slicing through ribs and gut. He wrenched it clear and checked his next target.
‘Ren, seek the archers,’ said The Unknown. ‘Denser, Erienne, offence. We can’t afford a shield. Cast whenever you’re ready.’
Behind them weakened timbers continued to fall, and now the Black Wings came in from three sides.
On The Raven’s left the TaiGethen and Rebraal launched a stinging attack. All four had dual short blades drawn and used them to devastating effect, forcing the Black Wings back. Beside The Unknown warrior, Aeb, his axe and long sword whirling, practically struck the head from his first enemy and crashed his sword again and again on the weakening upper defence of the next, eventually breaking through to carve the blade through shoulder and deep into chest.
The Unknown himself fought silently and powerfully, his dagger flicking everywhere, defence that could attack at will. He slashed it across the face of one man, who reacted by bringing his blade up to block the return blow only to catch the Raven warrior’s sword in his waist. The Unknown turned it, pulled it clear and kicked the body away.
Hirad had no such pretensions to silence. Looking for a way through to Selik, he bellowed into the faces of those against him, using his sword two-handed, driving his arms to work it through again and again, his muscles beginning to protest. He ignored the pain, leaning in and butting the nose of his nearest enemy before heaving his sword through close to his own body and into the man’s ribs. He forced the blade clear, raising it to block the next Black Wing’s strike and sweeping immediately down to hack into his leg. The man fell on his dead companion and Hirad chopped down on his neck to finish the job.
Ren’s bow thrummed with metronomic regularity, her arrows taking the remaining two archers from the platforms above the gates before getting to work on the men in the middle of the compound.
But, for all their killing, The Raven were being pushed back by sheer weight of numbers. Hirad took a cut across his chest as he leapt away from a clever reverse strike, the blow slicing his armour and drawing blood. He blocked the next away, Darrick next to him taking the man out with a downward stab through the collarbone into the heart.
‘We need more effort!’ called Hirad. ‘Where are those spells?’
‘Right here,’ said Denser. ‘On my signal.’
Hirad changed to a one-handed grip, punched into the mouth of the man standing in front of him and kicked him clear.
‘Now.’
Hirad ducked. The DeathHail surged out, dealing awful damage. Needle- and razor-sharp flecks of ice fired into the faces of the Black Wings, flaying skin from bone, goring into eyes and ripping holes in hands and clothing. In front of Hirad the attack momentarily collapsed. At the same time Erienne dumped more FlameOrbs at the back of the press, and from the far left the ClawBound pair broke free and panic engulfed the edge of the attack.
‘Push Raven, now!’
Hirad stormed back into the fight, sensing The Unknown and Darrick on either side. He opened up a huge wound in the side of a man whose face was covered in blood, levered him down and raced on, hacking into the top of a skull, kicking out right and connecting sharply with a groin and ripping his sword clear to bury it in the chest of the next.
He looked left. A blade was coming at him. He raised his guard but there was no need. The Unknown turned the blow aside easily and plunged his dagger into the eye of the Black Wing, where it stuck as the man fell. Aeb thundered on, bleeding from his waist and thigh. His sword sheared that of his opponent, his axe bit through backbone.
‘Come on!’ shouted Hirad.
Almost too late, he saw a sword flash his way. He swayed instinctively left but it caught him in the side. He felt the edge come through his leather and cut his side, deep but not debilitating. He cried out, clearing his head of the sudden pain, and clamped his right hand on the hilt of his opponent’s blade, pushing it clear as he crashed his own down, chopping deep, very deep, into the Black Wing’s hip.
Next to him, Darrick slipped two amateur thrusts with embarrassing ease and shuddered his own blade into the neck of his enemy. The Black Wings were down to their last men and it showed. The battle swung conclusively The Raven’s way.