"To me!" Prince Tiesto called, throwing himself into the fray as he launched himself at the legionnaires. He hoped that the pikemen would have difficulty continuing their advance if his men were tangled with the legionnaires.

Immediately his hunch was proven correct, but it didn't escape his notice that the Tingarans were the superior soldiers, effectively armed, stronger of muscle, and better trained.

Tiesto thrust his sword at a Tingaran's round face, the point penetrating into the man's mouth as he died with a scream. The prince pulled out his sword with an effort and then quickly raised it to block an attack. He countered with a classic riposte, taking down another of the enemy.

"To me!" he called again, drawing both the enemy and his own men to him.

Over a legionnaire's shoulder he saw Marcus take his squad smashing into the side of the pikemen. The enemy pikemen were soon tangled in their gear as they tried to turn their long weapons and Marcus penetrated deep into their ranks.

Prince Tiesto continued to hack and slash his way through his enemy, narrowly escaping being skewered by the bloody sword of a snarling Tingaran. Then a space opened up in front of him, initially filling him with relief.

Until he saw it.

A monster stood in front of him, an apparition of man and moulded flesh, with a black sword in place of one arm and a flail held in the grip of the other. The creature's face was a horror of metal and cloth, with red slits where eyes should be. It lurched and twisted as it moved forward, directly into Prince Tiesto's path.

Tiesto was unable to tear his eyes from the long twists of braided steel that jangled at the end of the flail, each length ending in a spiked ball the size of a man's hand.

Behind the creature was another, and a third lumbered forward behind that. These were imperial avengers, there were three of them, and Prince Tiesto's ragtag army didn't stand a chance.

Tiesto thought about Rogan Jarvish, heading in hope for the city's eastern gate, with only a hundred men and a huge number of half-starved prisoners, waiting for the gate to be opened; something that would never happen. He pictured the Alturan Lord Marshal, waiting vainly for the main southern gate to open, and Prince Tiesto realised that all their planning had been in vain.

Tiesto had tried. Perhaps he had never been cut out to be High Lord. He had never even wanted to be High Lord, only to help his people.

The prince raised his sword, and with a muttered prayer he prepared to defend himself from the avenger.