The first peasant came within range. Itkovian swung his sword, watched a head spin away from its body, watched as the body shivered and twitched before crumpling. His horse lashed out its hind hooves, connecting with crunching thumps, then the animal righted itself and reared, iron-shod front hooves kicking and clawing, dragging a screaming woman down. Another Tenescowri leapt to grab one of the horse’s front legs. Itkovian leaned forward and drove his sword against the man’s lower back, cutting deep enough to sever his spine.

His horse spun, the leg flinging the corpse away. Head snapped forward, teeth cracking down on a peasant’s hair-matted pate, punching through bone to pull back with a mouthful of hair and skull.

Hands clawed against Itkovian’s thigh on his shield side. He twisted, swung down across his mount’s withers. The blade chopped through muscle and clavicle. Blood and meat reeled away.

His horse kicked again. Bit and stamped and whirled, but hands and pressure and weight were on all sides now. Itkovian’s sword flashed, whipped blindly yet never failed to find a target. Someone climbed up onto the horse’s rump behind him. He arched his back, gauntleted hand swinging up over his own head, point driving downward behind him. He felt the edge slice its way through skin and flesh, skitter along ribs, then punch down into lower belly.

A flood of bile and blood slicked the back of his saddle. The figure slid away.

He snapped a command and the horse ducked its head. Itkovian swung his weapon in a sweeping, horizontal slash. Cutting, glancing contact stuttered its entire path. His mount pivoted and the Shield Anvil reversed the slash. Spun again, and Itkovian whipped the sword again.

Man and beast turned in a full circle in this fashion, a circle delivering dreadful wounds. Through the blistering heat beneath his visored helm, Itkovian gained a fragmented collection of the scene on all sides.

There would be no rising from his Grey Swords. Not this time. Indeed, he could not see a single familiar surcoat. The Tenescowri closed on the Shield Anvil from all sides, a man’s height’s worth of bodies under their feet. And somewhere beneath that heaving surface, were Itkovian’s soldiers. Buried alive, buried dying, buried dead.

He and his horse were all that remained, the focus of hundreds upon hundreds of avid, desperate eyes.

Captured pikes were being passed forward to those peasants nearest him. In moments, those long-handled weapons would begin jabbing in on all sides. Against this, neither Itkovian’s nor his horse’s armour would be sufficient.

Twin Tusks, I am yours. To this, the last moment.

‘Break!’