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He raised his sword and stepped forward, ready to meet the charge.
There was something vaguely familiar about one of the Tsurani, the one who had charged the gate and in a masterful display of swordsmanship dropped two moredhels in a matter of seconds. This Tsurani shouted something to the warriors around him, even as he stepped to the fore and raised his sword. De
De
All this had taken but a matter of seconds and even as the Tsurani leader stepped forward to fight, his own men were deploying out after the slaughter of the moredhel, ready to riddle the Tsurani coming through the gate and along the wall. A quick glance revealed that the Tsurani had yet to bring any archers up from outside.
And yet… De
De
'Close the gate,' De
The Tsurani leader dropped his formal pose and growled an angry reply.
De
'Moredhel!' the ru
All froze. De
De
De
Several of his men muttered but most grunted a chorus of agreement. Blades, spear points and bows started to lower.
The Tsurani leader shouted something and De
'Archers!' De
He ran to the still-open gate. The last of the Tsurani were coming through. One of them, at the sight of De
Two Tsurani, dragging a wounded comrade, came in last and their commander leaned into the gate. De
De
'Kill him!' De
His archers stood up and within seconds the rider, his horse and all the trolls were down.
He caught a sidelong glance from the Tsurani commander and a grunt of approval.
Shouts of anger greeted the volley. There was a bark of command followed by silence. De
Several minutes passed.
Tinuva slipped off the wall and came up to De
'What did you say?' De
'"Honours to his House", the traditional Tsurani greeting. Then I complimented him on his swordsmanship. I don't know if you saw it, a masterful double kill.'
De
'Where's Gregory?' De
'One of the men said he ran right into a roof support when he charged into the barracks: he was stu
'I'll find time to enjoy the humour of that if we live through the night,' De
Tinuva fell silent. He looked through a crack between the logs and then turned back to De
'They won't attack for a while. I think this is just an advance party. We laid enough traps along the trail to slow them down. They'll wait for the rest of their command to come up first then fan out and flank us.'
De
'Got them.'
De
He looked over at the Tsurani.
Damn, what a fix.
'This is what we do,' De
He pointed to either side of the pass.
'Tinuva, I want you to detail a dozen archers, get them up on the flanks and keep the moredhel and their trolls back – I don't want them coming down on us the same way we came down on them. My guess is those scum are as exhausted as we are. Once they find out we hold the heights as well they'll give up for tonight. There's some old dwarven mine shafts a mile or so back down the slope. My bet is they pull in there, build fires to warm up, and wait till dawn to fan out and trap us. We'll get out a couple hours before dawn, dried and rested.'
'And our friends?' Tinuva asked, eyes flicking towards the Tsurani commander.
Damn, De
'I guess we settle it before we leave. The Broad River, you remember it?'
Tinuva smiled and nodded. The thought struck De
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