Losing ground, the cavalrymen changed their tactics. They seemed to realize that their mounts were a hindrance. The beasts were less agile than the destriers, less disciplined, slower to obey. Almost as one, the cavalrymen dismounted. With their broadswords, they drove their beasts aside; sent many of them plunging off the road to break their legs or necks and die.

On foot, they had an advantage. The Knights could only hack down at them. One good thrust to a barrel or cut to a leg could take down a steed. And while the horse fell, its rider would be momentarily defenseless.

But the Knights of Ardor had trained for this as well. Their mounts were weapons of war, as expendable as lances or warriors. When Sword Eradimnie saw a cavalryman shove his blade into the chest of her steed, she reacted without hesitation.

Vaulting out of her saddle and over the destrier’s neck, she landed feetfirst on that man before he could draw back his weapon. While the impact crumpled him, she swung her sword, severed a head on one side, chopped halfway through a torso on the other. Then she stood braced and ready, reaping blood.

Her speed and power cleared a space around her, allowed her a moment to choose her next attack. But only a moment. In desperation, three cavalrymen rushed her together. Wrapping their arms around her, they forced her off the road.

She took them with her as she fell.

The first boulder she hit snapped her back. The second crushed her helm. Her life was over before she finished her long tumble.

In her covert of stones, Queen Estie had no idea what was happening above her until she saw one of the Knights roll past her, a smashed ball of armor. Then she began to understand what Crayn was telling her.

Unable to see the Repository or any part of the road’s final ascent, she had fixed her attention on Waysel and the cannon. Gouts of flame from the muzzles and subtle tremors in the ground told her when the siege-guns fired. But the extent of their position prevented her from seeing where the shots struck.

Nevertheless she trusted Waysel’s determination to obey his orders. She assumed that cavalrymen and beasts were dying. That the road was being shattered. That the long charge of Rile’s cavalry would be cut off.

She turned to scan the growing mass of priests at the edge of the road, the rising tide of the horde. From the priests, she sensed only the sorcery of their Shields.

Waysel’s balls and chain carried over the priests and fanged men, hit somewhere farther down the slope. But the priests did not use that opportunity to advance. Instead, they waited while the cavalry streamed past them. Behind and beside them, the fanged men crouched, slavering.