Sir Kralaford should have turned and fled. It would have been his best hope of surviving the trap, but his anger forced him to decline such cowardice.

He knew, as he watched the riders flood from the stone tunnel, that he would fight. Most of them were mounted on hydrayet, but amongst their number were other creatures. Two tall razorbeaks, dirty white with red crown feathers, screeched hideously as their riders spurred them forward. One thick muscled man sat high in the saddle of a low bodied broindell, a heavy boak spear clasped in his hand.

The hydrayet rider who had been hidden in the farmhouse spurred his beast away, and Sir Bedingvale's steed crouched to pounce in pursuit.

"Leave him!" called Sir Kralaford. "Close on Sir Hogan!"

The last thing he wanted was for his knights to be cut off from each other. He knew they must fight together as they had trained to do, and that the flat land on the farmhouse's far side offered the best ground. It would also place the building, at least momentarily, between them and the archers on the valley's eastern slope.

His plans passed through his mind in a moment, and Hakansa was already moving when the first arrows flew. He leapt across the farmhouse's open room, over the woman, who yelped and threw herself to the floor. As he sprang up the slope of rubble at its far side, Sir Kralaford heard arrows strike against stone behind him.

Sir Hogan had not been so lucky. An arrow from the western slope had furrowed his steed's unarmoured flank, leaving a livid line of red, and it was only the young knight's control that prevented the beast from turning up the hill to sate his rage on his attacker.

"Concentrate on the riders!" ordered Sir Kralaford as Hakansa leapt from the fallen stonework and down to the grass on its far side.

Their mounted assailants had spread themselves into their attack, and his object was to get amongst them swiftly in the hope of foiling the archers' second volley. Sir Hogan's steed pushed itself forward, and Hakansa bounded after him. Sir Beddingvale was closing on their right when Sir Kralaford saw the last riders emerge from the tunnel.

They were not mounted on rangy hydrayet or dirty white razorbeaks, but rode the savage and agile javacs of the Clans.

There were three of them, and all wore armour of mesh and hide covered plate. At a glance he took in the familiar lethal forms of their steeds, with their long angular limbs and prehensile taloned claws. Their bodies tapered, ending in sinuous double hooked tails that they carried curved high over their backs. Black bony plates covered their bodies and their long necks. The same dark plating formed angular crests on the creatures' heads, and spread in ridges that curved below the dark spaces shading their eyes. It formed strange patterns in the tight grey fur of their broad curving snouts, which were edged with serrated teeth.

They spread into a line and halted on the height of the slope. The two riders at the flanks did not wear helmets, and both their foreheads, beneath their wild hair, were disfigured by the mark of Outcast. The rider in their centre was more heavily armed, with lance, rail-shield and war plate, and his steed was similarly armoured, with plate and helm that copied the ridged markings of the javac beneath. The knight's armour had been fashioned in semblance of his steed, but on his helm's fore-plate, above the dark holes shadowing his eyes, the mark of outcast had been daubed.

The three men seemed content to wait at the valley's end while their ragged companions charged to their first attack. Sir Kralaford drew his heavy curved blade as Sir Hogan was first to meet their charge, and he briefly saw a rider fall as the young knight's steed lowered its head and swept the legs of a hydrayet from beneath it.

Hakansa lowered his own head and roared, and the gap between them and their attackers closed to nothing.

The Hydrayet were not trained for war, and their riders were ill disciplined, bunched together and eager for the kill, utterly unprepared for the capabilities of a knight of Klinberg and his madriel steed. Sir Kralaford blocked a sword blow with his rail-shield and killed its owner with an effortless stroke. The rider closing on his right screamed and fell as his mount collapsed, its ribs crushed by Hakansa's horns. Then they were in amongst their enemies.

Sir Kralaford knew too well the vulnerability of his position. When he had ridden from Klinberg, he had foreseen speed as the necessity, so had disregarded the need for armour. Now he was unprotected and surrounded, and only his skill, and that of Hakansa, would keep him alive. But the two of them had trained together for countless years, and they fought together as a singular entity. Hakansa moved swiftly, turning to every attack with barely a word of command needed, striking with his night black horns and his bladed claws. Where he struck left, Sir Kralaford struck right, and together they presented a constantly shifting maelstrom of deadly metal and bestial aggression. But in his analysis of the fight, he knew the press of their opponents was too great, and only the slightest lapse was needed for disaster to fall on them.

That moment came when the razorbeak attacked. More ferocious than the hydrayet, it struck with its curved beak, and it was only Hakansa's swiftness that prevented immediate fatal injury. One of his horns cracked against the bird's head, and the creature reeled away screeching, but its counter came swiftly. Its long, tight muscled leg lunged forward, driving past Hakansa's guard and scoring a deep welt across his shoulder. The bird's rider lunged with his spear, and Hakansa grasped it in his jaws and broke it, but he had been still for too long.

