The cavalry slowed,

halted their false retreat,

reformed in front of Donal’s infantry,

Xau’s six thousand cavalry

head-on to Tahj’s forces

while the horse lords

wheeled to either side,

fell on the enemy’s open flanks.

An early harvest reaped then,

heaped raw and red

on the grass,

the spring flowers.

Subetei, Khan of the Horse Lords,

shot eight men with his bow,

killed fourteen more up close,

his sword running red.

Few warriors then or since

to equal the horse lords in their wrath

as they honored their oath

to the Horse King.

King Donal one of those few,

cleaving men in two with his longsword Raid

as he fought for the man he’d once fought,

the man he now held as dear

as the brother he’d lost,

Xau whom Tahj had thrice tried

to assassinate.

Tahj would have spent his soldiers

down to the last man,

but the beast,

seven of his nine minion commanders

dead or dying,

called a late retreat.

When the rain broke

and washed the ground clean,

half Tahj’s army had been slaughtered.

CONVERGENCE

The war halted.

Tahj’s Imperial Army withdrew

from Innis, Meqing, Ritany.

Three separate delegations headed

toward a mountain border fort

for peace negotiations.

Donal, the Red King,

and Subetei, Khan of the Horse Lords,

rode from the Innish camp,

triumphant in battle:

bold, brash, brave, both unhurt,

both bringing a woman with them,

eight soldiers apiece,

no servants.

Memnor, King of Ritany,

gray-haired and great-hearted,

and Xau, the Horse King,

rode from the Ritan camp,

both men troubled, both men weary,

neither yet recovered

from their wounds:

rode with two translators,

Memnor’s surgeon, Memnor’s army commander,

a dozen of Memnor’s cavalry,

seven of Xau’s nine guards.

(One of Xau’s guards killed in battle,

another—arrow wound festering—

too sick to sit a horse.)

From the perfumed halls

of the Imperial Palace

where he’d waged war remotely,

the Emperor Tahj emerged

with a retinue of over a hundred:

attendants, aides, advisors, lackeys,

cooks, scribes, scouts, officers,

grooms, guards, tailors, translators,

three junior wives.

As spring warmed to summer,

the three contingents

converged.

JUDGMENT

King Xau rode,

wounded, worn out, harrowed,

from war toward peace negotiations,

rode with his ally King Memnor,

likewise wounded, weary,

the two kings managing

thirty or forty miles

before their surgeons ordered

a halt for the day.

Swifter by far,

riding to intercept Xau,

rode Hana, his queen.

Rode from dawn to dusk,

a hundred and ten miles a day,

changing mounts at every way-fort,

her guards struggling

to match her endurance.

Rode armed with bow and knife

and the knowledge

that Xau would prize

each hour she gained with him.

Later,

no historian would note Hana’s ride,

judging it incidental,

inconsequential.

Xau,

seeing the riders’ rapid approach,

not allowing himself

to believe Hana had come

until he could make out her features—

his heart speeding

as he sped his horse toward her—

dismounting awkwardly,

leg stabbing with pain, unsteady,

holding onto his horse one-handed,

reaching for her with the other—