'They might make it…' Bradan heard the hope in his voice.
'Let it please Shiva that they do,' Chaturi prayed. 'And may Shiva protect the Siddhar from a stray arrow.'
'What's that?' Kosala lifted a hand. 'I heard something.'
The sound started as a faint rumble and increased to a growling that echoed from the rocky slopes. Bradan looked up as a slot opened in the solid cliff underneath the fortress. Scores of Thiruzha soldiers slowly rolled a fifteen-foot-high iron fence across the pass.
'It's on wheels.' Bradan could hardly believe what he saw. 'It's a barrier on iron wheels.'
'Nothing will get past that.' Kosala sounded sick. 'I've never seen anything like that before.'
'Neither have I,' Bradan said.
Ignoring casualties, the leading squadrons of Chola horse pressed on, to erupt on the Thiruzha side of the pass a few seconds before the barrier closed. Wheeling, one squadron attacked the Thiruzha soldiers who pushed the mobile fence.
'There are not enough of them,' Kosala said. 'They are doomed.'
A sudden hot wind sent the oil lanterns dancing along Rajgana's walls and bounced surreal shadows on the ground. As the wind strengthened, it blew out most of the lights, plunging the pass into darkness. The battle halted except for arrows flying in both directions. The Thiruzha horn sounded again, long and low, and one by one, the lanterns were replaced. As the light strengthened again around Rajgana, details of the battle became apparent.
The detachment of Chola cavalry that had passed the gate milled in confusion as they realised that they were trapped between the iron fence and the entire Thiruzha army. With the light restored, the Thiruzha arrow hail increased, humming and whistling toward the couple of hundred Chola horsemen. A Chola captain trumpeter blew a series of short blasts and the cavalry formed into an arrowhead and charged toward the Thiruzha army. Sitting on his elephant, Bhim ordered his spearmen into a solid, spiked hedge.
Rather than a battle, it was a massacre as the cavalry ran into the spears, with the Thiruzha archers sending a non-stop stream of arrows toward the rear of the Chola force. It was over in five bloody minutes, leaving the ground littered with Chola dead.
All the time, the defenders of Rajgana Fort had been busily firing at the Chola host, with catapults, rocks, spears and arrows whistling down on the confused and largely impotent force that had seemed so formidable only the previous day. Some Chola warriors had advanced as far as the iron barrier, only to die in frustrated fury as the defenders fired arrows and dropped rocks on top of them. A few ragged survivors limped back.
The Thiruzha horn sounded again, five short blasts and a long drone. The defenders dragged back the metal gate and the Thiruzha army surged through, cavalry in front, followed by the elephants and the infantry.
'I've never seen a battle on this scale,' Kosala said.
Bradan said nothing as the Thiruzha cavalry charged straight into the disorganised Chola and sent them reeling back.
'We've lost the battle.' Kosala shook his head. 'Oh, Shiva! I wish I could help.'
'One sword would not make much difference in a battle of thousands,' Chaturi said.
Bradan thought of Melcorka and said nothing.
The horn sounded again, five long blasts, and the tail end of the Thiruzha army filed under the stone bridge and through the pass to the east. Last of all was the war elephant of Dhraji, deliberately stepping on the Chola wounded.
'Look,' Banduka said. 'Rajgana's gates are opening. The garrison is joining the pursuit.'
Bradan had expected the garrison to march down a path from one of the towers. Instead, a door opened beside the metal gate. Hundreds of men filed out, to trot towards the east in pursuit of the retreating mob that had once been the Chola army.
'Dhraji and Bhim must be confident of victory,' Chaturi said. 'They've stripped every last man from Rajgana.'
Every last man! Rajgana is nearly empty. 'They've given us a chance,' Bradan said quickly.
'A chance for what?' Banduka asked.
'Our chance to rescue that poor fellow there.' Bradan gestured upward, to where Machaendranathar swung in his iron cage. Bradan's mood lightened with this first stroke of good fortune for days. 'With most of the garrison gone, I can slip into the fort and get him out. There must be a way into his cage from above; how else will the garrison feed him?'
'You can't go in there,' Banduka said. 'You've just escaped from Dhraji. You can't go back into her den.'
Bradan glanced at Melcorka, lying supine and vacant-eyed on her litter. 'I have to,' he said.
'I know you do.' Chaturi touched his arm.
'I'll come with you,' Banduka said.
'No.' Kosala shook his head. 'I will. The pale foreigner might need a sword to guard his back.' He touched his sword hilt. 'Or he may be planning to betray us, in which case he will need a sword in his back!'
'He is no traitor,' Chaturi said. 'Move fast in case the rakshasa's men come back, and keep out of trouble.'
'Come on then, Kosala.' Bradan hesitated, looking at Melcorka.
'I'll look after her,' Chaturi said. 'Whatever happens to you.'
'Thank you, Chaturi.'
Glad to be doing something positive, Bradan negotiated the wooded slope with Kosala at his back and the night already beginning to fade. A slanting overhang half-hid the door in the rock, which the garrison had left unlocked.
'That was fortuitous,' Bradan said.
'Or one of Bhim's traps,' Kosala drew his sword. 'I'll go first, Bradan, in case there is a sentry.'
The door opened onto a flight of stairs that spiralled up inside the rock wall of the cliff. Without lighting to show the way, Kosala moved up slowly, testing each step, keeping his sword ready as Bradan followed, biting back his impatience. Within a few minutes, Bradan felt dizzy with the constant spiralling.
'Wait.' Kosala put out a hand.
Footsteps echoed
