The Wandering God

42 Twist Into A Single Rope 3/3

But then another sound came. The rattle of armor and the sound of battle cries.

A full troop of soldiers, near 30 strong, rounded the fortress. Raising their shields and with swords drawn, they made for Zakhar and Sanli below him.

"Shit," Kageyama cursed. He glanced once more above him, then kicked off the wall, sliding back down the rope.

He let go of the rope lengths from the ground, grasped his sword, drew it, and was on the nearest soldier before his feet touched earth. With a gasp the man fell to his knees, throat gushing red.

Beside him Zakhar roared and swung his axe, the catching two soldiers and sending them spinning away into their companions. Behind Zakhar, Sanli ducked and grabbed the sword of a fallen man, and swung it clumsily with his uninsured hand.

Together, the three men were trapped, pinned between the troop of soldiers and the fortress.

The soldiers, realizing they had the three men trapped, pressed harder. Kageyama furiousley cut, ducking and swinging with his blade, but they were too outnumbered; arrows started to fall from the wall above them again, one shuddered into the ground by his foot—

"Argh!" Zakhar cried, as another arrow buried in the top of his shoulder. Zakhar fell to his knees.

"Zakhar!" Kageyama cried. A soldier, taking advantage of Zakhar's lowered axe, darted forward, blade swinging for Zakhar's face-

-a gurgling sound came from the mans throat a moment later, as Sanli's sword swung forward in an arc faster than Kageyama thought possible. Red blossomed across the man's neck. The soldiers swing went wide-

-but still caught Zakhar, cutting a clean line from jaw to cheekbone. The gouge was just a red line one moment, then the next red flooded down the side of Zakhar's face.

Zakhar fell forward, onto all fours. Kageyama dove before him, fending off attacks from soldiers who had been too afraid of Zakahr's wild axe before and were now seeking revenge. Sanli stood beside Zakhar, bravely fending off the blows that Kageyama missed.

The group of soldiers fell back. Nearly the entire original group of thirty had fallen, or had limped to the sidelines to nurse wounds. But double that number had poured out of the fortress and now surrounded them on either side.

Kageyama sent out his knives, Kaizoumaru and Kesshomaru, and two soldiers screamed, one engulfed in flames and the other in a creeping case of crystal. The strange magic caused their companions in arms to hesitate but only momentarily. Then the press came again.

They were too outnumbered, the horses were too far away to reach, and Kageyama could think of no clever trick. This is it. This is-

The sonorous sound of a war horn pierced the air.

The soldiers from the fortress and those they besieged turned. At top a hillock out on the plains, twenty men on horseback stood. All were dressed in black. Their different shapes and sizes, outlined by the fading light seeping across the plains, suggested a mixture of humans and mu'ren alike.

Is that... Zhangyu's guard...?

The warhorn sounded again, and as one the riders charged.

A few of Changsha's soldiers turned to face the oncoming horses. But most looked around uncertainly. Killing three men did not require direction, but marshaling to defeat a mountated unit? That required coordination.

"Gahh!"

Kageyama, taking advantage of the soldiers' distraction, felled two nearest to him with slashes to the back of the neck where helmet met armor.