with shields, trying to keep them under cover from the Khanaphir archers. The shields were all of city make, Totho noticed, so the Scorpions had not been idle in their pillaging.
Teuthete loosed a shaft that split one of the enemy shields, lancing on through to kill its bearer outright. The Mantis recurves had a prodigious power to them, but Totho carried something better.
He sighted up on the Scorpion line, using the notches and the little annotated scale he had meticulously cut into the weapon's sight, thus adjusting for his best guess at distance and elevation. It was like employing a little siege engine.
He loosed, more careful this time, pausing after each shot to find his next target. When he was done, there was a gap five shields wide in the Scorpion defence. He dropped back to recharge his weapon.
'Totho!' Amnon bellowed, and he was on his feet in an instant.
'What is it?' Totho's eyes scanned the surging Scorpion host, trying to spot what the other man had seen. He wasted precious time trying to fit a view of the entire battle into the slot of his helm, before he dragged it off to see. 'Oh …' And what? For a second he was frozen, not a military man at all but an artificer feeling abruptly out of place. Then: 'Shoot them down! The bearers! Shoot them!' It was too close, though. Too close already. The Scorpion lines were falling back raggedly, many of their men staying on alone to hack at the defenders.
Too close. He ran along the width of the barricade and hooked one hand under Amnon's pauldron, before hurling himself back, shouting, 'Get off the wall!'
For a moment he thought Amnon would simply not budge and he would be left hanging from the man's armour like a trophy. Then his own weight told, and Amnon was falling back as, for the second time, Totho dropped from the barricade.
He struck the stone of the bridge and skidded, actually seeing a few sparks from the ridges of his breastplate, then he heard an almighty clatter as Amnon fell by his feet.
Totho braced himself as best he could.
There was a pause in which he wondered,
It went off.
The force of the blast shook every stone of the bridge, even though it had been such a small petard. The shock lifted Totho up and put him down half a foot further back.
He got to his feet, head ringing with the sound of it, turning to see what extent of ruin had been wreaked on them.
The barricade was still there, incredibly. The stones of the centre had been shoved back six feet so that the entire construction was a funnel now, and the upper stones had been toppled from the lower, stripping two feet off the centre's height. At least ten of Amnon's spearmen were dead, torn apart by the blast. Three times as many Scorpions must have stayed in the fight and been ripped into pieces. For those who had remembered to fall back, there was now a great hole yawning in the centre of the Khanaphir defence.
He could not hear them charge but he felt it, even as he frantically charged his snapbow, hoping its mechanism had survived the fall. Amnon lurched to his feet, too far and too late now to hold the breach. Totho saw the Scorpion vanguard surge forward, the surviving Royal Guard trying to form up against them.
His sight of them was suddenly half blocked by a wall of black metal. Something impossibly huge surged forth to meet the Scorpions, armoured head to foot in black, with a shield the size of a door, and propelled by an irresistible momentum. Meyr was entering the battle, wielding in one hand a spiked bludgeon that had been made for a strong man to hold in both. Totho actually saw one Scorpion warrior switch abruptly from slavering charge to a frantic halt, as the colossal metal warrior rose in front of him and the weighted mace came sweeping down.
The Empire had long known that Mole Cricket-kinden were superb labourers, craftsmen, miners and porters, but also that they were poor warriors. Their huge strength was a slow strength. An insect of their size could have moved like water and lightning in the fray, but they themselves were weighted with clumsy flesh and bone. Their first strike would shatter armour and bodies, but skilled soldiers would slip within their reach and be bathing in their blood before they could strike again.
The Iron Glove had cured that deficiency. The Scorpions struck at Meyr with their greatswords and their axes. They were strong, fierce warriors but Meyr was armoured in aviation-grade steel layered three times over. As the Khanaphir spears jabbed past him from either side, the Mole Cricket simply stood in the front line and smashed every Scorpion he could reach — and his reach was long. They were still coming from behind their fellows, crushing together, so he could not miss. The warriors in the fore were soon fighting against their comrades, trying to get out of his way. After Meyr smashed his mace apart he snatched a Scorpion halberd, and then one of their five-foot swords, striking so hard with it that he bent the blade.
They surged and pushed at him, trying with sheer numbers to drag him down. Something was dancing about his shoulders now, and Totho experienced a moment of confusion before he could work out what it was.
It was Teuthete the Mantis. As though she weighed nothing, she was crouching on the shifting pauldrons of Meyr's armour, shooting down into the Scorpion throng. She danced in time with him, used him as her personal platform, swaying contemptuously aside from the crossbow bolts that sought her.
Amnon was beside them next, hacking with his sword at any Scorpion who managed to escape Meyr's onslaught. Totho knew that he should join them up there and put his snapbow to use, but he just watched and watched in awe as that impossible trio and the Khanaphir soldiers turned back the tide, killing with skill and fervour and monstrous brute strength, until even the Scorpions lost their taste for bloodshed and fell back under the constant rain of arrows.
Totho felt exhausted, beaten black and blue, and he had not so much as struck anyone with his fist. Another squad of the diminishing Royal Guard had come forward to seize the breach. Meyr, when he turned round, was painted red, coated with what he had made of the Many of Nem. The giant sat down on a fallen stone, knees up at chest level. He pushed back his helm and inhaled breath in vast lungfuls.
'Well done,'Totho commended him.
'We're … not done yet,' Meyr panted, between breaths. 'Have you seen how
'I know.' Totho laid a hand on his shoulder, such a tiny gesture in comparison. Some of the Khanaphir had come forward with water, and they began to clean the Mole Cricket's armour as though it was a sacred honour for them.
It was noon, or so the sun said. They had held the Scorpions at bay for half a day.
'Tirado!' he shouted out, realizing that he had not seen the Fly-kinden for much of the fight. His call was immediately followed by the small figure landing beside him. 'Where in the wastes have you been?' he snapped.
'Keeping myself out of trouble, chief,' the Fly said. 'You wanted?'
'Go to the Scriptora. Find … find Maker, the Collegiate ambassador, and tell her … Tell her I want to see her. Ask nicely-' He stopped, on seeing figures approaching from the east shore. 'Never mind. Wait on.'
They were Khanaphir civilians, carrying baskets of food for the soldiers, but among them strode a tall woman with a full head of hair. Even as Totho recognized her, Amnon strode past him with arms outstretched. It was Rakespear, the Collegiate scholar, who threw herself against his breastplate, and then stepped back to stare.
'My life, look at you,' she said. 'You look like a sentinel.'
'If you say so.' Amnon managed a tired grin. 'Thank Totho for it. It's saved my life already.'
'Then I do thank him.' Praeda Rakespear nodded to Totho briefly. 'How is the defence?'
'Too early to say. They'll come back,' said Amnon. The food was being distributed among the defenders, and Totho found a cloth-wrapped parcel pushed into his hands. Being used to Solarnese cuisine, which was spicy and hot, he had found Khanaphir food too bland or subtle for his taste. Just then he was hungry enough to eat anything.
