Guardians of the West

built walls erected to bar entrance into the rest of the city.
    Garion, flanked by Barak and Mandorallen, waited in a snowy street near the perimeter of the occupied quarter.
    "This is the part I hate," he said tensely. "The waiting."
    "I must confess to thee that I myself find this lull just before a battle unpleasant," Mandorallen replied.
    "I thought Arends loved a battle." Barak grinned at his friend.
    "It is our favorite pastime," the great knight admitted, checking one of the buckles under his armor. "This interim just 'ere we join with the enemy, however, is irksome. Sober, even melancholy, thoughts distract the mind from the main purpose at hand."
    "Mandorallen," Barak laughed. "I've missed you."
    The shadowy form of Yarblek came up the street to join them. He had put aside his felt overcoat and now wore a heavy steel breastplate and carried a wicked-looking axe.
    "Everything's ready," he told them quietly. "We can start just as soon as the little thief gives us the signal."
    "Are you sure your men can pull down those walls?" Barak asked him.
    Yarblek nodded. "Those people didn't have time enough to set the stones in mortar," he said. "Our grappling hooks can jerk down the walls in a few minutes."
    "You seem very fond of that particular tool," Barak observed.
    Yarblek shrugged. "I've always found that the best way to get through a wall is to yank it down."
    "In Arendia, our preference is the battering ram," Mandorallen said.
    "Those are good, too," Yarblek agreed, "but the trouble with a ram is that you're right under the wall when it falls. I've never particularly enjoyed having building stones bouncing off the top of my head."
    They waited.
    "Has anybody seen Lelldorin?" Garion asked.
    "He went with Silk," Barak replied. "He seemed to think that he could find more targets from up on a roof."
    "He was ever an enthusiast." Mandorallen smiled. "I confess, however, that I have never seen his equal with the longbow."
    "There it is," Barak said, pointing at a flaming arrow arching high above the rooftops. "That's the signal."
    Garion drew in a deep breath and squared his shoulders. "All right. Sound your horn, Mandorallen, and let's get started."
    The brazen note of Mandorallen's horn shattered the stillness. From every street and alleyway, Garion's army poured out to begin the final assault on Rheon. Rivans, Algars, Nadraks, and the solid men of Sendaria crunched through the snow toward the perimeter with their weapons in their hands. Three score of Yarblek's leather-clad mercenaries ran on ahead, their grappling hooks swinging from their hands.
    With Barak at his side, Garion clambered over the treacherous, sliding rubble of the houses that had been pulled down to form the perimeter and over the half-frozen bodies of arrow-stitched cultists who had fallen earlier. A few -though not many- cultists had escaped the hasty floor-by-floor search of Silk's men in the houses facing the perimeter and they desperately showered the advancing troops with arrows. At Brendig's sharp command, detachments of Sendars veered and broke into each house to neutralize those remaining defenders efficiently.
    The scene beyond the perimeter was one of enormous confusion. Advancing behind a wall of shields, Garion's army swept the streets clear of the now-desperate cultists. The air was thick with arrows and curses, and several houses were already shooting flames out through their roofs.
    True to Yarblek's prediction, the loosely stacked walls blocking the streets some way into the city fell easily to the dozens of grappling hooks that sailed up over their troops to bite into the other sides.
    The grim advance continued, and the air rang with the steely clang of sword against sword. Somehow, in all the confusion, Garion became separated from Barak and found himself fighting shoulder to shoulder beside Durnik in a narrow alleyway. The smith carried no sword or axe, but fought instead with a large, heavy club. "I just don't like chopping into people," he apologized, felling a burly opponent with one solid blow. "If you hit somebody with a club, there's a fair chance that he won't die, and there isn't all that blood."
    They pushed deeper into the city, driving the demoralized inhabitants before them. The sounds of heavy fighting at the southern end of town gave notice that Silk and his men had reached the south wall and opened the gates to admit the massed troops whose feigned attack had fatally divided the cult forces.
    And then Garion