Mother of Daemons by David Hair

Author:David Hair [Hair, David]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Quercus
Published: 2020-04-15T07:00:00+00:00

19

Step Into The Light

Strategy and Tactics

No strategy survives first contact with the enemy intact: there are too many variables on the field of battle. This or that attack or defence will fail, units must be shifted, goals altered. This is the mark of the true commander: not how well he plans, but how well he improvises when his plan disintegrates.

GENERAL KALTUS KORION, BRES 914

Bruin River, Rondelmar

Febreux 936

The first few moments were deadly.

As Ostevan’s Kirkegarde knights leaped from the rooftops into the courtyard, most of the Volsai did as Volsai generally do in a fight and lunged for cover. Apart from Exilium, they were lightly armoured and trained for stealth, not hand-to-hand combat, nor were they pure-blooded magi. Lyra reeled in horror as those who could neither shield nor evade, the nuns and the weakest of the Volsai, went down in moments.

But Exilium’s pale blue shields enveloped Lyra and Coramore; they instantly went crimson, allowing heat to blaze right through, until Brigeda stepped over Basia and linked her shields to Exilium’s. Between them, somehow, they held.

Basia grabbed Lyra’s skirt, hauled herself to her knees and was dazedly fumbling for her blade – then she shrieked, ‘Run—’ and shoved Lyra towards the door behind them.

Lyra clasped Coramore’s hand and they obeyed, just in time, for a dark shape had stormed through the smoke and flame, a battle-axe cleaving the air where they’d been standing moments before. Exilium ducked, spun and lashed out; his sword flashed through steel, flesh and spinal cord and the enemy knight fell backwards. His head rolled in the other direction, but the Estellan was already flowing into another move, this time slicing off the sword arm of another knight before kicking him out of the way to protect the queen’s retreat.

Lyra saw Patcheart and, flinching as a mage-bolt flashed past her face, thrust Coramore towards him. Ostevan was in the courtyard behind her, plunging his crosier’s sharpened tip through the body of a burned-past-recognition Volsai. Brigeda was hurled through a window, vanishing in a crash of wood and glass. Then Basia lurched upright beside Exilium, pale as a ghost, and parried a Kirkegarde; their blades crashed together – until a blow from behind slammed into her helm and she collapsed, and suddenly Exilium, beset by two more knights, found himself being driven back. Basia lay unmoving in the bloody courtyard as the fighting surged past her.

‘Basia!’ Lyra shouted, but Patcheart had Coramore in hand and was hauling them inside.

‘Is there a strong-room?’ the Volsai captain asked.

‘I don’t know.’ They picked a corridor and ran, followed by Exilium, guarding their rear from a knot of Kirkegarde. His shields throbbing scarlet, he twisted athletically, somehow avoiding a massive zweihandle thrust at his chest, which instead plunged into the wall and stuck, giving him time to dispatch his opponent in a gush of blood.

‘Exilium, this way!’ Lyra shouted, terrified that Basia was dead already, and that in a few moments they would be too. But the imperative to survive drove them on.

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