No-one else spoke after that, there was nothing to say. The final few minutes counted down until there was only one minute left. Colonel Vento gave an order, and the ten inch thick oaken beams that locked the city gates were drawn back, sliding easily and silently on the layers of thick grease that had been smeared on them. If they were lucky, they would be taking the enemy by surprise and they’d be able to get everyone out before they were able to react.

     He tensed up. The day before, while they’d been planning this operation, some members of his command staff had suggested that the enemy would be expecting them to make a break for it and would be ready for them, but Vento had argued otherwise. The enemy knew that they had a teleportation cubicle, and the means to use it despite the magical interference. They would believe that the Beltharan command staff would be able to flee to safety at any time. Also, agents within the enemy army, agents belonging to the tactician Adamaster Hurgis, had been spreading whispers that the city’s defenders believed that the Orb of Proofing could keep out the Shadow. The defenders will try to hold the city even after it’s been swallowed by the Shadow, the agents whispered, and the enemy’s high command gave every indication of believing them. Now, though, now that the moment had finally arrived, Vento felt a moment of doubt. The gates would open a crack, and then be pushed open by enemies pouring in…

     The enemy didn’t come pouring in. The gates opened silently until they stood widely apart and there was no reaction from the Shadowarmies, their view being obscured by the massed ranks of zombies marching restlessly around and around the inner wall. Vento looked up at the town hall clock, and saw that the minute hand was within a hair of pointing directly upwards. Drass it, he thought. What’s a few seconds? He sat up straight in his saddle, therefore, and drew his sword, raising it high over his head. That was the signal, and the cavalrymen drew their swords as well. “Cavalry!” he cried in a voice that carried across the entire army, as well as to the Shadowsoldiers outside, “Charge!”

     The nearest Shadowsoldiers looked up, noticing for the first time that the gate was open, but before they could react the cavalry was pouring out, swords slashing at the zombies and anything else that came within reach. They headed straight down the long radial street towards the outer gate three hundred yards away, clearing the way for the infantry who followed as soon as the last horse was out of the way. Two companies pushed the startled Shadowsoldiers back from the gate, clearing a space in front of it, and then the Breachguard took their places. Pikemen backed by swordsmen, forming a semicircle fifty yards across forming a bridgehead that would allow the rest of the defenders to emerge. No commands were given throughout the entire process. Everyone knew what to do.

     By this time, though, the enemy had woken up to what was happening, and the harsh, blaring sound of trumpets was echoing among the blackened skeletons of ruined buildings. Zombherds whistled new orders to their undead flocks on their bone flutes and the marching corpses halted in their tracks. Then they turned and began marching towards the gate, the closest hurling themselves upon the lines of kneeling pikemen. Most of the defenders, sheltered from the enemy up until now by strong stone walls, were only now coming face to face with the full horror of decomposing, maggot ridden but still somehow animate flesh, and many of them froze in terror. Combined with the proximity of the Shadow, it was too much for some of them and they shrieked in terror, fleeing into the rubble choked streets where, away from the shelter of their comrades, they fell easily to dull, rusty swords wielded by cold, soulless hands.

     Most of the pikemen were experienced and battle hardened enough to endure the horror, however, and held their place, holding their pikes firmly outward at an angle, moving only their steel pointed heads to find the cold, still hearts of the onrushing horrors. Hundreds of zombies were dispatched in this manner, transfixed on steel and ashwood and held in place while a second rank of swordsmen chopped them to pieces until the reek of rotting tissues and fluids made the very air their enemy. Their controllers didn’t care how many of their undead slaves they lost, though. The defenders of the city, once they were dead, would be reanimated to replace those lost now. All they cared about was to crush the defence as quickly as possible, and so more and more zombies began to press in, to crush the pikemen by sheer weight of dead meat. More swordsmen pushed their way between the pike men, though, pushing the undead horrors back and clearing the way for the bulk of the defenders to break out. Once they were clear of the gate they followed the path that had been cleared by the cavalry through the devastated remains of the city.

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     Emerging from the gate in the outer wall, Vento lead the cavalry towards the tents occupied by the commanders of the Shadowarmies, intent on keeping them too busy to take effective control. A small city of tents lay in their way and the horses trampled them under their ironwood shod hooves, their riders slashing with their swords at any enemy soldier whose head happened to come within reach. A company of Shadow pikemen was trying to get themselves organised but they had no time before the city’s horsemen were past them, the horses leaping across a dike that had been dug across the former farmland. The earth had been piled up on the far side of the dike and the horses scrambled up it, their riders crouching low across their necks, and a scattered line of soldiers slashed their swords ineffectually at them as they raced past.

