Senses alert for the least sign of warning, he picked his way one careful step at a time through the sparse underbrush of the forest. His men spread out in his wake, carefully following his example. His sword was out and ready in his left hand; that would give him a little advantage against an opponent, should one suddenly appear before him, but not much. The enemy
fighters lurking somewhere ahead knew him and some had fought hand-to-hand against him before.
The enemy—all that he knew for certain was that they were here in his patch of pristine, old-growth forest, and that their numbers were equal to his. The most logical place to find them, the weathered remains of an ancient fortification, had been empty. He assumed now that they probably planned to set up an ambush for his skirmishers somewhere; they knew he was com¬ing, and he doubted that they intended to make a pitched battle of it. In their place, he wouldn't.
His advantage was that he knew these woods as well as his opponents did; he should, since everything for leagues around here belonged to him. He had made a mental tally of all the ob¬vious places for an ambush, and he hoped he could approach such places from unexpected angles, and with luck, catch the foemen by surprise.
An ambushed ambush—hardly sporting, I suppose. He smiled, knowing the expression was hidden by his helm. Well, first he would have to pull this off. Then he would worry about whether it was "sporting"—assuming he'd won the encounter, of course.
After all, it is the victor who writes the histories, and he is the one who gets to determine what is fair, after the fact.
A movement to one side caught his eye; only one of his men, trying to shoo away an irritating fly with a minimum of obvious movement. They knew better than to slap at insects, lest the sound betray them to the enemy, and he felt sorry for his human fighting-men. For all that he sweated as heavily as any one of them, insects seldom plagued elves, perhaps because elves, not native to this world, did not smell "right" to the pesky bugs.
Kyrtian froze and raised his hand to signal to his men to do likewise, as he thought he caught a murmur of voices up ahead. Holding his breath, he closed his eyes and concentrated on listening.
Perhaps—perhaps. He opened his eyes again, and consid¬ered their present location, frowning as he did so. He and his fighters were approaching a ridge overlooking one of the lesser-used pathways through the forest. The ridge was an obvious lo-
cation for an ambush placement on the part of his foes, if they assumed he and his men would take that path below. It would be very difficult for his party to creep up upon the enemy un¬seen if that was where they were.
He raised his right hand above his head to describe three cir¬cles with his index finger. The fighter immediately behind him made the same motion, and in due time, a slightly built, lithe young fellow by the peculiar human name of Horen Gosak moved cautiously and noiselessly into place beside Kyrtian.
They locked eyes, Kyrtian's green ones meeting the human's brown; Kyrtian nodded towards the ridge in the direction of the voices and made the hand signal for ambush. Horen nodded, and leaving his sword and sword-belt behind in Kyrtian's keep¬ing lest they catch in the brush, dropped to his hands and knees to snake his way up towards the ridge, moving so low to the ground that he looked like a crawling lizard.
It was always a wonder to Kyrtian how young Horen man¬aged to disappear into landscape that was so barren of obvious cover. Sometimes he wondered if the ability was some unique application of the so-called human magics. That was entirely possible, and would have caused far more scandal among the Great Lords than Kyrtian's little eccentricity of leading his fighters in person. Although it was the law that all human slaves be fitted with collars that inhibited their own peculiar magic, no slave on the Prastaran estates had ever worn anything but a dec¬orative collar since the Elvenlords came to this world. And no "slave" on the Prastaran estates had ever been a slave in any¬thing but name.
Humans make very poor slaves; Grandfather tried to tell his arrogant compatriots that, and they wouldn't listen, and now they're paying the price for ignoring such sage advice. The first Lord Prastaran had retired to the estate he'd been allotted, pro¬ceeding there to put his own theories to. work in regard to the aboriginal inhabitants of the place. Before he drowned in a flash flood—while nearly twenty of his devoted "slaves" also drowned in frantic attempts to save him—he had formed the loose confederation of primitives that had been living on the property into a thriving and prosperous community that not
only accepted him as their overlord, but were absolutely de¬voted to his welfare.
Kyrtian's father had inherited that community, and had cher¬ished and fostered it, recognizing it for the valuable resource that it was! Now it was Kyrtian's to guide and guard, for in guarding the humans under his protection, he was all too aware that he was guarding his own prosperity.
