‘Make them take the bait,’ said Calis.
De Loungville nodded once, turned his horse, and rode to the end of the column. Erik looked back and saw Foster and six other men slow and then stop after de Loungville gave the order. They would wait a quarter hour, then start riding after Calis’s company, hoping they would get the chance to catch up in a day or two.
It was midmorning the next day when someone at the rear of the column shouted, ‘Rider!’
Erik looked over his shoulder and saw Jadow Shati riding the life out of his horse. The animal was completely lathered, and from the huge extension of her nostrils, Erik could tell she couldn’t catch her breath. She was blown out and ruined, he was certain. Jadow was familiar enough with horses to realize he was killing the mare, so Erik knew it could only mean trouble. He untied the cord that held his sword in its scabbard, as he did not need to be told that they were about to fight.
For in the distance, less than a mile behind Jadow, came a dust cloud. Erik saw the figures on the horizon, and before Jadow could get close enough to speak, Erik shouted, ‘It’s the Saaur!’
De Loungville asked, ‘How can you tell?’
‘The horses look too big for the distance behind Jadow.’
Just then Jadow came within shouting range and cried out, ‘Captain! It’s the lizard men! They are following.’
Calis turned to de Loungville and said, ‘We stay in the saddle. Skirmish in two lines!’
De Loungville shouted, ‘You heard the Captain! I want the first fifty men dressed left on me!’ That meant that the first fifty men in the column would line up on de Loungville’s left arm, in a straight line. Erik was the man closest to de Loungville when he moved his horse around.
Jadow came reining in, his mount staggering as he leaped off. Calis shouted, ‘Where’s Foster?’
Jadow shook his head. ‘They bought none of it. As soon as I took off, they followed me and ignored the corporal. The corporal turned around and hit them from the flank, buying me a head start. Captain, but …’ He didn’t have to say any more.
Erik thought of the big man, Jerome Handy, who had become something of a friend after being embarrassed by Sho Pi aboard the ship. He glanced to his right and saw Sho Pi, and nodded. Sho Pi nodded back, as if he understood what Erik was thinking.
Luis said, ‘Then we bleed lizards,’ under his breath, but loud enough for those near him to hear.
Erik drew his sword and put his reins between his teeth. He unlimbered his shield and made ready. He’d control his mount with his legs, but he kept the reins in his jaws in case he needed to yank them.
The Saaur’s animals must be as incredibly strong as their riders, thought Erik, for if Jadow’s mount was near death, the Saaur’s looked merely tired. Yet the green-skinned warriors didn’t pause once they saw the line of soldiers facing them.
‘We don’t scare them much,’ observed Nakor from behind Erik, who wouldn’t take his eyes off the approaching riders.
Calis said, ‘When I give the order, I want bowfire; then the first rank will charge. The second rank will hold until I give the order.’
The bowmen, all in the center of the second line, drew back their weapons, and de Loungville half muttered, ‘Wait for it!’
The Saaur bore down relentlessly, and as they approached, Erik started noticing details. Some wore feathers on their helms, while others had strange animals and birds on their shields. The horses were bay and chestnut, with some that were almost black, but while a few were near-white, he saw no buckskins or mottled colors. Erik wondered why he was fascinated by the fact of there being no pintos or buckskins. He fought down an unexpected urge to laugh.
Then Calis shouted, ‘Shoot!’ and the forty archers in the second line let loose. The rain of shafts caused a half-dozen riders to fall, and several of the alien horses screamed. Then Calis shouted, ‘Charge!’
Erik dug his heels into his horse’s flanks and with a shout and a powerful squeeze of his legs told the horse to gallop. He didn’t look to see how the others were doing, but kept his focus on a Saaur with a metal crest topped with a horsehair fall atop his helm. The horsehair had been bleached and dyed a bright crimson, so it was an easy target for Erik.
Erik sensed more than saw when his own horse crashed into the larger animal. He was too intent on avoiding the blow aimed at his neck. The Saaur warrior used a large single-bladed ax, which meant he could bludgeon with it on the backswing, but cut only with a forward blow. Erik almost fell into the gap between the two animals after his own mount staggered away from the larger horse. Erik ducked under the looping blow, but recovered in time to deliver a punishing blow with his sword to the thigh of the Saaur.
