Tales of the Three Kingdoms: Silver Falcon Falls

As the Demon's looked down at his halberd, then down at the furrows his feet had left in the scree when the warlord in white had pushed him back, then finally back to where Stallion wheeled her god-horse for another charge, the Demon's scowl began to morph into a… smile? Was he really smiling? Where before he had levelled only a cocky mirthless grimace at the inadequate challengers, now he was a visage of pure, savage joy.

If I had thought the Tiger of the Southlands was a maniac when he fought, the Demon was on another level. The Tiger loved battle because his Mandate forced it upon him. He loved battle so long as he was suffused with bloodlust and probably only as long as he was winning. He loved it in the moment but regretted it in the hours that followed like a man morally hungover.

But the Demon was actually being challenged, pushed back, one could even say losing… and I had never seen anyone happier.

"He could have scared us all into the sea," I heard a awe-struck voice from beside me. I had thrown aside my chair in my panic for little Ang, but I hadn't gotten far before Stallion had changed my calculus and stopped me in my tracks. Swaying Willow was leaning forward in his seat as he watched Stallion make two more passes and the Demon struggle to block two more blows.

"He doesn't use his Mandate," Swaying Willow continued, "because he's tired of everyone running from him. He is truly a Demon of War."

By Heaven… I had thought Stallion actually stood a chance. But here she was using her full Mandate, not just bolstering herself with Courage, but lending it to her great warhorse, as well, which must have been one of the fastest and most powerful beasts in all the Land Under Heaven except… the Demon had chosen to fight with no Mandate and no mount. He hadn't even bothered to call upon all of his advantages because… he didn't need to? Because he hadn't wanted to! He was having too much fun. But now…

Stallion turned her horse back toward the assembled lords as the Demon reached for a whistle of blackened bone dangling from a chain next to his pendant. They had both come free in the clash. He raised the whistle to his lips and blew. Nothing. I heard nothing, except for the hellish shriek in the distance that came in response. Stallion turned her god-horse and passed in front of the lords.

Noble Lion had risen and stepped forward. Right into the path of White Stallion's mount. And as she drew near, he lifted a silver and ivory lance and threw it into the air. White Stallion ran under it and caught it, wheeling to make another charge at the Demon.

Bless him. Heaven bless our Grand General. If I had thought him cruel and domineering a moment ago, this small act of serving as White Stallions squire gave me a glimpse into the man he truly was. As Grand General he should have imposed martial law to ensure his commands where upheld. But as Noble Lion, all he wanted, now that the battle between god-horse and Demon was joined, was to give his side the best chance possible.

But did any of that matter, now?

We saw the glow of fire through the mist first, and then the inky black splotch of shadow. The Demon's own dreadful mount slowed as soon as it emerged from the curtain of fog, as if unperturbed by the challenge the god-horse presented, and the Demon mounted his Red Hare in the same unhurried fashion. White Stallion was at full speed now and the Demon was at a standstill, spinning his halberd out to one side, as he turned his hellish mount in place to face her.

If I knew anything about cavalry, it was that momentum was everything. And all the momentum was on White Stallion's side.

Come on, Stallion! I could almost feel the will of the warlords coalesce in support behind her, unified in a way it had never been since we started out on this warpath.

The warlord in white lowered her lance and couched it.

I stepped forward to clutch the back of the chair in front of me. The assembled lords drew in a combined breath. The very mist seemed to halt in expectation of the clash and Stallion thundered across the open space toward the Demon's motionless Red Hare. The god-horse put on a last burst of speed as the mist parted and the space between them evaporated. Stallion leaned into her thrust…

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The Demon smiled.

White Stallion's god-horse thundered forward then bucked in place, screaming as all of its momentum disappeared in a single heartbeat, everything coming to a crushing, instantaneous stop. Everything except the rider in white. She went flying over the top of her mount.

