"Oh, and tell them if anyone looks behind him before they're told, it'll spoil the magic."

Maltonr gave her a doubtful look, then smiled ruefully and sat with his followers and the spear-armed peasants. "How are you going to do that?" Swindapa asked, as they cantered back to their position. "Make each of them strong as two, that is."

Alston shrugged. " 'Dapa, a properly timed flank attack does double the effect," she said. "Now let's get down to business."

They halted by the standard-bearers. She looked down her own line as the chariot people milled on the lip of the rise a thousand yards to the east. The circle of wagons, with the Fiernan archers and slingers inside. More were trickling in every minute, to be shoved into the ring of the wagon-fort or called there by their friends. Others straggled over to join Maltonr and his crouching spearmen. Call it forty or so in the wagons, as many again or a little more with Maltonr, double that soon. Then her own force, a central block of fifty spears three deep and a double line of seventy-five crossbows on either side. She kicked her horse out again, a hundred yards in front, and looked over the line from the enemy's perspective. Good. The Fiernans weren't at all conspicuous; Maltonr's bunch were nearly invisible, what with a slight dip in the ground.

This is going to be ugly, she thought, returning to her station.

The Zarthani had paused for a moment to work out what was waiting for them; then they spread out in a line, blowing their ox-horn trumpets and snouting. Even at this distance she could see bronze and gold and bright felt trappings gleaming on the horses, the heron-feather plumes nodding as they snorted and tossed their heads.

"Nyugen, Trudeau," she said. The two senior lieutenants stood at her stirrup. "Remember, infantry usually breaks before a chariot charge here. When ours doesn't, the chariots may wheel off and try and shoot us up while their infantry close with us, or they may just ram in close as they can. In either case, concentrate fire on the chariots-go for the teams-and then switch to those following. Any questions?"

Both shook their heads. "Good luck."

The tribesmen had shaken themselves out, seven clumps behind the chariots of their chieftains. They started toward her at a walk, yelps and hoots and the odd high shriek coming as they worked themselves up. Wooden axles squealed like tortured pigs, wheels rumbled, hooves pounded the short dense turf, bare human feet slapped dirt. The chariots loomed larger and larger. Now she could see the men in them, the near-naked youths driving, and the leather-armored aristocrats standing behind, although one… she focused the binoculars. Chain mail, by God. Walker had been a busy little bee; and wouldn't one of these suits be a potent bribe here. The riders stood easily in the jouncing unsprung carts with their feet braced wide and knees bent, javelins and bows in their hands. Must train them from toddlers to do that, she thought. The horses trotted as the drivers slapped their backs with the reins, and behind them the hairy kilted warriors began to lope, keeping up effortlessly.

Four hundred yards. "Now," she said.

"Spears… down!" the officers barked. The Nantucket troops gave a single deep shout and raised their polearms high. Drums beat, and the cool English sunlight sparkled on the edges and points as the nine-foot shafts swung down into line.

"Prepare to receive cavalry!"

The first rank knelt, propping their oval shields on their shoulders and the ground ahead of them, slanting their spears out. The next two lines stood in staggered formation, points reaching out to make a bristling three-layered forest of knife-sharp heads poised to stab.

"Prepare to fire." The front rank of crossbows knelt. Three hundred and fifty yards. A bugle call. "Fire!"

Alston swung down off her horse, and Swindapa followed. The standard-bearers and their guards and the twelve sword-and-buckler troops formed up behind them. The easterners were at a full run now, horses galloping, pulling the chariots ahead of the footmen. The long shadows of the spears seemed to reach out toward them.

WHUNNNG. Seventy-five crossbow bolts nickered across the space between the two forces, moving in long shallow arcs blurred by their speed. Men fell; the short heavy arrows would punch right through the light hide-and-wicker shields, through the arm holding the shield and then the breastbone, and crunch into the spine. A chariot went over in a tumbling, splintering whirl as both its horses were struck by several bolts apiece and collapsed in mid-stride.

WHUNNNG. The second volley brought another two chariots down, and a dozen men; the range was closing fast. A slight ripple through the spearpoints as the troops braced themselves. WHUNNNG. WHUNNNG. The ratcheting click of the mechanisms as the crossbows' cocking levers were pumped. A chariot veering and going off on a wild tangent, a bolt standing in the rump of the off-lead horse and the animal plunging and bucking with its eyes bulged out, squealing piteously. WHUNNNG. More men down, but not as many as with the Olmecs-the easterners had a better formation than that, irregular but strung out so that men could support each other without crowding. So had their ancestors conquered, spreading out from the steppes of inner Asia, west to the Atlantic and east to the borderlands of China.

WHUNNNG. More chariots out of action, the man in chain mail dismounting and running forward, screaming hatred at those who'd wounded his precious horses. The remaining war-cars edged away from the sleeting death of the crossbows, heading toward the massed spearpoints at the bottom of the American formation. Then still farther to the right, as the Fiernan archers and slingers in the circled wagons opened up, ragged but enthusiastic. Arrows whistled, and slingstones cracked on shields, whunked into flesh. WHUNNNG. Very close now, a hundred yards, and the bowmen among the Zarthani were shooting as they ran. Shafts arched up into the sky, slammed down. Bronze and flint sparked and bent and shattered on steel armor and pattered on metal-faced shields. Here and there one slipped through to find vulnerable flesh, and a few Americans were dragged backward by the stretcher-bearers; their comrades closed the ranks.

Half the Zarthani were left on their feet, many of them wounded. One chariot came on, its horses streaming blood and foam, bolting, but bolting in the direction their driver wanted them to go. Alston could see snarling grins, shouting faces, axes whirling overhead in blurring circles.

"Bows down!" barked the officers. Trumpets reinforced the orders. A last spatter of bolts, and the crossbows went over their users' shoulders. The round bucklers slung across their backs went forward, and hands slapped down to the hilts at their right hips. "Draw!"

Long months of practice made the motion a single flicker of light as the leaf-shaped stabbing swords came free of their wood-and-leather sheaths.

"Give 'em the Ginsu!" someone shouted. Alston's teeth showed in a not-quite-smile. Ian Arnstein had wanted the short sword called a gladius, after the Roman blades it was modeled on. Public opinion had proved stronger. Ginsu it was.

Alston reached over her shoulder and drew her own sword, head moving back and forth as she kept the whole action in sight through the intervening ranks. A long rattle of thrown spears came from the Zarthani, in the moment before impact. An American not far ahead dropped on his back kicking; a spear had bounced off the rim of his shield and up into the unprotected underside of his jaw. The driver of the last chariot was leaning back, hauling on the reins to try to skim along the line while his warrior shot arrows. He almost made the quick turn, but the horses were too far gone in hysteria to respond as they'd been trained. Their too-tight curve put their legs into the thicket of spear-points, and they collapsed. The chariot cartwheeled sideways; its crew were thrown out straight onto the waiting points, but the wood-and-wickerwork vehicle followed right behind.