Free Darknesses by L. E. Modesitt

until the last moment. Then, at my command, we’ll ride out
and do a quick wheel and fire, single-target style, first man at their first
rank, second at their second…”
    “Yes,
sir.”
    Alucius
stationed himself at the head of the single file, where he could remain mounted
and appear to be peering around the corner of wooden shed. To the left of the
single file, to the north and toward the Plateau, another hundred yards away,
was a house, but he doubted that those inside, even if they heard and saw the
troopers, would be likely to raise any alarm.
    Before
long, the faint sound of hoofs slipped through the darkness, a sound Alucius
alone could hear, and a confirmation of what his Talent-senses had already
revealed.
    “Stand
ready,” he hissed.
    Another
fraction of a glass passed, and the raiders neared the orchard.
    “Column
forward.” Alucius kept his voice low, waiting until all his troopers were clear
of the shed. “Wheel in place. Second squad! Fire at will!” Alucius projected
both his voice and a sense of command.
    The
chill air cracked apart under the almost simultaneous volleys from the north
and southwest of the road. The militia force fired a good three volleys before
a single lighter series of cracks came from the
raiders.
    As
the voids of death and the agony of the wounded raiders swept over Alucius, a
grim smile flicked across his lips. The glass after glass of training had
clearly paid off.
    “Withdraw!
Back!” The command was in the Lanachronan dialect. That scarcely surprised
Alucius.
    Once
he was certain that the raiders had turned, he eased Wildebeast back toward the
road.
    “Second
Squad! Re-form!”
    “Re-form
on the captain!”
    Alucius
quickly reloaded with the speed of long practice and habit. Still, quick as the
squad was, the last of the surviving raiders had vanished over the crest of the
river road before second squad began the pursuit. That was fine with Alucius.
There was no sense in riding into the volleys from third squad.
    As
second squad rode past the ambush site, Alucius made a quick and rough count of
the dead—ten or eleven, and one raider dying. Once they dealt with the
remaining raiders, they’d have to return and claim mounts and weapons, and deal
with the bodies.
    Less
than two vingts past the rise, there was a swirl of men and mounts, outlined
against the snow of the bottomland fields, with the sound of metal against
metal and only a few reports from rifles. Most of those still mounted were the
militia troopers, but the remaining raiders fought with a quiet ferocity.
    “Sabres
at the ready!” Alucius ordered. “Charge!” He had his own sabre in his left
hand, although he was equally adept with it in either hand, unlike the rifle,
where firing left-handed was definitely superior.
    With
Alucius at the point, second squad swept into the back of the raiders. In
moments, most were down, one way or another.
    As
he studied the chaos of riders and riderless mounts, and the dead and dying
raiders and troopers, Alucius could sense two riders turning and breaking away,
driving their mounts off the road and across the fields toward the river. With
some of third squad’s troopers covering the road and trying both to stop the
raiders and to corral the surviving mounts of the raiders, Alucius dared not
use his rifle.
    “Second
squad! With me!” He urged Wildebeast forward, not looking back, but knowing at
least some troopers would follow.
    Less
than halfway to the river, the lagging rider looked over his shoulder, then to
the river, before he abruptly slowed and turned his mount.
    Sensing
fully the fatality within the raider—the resignation to death and the desire to
take others with him as he reached for the rifle—Alucius lifted his own weapon,
forced himself to concentrate, and fired. It took three shots before the void
of the raider’s death washed over him.
    Within
moments he was past the dead raider’s mount and nearing the snow-covered
underbrush at the edge of the