Now Bili looked amazed. “You mean that some of you Freefighters actually got out of Behreezburk alive? With our lines drawn so tightly it seems hard to believe that anything larger than a rat could have wormed through them.”
All at once, Hohguhn’s mouth dropped open, his seamed and weathered face mirroring surprise. When, at length, he again spoke, his tone was less of respect than of utter awe. “By my Steel, you . . . you be Bili the Axe! It wuz you what slew the earl and two of his bodyguards in that fight under the north wall. I seen it!
“And now you be duke here? Well, my lord, me and my men, what’s left of us, we’d be purely honored to fight under your banner, we would!”
While Lieutenant Krahndahl conducted Hohguhn and his men up to the hall to get them outfitted and decently mounted, Bili and the warband picked through what was left of the string of camps, dispatching any wounded they came across, making certain that the dead really were deceased and earmarking usable spoils for later collection by the hall garrison.
Then Krahndahl and Hohguhn were cantering down the hill at the head of the reinforcements and, at Bili’s word, Raikuh’s bugler sounded the recall while the thoheeks and Milo mindcalled the rest. And the larger-by-a-third column reformed and negotiated the ford and set off in pursuit of the quarry, the great prairiecats-Whitetip, Lover-of-Water and Steelclaws-bounding well in the lead.
The road beyond the ford was muddy for several hundred yards, deeply indented with impressions of hoof and wheel, of bpotsole and sandal and bare foot. Even after the mud had given way to choking dust, the discarded weapons and equipment gave clear evidence of retreat bordering upon rout.
Then, from the far side of a small patch of woods around which the road curved, came the rippling snarls of the huge cats, immediately followed by a veritable chorus of screams and wails of terror.
When Bili galloped around the turn, Mahvros had to make a quick, jarring jump, lest he trample Steelclaws and the writhing, black-bearded man into whose shoulder the cat had sunk his long fangs. Whitetip and Lover-of-Water had cor-raled the other four-and-twenty priests into a tight, shrieking bunch as neatly as might a pair of veteran herd dogs with an equal number of sheep.
A glance back at the blood-spurting man under the youngest cat told Bili that he could not live out the hour bearing such terrible wounds, so he mindspoke Steelclaws, “You may kill him, Cat Brother. But wait until all the horses are past you; then do it messily. Well put fear of Sun and Wind into these bastards!”
Bili had his warriors ring the knot of clerics, but made certain that all the prisoners had an unobstructed view of Steel-claws and his still-flopping victim. At his silent command, the huge cat rolled onto his back, the claws and teeth sunk into the gory flesh, bringing the priest over atop him. Then muscles rippled and bunched under dusty fur as the powerful hind legs were flexed, their needle-sharp talons sinking deep, grating on the hapless man’s lowest ribs. The preceding shrieks had been as nothing to the ear-shattering scream of ultimate agony emitted by the dying man when the cat abruptly thrust backward, tearing eight great, ragged wounds from chest to crotch and then flipping the eviscerated creature three yards up the road, trailing gouts of dark blood and coils of pinkish-white guts.
The packhorses were relieved of enough manacles to secure each of the living priests to a tree, and Steelclaws, his coat soaked and clotted with blood, was left to guard them while the grim little band rode on.
Out of the wooded patch, they cantered between fields of burgeoning oats, maize and rye, billowing like green lakes in the morning breeze. Between fields of flax and tobacco, they spotted the first of the rebel pikemen where he sat on the edge of the ditch, repairing a sandal strap. But when, alerted by the pounding hooves, he spotted the body of horsemen and identified the Morguhn banner, he forsook sandal, pike and shield and ran for his life. A couple of the clansmen uncased bows and hastily nocked arrows, but Bili mindspoke.