Bartolo finally reached where Shani had been half-buried beneath her horse. "My legs," Shani gasped. "I don't think I can get up."

"Nonsense," Bartolo said, gasping the word between his bladesinger's chant as he cut down two more of the enemy.

He crouched down again and with a mighty heave lifted the dead horse so that Shani could roll away. One of her feet was twisted at a terrible angle, the ankle swollen as Shani gasped with pain.

"Rest as long as you need to," Bartolo said. "I'm not leaving this spot."

"Look out!" Shani cried, as she launched a fireball past Bartolo's shoulder. It scattered harmlessly on the rune-covered chest of an imperial avenger, but gave Bartolo time to face off against his enemy.

He blanched when he realised he was facing three avengers. No, there were four. Two moved to his right while the others moved to his left. He would never be able to take them all.

Then Jehral came out of nowhere, his horse charging into the avengers on Bartolo's left side, knocking them back. One of them stumbled, and Jehral's scimitar rang as it struck the avenger's neck, but the avenger's magic-enhanced body was too strong, and the rider wheeled his horse to strike again.

A second fireball flew past, striking one of the avengers directly in the creature's face. Shani launched them in a volley, a rapid succession of discharges that leapt from her fingers one after the other, and the metal on the avenger's face began to melt. It screamed then, a terrible, nightmare sound.

Bartolo ducked under the flail of the last avenger, and then blocked the black sword with his zenblade, shattering it into two pieces.

Jehral was soon fighting from his horse by Bartolo's side as Shani hovered on one leg, an expression of intense pain on her face as she attempted to hold the enemy back with ball after ball of flame.

Then Jehral's horse was cut down from under him by a revenant. The desert warrior fell heavily to the ground, then leapt back up, just in time to block an axe blow from the tall warrior in grey with half his face rotted away.

Jehral, Shani, and Bartolo fought side by side. The warrior from the desert saved the Petryan's life, and the bladesinger then saved the desert warrior. Clustered around the bodies of the horses, the corpses of their enemy piled up around them.

But it was three against a horde, and they all knew it was hopeless.

Even as Bartolo fought legionnaires, avengers, templars and revenants, his mind took note of the carnage around him. Fallen Hazarans fought beside their dead horses, their honour forcing them to stay against all odds. Bartolo realised he stood directly between the great gates to the city of Seranthia. How close they had come.