Darkspell - Katharine Kerr [48]
“Well played!” Dannyn yelled. “Get him away!”
His eyes drunken with shock and pain, the prince suddenly grabbed at the dagger in his belt with his left hand, but Gweniver got it before him.
“No suicides,” she said. “Ever have a fancy to see Cerrmor, lad?”
Dannyn and the rest of his men wrenched their horses round and rode back to the battle, which was screaming and swirling behind them. Dagwyn falling in with them, Gweniver and Ricyn took the prince in the opposite direction down the road and paused in the shade of a tree.
“Get that gauntlet off him, Ricco,” Gweniver said. “If his wrist swells in there, it’ll take a blacksmith to cut the wretched thing free.”
The prince pulled off his helm with his left hand and threw it hard into the dirt. When he looked at her with tear-filled eyes, she realized that he was some years younger than she. As Ricyn pulled off the gauntlet, he grunted, biting his lower lip so hard that it bled. All at once Gweniver felt a cold shudder down her back: danger. With a yell she turned in the saddle and saw Eldidd men galloping straight for them, a squad of some ten riders with Cerrmor men right behind them, but Eldidd had the lead by a couple of lengths.
“Ah, shit!” Dagwyn said. “They must have seen the prince’s cursed horse!”
Gweniver wrenched her horse around, then drew her sword as she charged straight toward the oncoming riders. Howling with laughter, she saw the blood-red mist come down again. The two men in the lead swung right around her and headed toward the prince. She started to turn, but another dragon shield was riding straight for her. Her laughter rose to a wail as she threw every cautious lesson aside and lunged, leaning dangerously in her saddle, stabbing with no thought of parrying. Her cracked shield fell away under the man’s blow, but the Goddess guided her sword. She thrust so hard that his mail split. As he slid dead from the saddle, she turned her horse. All she could think of was Ricyn, back there outnumbered.
By then the Cerrmor men had caught up, and in a howling charge they swept toward the prince. Gweniver could see the white horse, rearing and bucking under its helpless rider. Swords flashed, and she heard Ricyn’s war cry as she charged into the mob.
“Ricco! Dagwyn!” she yelled. “I’m here!”
It was ridiculous, maybe, but Dagwyn yelled back a war cry and fought like a fiend. Nose to tail, he and Ricyn were parrying more than cutting, desperately trying to stay mounted in a mob of Eldidd swords. Gweniver slashed one enemy across the back, swung in the saddle, and barely parried a strike from the side. She heard Cerrmor voices behind her, around her, but she thrust on, laughing, always laughing, swinging hard, feeling blows glance off her mail, striking in return, until she’d fought her way to Ricyn’s side. His horse was dying under him, and his face ran with blood.
“Get up behind me!” she yelled.
Ricyn threw himself clear of the saddle as his horse went down. She blindly slashed and fended as he scrambled up behind her, the horse snorting and dancing under them. An Eldidd man charged in, then screamed, twisted, as a Cerrmor strike got him from the rear. Swearing at the top of his lungs, Dannyn shoved his way through the mob and grabbed the reins of the prince’s white horse. The little eddy of death ebbed as the Cerrmor men chased the last of the raiders down the road.
Suddenly Gweniver felt the Goddess leave her. She slumped in the saddle, looked dazed around, then wept like a child who falls asleep in its mother’s lap only to wake up alone in a strange bed.
“By the hells!” Dannyn snapped.