All Shadows Fled - Ed Greenwood [13]
"Aye, but how can ghost Riders kill any Zhents?" Kuthe demanded as Merith Strongbow came up beside him, an arrow ready, and nodded in silent greeting.
"That's the next spell," the elf told him with quiet confidence. "I've seen this trick before." He thrust both bow and arrow into the startled Rider's hands. "Here- hold this."
As Kuthe gaped at him, he raised his own hands and joined in the gestures of the next spell, murmuring something the Rider couldn't quite hear.
Then he plucked bow and arrow back from the officer's hands and stared east, watching as the dust cloud behind the false Riders became a thick, swirling mass of yellow and green-and the two forces crashed together.
With startled speed, the Zhents plunged through the phantom Riders-into the thick of the yellow-green cloud. And men who rode into that cloud did not come out again.
"I hate doing that to horses," Illistyl said, her voice as thin and cold as a knife.
Merith's eyes, however, were on those who'd ridden wide. "Jhess!" he snapped urgently. As his wife peered past Kuthe, Merith drew his bowstring back to his chin, angled the ready arrow up into the sky, and loosed.
Kuthe had never been so close to a spell being cast before. He stiffened and swallowed as one slim and shapely arm brushed his breastplate in an arcane gesture, and a clear, musical voice spoke two distinct words.
She turned her head and winked at him. Kuthe blinked at her-and when he looked again at the sky, the arrow had already split into a dozen shafts, plummeting down on the hard-riding Zhents in a deadly rain.
All but two of the invaders fell in that volley. Kuthe glared at the surviving Zhents and snapped, "Orold- take them!" Six of the Riders spurred away without a word, waving their lances as they followed Orold into battle.
"It feels… unfair, killing men like that," Jhessail said quietly.
Kuthe stared at her, and then at the fading yellow cloud where only a few horses still choked and rolled.
"Lass, lass," one of the older Riders replied through his snow-white mustache, "there're still near seven thousand of them, if our scouts be right. When we face alt of'em, sweeping down on our homes, d'you think they'll turn their mounts back if we yell 'unfair' then? Aye?"
Another Rider spoke then. "I can even things just a trifle more."
Jhessail turned her head to see who'd spoken; the voice had sounded surprisingly old. The Rider guiding his mount toward her wore worn armor that had been recently burnished at the joints to quell creeping rust. The armor was of an older, bulkier design than what Kuthe wore, though most of it matched the ebon gloss of the other Riders' harnesses. The Rider doffed his helm-and Jhessail stared into the lined face of a very old man.
"Lead us if you will, Baergil," Kuthe said quietly.
"Nay, lad," the old Rider told him. "My commanding days are done. I know daily just how good I was-I order my cabbages about in the garden, and they heed me not a whit."
"Ho, Baergil," Merith said with a smile, and the old man matched it as his cloudy blue eyes met the elf's steady gaze. "I remember you."
"And I you, Sir Elf," Baergil replied. "Though it's been thirty years gone since then."
"Baergil led the Riders that many summers ago," Kuthe told Jhessail, "when I was but a lad. Then he turned to the worship of Tempus, Lord of Battles, and left our ranks."
"They're all dead," Illistyl told them bleakly; she had never stopped watching the Zhents die. "I guess we'll not need your spells, priest of the war god."
Baergil smiled. "Nay, lass; their deaths're what I was waiting for. There's a spell that raises the fallen…"
"To do-what?" Jhessail asked quietly.
"In the hours before dawn," Baergil said, "if they ride as hard as I bid them, sixty skeletal reavers will ride into Essembra, striking at anyone with drawn weapons – or who hurls spells at them. Those who offer them peace they'll leave be, but Zhents being Zhents…"
There was a roar of hard laughter. "Do it!" Illistyl