Soon enough, the huge cannons were brought to bear on their target. Gustav did not wait to fire a coordinated volley, as Torstensson's artillery was trained to do. Each gun fired as soon as possible.

The fire was ragged, slow, and indifferently aimed. It mattered not at all. Tilly's army was now a crumpled and half-broken thing, distorted almost beyond recognition by the pressure of the battle. The rigid formations of the tercios had collapsed, compressed between Horn's unyielding line and the battering of Torstensson's artillery. Now, adding to their destruction, came the heavy fire of their own cannons. The huge mass of Catholic soldiers-not much more than a mob-was a target impossible to miss, even for the cavalrymen manning the captured guns. And the size of the cannonballs made up for their lack of accuracy. Unlike Torstensson's well-trained and experienced gunners, the cavalrymen failed more often than not in making the grazing shot. But against thousands of men packed so tightly they could barely move, the twelve- and twenty-four-pound balls which landed caused pure havoc.

For one of the rare times in his life, even Gustav was not tempted to launch another charge.

Well… Not much.

"Perhaps…" Jonsson heard him mutter. "Perhaps…" The king was squinting at the distant enemy, raising himself up in his stirrups. His huge frame seemed like that of a brown bear, eyeing a crippled moose.

His bodyguard spoke hastily. "It's a done thing, Your Majesty." Jonsson pointed at the imperial forces with his saber. "They're finished. It's over."

The king took two or three deep breaths, and then eased himself back into the saddle. "Yes."

He heaved a sigh. "They should surrender now. Their cavalry has all fled. No chance of making a sally. They're trapped."

Jцnsson said nothing. There was no chance at all of their enemy surrendering. Not with Tilly in command.

"Poor Tilly," mused Gustav. "Pappenheim has ruined him twice. The butcher of Magdeburg. And now-forever-"

The king's near-sighted blue eyes scanned a landscape that could have been nothing but a blur. But the sight still seemed pleasing to him.

"And now, forever. Breitenfeld."

"God damn Pappenheim," hissed Tilly. The old general's face grew pinched as his aide tightened a bandage, but he made no sound of protest. Just another hissing curse:

"God damn Pappenheim."

Tilly was lying on the ground near the center of his army. He had been wounded twice already. The first wound was minor, not much more than a bad bruise caused by a musketball glancing off his cuirass. The hip wound which his aide was now bandaging was more serious. A pike head sent flying by those infernal Swedish guns had torn him badly. His entire leg was soaked with blood.

Tilly's verbal curse was for Pappenheim. His silent one, for himself.

I should have listened to Wallenstein. So fast! So fast! I never saw an army move that fast. How did that Swedish bastard do it?

The old man was tempted to close his eyes, from sheer anguish and humiliation. But he resisted the impulse, even when-not forty yards distant-he saw another dozen of his men turned into a bloody, bone-splintered mess by a bouncing cannonball. No man would ever say that Tilly-Jan Tzerklas, Count Tilly!-could not face ruin with the same fearlessness with which he had always faced triumph.

Two of his officers approached and knelt at his side. The faces of both men were haggard.

"We must surrender, General," said one of them.

"There is no possibility of retreat," added the other, "not without cavalry to cover us. The Swedish cavalry and their Finns will butcher us."

Still lying on his back, weak from loss of blood, Tilly shook his head. For all the general's exhaustion and age, the gesture was firm as a bull's.

"No." Hissing: "Damn Pappenheim and his precious Black Cuirassiers!" For a moment, he closed his eyes. Again: "No. I will not surrender."

The aides began to protest. Tilly silenced them with a clenched fist held high. His eyes reopened, staring at the sky.

"How soon is nightfall?" he asked.

One of the aides glanced up. "An hour. Perhaps two."

"Hold till then," growled Tilly. "Till nightfall. After that the men can retreat. It will be a rout, but in the darkness the damned Swedes will not be able to pursue. We can save most of the army."

"What's left of it," muttered an aide.

Tilly glared at him. Then at the other. Then at three more officers who had come to their side.

"Useless," he snarled. "As bad as Pappenheim. All glory and no stomach."

He turned to his aide. "Get me up," he commanded. "Onto my charger."

The aide didn't even think to protest. It was the work of a few minutes to lever the old general onto his horse.

From the saddle, Tilly sneered down at his officers.

"Surrender, you say? Damn you all! My men will stand with me."

And so it proved. Till nightfall, Tilly took his place near the front of the imperial line, holding his men by force of will and example.

Jesu-Maria! they cried, dying. Father Tilly!

At dusk, Tilly was struck down again. No one saw the missile which caused the wound. A musketball, perhaps. But by the look of the terrible wound in his shoulder, it was probably another broken piece of the battle, sent flying by those horrible Swedish guns.

His aide and several soldiers rescued him. Improvising a stretcher, they hurried to the rear. Until he lost consciousness a few minutes later, Tilly cursed them for cowards. As the stretcher passed through the broken tercios, clusters of Tilly's soldiers formed a defense guard, escorting their commander to safety.

For the rest, Tilly's fall signaled the rout. The Catholic veterans could stand the butchery no longer. In less than five minutes, the lines which had stood unyielding for hours broke into a stampede. Discarding their weapons and gear, thousands of imperial infantrymen began racing for the shelter of darkness and distant woods.

Most of them made their escape. Gustav ordered no pursuit. Tilly's sheer courage, by holding the Swedes at bay until nightfall, had made the complete destruction of his army impossible.

As he knelt in prayer after the battle, the king of Sweden was not aggrieved and never thought to curse his foe. He understood what Tilly's purpose had been, in that seemingly insane stand, and found nothing in it except admiration.

And, truth be told, a certain satisfaction. The last of a great line had fallen. But he had toppled like a great tree, not rotted like a stump. Something in the pious Lutheran king saw the hand of God at work, in the broken but glorious ruin of his Catholic enemy. God's will worked in mysterious ways, not understood by men. But Gustav thought he could detect something of that divine purpose, in the manner of Tilly's downfall.

No matter, in any event. Gustav Adolf had not completely destroyed his enemy, true. But he had won the greatest battlefield victory in decades, perhaps centuries. And if Tilly had prevented total ruin, the wreckage was still incredible to behold. The proud imperial army which had defeated every opponent they faced since the White Mountain was nothing but rubble.

At Breitenfeld, the Swedish forces suffered barely two thousand casualties. Their opponents?

Seven thousand dead.

Six thousand wounded and captured.

All the artillery, captured.

The entire imperial baggage train, captured.

Ninety battle flags, captured.