In the centre was the girl, tall and hair dripping like heart blood framing a furious face, prominent beaked nose pointing straight at him like an eagle about to stoop. A silver sword, breath-taking in its simple beauty and savage purpose, grew from her arm with a life of its own. To one side a beautiful bare-chested heathen brown girl, long hair swirling around her, short spear in one hand, dripping with the blood of Havantine soldiers and the right clasping a long barbed lash which she snapped at the front rank. On the other side a buxom girl with long blonde hair, unusual in Havant, and her long skirts tucked up into her underwear, revealing long lissom legs balanced for action, a staff held loosely in the manner of one who knows how to use it.
It did not occur to any of the soldiers that the girls were beautiful - they exuded menace, death and blood. The girls inched forward. The sword rose and dipped, the soldier second from left followed the tip and screamed as he failed to block the whip which slashed across his face, bursting his right eye and drenching his other in blood. The man behind him grabbed his shoulder and threw him backwards, leaping into the gap before the girls could take advantage. The wall stepped back.
“Steady boys.”
Suzanne’s long staff swung at heads, before dipping and shooting forward to crunch the toes of the right hand soldier. He grunted and swayed forward, just enough for the tip of Lady Strike to slice through his carotid under his ear. He slumped forward and Suzanne leapt forward, her staff taking the next soldier smack in the belly before swinging sideways into the ribs of the man in the front rank. He died as his reaction exposed him to Sara, while the other three swayed back from the lash cracking in their faces.
Sara struck at Sebastien and somehow he parried, goggling internally at the speed of her strike, wondering how he managed to get his sword down in time. He felt the warmth run down his leg, for a moment believing he was cut before realising his bladder had cut loose. The shame of his body letting him down concentrated his mind and he evaded the next three cuts, not knowing enough about swordcraft to recognise the form. The shield wall staggered back, and Sebastien wondered if the rear ranks were still there or had fled. Sergeant Baptista’s voice rose over the pants of his men.
“Steady boys, we’re here to save your hide.”
The end man glanced back and desperately swung his sword to try and cut the lash wrapped round his ankle, but it jerked his leg forward and he howled as he hacked into his own calf. Sara and Suzanne pressed, the wall fell back and Rerata eased her spear head into the man’s throat and up into his brain. She was getting fed up with all the men moaning and screaming as they died. In a moment the wall broke, and Sebastien turned to run, the lash catching him on his buttock as he went and he screamed.
Sergeant Baptista was by the entrance to the square, catching the men and re-forming them. He had three men with him and Sebastien’s heart leapt as he recognised slingers. They were whirling the slings and he turned to find the heathen girl fixed on him as she slunk forward. He diverted the first thrust of the spear with an ungainly slash of his sword, which opened him up for the lash which flamed across his cheek and made him drop his sword as the barbed end flicked through the ball of this thumb. Helpless, he stood with his mouth open as her arm went back and tensed as she began the thrust into his guts.
The lead projectile hurled by the first slinger smashed into Rerata a finger’s width behind her eye, breaking through the bone and caving in the entire side of her head. She dropped like a stone. The other two girls stopped in shock, staring uncomprehendingly at Rerata, whose prone body convulsed once, bending back on herself, before going still, the one remaining eye protruding horribly, her spear dropping at Sebastien’s feet.
A second missile whisked past Sara’s ear and a third cannoned into Suzanne’s stomach, flinging her back and to the ground. She cried fat tears of agony as she circled herself around the roaring pain in her solar plexus, kicking as her abused muscles convulsed.
