trembled, but there was no use being cowardly; there was no-one to help him, and he must decide. Below, the two Chevaliers slept just one hill beyond the low rough earthwork barricade, where the sentries strolled along the line, casually. In the camp, fires were scattered about, and some horses - the wind drifted a little, bringing some eddy with it, and one of the horses raised its head and whickered, uneasily; another pawed at the ground and tossed its head.
"Ce n'est rien, ce n'est rien," a man said, eating his supper near them.
Temeraire drew his lungs full, thought of Laurence, and roared out his challenge.
He kept roaring a long time. The Chevaliers jerked up in their clearing at once, their wings opening even before their eyes had, and began roaring furious answer, their heads twisting this way and that as they searched the sky for him. Men came racing from the tents about them; Temeraire saw a captain with flashes of gold on his shoulder, being put up. They sprang into the air half-crewed, men leaping for the harness from the ground as they rose.
"Je suis la!" Temeraire called out, propelling himself with great thrusts backwards away from the camp, and roared again. "Me voila!" They wheeled mid-air and came barreling straight towards him, teeth bared, and he hovered and waited and then dropped himself straight out of the way, his wings folded closed and tight while they shot by, white flashes of rifle-fire sparking along their backs - and behind them, Gentius came soaring gracefully down over the camp on his wide-spread enormous wings, and spat acid over ten cannon in a row.
Bells of alarm were clanging madly now, torches lit, men rushing out to form into rows as the handful of horses screamed and struggled against their handlers. Temeraire could not help a wild surging sensation of excitement almost overpowering, as Requiescat and Ballista and Majestatis came thundering down through the camp, claws and tails dragging through tents and pickets and fires all alike, scattering them, and the red banners glowing in the fires that bloomed at once all over.
He dived down and joined their long straight row, stretching his ruff wide. They tore across the full length of the camp without a pause, and whipped back up aloft trailing canvas and rope and anything else they had snagged upon their claws. Once they had gone high enough again they could not be shot, they pulled it all off and let it drop down upon the camp.
Perscitia had suggested the notion, as they had no bombs, "especially if you can get some tents pulled up, and drop them on the pepper guns," she had said, and it answered remarkably well - most of the tents bundled up as they dropped, but one luckily unfurled and floated down in a heap atop a company of infantry trying to aim the long-barreled pepper guns, the bayonets poking out of it and making them only worse entangled.
"Oh!" Temeraire said exultantly. "Oh, it is working! Perscitia, look - " but she was nowhere near to be seen, and he could not spend time finding her. The Chevaliers had wheeled about to come back, but they were holding off - the sizzling crisp of Gentius's acid was sharp in the air for anyone to smell if only they put out their tongue, and though it was dark, the fires leaping up from the camp glowed red against Temeraire's belly, and Majestatis and Requiescat and Ballista, enough to make it plain that there were four heavy-weights lined up opposite. Quickly Temeraire turned and roared out, "Chalcedony! Go around and at them!"
"What?" Chalcedony called back, circling himself in mid-air, to try and keep his place; he and the other Yellow Reapers and middle-weights were in a great mass waiting for their turn to have a go at the camp.
"The Chevaliers! All of you circle about and come at them, from behind, make them come towards us," Temeraire called back, impatiently.
"Oh!" Chalcedony said, and the Reapers jumped at it, streamed out in a flock, and whipped around the Chevaliers.
"Second line!" Temeraire cried, and the Anglewings and Grey Coppers all darted down in a pair of short rows, and made another pass through the camp, crosswise to the one the heavy-weights had made - they were all middle-and light-weights, but so especially quick and skillful they were hard to hit even under the best of circumstances, and the soldiers had all been aiming their guns up