Free The Spell-Bound Scholar by Christopher Stasheff Page A

horse, Alain! On guard!"
    He caught up his buckler from the cartbed and sprang onto his charger, drawing his sword and cutting the harness with

    two strokes. Alain blinked at him, taken by surprise; then he heard the roar of many throats as a dozen men burst from the doorways of the ruined cottages. He reached down, caught up his buckler, and vaulted onto the back of his warhorse, drawing his sword and cutting the straps as Geoffrey had done. "For the people and the right!" he shouted and turned at bay.
    The assassins struck, the front rank slashing at him with swords, the back rank stabbing up with spears. Alain ducked to catch the blades on his buckler; one sliced his calf. He bellowed with anger and swung his blade, cutting off two spearheads.
    Geoffrey faced a similar double rank and had to admit that this rabble had a commander who had some sense. He raised his buckler to deflect the spearheads while his mind wrenched at the swords. But another mind wrenched them back, cancelling his telekinesis and leaving the swordsmen free to chop at Geoffrey's ankles. He realized he was up against more than he had thought and called, "Up, stout fellow!" His horse reared, screaming, and struck at the footmen with its forelegs. They shouted in surprise and backed away.
    The battle-rage was on Alain now, for these foes had come in secrecy, even decoyed him to their ambush with a false damsel in distress. They deserved no mercy, especially since they would probably give none. He bent low to stab at the swordsman who had wounded him, feinting, slashing high, then suddenly circling his blade to stab through the other's defenses as he caught a second man's sword on his buckler. Even then, the first attacker was almost too fast; he managed to parry, but Alain's blade sank into his shoulder, and the man dropped his sword with a shout of pain. He fell back to let two mates take his place.
    His charger set his feet back on the earth, and Geoffrey backed him away. The assassins came after with a shout. Geoffrey reversed course and charged then, swinging his sword in an arc right in front of them, bending low to slash. The swordsmen leaped back with shouts of alarm—and collided with the spearmen. All stumbled, and Geoffrey turned his horse back to ride over them. They saw the beast coming

    and scattered, shouting warnings to one another. Geoffrey turned to cut down the one nearest him.
    An invisible hand imprisoned his sword; it slowed, straining against a telekinetic bond. Geoffrey shouted with exasperation and kicked the swordsman in the jaw. Then he sent his mind arrowing after his telepathic foe. He felt the mind thrust coming from a tumbledown cottage off to his left, so he sent a thought bolt that excited the atoms of its thatch, and its roof burst into flames. The bind on his sword ceased abruptly as alarm filled his head, along with an assortment of curses. Geoffrey ignored them and spurred his charger toward the nearest spearman.
    Alain had disabled four of his attackers, but the other two ranged themselves on either side of him. If he turned to strike one, the other would run at his back.
    Then the spearman pulled a strange sort of short-handled hammer from beneath his tunic and pointed it at Alain.
    Alain knew a weapon when he saw one. He kicked out of the stirrup and threw himself off on the far side of his mount. As he landed, he heard the creature scream, smelled the sickening stench of charred horsehair, and his battle-lust turned to white rage. He knew without looking that his horse was dead, a good and faithful beast who had always protected his master and fought far more bravely than this mob of cravens. But Alain wasted no time in turning on the man with the exotic weapon—he charged the fellow's mate, thinking the man would not dare shoot at his own.
    He met the swordsman sword to buckler, each one's blade clanging on the other's shield. Alain circled around him quickly, putting him between himself and the wielder of the