The Red Hare hadn't bothered to gain speed. It hadn't bothered with a charge. In a single canter it had generated all the momentum it needed to meet the most impressive horse I had ever seen in my entire life of riding. Shoulder met shoulder. The Demon ducked the spearthrust and Red Hare caved in the god-horse's chest.

Riderless now, the majestic white beast took one more faltering step and collapsed to the side, shaking the earth beneath our feet as it fell.

Red Hare tossed its flaming mane in triumph. Red Hare was the strongest mount in the Land Under Heaven, according to the Imperial Ranking of Steeds, and apparently it wasn't even close.

The Demon, too, flourished his halberd and smiled at the combined warlords. He was the top ranked Hero of the Times according to whatever system of floating letters had changed his pendant before my very eyes, back when I had first met him.

Among men, the Demon was incomparable; among horses, Red Hare, indomitable.

White Stallion groaned on the ground in the distance behind him, her god-horse pawing the ground weakly from its side.

"No more games," growled the Demon, smile fading. "Send me your best."

White Stallion struggled to rise, her own arm dangling limp at her side where she had fallen on it at all speed, the flesh of her face hanging in ragged strips where it had met the scree. She dragged herself the twenty bloody span to the wreck of her warhorse, where its chest heaved in doomed knickers.

She drew in a shaking breath and let out a single sob over her beast.

The Demon, chin inclined, rolled his eyes toward her as if remembering she was still there.

Stallion took a moment more to whisper something to the massive wreck of white that had been a god among horses until it had met Red Hare, and then the warlord in white drew a knife from her belt. She slid it into her suffering beast's throat, wrapping herself around its over-large muzzle until its death-throes subsided. Then she stood, her own blood mingling with her steed's, dripping from her chest and shoulders to cover her almost completely in red now.

"I'm not done with you, you three-faced bastard!" Stallion howled, one arm dragging, the other gripping her knife. "Come and finish this!"

With that, her aura of courage poured off of her so strong that the mountains rang with her valor. I would swear – and I would not be alone among the survivors of that day – that the mist crystallized in place to dance with the multi-hued light of Heaven around her.

The Demon… shook his head and smiled. Then his eyes flicked up.

The whip cracked. White Stallion's aura evaporated. The shining white mists turned black as night and closed in around her. The Demon kicked his horse toward her, a slow walk, then a trot, then a canter.

Stallion's knife rattled from her grasp. She took one faltering step backward, then another, as her aura of courage flickered around her. Then she spun and flat-out ran for her life, valor lost and forgotten. White Stallion, our glorious paragon, our Most Distinguished Leader beneath our Grand General, despite her Mandate from Heaven to imbue us all with valor…

She too fled before the Demon.

She would not get far.

The Demon's halberd whipped up into the air, ready to strike.

"YOU WANT OUR BEST!?" roared a powerful voice. A wide muscular figure had found its way out onto the field without any of us noticing. He was unarmoured and unmounted, bare-chested and, as far as I could tell, either hungover, or possibly even drunk. He looked like he had woken up late and grabbed a flagpole on his way out to the field. It just so happened to be a green snake-head banner, eighteen span long, belonging to some minor lord I couldn't name at the moment. "COME GET SOME OF HOGBARREL!"

The muscular man who called himself Hogbarrel planted his feet, lowered his stance, and something about the ground around him changed. It seemed to shift and compact.

The Demon turned his head and allowed Red Hare to slow to a standstill while White Stallion continued to stumble for her life in the opposite direction.

The Demon thought for a moment before his smile returned and pulled his reins hard toward the new challenger. Pure insane glee spread across the Demon's features as Red Hare reached a full charging speed, and he, once again readied his halberd, this time to take someone who actually faced him. He aimed it straight from the unmounted man with only a long spiked flagpole as a weapon.

Still this Hogbarrell didn't budge. In fact his stance seemed to settle in even further, his legs bulging with the effort of squatting so low. The stoney scree around him shifted more, though to what end I couldn't tell.

I could only brace myself to watch the poor foolish man get obliterated.