The Dark Lord

today!

—|—

An hour passed with Jusuf keeping a weather eye on the Roman lines. His riders wheeled and darted towards the slowly assembling Avar lines, loosing clouds of arrows into the Slavic spearmen. This drew shouts of rage and occasional warriors burst from the ranks of their fellows, running out to hurl a spear or a javelin at the Khazar riders, who danced away, laughing. The enemy maintained his line, though Jusuf saw at least a dozen Slavs—wild white hair, thick with grease and clay, barely armored in leather jerkins or woad-blue tattoos—cut down by their Avar officers.

Jusuf bit his thumb nervously. Those Avar beki jegun are good. They'll kill a hundred men to keep the rest in good order...

The huge mass of the Slavs was being reinforced by troops of Avar horse—glinting mail and horsetail plumes and tall spears—and moving forward. There were a lot of Slavs on the field today, and behind them, half- hidden by the mass of spear- and axe-men and the cloud of dust they raised, bands of cavalry were forming up. Jusuf began to get a feeling the full weight of the Avar nation had come down the road from Constantinople.

He suddenly felt foolish. His appreciation of the comes Alexandros' tactics had blinded him. Soon enough, the Avars were going to storm right into his line and try their best to kill him and his men. Jusuf shook himself, like a soft-mouthed Charka hound rising from some prairie lake. A trickle of fear pulsed through the Khazar and he took a firm grip on his sword-hilt.

Then a shrill of bucinas and a thunderous kettledrum roar sounded from the center of the Roman line. Without Jusuf noticing, his portion of the line had carried forward beyond the axis of the Roman advance and now, looking off to his right, he could see back into the center. The lines of round Eastern shields had parted, folding back like a clockwork, and a great host of men advanced up the highway, pikes swaying above like young saplings. The Goths advanced on the Avar center with a deep basso shout and the tramp-tramp-tramp of their hobnailed boots.

The haze shrouding the field faded and Jusuf wheeled his horse, riding back, shouting for his banner commanders. 'Fall back! Re-form on the Roman line!'

Down on the road, the Goths deployed with surprising ease, flooding out across the highway and falling into twelve deep ranks. The drums continued to beat, shivering the air, and Jusuf saw a stillness fall across the Avar front. Every man was staring at the apparition emerging from the Roman lines. The Gothic ranks continued to deploy, pikes upright, swaying almost in unison as the men below marched forward. At the edges of the phalanx, more Goths ran forward, a mixture of armored men with bows and some with swords and maces.

Horns wailed and the phalanx rippled like a snakeskin, the long spears dipping as one and suddenly the Avars were faced with a solid wall of iron points. The first five ranks held their spears low, underarm, while those behind remained raised. The maneuver developed effortlessly and the phalanx swept forward without so much as a missed step.

From his vantage, Jusuf suddenly felt a chill and the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. Oh, lord of heaven, his mind raced, Anastasia was right—this is no actor playing the king of kings, this is the very man himself!

Moments later, the phalanx ground into the center of the Avar line at a swift walk and there was a resounding crash of metal on wood and flesh. The Avar host reeled back from the shock and Jusuf could see men screaming, dying, pierced through by eighteen-foot spears. The Goths stabbed overhand, leaf-shaped points licking into throats and chests. The first three ranks stood their ground, holding the Slavs back with a thicket of iron. A drum boomed, a single deep note, and the phalanx advanced a step.

Terrible confusion gripped the Avar center. The phalanx was hungry and it ate into the crowd of barbarians—armed with axes, short spears, javelins, swords—who could not come to grips with the iron-faced men in the twelve ranks. At the same time, the flanks of the Roman advance filled with lines of Peltasts, running up with their great bows to take a shooting stance.

A deep roar brewed up from the center, mingled screams and battle cries and the ceaseless stab-stab-stab of the phalanx grinding forward, a step at a time, into the enemy. Avar officers ran out on the sides, lashing the Slavs and drawing their own weapons. The black mass of the enemy began to draw away from the forest of spears and rush forward on either side.

