Free Straken by Terry Brooks Page A

His hands closed more tightly about his sword.
Another few seconds
.
    He let the first ten rows of the Federation army clear the mouth of the draw before he gave the hand signal to the archer at his back. The archer dropped to one knee, drew back his bowstring, and released the signal arrow. Its shaft meticulously cored and its tip altered, the arrow caught the wind as it flew and made a shrieking sound that could be heard for hundreds of yards. In the silence of the early morning, it was deafening.
    Instantly, the Elven bowmen released their arrows from both sides of the advancing Federation force. A deep whine like the buzzing of a thousand swarming bees replaced the shriek of the warning arrow, and Pied’s heart lurched. Positioned to fire in three alternating waves, his bowmen sent wave after wave of steel-tipped arrows raining down on the unprotected men. Screams and cries rose on the morning air. Dozens of Federation soldiers were dead or injured before they could react. When those remaining realized what was happening, they turned in all directions at once, and dozens more fell. Caught in the open, they had no chance of escaping the assault. Even using armor and shields to ward off the deadly killing shafts, they were vulnerable. No matter where they turned or what they did, some missiles still managed to get through.
    Finally, someone in the ranks took control, and the remnants of the stricken forward units formed up and charged the archers insmall groups, reinforced by soldiers still coming out of the draw—hundreds of them, flooding the flats with silver-and-black uniforms.
    “Elessedil!” Pied Sanderling shouted the Elven war cry, leaping from his hiding place and raising his arm.
    In a solid line, the front ranks of the Elven Hunters surged from their hiding places behind the rise and charged the Federation command, taking up Pied’s war cry. The Southlanders, split apart in their efforts to reach the archers on their flanks, were caught by surprise. To their credit, they swung into defensive formation with practiced smoothness, but their ranks were already decimated, and there were gaps that could not be filled quickly enough. The Elves hammered through the front lines to the center, bowling over Federation soldiers who tried to stop them, pushing back the entire command.
    But the soldiers of the Federation were well trained, and they regrouped quickly, first slowing, then stopping the assault, bracing behind dozens of oncoming ranks, behind weapons and armor, front ranks dropping to one knee and bracing the butts of their spears against the hardpan, rear ranks lowering spears over their shoulders. The Elves slammed into the wall but failed to break it, tried a second time and failed again.
    Pied, still standing on the rise with the bulk of the Elven forces, signaled his archer a second time. A pair of arrows shrieked a command as they arced above the combatants. Not all heard the shrieking sound, but those who did signaled their fellows to pull back. Swiftly, the Elves disengaged, retreating on the run to the topmost part of the rise, moving past the six fighting triangles into which the remainder of the Elven foot soldiers had been formed.
    It took only minutes for the first wave to retreat, but even in that short time, hundreds more Federation soldiers poured through the gap onto the flats, joining their fellows. It was a much larger force than Pied had envisioned, much larger than his Elves were equipped to handle, but there was nothing he could do about that. Lifting his sword a second time, he called out the Elessedil battle cry and sent his triangles into battle.
    The triangles advanced as one. Shields locked and spears lowered, they presented bristling walls of steel tips. The triangles were formed into two lines, three triangles of eighty men each in front and three behind, the latter offset slightly to the right of the former, so that the leading points of each triangle filled all the gaps. As the