«Come on back up here, you bastards!» he roared at the top of his lungs. «We've got to hold the wall.»

The sight and sound of Blade jerked the retreating Dreamers to a stop and turned them into a solid mass. As the Wakers poured down the inside of the wall, stumbling, falling, and yelling like fiends, they ran into the Dreamers coming back. The crash as the two forces ran head-on into each other at full speed echoed in the street and nearly deafened Blade. But he was too busy slashing his way through the enemy close at hand to pay much attention to what was going on behind him.

Stones began to crash down from windows high above as the people up there joined in the fight. They were falling wildly onto both sides alike.

Blade opened his mouth to bellow, «Stop it!» to the fools at the windows. As he did so, a stone plummeted down and bounced off the back of his skull. It was like being hit with a hammer. He staggered as sparks and flame exploded in his head. He nearly went down. A Waker saw him reel and sprang forward, sword raised. But the man kept on going forward, down onto his knees, down onto the top of the wall as a Dreamer leaped up behind him and ran a spear through him. Half-stunned, Blade suddenly realized that he was surrounded by Dreamers, Narlena among them, all around him. Not Wakers! The Wakers were either leaping down the outside of the wall and taking to their heels or kneeling and begging for mercy.

Not all of them received it. The Dreamers' blood was boiling, and more than a few of them went charging straight off into the darkness in pursuit of the fleeing Wakers before Blade could stop them. He cursed them half-incoherently as they dashed past him; they might be running into a trap. Then somebody stuck the spout of a water jug into his mouth. The water poured down his dry throat, and his head began to clear.

As he looked around him, he began to wonder whether there could be enough Wakers left from the attacking column to provide the trap he had feared. He didn't even want to guess at the number of Waker bodies lying in the street on either side of the wall or on the slopes of the wall itself. Not much under two hundred, certainly. And he could only see about a dozen Dreamer bodies. There must be more, but even if there were two or three times as many, it was still a solid victory. The riverbank column wasn't going to be in shape for another attack for a long time.

He looked down the street to the south and saw the sharp, jagged movements of a battle there. The Dreamer pursuers and the freeing Wakers were fighting it out. The catapult fired again. This time a fireball soared all the way down the street into the middle of the fight. The fight broke apart amid screams and shouts. A moment later there was nothing alive in the street except a dozen or so Dreamers drifting back to the wall, herding as many Waker prisoners ahead of them.

Blade would have liked to stay and greet them. But he had heard nothing of how the Dreamers were doing against the other two Waker attacks, and he had to know. The battle for Pura could still very easily be lost. Calling to Narlena, he strode away up the street, holding his throbbing head as still as he could.

Chapter Nineteen

Blade and Narlena turned into the street leading back to the center of the enclave and increased their pace to a trot. Suddenly Blade heard running feet approaching, and another messenger dashed up to him.

The man was panting so hard that at first he could not speak. Finally he gasped, «Captain Blade, the other two columns are both in sight but neither is attacking. Captain Yekran wants to know if he should lead the reserves out to attack them»

«No, damn it, tell that id-«Before he could get any further, the dull pain in his head suddenly flared into something savage and pounding. He winced and staggered and would have fallen if Narlena and the messenger had not grabbed him and held him upright.

After a moment the pain faded back to a dull ache, but he could feel the veins in his temples pulsing unnaturally. Lord Leighton was trying to bring him home. The computer had reached out across dimensions for him, for his brain. For the first time in several trips it had missed its first thrust. But it would be trying again, and sooner rather than later it would drag him back to Home Dimension. And damn it, he didn't want to go now! All his work in Pura had been leading up to this battle, and now he might be snatched away in the middle of it and have to leave the overconfident Yekran in command.

The messenger was still holding onto him, staring up into his face, with wide eyes. «Are you feeling all right, Captain Blade?»

«Well enough for the moment. Go to Yekran at once. Tell him that he should not take anybody outside the walls unless I tell him. Anybody.» He slapped the messenger lightly on the shoulder. «Run!» The messenger shot off into the darkness even faster than he had come. Blade and Narlena followed more slowly.

They came up through the center of the enclave where the reserves had already heard of the rout of the southern attack. The fighters swarmed around Blade, pounding him on the back, pumping his hand, cheering loud enough to make his head ache even more. Seeing the Dreamers cheering and capering about as if the battle had already been won didn't improve Blade's already short temper. He was on the verge of bursting out furiously at the people around him when suddenly the blue-white light of the marconite lamps poured down the street from the north. A moment later the unmistakable roar of another battle followed the light. Messengers came pelting down the street, yelling, «Attack! Attack! All along the northern side. They're on the wall!»

Before Blade could move or speak, the entire reserve force was on the move, pouring north like stampeding cattle. The rush nearly swept Blade and Narlena off their feet. Blade waved his arms, struck at people with the flat of his sword, shouted at them to halt, roared threats, and roared curses that would have blistered their ears as thoroughly as any fireball if they had ever been heard over the uproar. He might as well have saved his breath. Most of the reserves kept on at a dead run to the north side of the enclave. As they came pelting up, Blade grabbed Narlena by the arm and dragged her to one side. Then he sprang up on a pile of stones to get a view over the heads of the crowd.

Some of the Wakers here had bows. Arrows were whistling in both directions; Blade saw little swirls in the crowd of reserves as men went down. He sprang down from the pile and pushed his way forward, using his hands, elbows, and voice on the staring, milling crowd. Eventually he got through and up onto the wall.

There were more Wakers here than there had been in the southern attack, but they were not rushing in. Not now, at least. A litter of mangled and charred bodies in the street before the wall showed where they had tried it once. Now they were holding well back at the end of the street, too far for accurate shooting by the catapults, too spread out to make a good target for the fireballs. Blade frowned. Were the Wakers here too demoralized from a single repulse to make another attack? Or were they waiting. And if so, what for?

Yekran spoke from behind him, and Blade spun around. «What's going on here?»

«They came in once and lost about fifty men. We used the lights, and that was a great surprise for them. After that, they went back to the end of the street. They seem to be waiting there for something.»

So Yekran had noticed it, too.

His sober voice showed it was bothering him.

«You're right,» said Blade. «But we can't do anything about them now. Let's get those damned reserves back where they belong, now! They can't do a thing standing around here like that and gaping.»