His wandering thoughts were abruptly recalled by Horen's return, as the young man wriggled into cover beside him. With the aid of twigs, pebbles, and a few hand-signals, Horen swiftly laid out the disposition of the enemy forces ahead.
Kyrtian studied the arrangement for several moments, grind¬ing his teeth a little in frustration. As usual, the enemy com¬mander showed brilliant skill. It was an appallingly superior disposition. Obviously one couldn't approach them from the front or the rear, so what did that leave him?
We could retreat, but that would leave them in possession of the woods, and they would win this without a fight. That was unacceptable. Is there enough room on the top of this ridge to flank them?
He didn't want to divide his force if he could help it, and he'd have to if he wanted to use a classic pincer maneuver. That wouldn't be a good idea anyway; one that the ground didn't en¬courage. He'd have to send his men to fight against both ends of the enemy ambush-line in a way that would only allow one or two fighters to close in at a time; that would put them at an im¬mediate disadvantage.
Finally Kyrtian decided on something truly unorthodox; waiting until the enemy commander was frustrated enough to come looking for him. Short exploration by Horen produced the place where any opposing force was most likely to descend from the ridge. After careful deliberation, he set up an ambush of his own.
Of course, the weakness of this plan was that the opposition might not decide to come down on this side of the ridge. That would leave him, in his turn, waiting to spring an empty trap. Still, the occasional murmur of voices through the hush of the forest told him that his opponents were getting tired of waiting.
Probably they had been in place ever since his own force had entered the woods. Horen went out again to spy, so that Kyrt-ian's troops would at least know if the foe moved off in some other direction. Kyrtian settled into his own position and held off boredom by making an informal bird-count based on the calls he heard.
Time crawled past, but his patience was finally rewarded. Horen slithered back to take up his weapons. Kyrtian pumped his fist in the air once, and heard a faint rustle of leaves as his men caught the signal, relaying it down the line, and readying themselves for action.
He had chosen his own place perfectly. Another faint rustle of leaves and the occasional snapping of a twig warned that the enemy was on the move, and shortly after, the men ap¬peared filing cautiously down the slope below them, flitting from bits of cover to their next position. Kyrtian waited until he was certain that all of the enemy skirmishers were immedi¬ately below their own position, his nerves so taut that his skin tingled, muscles were afire, his pulse pounding in his temples and his ears.
Wait for it—
If he sprang the ambush too soon, his own men would be sur¬rounded. He didn't know exactly how many men the enemy had, so he couldn't count heads....
Wait for it—
He didn't dare permit his force to be outflanked.
Now!
His throat cracked with a yell as he broke out of cover and charged, his men streaming down the slope behind him. The startled skirmishers whirled to face them.
Kyrtian skidded to a halt on the slope as he nearly ran into a fighter who was considerably taller than he. In that moment, as was always true for him once the fighting started, everything narrowed to this single opponent. Their swords clashed to¬gether, his opponent countered with a clever parry that sent him leaping away lest the fighter try to grapple with him. Next the man tried to circle him, but that was the last thing that Kyrtian was going to allow—at the moment he had the slight advantage
of being uphill, and that was the only advantage he really had over this bulkier opponent.
Kyrtian retreated as fast as the other advanced; nothing was going to force him to turn if he could help it. Somewhere in the back of his mind he was dimly aware of shouts, the clashing of metal, and all the din of battle, but he was too seasoned to ever be distracted from his own line of combat. Giving up on the ploy of forcing Kyrtian off higher ground, the fellow swung low, hard and wide, scything at Kyrtian's legs; Kyrtian used the opportunity to slash at the man's sword-hand as he himself skipped backwards.
He really hadn't expected the luck of a full strike, but his op¬ponent had evidently anticipated a blow to the head rather than the hand. The fighter ducked to one side and didn't get his hilt up in time to deflect Kyrtian's blow.
The blade passed through the other's wrist, leaving behind a glowing line. The fighter cursed, transferring the sword to his left hand, tucking the "disabled" hand into his belt at the small of his back, as per the rules of combat. If he hadn't, he'd get a warning after the battle was over—and the second time he re¬fused to accept a blow, the marked area or limb would truly go completely numb and useless until Kyrtian removed the magic that rendered it so.