He didn’t see if the creature fell from the saddle or rode past, because he was too busy engaging another warrior who had just unhorsed one of Hatonis’s clansmen. Erik charged him and got his sword point under the creature’s shield before it could turn and face him, and the Saaur fell backwards, flipping completely over the rear of his horse.
Erik swore and reined his own horse away as the riderless alien horse lashed out with a foreleg. “Ware the mounts!’ he cried. ‘They’re trained to attack, too.’
Erik moved to help Roo, who was attempting to work in tandem with Luis against one Saaur. He came up on the lizard man’s blind side and delivered a killing blow to the back of the creature’s helm. The Saaur fell over and the helm fell off, revealing an alien face, green and scaled, but covered in scarlet blood.
‘Well, their blood’s not green,’ shouted Biggo, riding by. ‘They’re also dying right enough.’
‘So are we,’ said Roo, pointing. Biggo and Erik turned to see that while most of the Saaur had been unhorsed, for each one killed, one of their own was down as well.
Pushing back his helm, Biggo said, ‘We face them three to one, and still they take us out in equal numbers.’
‘Shoot,’ cried Calis, and the ten archers who remained to him started peppering the five remaining Saaur with arrows.
Jadow said, ‘Look!’ and pointed into the distance.
‘That’s why they’re so fearless,’ shouted de Loungville. ‘These are just the trail-breakers!’
Afar, a large column of dust rose into the sky, and even at this distance the rumble of hooves was thunderous. Erik didn’t wait but set heels to the flanks of his horse and charged after the remaining Saaur, who were attempting to keep the humans engaged as long as possible until their companions could overtake them.
Biggo let out a whoop and charged after him. They rode full into the same Saaur, striking at him from both sides. Erik caught him on the sword arm, shattering bone and cutting deep into flesh, while Biggo hammered relentlessly at the creature’s shield.
Soon it was quiet.
Calis said, ‘Ride for the cave! We’ll stand there!’
Erik sucked a deep lungful of air and willed his tired horse to run. There was no choice. The alien horses were stronger and more powerful and had more endurance. They couldn’t outrun them, it was clear, and at one to one, they couldn’t outfight the Saaur in the open.
Erik hoped that the cave tunnel did lead somewhere, as Praji had claimed. For if it was only a cave in a hill, it would be a lonely place to die.
In ragged order, leaving the remounts to follow or wander, Calis’s Crimson Eagles, exhausted and sore from the short but furious fight, headed toward the distant hillock.
Nakor was among the first to reach it, and without much grace he half jumped, half fell from his horse. He grabbed a waterskin and a bag of rations, then struck her on the rump, yelling enough to send her running away as he ducked into the cave.
As Erik and the others began to dismount, he shouted, ‘There’s a door! Come quick!’
Strike a light!’ commanded Calis, and de Loungville produced a special oil and motioned for someone to give him a torch. A bundle of them was fetched from the baggage along with a few other items the men would carry, but most of the baggage, food, and all the horses must be sacrificed.
De Loungville sprinkled the oil on a torch, then struck flint and steel to cause a spark. The oil caught and the torch was lit, and he ducked inside the cave.
Erik followed after, and had to duck-walk to pass below the low ceiling. After about ten yards, the ceiling rose and the corridor broadened, as the passage moved down into an underground cavern.
Erik looked for the door and discovered it was a huge round stone. It was nestled in a heavy iron and wooden frame, rigged so it could be rolled from its position to the right of the passage to block it. While a few strong men could use large wooden pegs set in the face to move it from inside this cave, those following after would have no handhold on the smooth surface, nor any way to gain enough leverage to move the massive rock.
When the last man was inside the cave, Erik, Biggo, and Jadow grabbed the wooden pegs and struggled to move the rock. Others insinuated themselves against the wall so they could push against the edge once it moved enough.
Slowly, protestingly, the rock budged and then with a grinding rumble moved as the sound of horsemen echoed through the entrance of the cave. Angry shouts in an alien language echoed down the hall as the grinding stone moved slowly to block their retreat.
Suddenly Erik felt resistance and knew that the Saaur on the other side had tried to prevent the closing. ‘Push!’ he shouted, and another pair of hands moved below his, and he looked down to see Roo trying to add his strength to the task. The little man had slipped below and crawled on the floor to find a place from which he could help.
Nakor shouted, ‘Close your eyes!’
Erik was slow and was temporarily blinded by a sudden flash of light as Nakor lit something from de Loungville’s torch and tossed it through the narrow space between the wall and the slowly moving rock door.
