Chapter 37 Malini #2
“Lord Prakash,” Malini said, when the orders had been given. “Neither of us are great warriors, fit for wielding weapons in battle, I think.”
He inclined his head in agreement.
“But I will be glad to stand beside you and shape this battle together,” she went on. “I will be honored to have your guidance, as my elder, and to hear the wisdom my father once placed great trust in.”
Some of the wariness, the flint her harsh words had brought out in him, softened. She saw it in his eyes.
“And I will be honored to guide you,” he replied.
On one side of the ford stood Chandra’s army.
Archers and riders; chariots gleaming and flags flying, all imperial white and gold.
On Malini’s side of the ford stood her foot soldiers; her archers, higher up the bank, poised and ready to fire.
Her Dwarali horsemen, holding their mounts still. Waiting for her orders.
She raised a hand. A conch was sounded.
Both sides moved forward like two clashing waves. Foot soldiers racing forward—Chandra’s army outfitted with sabers, her own with maces and whips and daggers and swords, and then nothing but bodies crashing into one another—and arrows flying thick and dark from both sides of the water.
Her Dwarali riders surged forward with a cry, white mounts racing into the gleaming water.
And Malini stood tall in her chariot, bearing witness. She breathed through the scent of blood and water, as the water’s edge turned to a froth of unending mud under hundreds of feet and hooves.
One thing was in her favor: Chandra’s men clearly had less familiarity with the fighting styles of Srugna or Dwarali.
They were struck down by maces—skulls abruptly reduced to meat, bones broken through their armor.
Arrows caught them with brutal speed, Dwarali soldiers crouching on the backs of their steeds with their bows drawn for attack.
As Khalil had told her, Dwarali horses were not used to warfare on water, no matter how shallow, but their riders were confident, holding them steady.
They’re not seasoned, Malini observed, watching her brother’s Parijatdvipan soldiers with a critical eye. They were clearly well trained. They fought fiercely. But there was an edge of cruelty and cleverness to a battle-hardened man—to her own men—that these did not have.
Slowly she began to realize that these were men reared and trained in the imperial city of Harsinghar or surrounding Parijati estates. They should have been Harsinghar’s last line of defense, not the first.
What are you doing, Chandra? Malini thought, frustration and dread worming through her—she could not understand his scheme, his intent.
And then abruptly, she stopped thinking of Chandra entirely.
Malini felt the rattle of her chariot around her—gold and steel and gilded wood trembling.
The horse reared uneasily, barely calmed by the charioteer’s practiced hand.
She steadied herself, widening her stance, and Raziya grasped her shoulder tightly—remembering, perhaps, the chariot that fell when they first faced Chandra’s fire outside the High Prince’s fort.
Then together they looked to the Veri, to the distance, where the arrows had fallen.
At first, Malini saw nothing.
And then, the water was rising. Not like any natural wave that Malini had ever seen but like a wall, a shield. It was bright, huge. A shining mirror, reflecting death.
It fell with a roar, crashing onto the far bank, moving with terrible fury, into the flank of Chandra’s army.
Too far. They were too far to see everything in perfect detail, but the explosive howl of the water was undeniable; the sheer size of the wave, and the power with which it swept over the bank.
It swept over people, dark shapes running, running—then abruptly swallowed them.
Malini’s mind could barely comprehend it.
She was frozen. Her men around her were frozen.
A noise split the air—almost inhuman, a wail of grief and horror from one of Chandra’s men.
All the men in the distance were dead.
All those people, she thought. All of them, gone. If I had blinked, I would not even have seen them die.
Joy bloomed out of horror, suddenly, fiercely.
Ah, Priya, she thought. Priya, you did it.
The wave settled.
In its place, something grew out of the water, a bridge, vast and strong, a thread binding the two banks together.
Only then did the water grow entirely calm. She watched for a moment as her Aloran and Saketan forces crossed the bridge where there had been no bridge in a sudden press of bodies, shouting in triumph.
She wanted to yell with them, wanted to scream a kind of vicious triumph out. But she hadn’t won yet.
She turned her focus on Chandra’s army.
There was a kind of impossible, awful forward motion to an army in battle that could not be easily halted, only slowed.
Chandra’s men could not simply turn back and fight the enemies at their flank—Rao’s men.
The Saketan soldiers. Chandra’s men had faltered, were wavering, frightened by the strangeness of the water, just as her own people had been frightened by the unnatural fire at Saketa.
At the maze fort, fate had turned against her. But today it was in her favor, and it was all thanks to Priya’s presence. All Malini needed to do was let the tide carry her.
She raised her saber in the air and finally let out the cry bottled inside her—a thin, wild thing, like a bird of prey taking flight above a wounded hare. The sunlight caught the edges of her saber, giving the polished blade a hue like bright fire.
“For Parijatdvipa!” she yelled. “For the mothers! For your empress!”
She heard the answering cries around her, a noise that swelled and swelled, already triumphant, drowning her enemies in its song.