls of magical energy flashed out of the sky, killing six men. Batu looked up and saw a griffin swooping low overhead. The wizard atop the monster held his hand outstretched and pointed at the melee below him. The griffin’s other rider allowed the beast to swoop safely past the battle, then wheeled it about for another pass.
At the same time, Batu saw a gnoll step toward him. He spurred his horse, and it pushed its way forward to where Jochibi had just separated a beast’s head from its shoulders. All around the Tuigan, the ground was carpeted with fallen gnolls. Nevertheless, their fellows pressed the attack, wildly swinging their maces and morning stars. Often, the dog-men had forsaken weapons altogether and were using bare hands to drag the Tuigan from their saddles.
They were meeting with entirely too much success. In Batu’s group alone, nearly half the horses were riderless. Farther away, in the companies to either side of the renegade’s, the story appeared to be much the same. He saw many empty horses and, fortunately, plenty of fallen gnolls. Near each group were three griffins bearing a wizard and a rider. While the riders guided the flying mounts, the mages flung various magical bolts, beams, and rays into the melee.
The gnoll that Batu had avoided earlier came up behind him. Just as the beast swung its morning star, the Shou turned his mount to meet the attack. The spiked ball bounced of the black horse’s barding, then the stallion reared and thrashed the gnoll with its front hooves. When the horse dropped back to the ground, Batu finished the cringing dog-man with a swift chop to its collarbone.
“Time to leave!” Batu shouted, trying to make himself heard above the clamor of battle. When Jochibi showed no sign of hearing him, the Shou slapped is subordinate’s leg with the flat of his blade. The grisled Tuigan twisted around, his guard raised. “I thought you were dead!”
“I am,” Batu responded. “But the judges of the hells have allowed me time for a few battles more.”
Another griffin swooped overhead, and a fireball erupted on the edge of the company. A half-dozen men, horses, and gnolls screamed in agony as the orange flames engulfed them.
“By now, the enemy should be convinced of our sincerity,” Batu said.
“Agreed,” Jochibi responded. “Let’s go!”
Without waiting for Batu’s command, the Tuigan spurred his horse and pushed his way out of the melee. An instant later, Batu turned his horse in the opposite direction and broke free of the fray. As the renegade and his adjutant bounded away, the nearest drummers silenced their instruments.
Within moments, the area was empty of Tuigan, and the Shou was riding past the next group of gnolls with more than twenty warriors at his back. As the drummer assigned to this melee saw Batu pass, he silenced his instrument. The horsewarriors disengaged and joined the retreat.
Batu could not help but admire the precision of the maneuver. As the time came, each man executed his orders flawlessly, regardless of what else was happening at the moment. Even in the heat of battle, there was none of the confusion common to Shou maneuvers. Batu continued past melee after melee collecting his troops with drill-field precision.
As expected, the retreat took the enemy by surprise. For several minutes the griffin riders did not pursue. By the time the airborne cavalry reorganized themselves and turned to the chase, Batu was only two miles from the valley walls. With him rode nearly five hundred warriors that he had collected from the melees along the line.
Even in retreat, his troops were dealing a serious blow to the gnolls. As their fellows disengaged and joined the retreating army, the Tuigan archers, accustomed to firing on the gallop, unleashed a volley of arrows. The deadly shafts rained down on the defenders like a hail storm. The massed fire was so accurate that barely a handful of gnolls escaped each time the archers fired on an enemy company.
As the Tuigan approached the next melee, it was the enemy who tried to disengage and run. Having seen what had happened when the mounted archers passed the last company, the gnoll officers had no wish to meet a similar fate. The Tuigan, however, were accustomed to battling fleeing adversaries and did not allow them to escape. As the gnolls turned their backs, the horsemen tarried long enough to cut them down, then joined the rest of their fellows.
The same thing happened as the riders approached the next three companies. Batu began to fear that the efficiency of his archers had alerted the flying cavalry to his plan. The Tuigan were only a mile and a half from the canyon walls, and the griffins still had not caught up.
With less than a mile to go before reaching the flank, two hundred griffins finally gathered into a formation behind the barbarians. Unfettered by the presence of their own troops, the wizards showered the Tuigan with horrible, destructive magic. Walls of fire and ice appeared in the middle of the Tuigan retreat. Struggling to avoid the obstacles at a full gallop, dozens of men and horses tumbled to the ground. Black clouds rained death down on small numbers of riders. Once, twenty horses drifted high into the air, then came crashing back down on their fellows.
Four hundred yards from the canyon wall, the Tuigan retreat turned into a genuine rout. Under the withering, airborne attacks, the barbarian horsemen could no longer ignore their fear of magic. The last few gnoll companies escaped intact, but Batu was not concerned. His troops had already dealt so much destruction that the enemy army was ruined for all practical purposes.
Besides, the rout would only serve to draw the griffin riders into his trap, and that was worth the lives of a few dozen gnolls. If his plans were to succeed, the enemy fliers had to be so caught up in pursuit that they did not notice their danger until it was too late.
The Tuigan and their pursuers reached the canyon wall. The retreating horsemen turned east along the base of the mountains, just as Batu had planned. Looking around, the Shou estimated that he had perhaps a thousand riders with him. Assuming that Jochibi had a similar number on the other side the of the valley, that meant he had lost two thousand men to the gnolls and the magic. The number was a large one, but
he knew the figure would have been a lot higher if Jochibi’s sharp eyes had not spotted the griffin formation before the battle began.
They continued along the base of the canyon for several more minutes, the enemy in close pursuit. Batu saw no sign of his reserves on the canyon walls, but he had too much faith in the Tuigan warriors to doubt that they were there. A few moments later, the sweet music of twanging bowstrings filled the air, and the Shou twisted around in his saddle to see what had happened.
He was greeted by the sight of chaos in the air. Over a hundred wounded or dead griffins were dropping to the ground. Their panicked riders were leaping free or trying in vain to pull the beasts back into the air. The Tuigan reserves stood along the mountainside, their shoulders and heads still white from the snow that had hidden them only moments before.
As the renegade watched, the reserves fired their second volley. Every arrow found its mark. Another forty griffins plunged to the earth, six arrows apiece protruding from their throats and flanks. Those that remained airborne, no more than a dozen, turned and flew away toward the west.
Batu screamed for joy.
He gradually pulled back on his horse’s reins and signaled his men to reverse directions. Even without the griffins in pursuit, it required more than two minutes to bring the retreat under control. Eventually, however, the Shou sent his soldiers back to finish the few griffin riders who had survived the ambush.
As Batu watched the barbarians dispatch the survivors, his heart filled with a warm feeling. The attack on the gnolls was the finest maneuver he had ever executed. He had decimated a force twice as large as his own, and he had eliminated the enemy’s greatest tactical advantage, its flying cavalry.
A sensation of elation came over him. He had not experienced such a feeling since earning his promotion to first-degree general and winning Wu’s hand. A pang of sadness struck Batu as he thought of his wife and then his children, but he no longer felt empty or lonely. They would always be a cherished part of his life, but the sense of fulfillment that he now experienced left no room for doubt: his destiny had always been to make war.
