Casket of Souls

still. Give me another victory today and I promise you, you will see the hidden lands of Plenimar through the eyes of conquerors!” She paused as another cheer went up, not quite as enthusiastic as the last one.
    Beka glanced over at Klia, but the commander kept her gaze on the queen. She wasn’t smiling now.
    More than the Plenimaran forces stood between them and Benshâl; the mountains loomed ahead, the passes perhaps still crawling with defenders, and winter coming on. Snow showed on some of the higher peaks already. Even without resistance, it would take more than a few days to traverse those heights—and who knew what lay beyond? More troops in reserve? An armed populace? Unless they captured the Overlord and paraded him before the army, the chances of resistance were high.
    “My brothers and sisters!” Phoria continued. “This day we have the chance to secure the lasting safety of Skala. No more will Plenimaran armies march on us. No more will their ships plunder our vessels and coast, carrying Skalan citizens off into wretched slavery. No more will they choke off the Gold Road and starve our treasuries, our people. In our beloved homeland, people are suffering now, this very day, from the deprivations caused by Plenimar’s boundless aggression. Our people! Our loved ones! And those who have spilled their blood to keep us free of Plenimar’s yoke! My brothers and sisters, will you stand with me this day to preserve the future of our homeland?”
    This was greeted with a roar of acclaim, Klia and Beka with them.
    Across the field came more cheering, but Beka thought it must be driven by desperation.
    Phoria drew the Sword of Gherilain as she shouted, “For Skala!”
    “For Skala and the queen!” the soldiers roared with one voice, banging shields and waving weapons. “For Skala and the queen!”
    Brandishing the great sword, Phoria wheeled her horse and gave the signal. The battle trumpets blared out on both sides of the field and the armies began the dance of battle.
    The two forces clashed like surf against the rocks. As the morning wore on, lines broke and pockets of little battles formed across the field. Outnumbered as they were, the Plenimarans fought with the fury and zeal of defenders. It went on through the morning and into the afternoon. Beka and Nyal stayed at Klia’s side, with Myrhini and most of Beka’s troop. So Beka was close enough to hear when Klia let out a ragged cry of dismay.
    “The queen’s horse is down! To the queen!”
    Just ahead of them, the queen’s standard, close by Danos’s pennant, wavered over a seething sea of battle for a moment, then went down. There was no sign of Phoria or her horse. Getting to the queen was nearly impossible but somehow they hacked their way through.
    As they neared where they’d last seen her standard, Beka realized that Nyal was no longer beside her. In the crush of battle there was only an instant to look around, but there was no sign of him. Heart warring with duty, she had no choice but to press forward with Klia, who was still shouting, “To the queen!”
    Suddenly the press gave way. Before them, Phoria lay over her dying stallion’s heaving withers with half a dozen dead or dying riders around her. Her horse’s hindquarters were badly hacked and its throat was slashed, Beka noted in an instant, but what filled her heart with ice was the sight of the queen’s headless body, and the laughing Plenimaran marine standing over her, holding her head by her pale hair in one hand and the bloody Sword of Gherilain in the other.
    As voices in two languages shouted the news Klia let out a scream of pure rage and leapt over the horse. With a singleswing she sliced the marine’s head from his shoulders, then caught her sister’s before it could strike the ground. She placed it reverently beside the body, then took up the queen’s sword and held it high, yelling “For the queen! Avenge Queen Phoria!”
    The cry spread and the battle went on, the Skalans driven now by vengeance. The army loved her, the queen who led from the front, and the warriors fought beyond the edge of exhaustion, slaying every Plenimaran they came against or dying in the effort.
    The lowering sun was painting the clouds a bloodstained red when word spread that the Overlord was wounded and suing for peace. Still at Klia’s side, Beka and her troop had to wade through the dead and dying to reach the place of parlay near the shore.
    The Overlord was already there,