Shadows of Doom - Ed Greenwood [71]
They were in time to see Longspear lean out of his saddle and swing mightily with his great gore-bathed warhammer at a man on foot who wore dusty leathers and a grim expression. The man dove and rolled aside as nimbly as any acrobat and came up circling, sword flashing.
Another Wolf lancer charged at the man in leathers from behind, but two white stars whistled from a shop front to strike the soldier down. The horse was riderless when it thundered past the man with the sword.
Another man in leathers was running in at the lord's other side. Longspear jerked his reins about savagely, but the man's sword was already leaping for his throat. With a shriek of straining metal, the warhammer met the striking steel just in front of the lord's impassive helm and turned it aside, but the man dropped it and dove in, hurling himself at the lord's ribs and upper leg.
The horse bucked. Armored arms flailed for balance, and Lord Longspear crashed to earth. The first man he'd struck at was waiting. His dagger went in under the lord's helm with the speed of a striking snake.
A great, savage roar went up from the watching folk, and they were pouring out into the marketplace, running amid the still-gathering Wolves. The dalefolk leapt and swung weapons as if driven by the gods themselves. The Zhent warriors fought to stay in the saddles of bucking mounts and laid about themselves desperately with their own blades. The red, shouting chaos of Tempus, god of war, reigned over the marketplace.
"I'm missing something!" Irreph Mulmar snarled in frustration, hearing the tumult outside the shuttered shop he'd plunged into. He thrust his struggling daughter into the arms of the fat woman who sold rope, cord, and thread there. "Ulraea, watch her for me, will you? And keep her here!"
"Aye, sir," Ulraea began doubtfully, but Ylyndaera twisted out of her grasp like swirling wind and leapt across the room toward the window her father had brought her in by.
"By all the gods, girl, forgive me," he said, chains rattling, and clipped her on the jaw as she ducked past.
Ylyndaera Mulmar continued gracefully, face first, to the floor and lay there unmoving. Irreph snatched her up by the shoulders; her head hung limply. Without pause he swung her into Ulraea's arms and said, "Just hold her here, will you? She'll be right again, all too soon. I must be out there!"
He whirled, shackles gleaming, and plunged back out through the window. One of its shutters broke off as he burst out into the battle, to hang dangling in his wake.
* * * * *
Stormcloak swayed amid the milling horses. He clutched his head and his gut, feeling wretchedly sick and wincing at the splitting pain in his head, all at the same time. Gods! So that was what it was like to be linked to the mind of a man when he's killed. Ohhh, gods above!
* * * * *
When Irreph charged out into the marketplace, a slim figure ran with him: a long-haired, beautiful woman in tattered leather armor, the one who'd earlier been with the wizard with the wand. A long sword gleamed in her hand. Irreph frowned. What had the Harpers called her?
One of the Knights of Myth Drannor, they'd said. Irreph shot another look at her; she winked back. He'd heard of that band of adventurers-who in the Dales hadn't?-and she certainly looked as if she knew how to handle a blade. He glanced back. There was no sign of the old man with the wand now. Elminster or not, he'd vanished.
Irreph began to think, for the first time that day, that the High Dale could be his again. He just might live to see the last of these accursed Zhents gone. He bounded forward and swung his chains with a savage grin, smashing the nearest Wolf from his saddle.
The man fell on the other side of his horse. He staggered up and got out his sword before Irreph could reach him. The Wolf's broad