     More dikes had been dug beyond. Apparently someone with some imagination had foreseen that the command tents might be a target, but they’d been expecting spies and assassins, creeping out under cover of darkness, not a suicidal charge of cavalry. The horsemen leapt over them and crashed their way through everything in their path. Humans, shologs, milling crowds of screaming goblins. Even an ogre dodged out of the way, grunting with annoyance as a sword wielded by the rider behind Vento drew a line of blood across its broad back. A squad of archers let fly with arrows and several horsemen fell from their saddles. Vento cursed violently, but there was nothing they could do but grit their teeth and mutter prayers under their breath. An arrow grazed his head, the flint head opening a flap of skin above his left eye, and another bounced off his shoulder guard. His horse stumbled in mid step as it was also hit, but none of the injuries were serious and it recovered rapidly. “Good boy!” muttered Vento with admiration. “Show the bastards what Belthar steeds are made of!”

     The command tents were close now, and Vento aimed his horse towards the biggest of them, a magnificent affair the size of a circus tent with dark flags and banners flapping in the wind. Figures were emerging from it, curious to see what the noise was, and some of them were dressed as high ranking officers. Vento grinned with savage anticipation and lifted his sword. Let’s see how many of you I can take to Hell with me, he thought. If I’ve got to go, I’m damned if I’m going alone!

     A dazzling flash of light suddenly burst in front of him. The riders were blinded and horses reared up in panic. Vento was almost thrown, but he held onto his place with a grimace of determination as his horse spun and danced. He shouted commands until it fell back down onto all fours. A wizard! He thought in alarm. A single starburst spell to disable an entire column of cavalry!

     A vivid after image blocked his vision, but his peripheral vision showed spear throwers coming towards him. He turned his horse towards them, shouting commands to his men while searching around for the wizard.  Where in the name of the Gods was he? A spear was thrown and he crouched down in the saddle to dodge it, then lopped off the man’s head with a swing of his sword. Another spear grazed his horse’s flank and a third flew past his shoulder. He pulled on the reins to turn his horse again and ran the man down.

     Then a spear hit his horse squarely in the side and it went down screaming. Vento rolled out of the saddle as it hit the ground and scrambled to his feet, trying you look in all directions at once to see where the nearest threat lay. The remainder of his men galloped past him, one of them angling towards him to offer him a ride, but more spearman were closing in and he turned to ride them down instead. Vento saw movement out of the corner of his eye and turned to see a group of shologs charging at him, their massive teeth bared in a savage grin of delight. He sliced open the belly of the first one to reach him, but it bowled into him and knocked him down, simultaneously stabbing with a large, ironwood dagger. The blade was turned by his breastplate but then the others were on him, barking and howling with jubilation as they stabbed again and again with their massive, steel blades…

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     The handful of griffins remaining to the city circled around overhead, giving whatever assistance they could to the battle below, and Resalintas climbed up onto the roof of a ruined house where he had a clear view of all that was going on, grimly determined to take his toll of the enemy before he left. The raucous screeching of wyverns split the air a few minutes later, and then the hideous flying reptiles were there, their riders almost hidden by tattered leather bat wings and pennants of night black and bone white. The griffins looked tiny beside them, like mice before venomous snakes and outnumbered three to one moreover, but the wyverns were ponderous and cumbersome while the griffins were swift and agile, darting easily among wings, serpentine necks and wickedly barbed tails. Tearing the scaly skin open with lion claws and eagle beaks while their valiant riders aimed bow and arrow at the armoured Shadowriders.

     Resalintas’s heart lifted with pride at the courage and valour of the city’s aerial cavalry, but their position was clearly hopeless. Even as he watched, a wyvern struck a griffin a lucky blow with its tail, the razor sharp tip slashing open its furry flank and spilling blood and entrails. The flying steed convulsed in agony, spilling its rider to a fatal plunge onto hard rooftops, and then went into a spiraling dive, screeching its suffering and despair all the way. Another griffin met its end between a wyvern’s jaws, another stroke of luck for the forces of evil. The difference in size meant that a griffin would have to fight long and hard to bring down a wyvern, whereas the huge flying reptiles only had to strike one lucky hit.

     Incensed with fury, Resalintas raised his arms and shouted a prayer to Samnos, ending with a pointed finger and a Word of Power. An aura of radiant holiness lit him up and lanced out at the nearest wyvern, spearing it like a pin through a butterfly and blasting it into a shower of blood and scales. He blasted a second and a third, accompanying each attack with a curse and a prayer, and he continued destroying them until he was too exhausted to continue.

     The violent destruction of so many of the enemy’s most fearsome weapons inspired the men with new hope and a spirit of determination while dismaying the enemy. More critically, it had given the remaining griffin riders a much needed breathing space and they turned on the remaining wyverns with new energy and vigour. Out of the corner of his eye Resalintas saw Drake’s carpet flying him to safety, and he whispered a prayer for him, calling on Samnos to carry him swiftly and safely to his next battle where, if his Lord was willing, he would win the great victory he so richly deserved.

     Savage cries came from below and he looked down to see a troop of ogres staring up at him. The priest gave a savage grin and leaped down to land in their midst, swinging his sword until the blood rose around him in a terrible, crimson spray…