There was barely half the tally of the defending southerners that had stood at the Madamer Gate in the morning; and there was an ashen cast to the faces that remained, for the northwest wind was not good to breathe. Unwounded limbs were numb and slow, and brains were clouded with a nagging dread that had little to do with the mortal risk of battle.
Kentarre said, as she bound up another archer's arm, "Thurra is known to love slow bloodshed, and he can afford not to hurry, for nothing can stand against him. But you have done him a blow he did not expect, for you tore down his standard."
"Thurra?" Harry said in disbelief.
Kentarre nodded, and Terim and Senay both stopped what they were doing and looked at her. Kentarre said: "I recognized him at once. He laughs during battle, and he always rides a white stallion who loves bloodshed as much as he does.
"Why do you think there are so few of us left after so brief a meeting? We are strong fighters, and we fight with the strength of despair besides, for we are terribly outnumbered. But anyone who is struck by the white rider dies on the first blow."
"Not everybody," said Terim. "Not Harimad-sol."
Kentarre nodded solemnly. "Why do you think we follow her?"
Harry said, with her left arm across Sungold's saddle to help hold herself up, "I did not die only because he chose not to kill me. I cannot match him, even for one blow." Sungold turned his head, and Harry reached stiffly out to put her fingers on his soft muzzle. She rested them there for a moment, and a little warmth crept into her nerveless hand. "And, perhaps, a little because I ride a better horse than his."
There was a commotion then, somewhere behind them, near the mouth of the trail; and then one of Jack's men laughed, and the commotion subsided. Harry looked inquiringly in the direction of the laugh, and saw a tall slim figure stride forcefully into the clearing, leading a tired horse.
"Dickie!" she said; and blushed uncomfortably, because she knew how he hated the old childhood name. "Richard - " she began, humbly, but he had reached her by then and threw his arms around her. She hugged him back, although her right arm was still not functioning very well and the left was weaker than it should be. He let her go at last, and her eyes blurred, and she couldn't tell if the brightness in his eyes was her own tears, or his.
He said to Jack, although he was staring at his sister, and his hands were closed on her arms as if she might disappear if he let her go, "I returned two days after you had left, sir. I had gotten no satisfaction on my mission, as you anticipated."
Jack grunted.
"They told me what had happened, and where you were going - and who was with you - and I took a fresh horse and followed you." He smiled at last. "Harry, damn you, we all thought you were dead."
She shook her head. "I'm not, you see." She smiled back. "Not yet, at least."
Richard let his hands drop. The shadowed army lay spread below them, and the north wind, which had quieted a little after Tsornin beat back the wizard's stallion and Narknon pulled down the red-and-white standard, began to howl around them again, and sting their eyes and throats.
"Took another horse?" said Jack musingly. Richard had dropped his reins when he reached for Harry, and the animal stood, weary and patient, where it had halted. "This looks like Bill Stubbs' horse."
Richard turned back to his commander and grinned. "It is. It always was too good for him; and I needed something fast, to catch up with you before it was all over."
"You've just blighted a spotless career with horse-stealing?" Jack said mildly.
Richard sobered. "If you like. You know that all of us who have come here - thrown in our lot with the old Damarians - are finished as far as Her Majesty's Government is concerned. You knew that when you decided to come."
Harry stared at Jack, although in the back of her mind she had known this all along. "Is this true?"
Jack shrugged. "Yes, it's true. That's why the two dozen of us who came are all grizzled old veterans - we don't have much to lose. But Richard, you - "