All around me, a mass of the Byakko mercenaries were circling, but they looked scared now, glancing at one another as if they feared to attack.
A voice spoke to me, mind-to-mind, a deep voice like the boom of the sea.
“Yasei,” it said. “My name is Yasei. If you will free us from our captivity, we will do your bidding.”
It was the tiger that I was riding speaking to me, and as I glared around at my enemies, he turned his huge head and rolled one eye at me. The other two had fallen in beside me, one on either side. I didn’t have to think about it.
“Yasei,” I said. “I will free you and your kin. Kill the men.”
“Gladly,” his voice rumbled in my mind.
He reared up to charge, and suddenly there was a loud whistling in the air around us as a flight of hurtling projectiles cut through the air. It was a flight of shuriken stars, and twelve of the Byakko riders tumbled backward off their mounts, the deadly stars sticking out of their heads and chests. I looked around for Cara and saw a flash of black and red hurtling down the hill toward me.
I charged the circling mass of Byakko mercenaries as their freed mounts leaped forward to join me. They stood their ground, forcing their bound mounts forward to meet us with a crash of spears and claws on metal. I laid about with my axe, killing six men as their lances and swords scored and smashed against my armor, jolting me but causing no damage. Every tiger who was freed of his rider wheeled about and attacked the Byakko mercenaries, until I found myself charging up the hill toward Cara at the head of an ever-increasing wave of ferocious white tiger spirits.
Cara was holding her ground with her black straight sword now, in the midst of a cloud of thick white smoke. For a moment, I wondered where the smoke was coming from, and then I realized—the Byakko mercenaries, seeing that their bound mounts were turning on them, were killing the tigers before they could turn and join me. The tigers, when killed, turned into this strange mist-like substance. Now, a mass of fifty of the men were dismounted, and they held in a ragged rectangle of ten abreast and five deep. Cara had charged them leaving a trail of dead in her wake, and the rest of them had made a wall of pikes to try to hold her off.
Riding my new tiger mount Yasei, I thundered toward the braced line of pikes, but before I could reach them Cara had disengaged from the fight. She leaped in the air and backflipped three times to put a bit of distance between her and the front line, then flung a flight of shuriken stars, this time trailing comet tails of freezing air behind them.
They thudded into their targets and five men were instantly covered in thick ice. I saw her potion in her hand, a flash of bright yellow, and then three arrows were loosed at the frozen targets. Black smoke and gouts of dirty orange flame exploded outward from the men, and a rain of ice and charred flesh thudded to the ground around us.
From the left, a small unit of the remaining Byakko mercenaries who were still mounted were charging toward me. I wheeled Yasei’s head around and charged to meet them head on.
On impact, I leaped from Yasei’s back and flung myself at the leader of the mercenary company. He was armed with a long naginata polearm. I landed on his mount’s back, wrapped my left hand around the shaft of the naginata and wrapped my right hand around the man’s throat. His bound tiger mount reared up, flinging us both up into the air. I kept my grip on him, but he twisted as we crashed to the ground together and he landed on top of me. I brought my feet up and shoved him off me, and he let go of his naginata as he arched up and away, landing hard fifty feet away from me.
Behind me, the tigers were overcoming the soldiers. Away off to my right, Cara was dealing with the dismounted men in a thunder of explosions and flying ice. I focused all my attention on the dismounted leader in front of me and charged him, using his own naginata against him.
He pulled another naginata from the hand of a dead compatriot nearby and ran down the hill at me, screaming wildly. I spun, enjoying the heft of this new weapon, and knocked his first blow aside. We traded hits, circling each other, until I decided to finish it. I dropped the stolen naginata and reached for my Ironside shield.
Fear sprang into his eyes as the shield magically appeared, strapped onto my left forearm, and a one-handed war axe appeared in my right hand. I ran at him, knocking back one blow from his naginata and then bashing him hard with the shield. He dropped the pole arm and reached for his sword. I glanced up, hearing a thundering noise of heavy feet galloping toward me. It was Yasei.
“This one is mine,” boomed his voice in my mind, and I let him take the kill. His huge claws skewered the man through the belly, and he lifted the man up and tore him in half with his enormous teeth. Blood spattered my armor, hissing on the hot metal.
Yasei dropped one shoulder to the ground, and I leaped onto his back, grabbing the reins. Behind me, fully one hundred armored white tiger spirits now stood, teeth bared. The rumble of their growling shook the air around us.
I looked
