The Born Queen - J. Gregory Keyes [128]
Ignoring the approaching spearmen, the archers around him concentrated their fire on the cavalry, as did those on the field, and the effect was astonishing. Five or six of the lead horses and their riders went down, followed immediately by another ten or so tripping over the fallen. The hedgehog archers poured shafts into the confusion, creating further havoc. The charge slowed to a crawl under the deadly rain, but the forty or so horsemen who remained mounted quickly re-formed and charged at the archers. They were slowed by the stakes, however, and several dismounted and began uprooting them, giving the archers plenty of time to retreat behind the battle wedge and take their places on the levee, where they could send more darts down on the enemy line.
While half the bowmen in the woods were still helping to riddle the cavalry, the other half had begun firing at the approaching infantrymen, who were now only about thirty kingsyards away, moving their shield wall along with good discipline.
There had been sporadic fire from the enemy archers, but Cazio didn’t see any more of them.
“Move back,” Cazio said, echoing z’Acatto’s orders. “They won’t be able to keep that shield wall in the woods.”
As ordered, the bowmen started backing into the swamp, continuing to fire at the infantry, whose shields were now pretty well feathered. Seven of them had already dropped out of formation, either dead or too gravely wounded to keep on, but that left the numbers pretty even, and although the archers had swords with them, they didn’t have shields or spears.
The cavalry was charging again, and this time there was nothing between them and the hedgehog. The massed horsemen looked unstoppable.
Mirroring the horse, the infantry advancing on Cazio’s archers sent up a hoarse cry and charged.
Cazio drew Acredo.
“Run,” he told the archers. “Back to the wedge.”
Although, glancing that way, he wondered if there would be anything to retreat to.
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE WAY OF POWER
THE GRASS RIPPLED, shifting to trees and hills as Anne unraveled herself and moved like a cloud. She had been afraid at first of discorporation, but in the sedos realm, the body was more illusion than anything else. Once that deception was put behind, there was much fun to be had. She could twine like grapevines through massive forests or flow like rainwater down a hillside. She could choose another illusory body. She had played at being a horse, an eagle, a porpoise, a spider, a creeping lizard. They felt more welcome in her thoughts now, too, more easy. The more she used her power, the more secure her identity seemed to become.
She had to remind herself sometimes that she wasn’t there just for simple enjoyment. She never wanted to leave and returned more and more often whether or not there was anything particular she was looking for.
In fact, sometimes she forgot what she was looking for.
But not today. Today she drifted back days and toward the south.
She saw the army of the Church massed in the thousands at Teremené. That was nothing new, and already half of her army was marching to meet them. Looking at them now, she felt a coldness in her belly. Crotheny was caught in a vise; the Hansans were being held at Poelscild, but to attack with enough force to drive them back would mean letting the Church come to her gates, and the south was poorly defended. She had seen, too, a new fleet of strange copper-skinned men sailing down from the north, from Rakh Fadh, in the company of tow-headed Weihand raiders. That sailing hadn’t happened yet, and the results of it seemed inaugurable.
And in the south the future was also unclear. Sometimes she saw massive carnage, sometimes an unhindered march, sometimes nothing.
None of this was new, nor did it long hold her attention. She was looking for her friends.
She already had seen Cazio, captured by the Church. She knew there was something missing, someone he had talked to that she could not focus on. But she also knew he and z’Acatto were free again.