Sir Kralaford had his rail-shield raised to block a sword stroke, and barely heard the crack of the ranch whip as it ripped the air and came forward to curl tight about his arm. The rider who had ensnared him pulled back in his saddle and brought his shield down, as another rider closed on his right. He struck with his sword, but the man had some skill, caught the blow with his own rail-shield and pushed it down.

Mere moments had passed since Hakansa had broken the spear in his jaws, but its broken shaft still hampered him as the razorbeak struck again. It ignored the madriel and leapt into the air, its lethal beak open to show its bright yellow tongue, to strike at Sir Kralaford, who in that vital second was pinned and defenceless.

* * *

Sir Beddingvale saw the imminent plight of his Pride-commander, but was too beset to save him. Closing from the right, he had been the last to enter the fight. The riders that had hurtled down the slope had been intent on closing with Commander Kralaford, but three of them had turned on him, and they had seemed confident as they had spurred their mounts towards him.

One of them bore a wide grin on his bearded face, and he had been the first to die. Sir Bedingvale's steed had disabled the second, hooking one of his horns about the rider's leg and wrenching viciously to dislocate it with a crack, and then pull him from his saddle. The man's scream as he fell beneath his beast's claws had not had chance to dwindle before the third man died with his throat slashed by Sir Bedingvale's sword.

Then he was past the riderless hydrayet and charging into the battle's flank.

Men and hydrayet fell, but his charge quickly faltered as more riders turned to his attack. He could see his Commander ahead of him, could see his sword's deadly arcs as his steed twisted in its attacks, but as a hydrayet fell before him, its neck broken by a wrench of his own steed's horns, a gap in his view was opened and he saw the razorbeak closing in. The gap widened as the riders before him pulled away, and Sir Beddingvale began to grin at their cowardice until he saw the reason for their withdrawal.

The noise the broindell made as it charged was a hissing roar that grated in its throat. It was not the shoulder height of a madriel, but it was wide and powerful. Its thick legs carried it at a deceptive speed, and its weight added to its momentum. As it lowered its head, and the two horns that curved from the end of its snout locked with those of his madriel, the jolt of impact rocked Sir Beddingvale forward in his saddle, and his steed was pushed backwards, claws scrabbling through the grass.

His rail-shield caught the thick wood shaft of the broindell rider's boak spear and saved his own life, but they had been stopped, and the hydrayet were closing on his flanks again. It was then that he heard the crack of the ranch whip over the growling of the battle, and saw his Pride-commander's plight.

* * *

Sir Hogan was closer to Sir Kralaford, but his own life was threatened. Like the others, his steed had moved swiftly in his initial attacks, tearing in circles, their enemies falling about them. They were winning, and in his youth Sir Hogan felt his confidence, and only became aware of the imminence of danger when the arrow gouged pain along his neck. His closest opponent reeled away with the poorly aimed shaft in his stomach, and Sir Hogan took the second's respite to turn, and saw the archers on the slope above him. After their first volley, they had followed along the valley, and were close enough to be accurate, even at a target embroiled in the midst of swarming combat.

He had been lucky, but was unlikely to be so a second time. Sir Hogan was accustomed to armour, the Engineer made plate that could resist even the power of a plain's longbow. As he watched the archers on the slope above haul back on their bow cords and take their aim, for the first time in his life he felt genuine fear.

* * *

Sir Kralaford did not have the time to be afraid. If he had, he may have been immobilized by it. It was pure instinct that saved his life. His command issued from him without the intervention of thought. Hakansa reacted with tutored impulse, throwing his strength at the hydrayet whose rider had Sir Kralaford's sword held, and the creature was forced away stumbling. Sir Kralaford pulled with him, and the rider whose whip wrapped his arm, who thought he had his adversary held, was wrenched from his saddle.

The man screamed as the razorbeak struck him, its hooked beak clamping closed over his shoulder and lacerating his neck. Sir Kralaford freed his sword from the rider whose mount had been forced aside. He brought it round to kill the bird's rider, who was struggling to control the beast as it shook the wounded man in its beak, unwilling to let its prize go.

Sir Kralaford twisted his sword free, scattering droplets of blood that fell bright on the razorbeak's dirty plumage. The bloodied blade arced back around as Hakansa swung his own curved horns to break the legs of the stumbling hydrayet on his other side. Its rider was still struggling for balance, and this time his skill could not save him.

Sir Kralaford's blow split his face, turning it into a red mask of horror. With no pause, he brought his sword around for a second time to sever the whip still coiled about his arm, its looped grip still held taught in its owner's dying hand.

He roared as he freed himself, and Hakansa answered him with an echoing bellow. The narrow gap in which his life had almost ended had closed. He breathed still, and his sword was in his hand.

The battle was not yet done.

But it was close to catastrophe.

* * *

The archers on the slope above Sir Hogan sighted along their arrows at the young knight below, but they had no indication that their own deaths were imminent.

