Nightrise

for Jamie to work out which was which.
    In the front line were the most wretched of all, the human slaves who had put their trust in the Old Ones and stayed with them to the bitter end. This was their reward. They had all been chained together, either naked or covered with a last few rags, their names branded into their flesh as if they were the cattle.
    They had been given wooden clubs and axes with which to defend themselves. Many of them had been disfigured, missing eyes or ears. Even worse than that, some of them had had the lower part of their arms cut off and replaced with jagged blades so that they and their weapons were one.
    Behind them were more humans: surely the ruling classes. These were the people who Scar had referred to as overlords and advisors. They had swords and shields and — some of them, at least — odd pieces of armor. They were pale and sickly looking, for although they had been happy enough in their positions of power, they had no stomach for the fight. Even from a distance, the fear and cowardice could be seen in their faces.
    Then came four lines of horsemen. Jamie could only think of them as knights, encased in black armor.
    The first two were identical to the fly soldiers he had seen on the way to the City of Canals. But there were two more lines behind them and these were so ugly and grotesque that Jamie could barely bring himself to look at them.
    Perhaps they were the officers. Perhaps they were human beneath the armor. It was impossible to know.
    They had blades jutting out of their shoulders, their elbows, and their knees. Their helmets were also surrounded by vicious black spikes so that, from the neck up, they were like porcupines. Their horses had been mutilated, with silver bayonets jutting out of their foreheads, screwed into place just above their eyes. Each of them had been turned into a grotesque version of a unicorn. The knights were standing rigidly at attention. How many of them were there? It was impossible to say. Each one of them was the same height as his neighbor. In fact they could have been the same man, replicated a thousand times. They were holding shields — also surrounded by spikes — striking them rhythmically with the flats of their swords. That was the booming that Jamie had heard. Seeing them now, hearing the sound froze his blood.
    The worst was still to come.
    It was an infestation. Jamie couldn't think of another word for it as it bled out of the forest, pouring into the field. Jamie had thought this would be a fight between two armies, but what he was seeing now was a horde with no shape or formation, just an oozing mess of nightmarish creatures desperate for the kill.
    They carried clubs studded with nails, huge axes, spears, nets, and pitchforks. Some slithered. Some scuttled forward on three legs or more. They were half man, half animal, as if the two had been mixed up on purpose, to see what could produce the most hideous result. Some were part scorpion, like the creature that had attacked Jamie at Scathack Hill. But there were also man-dogs, man-crocodiles, man-eagles, and even man-sharks, a crazy mixture of arms and teeth and beaks and scales and feathers and claws, all brought together to create unimaginable monsters.
    And finally there were giant animals passing through the forest, high above the trees, looming up behind the army yet not quite part of it.
    The first was a spider. It was about thirty feet high, standing on eight elongated legs with a fat poison sac hanging beneath its stomach. It had two feelers that twitched in front of it, as if testing the air, and great fangs dripping venom and saliva. As it turned its head, Jamie saw the army reflected many times in the glistening black mirrors that were its eyes. Once it attacked, it would be invincible. Swords and arrows would be useless against it. They might as well fight it with pins and needles.
    A huge monkey had appeared next to it, jabbering and screaming with a hideous, high-pitched voice. It wasn't muscular like an ape but almost insectlike, with a long tail and filthy, matted hair. It had only four fingers on one of its hands. As it stood there, the trees suddenly parted and a gigantic hummingbird burst into the air, its wings beating so fast they were just a blur. The bird was creating a storm around itself, whipping up dust and dead branches. A
    moment later, another bird appeared, soaring up into the sky. This one was a condor the size of a plane.
    It flew overhead, its