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her head, pulled back until her neck creaked. The young Kommanza laid down his sword, drew his knife, and traced a palm-sized patch. With a grunt of effort he wrenched the scalp free and held it before her eyes. Fading, it was the last thing she saw as the knife slit her throat, neatly, from ear to ear.
    Being preoccupied, Shkai'ra failed to see the rope lying across the lane before it snapped up under the forefeet of her horse. The animal went over with a scream of pain and fear, cut short with a sickening snap of neckbone. A lifetime's drilled reflex brought her feet out of the stirrups, curled her into a ball in midair. The hilt of her saber caught her a painful thump under the armpit, but she ignored it and the taste of blood in her mouth as rage and sorrow washed over her. Spring-Foot-Among-Wildflowers had been not only a trained warhorse and thus valuable, but afriend raised from colthood. By Baiwun Thunderer, someone was going to die for this!
    She came to her feet and sprinted back for her bow. That turned into a frantic dive as a crossbow bolt whirred by her head and thumped into the logs. She pulled the bow free of its case, yanked a shaft out of the quiver, nocked, turned, and loosed in a smooth, flowing curve. The Minztan archer on the roof threw up her hands with a grunt no louder than the meaty thud of the arrow striking home and slid with her weapon to land at Shkai'ra's feet. She had used a broad-headed hunting shaft, better than a needle-thin bodkin point against an unarmored enemy, and it had driven up under the breastbone to sever the spine. Blood flowed out red as sunlight on the snow. There were only three unbroken shafts in the quiver. Shkai'ra mumbled a curse as she clenched them between her teeth and looked around for another target. She did not have long to wait: a section of one of the walls fell outward, and five of the enemy poured through. She was between them and the only hope of escape. They charged.
    She dropped to one knee and shot three times in as many seconds, killing with every shaft; at that range shock alone would kill from a wheelbow as heavy as hers. The leader was a big man in a leather breastplate, swinging a long sword. Her shaft sank to the feathers in his chest, knocking him backward to trip the spearwielder following. Her second arrow slammed through that one's neck and nailed them together. The third paused to aim her own weapon, and waited a moment too long: hunters had less reason than a Kommanza to learn close-range snapshooting. The last two checked, long enough for her to shift the shield slung across her back to her left arm and snap out her saber.
    For a moment they stared at each other, the Minztans stunned by their comrades'
    deaths, the Kommanza considering. The two remaining were a woman in her thirties, with a wooden shield and spear, and a slight youth with a spike axe that looked too heavy for his wrists. Shkai'ra made a swift decision. She had been standing in the standard footfighting position, crouched with her feet at right angles, left forward and shield up under her eyes, saber held high with the hilt toward the enemy. A vast lighthearted calm possessed her as she filled her lungs and charged with an earsplitting scream.
    "AAAAAAAAAAüüMeeeeEEEEEEEE—" she shrieked, an endless saw-edged wailing that clawed at the nerves. Charging, she ran crabwise with her blade whirling to distract the eye; it was a reckless move against an experienced opponent, but a thousand subtle clues of stance and tension had told her that these were no warriors she faced.
    The other woman lunged with her spear. Shkai'ra went in under the point, crouching and driving upward with all the strength of leg and thigh added to her momentum, bracing her shoulder against her buckler. The shields struck with a gunshot crack and the Minztan reeled backward. Shkai'ra followed, ignoring the spear once she was inside its reach. Levering the other's shield aside with the edge of her own, she struck