Sara turned back as the slingers scrabbled to get more missiles into their pouches and she grasped the weapon’s method. She ran at the shield wall, rewarded by three soldiers breaking rank and running, the rest backing up, faces drawn. They hadn’t realised two of the fearsome girls were out of action. The front rank braced itself for her arrival - this was more like it, enemies should run singly on to a wall to be easily slaughtered. The first slinger sent his missile towards Sara, who anticipated and turned left, seeking the flight of the stone through the void. Leaping over a stall, she ran up the rough bricks of the wall on the house to the side of the slingers, her body at right angles to the wall and only her speed giving her the momentum to make the move, before dropping down behind the slingers as the third dropped his missile and the second smacked the stall with his. Two fast slashes and two slingers were kicking on the floor, while the last ran to hide behind Sergeant Baptista. This worthy held a short spear pointed directly at Sara with one hand, while grasping a short sword ready for her to come round the side.
The shield wall was in disarray, falling about and trying to come round to face Sara in her new position. Sebastien leaped from amongst them to stand in front of Sara, between her and his sergeant, his sword pointed ineptly at her midriff. She batted it away and kept coming, Sebastien surprising her by stepping forward inside her sword arm and blocking her run. Lady Strike arced down into his thigh and he gasped in agony, grabbing her around the waist with his left arm. She retaliated by ramming her knee into his groin and he staggered backwards, flailing at her with his sword. She blocked the slash and dodged a spear thrust from the sergeant, only to sense a missile coming from the remaining slinger, right at her head. She twisted to one side, throwing herself forward at the same time to avoid another spear thrust. Sebastien jabbed despairingly forward in her general direction. She felt his sword slice through her dress and bisect her nipple as it plunged into her left breast, then the missile caromed into the side of her head and darkness fell.
Pat, Bai Ju and Hinatea sat in a triangle, deep in the void and reaching for each other. Bai Ju wanted to find out if they could feel each other grasp a weapon, but it wasn’t happening. Legend said it would, in time, she claimed. All three felt a disturbance from the entrance to their area of the palace and rose as one, gliding fast to the front door where Mimi cried in the arms of a perplexed Grey Fox. The soldiers came around as they arrived, Pat recovering first.
“Mimi! Where is the Princess?”
“She’s, she’s dead! The Havantines came. They are all dead. I only escaped because I am Parsi, they did not think I was with her.”
“What happened?”
“A soldier, he came from nowhere, and he put his sword in Maciu who was not expecting it. The Princess became very angry and she attacked them, so many of them. Maybe a hundred, maybe more. All Havantine, with big swords and axes. She killed them, the ones who killed Maciu. Then they make a row of men, and she, Suzanne and Rerata drive them back, killing so many of them.” Mimi bawled loudly, unable to carry on. Lieutenant Mactravis, unable to contain his impatience, shook her.
“Carry on, damn you. Then what happened?”
“They had three wizards. The wizards twirled things in the air and Rerata fell dead, her head smashed in. Then they struck Suzanne dead. Sara attacked the wizards, she kill two when the soldier try to hit her with his sword. She started to kill him when the last wizard hit her and made her run into the sword. Right through the heart.” Mimi screamed into the room.
“Where?” Pat asked.
“The, the market square by the southern gate,” sobbed Mimi.
Pat ran out of the room, his scouts falling in behind him, grabbing their weapons as they went. Lieutenant Mactravis followed them also without needing to instruct his soldiers. Janis translated rapidly for those Spakka still poor in Harrhienian, keeping up with the soldiers.
They arrived in the square to find a few locals starting to strip the bodies of the dead, and chased them off. Maru claimed Maciu’s body, fury in his eyes.
“My brother died to a coward’s stroke,” he said. “A blade is pushed into his stomach, here. I think this one,” he kicked at the short sword under the body of the nearest soldier, turning him over and revealing the wound in the stomach recognisable as Sara’s work. The soldier’s eyes flashed open, blinking in pain. Maru grabbed him by the throat, pulling him painfully erect so his torn guts fell out.
“You kill my brother when he not looks,” he grated in Belada. “Now I eat your liver while you alive and watching.”
The soldier had thought his pain could not get worse, but screamed as he realised how wrong he was. Maru plunged his hand into the wound and lived up to his word, the soldier’s eyes radiating horror as he died.