When Sir Kralaford's remaining scout had seen the archers emerge from hiding, she had disregarded her Commander's orders and urged her steed up the ridge. As their fingers twitched in anticipation of releasing their arrows, the first of the archers died. The scout's madriel was not trained to the fight, but she was still a huntress of the Pride, and could kill as well as any other beast.

The second archer scarce had the time to turn his head at the sound of his comrade's dying gasp before strong jaws seized his head, and a twist of muscles snapped his neck. The third man managed to turn and bring his bow around before a claw sliced his throat, and his arrow arced away over the valley.

The remaining archers had the time to release their own arrows into the valley before they realised their danger. One died under the huntress' claws, and the others fled, but those furthest from the new attack had the presence to draw new arrows and get the fletching to their cheeks to put down the lone madriel that charged them.

They did not get the chance.

Sir Kralaford's remaining messenger, as similarly insubordinate as his scout, ordered her steed to the killing, and she fell among the archers from the slope above the tunnels.

* * *

Sir Hogan heard the roar of his steed as the first arrow sank into its flank, and pain sliced his side as he was struck himself. The hydrayet closed in about him, and his rail-shield came up to protect his left side, but the pain as he raised his sword in defence tore at him, and he flinched as his assailant's attack was blocked. His steed turned and clawed, raked with its horns and turned again, but its movements were hampered by the pain of its own injuries, and Sir Hogan knew his struggle had become desperate.

* * *

Sir Bedingvale's position was no less dire. Locked together so close, the broindell rider's spear was too long and cumbersome for him to make an accurate strike. Sir Bedingvale's rail-shield fended off the clumsy blows, but his own sword did not have the reach to threaten the man over the intervening gap made by his mount's elongated head and wide horns. The broindell was too strong to force back, and the knight's instincts failed to provide him with a solution to his predicament.

His steed solved it for him. With a twist, he extricated his horns from those of the broindell, and he reared up on his hind legs. The broindell lowered its head to strike at his exposed stomach, but the madriel was too swift. His forepaws hammered the creature's snout into the ground as he bought them down, neutralising the threat of its horns, and then he leapt. The broindell's rider had no time to ready his spear. He lifted his heavy shield, but it did no good. It was swept aside by the crack of a horn, and his arm was seized, the madriel was on him and he was pulled from his saddle. Sir Beddingvale heard the man's scream over the pained roar of his madriel as he landed, and he felt his steed stumble. Sir Kralaford was ahead of them, his sword rising after slicing through the whip that had held him, and Sir Beddingvale urged his steed on to attack the knot of riders surrounding his Pride-commander.

* * *

Sir Kralaford roared again as the razorbeak, its rider flopping dead in its saddle, dropped the man it had killed and leapt away, its short wings flapping, to attack the riderless hydrayet in the valley behind.

Sir Kralaford ignored it and wheeled Hakansa to face the riders threatening his left flank. He heard the pained bellow of Sir Bedingvale's madriel as it landed behind him, but knew that Sir Hogan's plight was more pressing. The knight had an arrow in his side, and two more had sunk their serrated teeth into his steed's flank. Hakansa charged, forcing a passage towards the wounded knight with the strength of his aggression, and Sir Kralaford struck left and then right to add his own fury to the fight.

The second razorbeak struck at him, but he barely noticed as his sword plunged into its neck. The creature's head was wrenched upwards as Hakansa leapt onto the back of a hydrayet, whose rider had his sword raised, ready to take Sir Hogan's life. He clamped already bloodied jaws about the man's elbow, and twisted his arm from its socket.

Sir Beddingvale had closed behind him and was at his right hand, his sword, and his steed's horns, glossed with blood.

Together, they roared their anger and turned on the remaining riders, but it seemed that the aggression of their final charge had persuaded their assailants to abandon their attack. They were fleeing, hydrayet limping and riders bleeding.

Sir Kralaford wheeled Hakansa towards Sir Hogan.

"I will live, Commander," said the knight, but he was swaying in his saddle. His face was ashen, and blood had soaked his side and his neck.

"You will," said Sir Kralaford, though he did not know for how long.

A second attack was coming, and it was sure to be more dire than the first.

The surviving riders had pulled back to the valley's sides, leaving its centre clear, and down the open gap came the three Clan knights.

Sir Kralaford knew their attack would not come in an undisciplined rush. Their steeds were as well trained for war as his own, and they were fierce and quick, their riders armoured and equally proficient.

Sir Beddingvale closed on his right, and Sir Kralaford saw that his steed was hurt. It limped, carrying one hind leg above the ground, its tawny fur slick with blood. To further trouble their position, Sir Kralaford saw that the archers from the eastern slope had taken up positions close by in the farm's ruin, where their range would be short and deadly. His scout and his last messenger, who had saved them once from the archer's threat, had dropped back down to the valley floor, to loop around the building, but the archers inside were alert to their presence and had them covered from its deep windows.

"Fortak accept us!" Sir Kralaford muttered in prayer.

He should have fled when he'd had the chance.