Five hundred moved as one, scrambling to the crest beside them, swords drawn, horses stamping and snorting with the scent of Horde in their nostrils. The Third Fighting Group was sandwiched between two armies, each large enough to smother them with Scab flesh, never mind their swords.

Boris spoke low and hoarse, keeping his command firm. “Hold until I give the word. Archers first.”

The fighters passed the order down the line, stilling their horses, never removing an eye from the black riders.

Johnis looked far right and left, but no escape route presented itself. No place to run.

From behind came a single voice, so confident, so forceful, yet so conversational that Johnis wondered if the Horde commander who spoke was Teeleh himself.

“Give us the one named Johnis, and the rest of you will live.”

Johnis could hear the Scabs’ horses breathing. He wasn’t sure why Boris had commanded them to hold. Either way they were staring at death. Only he could save them.

“Give me up,” he said, voice faint. Then louder, “I’ll go; take me!”

“Never!” Boris screamed. “Never give in to the beasts!”

“No, I have—”

“Shut your hole, recruit!” Boris growled.

“Then you will all die,” the commander of the Horde said. His understated tone left no doubt. A slaughter awaited them.

The Horde commander spoke his order. “Take them.”

The army on the far side surged over the hill and down into the valley like a thick tar that would surely swallow anything in its path.

“Ready . . .” Boris said. “Ready . . .”

Two hundred of the Guard raised drawn bows, aimed down.

Johnis turned back, alarmed to see that the army behind them was spilling into the opposite valley. From two sides the enemy swarmed.

When the first full line of Scabs reached the lowest point in the sand, Boris cried his order.

“Now!”

Arrows flew silently, barely seen in the darkness. And they found a mark, each one. The Horde army stalled in its rush as hundreds fell or reared back on wounded horses.

Faster than Johnis could have imagined, the archers strung fresh arrows and shot into the black mass. Then they reversed their aim to the back side and sent shafts into the Scabs on the other side.

For the briefest of moments, Johnis embraced a thin hope.

But the Horde simply forced their horses over the dead and rushed up the dune toward the Guard.

“I’ll go!” Johnis screamed. “Take me; I’ll go!”

His voice was swallowed by a thousand roars as the two armies collided.

Johnis discovered immediately why Boris had driven them to the top of the dune where they held high ground. Striking down on a slower foe gave them a distinct advantage. A snorting horse ridden by a warrior twice Johnis’s size clawed slowly up the sand toward him. The Horde’s arm jerked back, spear in hand, and Johnis went stiff.