dying. Duwan protected his position with a fierceness and rage that piled the dead in front of him, leaving, at times, a blank spot in the enemy line, since none cared to face him. He smelled the battle, the sweat, the blood, the acrid stench of fear, and he heard the thunder of the enemy captains'
voices, and the shoutings of his own leaders.
Sweat rolled into his eyes and he wiped it away with the top of his shortsword wrist while parrying a thrust by an enemy. Blood smeared from the contact, not his own. The enemy leaped forward as if eager to impale himself on Duwan's shortsword and was given his desire and then Duwan was moving to his left where a swordsman had fallen. Now the battle reached a peak. Hata's own unit was a prideful group, and for many days now they had been repelled by a force of pongs. They had come with Hata's harsh words burning in their ears, words of reproach and shame, and they were determined not to leave the field with a single pong standing.
One by one the defenders fell, and there were several times when Duwan felt that all was lost, when screaming guardsmen breached the line and threatened to fall on the defenders from behind. But each time his warriors rallied, threw themselves into the breach, pushed the enemy back.
The enemy pullback began at the center, where Duwan was the anchor, and spread until there was no longer the sound of sword on sword, only the moans and cries for aid from the fallen. Duwan saw Hata standing at a distance, his arms crossed over his chest, glaring hatred. Now was the time. Now was the time to pull his own remaining warriors back into the trees, to send them climbing up the steep walls, taking their last chance for escape and for life. Now it was time for him to follow them, to lose himself in those dense stands of tall brothers in the hills and slowly and carefully to make his way westward, there to rejoin his family and Jai. He looked across the body strewn battleground to see Hata still standing, still glaring at him, and at Hata's side there appeared Elnice of Arutan, dressed in a crimson copy of the guards' uniform. He looked at her for a moment, then turned to give his orders to begin to fade back into the trees. At that moment a shout of warning came from his rear and he ran back to see a sprinkling of color on the steep walls of the canyon. His heart leaped in alarm, not for himself, but for Jai, for his mother and father, for the enemy had come to his rear in force and were now sliding and slipping down the canyon walls. They had not tried that since the first days, when they had lost many men. To get into position to come at him from the rear they had had to move during the night. Had they known of his plans? Had they come upon the small groups who had left the canyon and destroyed them one by one? No, surely he would have heard had that happened. He could only hope that they had not started their movements until late at night, that his mother and father and Jai and the others were safely away.
Now he heard the battle chant of the enemy from his front. A few of his warriors were running to meet the enemy scrambling down the canyon walls. He lifted both his swords and shouted, 'To me. Form on me.' Except for isolated individuals already engaged with an enemy who had come down the steep walls, they came to him and he stood among them, so few of them now, and he said, 'It is not Du's will that we escape this time, my friends. We make our stand here.'
'It is better to die fighting than fall into the hands of the enemy,' someone shouted, and Duwan nodded.
'Let us show them how Drinkers can fight,' Duwan shouted, as the enemy began to reach the floor of the narrow canyon and advance and he heard the sound of the chant and the poundings of many feet. The guardsmen who had come down the walls fared rather badly, for they were winded by their march and their efforts. They found that pongs could fight well and they died, their bodies littering the ground. Then, from the west, Hata burst into the field at the head of fresh forces. Each one of the enemy came toward the concentrated melee with the words of their High Mistress ringing in their ears.
'Remember this well,' she had told them, time and again, 'I want their leader, this Duwan, alive. If he is killed not only will the one who killed him be peeled, but each surviving one in his unit.'
Thus it was that Duwan had to seek engagements, and was surprised at the ease of his victories. Many, seeing him coming toward them, ran, often straight onto the sword of another Drinker. But one by one the Drinkers fell. Surrounded, in the open, the outcome was inevitable. At last he stood with the only other surviving defender, an ex-slave whose back was to Duwan's as a ring of enemy closed in them.
'Master,' the one who was soon to die said, 'we will meet again in Du's paradise.'
A surge of guilt swept through Duwan. 'Du,' he prayed silently, as the enemy closed, swords extended, 'if I have used your name in vain, forgive me.' For he knew that he had been presented by Tambol and Tambol's followers as, at the least, favored by Du, and, at best, as Du's own representative on the earth. It was true that he had often denied divine origin, but he had not been firm, had even, he guessed, as death closed on him, been willing to let the ex-slaves believe in him in order to make them fight better.
'Forgive me, Du,' he said aloud, as he lashed out and his sword swept aside a blade and brought blood from an enemy who fell back, screaming. At his back he heard the clash of metal and felt his last companion lean suddenly against him, then slide to the ground.
'Come then,' he shouted, 'let me take a few of you with me.' Surprisingly, the enemy backed away. He rushed toward them and they slipped out of his path, but always he was surrounded by a wall of uniformed, armed Devourers.
'Fight,' he hissed, making a lunge that was avoided by an enemy officer who actually turned and ran into three soldiers, sending them sprawling.
'Fight, cowards,' Duwan roared, as he stood, swords hanging down, panting with his efforts.
'It is over,' he heard, and he spun around to see Captain Hata standing, sword in hand.
'We fought once, Hata, with padded weapons,' Duwan said. 'There is no pad on my blade now.'
