Arztilla attacked at dawn. Eric, Cobb, and Temerin, now dressed in leather armor with iron chestplates and helmets, were summoned from the citadel, by sharp blows of a horn. Everywhere people were running: women and workers fleeing back towards the city, and fighting men rushing to muster behind the walls. Selva approached, with Rachel following.
“I told you to stay inside!” Temerin shouted at Rachel.
“Bull-shit, I helped too! This society may be sexist but we don’t have to be; you bet your ass I’m seeing this thing through!”
The Professor considered for a moment, then tossed her a helmet to go with her armor. “Fine. But don’t blame me if you wind up decapitated!”
“Mara has a shuttle standing by in orbit,” Selva said, as they headed downstairs to the wall. “This goes south, we give the word and it’ll be here in forty minutes tops.”
“Lots of things can happen in forty minutes,” Cobb said.
“And we’re not leaving these people.” Temerin reached the wall, the two lords of Highwater Mountain stood atop it with Sirs Wotoc and Gerend, plus Ralbor.
“They are fighting at the Cleft Pass, I heard their horns,” Lord Leon reported.
“Then we’ve still got some time,” Temerin said. Eric’s stomach sunk. The outcome of that fight had never been in doubt, but to hear it confirmed in such a way...
“Just speak the word,” Wotoc said, “and I will lead your charge into battle!”
“Not so fast. All things considered, I’d rather fight from this side of the wall.”
“Bah! Where’s your sense of courage, your desire to call out to a worthy foe and meet him in combat?”
The shadow of a gryphon passed overhead, a scroll with a yellow streamer tied around it fell to the ground. A runner brought it to Lord Leon.
“As expected,” Leon said. “Osral is routed, his men are falling back.”
“Few will make it,” Temerin said. In such primitive combat, a good deal of the casualties came from fleeing armies run down by their victors.
Eric produced a pair of binoculars, peered through. He saw the pass in the mountains, black shapes were streaming out at speed. Horses. Pursued by—he adjusted the zoom again—armored dinosaurs bearing riders.
“What is that you hold?” Wotoc eyed the binoculars.
“Here, you try.” Eric handed them over.
“My stars!” Wotoc exclaimed, and lowered the binoculars. “I’d give a fine sword for this, lad!” He looked again, and frowned. “The Dread Riders of Orus, atop their clubtails. Slower than horses—those men will escape—but one does not want to be caught in their circle.”
The fleeing horsemen tore through fields, some falling off as they went. Not from arrows (Eric saw none), but rather succumbing to wounds already sustained. Less than a dozen reached the ascent to Forefathers’ Walls, now strewn with barricades and sharpened logs. Lord Leon cried, “Open the gates!”
Eric followed him down. A man in armor, bloodied and missing his lance, jumped down and threw himself at Leon’s feet. “My pledge-lord Osral is dead, struck down by the beasts! You must flee!” He stood and shouted to the assembled men, “Flee, or you will die!”
His eyes rolled up into his head and he flopped to the ground. Selva stood behind him, stunner in hand.
Leon called out, “No one will flee! The lives of your children and wives depend on us standing firm! These men are fools, they suffered a fools’ defeat! Let us show them what a real battle looks like!”
The Highwater forces cheered. Eric rushed back atop the wall, lest he be caught unaware by some approaching horror. The pass was hidden now in smoke, and the far end of the valley burned.
Eric had not traveled much, but still knew some things about planetology. Even with a human-habitable atmosphere, a great deal of variation in oxygen concentration was possible between worlds. Too low, and even dry tinder would only smolder, not burn. Humans preferred air with oxygen levels similar to Old Terra’s, but it could go higher. On such a world, even wet, green plants would go up in flames, and fire was Hades brought to earth. Meridian was one of those worlds.
Through the binoculars, he saw Dread Riders on ankylosaurs lighting torches and throwing them atop hovels, where the straw roofs caught ablaze and even the plant matter in the mud-bricks burned. It happened frighteningly fast, and spread surprisingly far—in a matter of seconds, a whole village was up. Brown smoke lofted into the sky, the Freehold gryphon-scouts stayed on their side of it.
The fields of Cleft Valley fared little better. Had Lord Osral been less arrogant, he would have sent his landsmen to harvest early, giving their community at least some resources to sustain it in its exile. Now they were made dependent on charity. Meridianite farmers had evolved a whole raft of fireproofing techniques, lest a stray spark cause a famine, ranging from paddies separated by water-breaks to grain mixed with Keeper-engineered flame-retardant plants, but all fell to the focused malice of the Dread Riders and sappers who followed them on foot and horseback. The crops burned down to the roots, or the waterline.
Selva pointed up. “Look!”
An echelon of gryphon-riders finished rounding the smoke from the Arztillan side, and headed for the scouts circling above the valley.
“They mean to drive our scouts back!” Leon said, and turned around to face men with instruments on a nearby platform. “Blow the retreat!”
A man blew three notes on a horn, then began to repeat. The Freehold sky-riders wheeled around, tilted into a descent. Their foes moved to engage.
“Gryphon combat is fast and deadly,” Ralbor said. “It is not uncommon for both victor and vanquished to end up dead.”
“Then why do they fight?” Rachel asked.
“They know we can scarce afford losses,” replied Leon.
Each Arztillan rider lined up with his prey and stooped, trading altitude for airspeed and closing distance. The gryphons maneuvered more like small planes than large birds, massive wings tilting and pumping at the air. One Freehold rider rolled sideways through a hundred-eighty degrees and entered a steep dive. His Arztillan opponent, predicting his move, aimed for a spot further down his trajectory and caught him there.
The gryphons met, facing underside to underside, the Arztillan rider far enough ahead for his steed to reach out and sink its talons into the belly of its quarry. The vice-grip pulled closed like a ratchet, breaking bones, the victim let out a dying scream and struck back, wounding its killer on the leg. The Arztillan released his hold and pulled out of the dive, gliding away. Falling without control, wing-slats fluttering in the breeze, the Freehold gryphon and rider disappeared behind a ridge.
“He was one of ours.” Ralbor hung his head. The valley burned, to the point where Eric wondered if they intended to torch it and return later.
Then, out of the smoke, came an army.