The first rank of archers loosed, the snap of their bows singing across the field. Jusuf flinched as if he had been struck himself. The air was suddenly dark with arrows. The Avar advance staggered and there were more screams. Dozens of men fell, pierced through by yard-long shafts. The second rank of Peltasts loosed hard on the heels of the first and the Slavic line staggered. Then the third rank loosed, shooting high, lofting a black hungry cloud over the heads of their fellows. The first rank had already plucked a fresh arrow, drawn, sighted and loosed again.

The Avar officers screamed, urging their men to stand, but the lightly armored Slavs were being forced back by a constant rain of arrows, loosed at point-blank range. The wicker shields were thick with shafts. Their own archers were trying to shoot back, but everything was in chaos, with men surging back, trying to flee, and more men hurrying up.

The phalanx continued to advance, step by step.

Jusuf tore his attention away from the slaughter. 'Stand ready!' His own men formed up, readying arrows. Any moment now the wings of the Avar host would come into play... Jusuf looked back and saw, to his great relief, Dahvos and the heavy Khazar horse surging up out of the streambed, banners snapping in the breeze, their own standards flashing in the morning sun. The Khazar wheeled his horse, surveying his lines and seeing that there wasn't enough space for Dahvos' umens to deploy on this side of the streambed.

Need to clear some room to maneuver, he thought.

'Lancers!' he shouted, voice booming across the field. 'With me!'

—|—

Surrounded by a thick crowd of nobles on horseback, Bayan rode through a stand of evenly-spaced lemon trees. Thick, glossy leaves brushed his helmet and plucked at his lance. Dappled sunlight fell on dark gray armor under by a shining silk coat printed with a pattern of russet leaves. The khagan felt light, almost exalted. The rumble of four thousand hooves, the creaking of armor and the mutter of men praying or talking surrounded him. The royal guard swept out of the orchard and into the confusion behind the line of battle.

'Clear the way,' shouted Bayan's outriders, spurring their horses forward, lances lowered. Crowds of Sklavenoi parted before them, the mountain barbarians staring at the khagan as he passed. Many of the blond and redheaded men watched Bayan pass with ill-disguised anger. The khagan ignored them, for they lived in huts of wattle and daub in the high mountain valleys. Though they were sometimes brave, they could not withstand the practiced efficiency of Avar soldiers.

Horns blew, ringing in the air, and the royal guardsmen began to form up by rank and file, shifting around Bayan like a cloud of dark birds. The hring banner came forward and the khagan raised a hand in salute. Other banners—long dragon-mouthed tubes of cloth, or square blazons holding images of the sun and the lightning—surrounded him.

Ahead, beyond clumped umens of spearmen and axemen, Bayan heard the sound of battle. The earth quivered and he could see arrows in the air, flashing bright as they fell.

'The Khazars,' he said, caressing the stave of the bow laid across his saddle horn. 'Are they attacking in earnest, or only flourishing before our lines?'

'They harass the foot soldiers,' barked one of the beki jegun, quilted armor spattered with dust. The man's voice echoed from behind a full face mask. 'Like Huns themselves.'

'Very well.' Bayan raised the black bow and every man within sight focused on him, their eye drawn— willing or no—to his face. 'Form wedge and prepare to attack! We will drive off these slaves of the T'u-chueh and show them how real men fight! You, messenger, inform the commanders of foot we will be moving up. They will clear a lane through their mob for us!'

Men wheeled their horses, eager to do his bidding. Bayan smiled, then laughed aloud.

The day was perfect. His quiver was filled with arrows, fletched with gray goose, and each shaft, he knew, would find destiny in a Khazar heart.

—|—

Jusuf slashed his arm down, pointing with the sword, and his line of horsemen bolted forward, hooves