He was by no means as good a fighter with his weak hand as Kyrtian was. A clumsy attempt at an overhand blow left his armpit unprotected, and the Elvenlord executed a fatal thrust. The blade vanished up to the hilt with no resistance, and the man jerked in reaction to the all-over tingle that the "death-wound" gave him as the sign that he was "dead."
Now the fighter glowed the color of new leaves all over; with a good-natured curse, he saluted Kyrtian, sheathed his blade, and removed his helm, joining five of his fellow "dead men" on the sidelines. All of them were glowing the same yellow-green, which meant they were all out of the enemy forces. Kyrtian made the mistake of allowing himself a brief pause to gloat without looking behind him.
A moment after that, a sudden electric jolt told Kyrtian that
he had been taken from behind. Ruefully looking down at him¬self, he saw that he, too, was glowing.
"Galkasht!" he cursed, in the Old Tongue, and heard Sargeant Gel's familiar laugh in answer. He sheathed his own sword in disgust, pulled off his helm, and went to join the other dead.
Gel did not get a chance to enjoy his victory for long; Horen rose out of a bush behind him and caught him across the neck as he turned. Gel swore even more colorfully than Kyrtian had, while his own men jeered and catcalled from the side¬lines.
"Who is it has never been hit from behind?" called one, in feigned innocence.
"You owe me beer for the next moon, Sargeant," one of the others heartlessly reminded him. "And you owe Horen three night-watches."
"Don't remind me." The human pulled off his helm and threw it to the ground, glaring at them—but they knew they were safe. The "dead" could say anything they liked as long as the battle was on. That was another one of the rules, meant to be sure that no one turned mock-combat into a real fight.
"Temper, temper," scolded a third, as Horen vanished to seek a new opponent. "A true warrior never fights with anger."
"I'm not fighting," Gel pointed out sourly, his jaw clenched tight.
Gel picked up his helm after another scorching glare and stamped his way down the hill to the sidelines. Kyrtian hid his own grin, and gave Gel a commiserating slap on the shoulder.
"Too bad, old man," he said, with what he hoped was a good counterfeit of sympathy. "That's combat-luck for you."
'That's carelessness, you mean," Gel growled, as he ruffled his sweaty, grizzled brown hair to dry it. "Don't coddle me, Kyrtian; I got you when you stopped to gloat, then I was served the same dish. What's more, you ambushed me when I lost pa¬tience. You're going to win this one. I underestimated you."
Since at this point, those who glowed yellow-green outnum¬bered those who glowed red-orange by three to one, that was
fairly obvious, so Kyrtian held his tongue and tried assume a modest expression.
"I think we can count this experiment a success," he said in¬stead. "I wasn't sure we'd be able to make the transition from arena-fighting and set-battles, but it's obvious this mode is go¬ing to work."
"I'd keep it at the skirmish-level for a while," Gel cautioned.
"I intend to," Kyrtian assured him, as more of the "dead" on the sidelines cheered the surviving fighters on or showered them with abuse. "At least until everyone's gotten a fair amount of practice at this. I don't want people stumbling around break¬ing ankles in rabbit-holes or running into an alicorn and getting skewered. We're out here to fight, not get hurt." He loosened his throat-guard and yanked it off.
Gel barked a laugh at that, and Kyrtian had to grin. 'That's as true as it sounds absurd," Gel chuckled. "And it's true you'd have less luck getting people to volunteer to fight for us if too many of the boys started coming back with broken bones, or worse." He stuck his thumb in his sword-belt and watched the fighters with pardonable pride. "I'll tell you what, though—I'd pit these lads against any of the professional fighters I've seen when it comes to combat rather than gladiatorial games. They'd win."
"That's rather the point, though I hope it doesn't come to that. There'll be far less blood shed if they go up against con¬scripts." Kyrtian watched as the last of his men surrounded the last of Gel's and demanded their surrender. "The Elvenlords can compel men to fight, but they can't compel them to fight well. Speaking of volunteers—the field-folk are going to need another holiday before too long."