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expected, the leader headed directly for him. Closer he came, and closer, and still the orc refused to budge. Slowly, an insidious grin spread across his filthy green face.
    The lance was now mere feet from the orc’s heavily muscled chest. And then, with a speed that was nigh incomprehensible, Cræosh sidestepped. Sidestepped—and grabbed.
    It was a move that would have been, for even the mightiest of humans, absolutely impossible. But Cræosh’s people, with the exception of the gargantuan ogres, are easily the strongest of the sundry goblinoid races. One unfortunate human was about to learn just what that meant.
    Cræosh snagged the shaft of the weapon in both hands and jabbed downward, sinking the point deep into the soil. The dumbfounded knight vaulted into the air, held aloft by the lance’s handle, which was locked professionally under his arm.
    For a timeless instant, the tableau held: the plate-clad human a living pennant swaying in the wind; the orc, biceps bulging, both fists locked around the warped and bending lance. But of course, it couldn’t last. Something was bound to give, and quickly.
    It did. With an abbreviated scream, the knight slipped from the end of the lance and plummeted to the dirt, where he landed with a painful crash and a cacophony of clatters.
    Casually, Cræosh released his grip on the lance—which, though wobbling frenetically, still protruded from the ground like some demented sapling—and strode to the battered warrior.
    “How…?” the human gasped, struggling desperately to regain his breath, unable for the moment to move. “It’s…It’s not possible!”
    “You,” Cræosh observed, “appear to be having difficulty breathing. Would you like some help?”
    The knight’s expression—now exposed, as the helmet’s visor had been knocked askew in the fall—shifted in terror as the orc’s foot slammed down hard beneath that helmet and crushed his windpipe.
    They get younger every year
, Cræosh noted, glancing briefly at the human’s face.
Where’s the honor in slaughtering children?
Then he shrugged, turning his attention back to the others. At least, at that age, the meat was tender….
    He snarled, all thoughts of food forgotten. Dækek was handling himself admirably; he’d already punched several holes through his opponent’s armor with the jagged spikes of his morningstar. But the other orcs were more evenly matched, and even as Cræosh watched, one of his tribe went down hard beneath the largest human’s hand-and-a-half sword.
    With a thunderous cry, Cræosh charged, head down, shoulder forward. The knight, struggling to remove the massive blade from his opponent’s corpse, barely had time to turn his steed to meet the sudden impact. Frantically he swung, determined to divorce the orc’s head from his neck.
    Cræosh ducked and then dove into the legs of the startled horse. Several loud snaps reverberated over the sounds of battle, and the animal collapsed, screaming.
    The knight, abruptly pinned by one leg beneath his thrashing mount, struggled to yank himself free before—
    Too late. A thin string of drool swinging from his lips, Cræosh reached down, grabbed the human’s forehead in one hand and his jaw in the other, and twisted. A sickening pop, a gout of blood, and Cræosh was once again glancing around for more enemies.
    But here, even Cræosh’s years of battlefield experience proved inadequate. So busy had he been tackling the warhorse, he had perforce failed to notice another of his orcs dying beneath the blades of the two remaining knights. One of the pair went for Dækek, who had by then dispatched his own foe. The other had come for Cræosh—and by the time the big orc sensed his approach, it was too late to avoid the whistling blade.
    And yet, just before his sword hit home, the human lurched, an expression of bewilderment stealing over his features. The blow landed, yes, but with negligible strength, failing even to bruise through the metal