Hinatea cradled Rerata’s head in her lap, her face flat and empty. “How she die? What this thing in her head?” She asked Pat as she pulled out a knife, and delicately levered out the lead missile, passing it to him while stoically levering up bone and pushing Rerata’s mangled head back into place.
Pat considered the missile and showed it to Lieutenant Mactravis, who shook his head. Bai Ju leaned forward and picked up the bullet.
“I think I know this weapon. Not know name in Harrhein. Put this in cloth, whirl it round the head and you can throw it very fast and accurate. If long cloth, can kill people a hundred paces away.”
“Never heard of it,” said Mactravis. “We need to find out what happened. I will secure the perimeter, Pat, you and Grey Fox go over the scene and work out the battle.” He turned to Janis, hovering behind him, telling him to secure the west and north side while sending Russell to the East, his face set in stone.
The Spakka made short work of dispersing the crowds, inching into the square. Their departure revealed more bodies by the gate, including two near the wall. Sung Bai Ju went to these and picked up a sling.
“Here is the weapon,” she said. “Sara managed to kill two of them, as Mimi said.”
Pat glanced at her briefly, before returning to his discussion with Grey Fox. They spoke in Elvish, to Little’s annoyance as he tried to help. They put together the battle with painstaking care from the marks in the ground and the bodies before reporting to Lieutenant Mactravis, as Captain Larroche arrived, Brian at his back, concern written large on their faces. They had arrived from the coast by cart that morning.
“Sir, we have worked it out,” began Pat, with Grey Fox nodding beside him. “This one Maru is dismembering struck and killed Maciu before he knew what was happening. Sara cut him and left him to die a slow death with a punctured stomach.”
They looked over to where Maru and Wiwik continued their farewell to Maciu, both men daubed in the blood of the Havantine with dust running out of their hair. They washed Maciu’s feet in the blood and Pat continued.
“We think there were nearly thirty men in the ambush, and the girls responded by killing nine of them. Most of the bodies are here, but the one killed in the middle of the square is gone. We think he was the leader and Sara killed him in single combat. He died badly, again with a stomach wound. She did so deliberately. We are convinced he is dead because there is so much blood on the ground, even though no body. We think they took his body away with them, the only one of theirs they took. Suzanne took a sling missile here. You can still see the scratches in the dust where her feet scuffed as she kicked, although the area is walked over. Her body is gone, we don’t know where she was struck, but if she kicked so much the strike was not the head like Rerata. They have her body, so she may be alive.”
“And the Princess, man, what about her?”
“She bled. She did not kick. She fell there and her body is gone. There is quite a lot of blood, we cannot tell if it is a mortal blow or not. The area where she fell has many other footprints over it since she fell. I think she was struck by a sling, Grey Fox is not sure.”
“Is she dead?”
“I think so. Mimi says she is, and if she is not, they will mistreat her for killing so many men. The wound she has taken will kill her in this climate if she survives.”
“What have they done with her and Suzanne?”
“They will take her body to Hua and crucify it as an example to others, the penalty for those who come to their waters.” Sung Bai Ju spoke.
“I won’t let it happen,” said Lieutenant Mactravis, tightly. The others, except for the Captain, nodded. Pat moved away from the group, his report done, and spoke gently to Maru, who nodded. All three stood beside Maciu, while the Pahippian girls brought Rerata’s body and laid it beside him. For a moment there was quiet in the square, as the Scouts put their hands forward above the bodies and touched fists. The Scouts moved off towards the south gate, while Sung Bai Ju turned towards the palace.
Pat turned to the Captain. “Please take our comrades to the ship and consign them to the sea when you are away from land. The great shark god will take them home.”
“Where do you think you are going?” Captain Larroche asked, his voice breaking.
Pat showed his surprise. “We get horses and our supplies, then we follow them and soon catch up. We will recover the bodies. “
“You know I cannot wait for your return?” The Captain didn’t waste his breath denying their purpose.
“We know. We will see you on your return.” Sung Bai Ju did not turn her head as they left at a fast, loping run.