The Crown of blood

I

The behemodon bore down on Ullsaard as he lay on the hot sand, the enormous reptile's blue-scaled flanks slicked with the gore of the commander's warriors. Ropes of saliva drooled onto the dune from its dagger-long fangs and the stricken general could see his bearded face reflected in plate-sized black eyes. The lizard's panting was interspersed with bass growls, punctuated by cracking bones and wet splashes as it pulped the dead and wounded beneath its clawed feet.

Atop its back red-skinned Mekhani tribesmen leered and shouted from their howdah, jabbing the air with their stonetipped spears. Among them was one with an elaborate headdress of green and black feathers: a Mekhani chieftain. The tribal leader snarled and spat at Ullsaard from his vantage point, waving a club edged with sharpened flints, furious at the Askhan general's offer of peace.

"I'll take that as a 'no', shall I?" Ullsaard said, the niceties of the pre-battle parley having been ended by the attack on his bodyguard. He had expected the Mekhani to refuse his conditions of surrender, but the barbarians had not withdrawn as was usually the custom. Ullsaard had been surprised by their sudden attack. He was angry with himself for trusting the Mekhani to conduct the parley with any kind of honour or dignity; a misjudgement that had cost him losing twenty good soldiers.

Looking up at the towering behemodon, he hoped he would not pay the same price for his mistake.

The general pushed himself to his feet, fuelled by indignation. The morning sun glinted from his bronze greaves, vambraces and breastplate, his armour carved with designs reminiscent of spiralling clouds and crashing waves. Ullsaard brushed sand from his black leather kilt and adjusted his high-crested helm so that he could see properly. Snatching up the scored remnants of his shield and tightening his grip on his golden spear, he took up a guard position.

With a coughing bark, the behemodon snapped its head forwards. Ullsaard slammed his shield upwards, smashing its rim into the creature's lower jaw. The impact sent Ullsaard sprawling to his back again, the shield splintering in his grasp, its bronze rim catching him in the mouth as he fell. The behemodon reared back for a moment, cracked shards of fangs spilling from its bloodied mouth. Ullsaard tasted blood, but considered a cut lip a fair exchange for the behemodon's mouthful of broken teeth.

"I gave you the chance to surrender," the Askhan leader muttered as he regained his footing. "Let's get this over with."

The shrieking Mekhani fell quiet at the general's defiance. Even the behemodon paused for a moment. Something in the puny human's slate grey eyes was beginning to register in its tiny brain. Prey was supposed to flee and be hunted down, not stand and fight.

Adjusting to a throwing grip Ullsaard took one pace, his eyes fixed on the behemodon, and cast his spear with an arcing arm. The gilded shaft punched into the beast's left eye and erupted from the top of its skull in a carmine fountain. With snorts of pain the creature thrashed its head in an attempt to dislodge the weapon as dark blood poured from the grievous wound.

Half-blind and in agony, the behemodon lashed out wildly, driving its head towards Ullsaard with mangled jaw gaping wide. Ullsaard bounded to his right, pulling his sword from its sheath. He spun on his heel and drove the point of the blade backhanded into the roof of the creature's mouth. The behemodon staggered as blood and spittle foamed, wrenching Ullsaard's sword from his sweat-slicked grip. With a rattling hiss the monster collapsed, sand billowing into a cloud beneath its gargantuan death throes. The dying behemodon's heaving spasms snapped the ropes tying the cane howdah to its back and the structure slid sideways, spilling tribesmen to the dusty ground.

The Mekhani pulled themselves to their feet and edged uncertainly towards the unarmed warrior confronting them. They grunted at each other in their guttural tongue, urging each other to make the first move, the chieftain growling commands from behind his warriors.

Ullsaard cast the remains of his shield aside. He cracked his knuckles and smiled at the Mekhani. It was a wolf's grin and Ullsaard fervently hoped they would not see through his bravado. His guts writhed but he kept the fear inside and stared at his foes with the expression of a man confident of victory.

As one the chief and his guards fled, their bare feet kicking up clods of sand in their haste to get away.

Ullsaard strode to the twitching corpse of the behemodon and ripped free his weapons, hands trembling at the shock of what had just happened. Taking a deep breath to steady himself, Ullsaard sheathed his sword and rested the spear jauntily over his shoulder. He turned to face his army.

Seven legions of Askhor, nearly fifty thousand men, cheered their gore-spattered general as he raised his spear in triumph. Ullsaard spat blood to one side and flicked glutinous strands of reptilian filth from his hand. He gestured over his shoulder with a thumb, indicating the seventy thousand tribesmen advancing down the ridge beyond the behemodon's twitching body.

"What am I paying you for?" he called out.