"Fire!" Mageta called as he rose once more from the trenches, holding a launcher. The general discharged a war bolt that vanished into the milling crowd of the enemy. Barrin couldn't tell if anyone fell, but the infantry in the trenches began firing in a sporadic barrage. There was a serious shortage of launchers and war-bolts, but the fire was a light rain on a pile of sand. The Keldons were dissolving away under the attack. Barrin could see the League technicians loading the weapons modules of the mantises and crabs. For a moment the wizard hoped the enemy might break, but then warlords in fantastic armor forced their way to stand in front of the Keldon lines. Barrin could hear their shouts as they exhorted the warriors.

"Do you think victory and glory are free?" an armored giant of a man bellowed. "A great people are known by the strength of their enemies! Kill for the glory of Keld! The final days are upon us! Kill the thieves, kill them…"

Even as they shouted, Mageta was leading men and machines from the trenches, gambling on breaking the enemies' spirits. Barrin wondered at the boldness, but knowing how outnumbered the League forces were, he acted to make the blow as strong as possible.

"Attack the rear!" The call echoed through the aether as the wizard drew power and called to the light forces beyond the battlefield. Rayne's troop of fast runners and ants was out of sight, but he knew that they charged at his call.

The crabs from the trenches slowly advanced. Each few yards a fusillade of bolts poured from their weapon bays. Some of the supporting infantry knelt and fired launchers while the rest advanced with swords and spears jabbing into the air for blood. Mageta was just behind a crab trotting forward, signaling the advance with every step. The Keldons started forward, but they came at the League in a string of disorganized driblets instead of the unified front that the warlords desired.

More bolts and rockets flew toward the enemy, but the Keldons were implacable now, advancing in a silent rage. Mageta halted and dressed his line of men and machines. Clumps of spears faced the enemy and formed small arcs of soldiers anchored by crabs. The heavy war machines launched all their weapons at point-blank range, and then the forces met. The soldiers with spears funneled Keldons and hollow warriors to the crabs. Massive metal arms rose and fell. Manikins and men almost exploded as they died under the relentless pounding clubs. The bodies mounded up into piles, and the crabs inched back as warriors mounted the shattered bodies to continue the attack.

Now League soldiers were within range of Keldon swords, and infantry dropped screaming as gray-skinned warriors shattered bones and parted flesh. The soldiers carrying launchers drew swords. Mageta shouted and mounted the back of a crab, a spear in his hands. He yelled and signaled for the League troop to back toward their earthworks. The crabs slowly stepped away from their mounds of victims and began rebuilding their fleshy barricade with new corpses. Mageta was covered in blood and poorly balanced on the back of the crab but remained there as he directed the withdrawal, needing the extra height to be seen. Axes and spears flew toward him, but the crab deflected them, smashing them out of the air.

Barrin raised more power, and his senses flew toward the general. He enveloped Mageta in a web of power. The wizard could feel crossbow bolts burning to ash as Keldons finally began sniping at the general. Mageta threw his arms wide in defiance of the enemy, trusting in the magic that surrounded him. The League withdrawal slowed as the general's actions brought fresh heart to his men. The wizard could hear Mageta whispering through the surrounding magic.

"I really hope you can keep this up, Barrin. Otherwise, I'm dead."

More weapons flew past the waving arms of the crab to burn up in the wizard's shielding spell, and Barrin drew more power, waiting for the Keldon mages to enter the fray. Then cheering rose from the retreating troops. Hordes of steel ants came swooping from the distant flanks, falling upon the enemy.

"Your wife is coming to save me from myself, Barrin," General Mageta said to the wind.

Rayne and Shalanda on their runners fired groups of bolts into the Keldons, tearing at them like rabid dogs. Wing blades scissored as they cut apart groups of warriors. Steel ants nipped at the enemy, leaving wounded who stumbled and crawled through the ranks. Rayne had directed the ants around her to wound rather than destroy. Barrin had protested the inhumanity of the tactic, but Rayne insisted that wounded warriors were more trouble to the enemy than dead ones. Additionally, the ants were less vulnerable if they didn't linger over their kills. Hundreds of voices screamed and tore at the will of the Keldons, confirming her tactics.

"Send the mantises against the Keldon transports," Barrin ordered.

A runner tore his eyes from the battle and ran to relay the command. Mageta was holding the line and retreating at a crawl that allowed more Keldon warriors to reach the crabs. Here and there a machine went down as axes and swords sheared legs free, and a crab collapsed. One huge Keldon used a crab arm as a giant club, leaving a trail of smashed League soldiers dead among the field of crushed enemy warriors. Mageta shouted orders and then led several swordsmen against the champion. The general dodged an overhand strike, and his sword cut the tendons on the warrior's arm. The Keldon grabbed Mageta with his free arm, and the general battered the warrior's face with blows from his helmet until a League soldier cut him free.

The steel ants still lashed the peripheries of the enemy as the Keldon center advanced into oblivion under the hammering metal arms of the crabs. Now Barrin saw the mantises charging the left wing of the enemy army. The colorful machines broke through the thinning lines, their long arms slicing through flesh and manikin with equal ease. Then the marines and their charges were through with the barges only a few hundred yards away. The machines ran forward as their handlers ordered them to engage at pointblank range with their reloaded rockets.

Then Barrin sensed magic from the Keldon barges like a sea of fire burning. Slaves and barge crew rushed out of their craft in a panicky mass, and flocks of birds issued forth. They circled and rose high over the battlefield then fell onto the League forces. As each small body smashed into a soldier or machine, it disintegrated in a sharp explosion. Barrin could see the center melting away, the bludgeoning crabs chewed to pieces by the attack. The surrounding infantry died as men fell with sudden ghastly wounds. Mageta struck out at a diving bird, and the resulting explosion tore at his arm and knocked the general to the ground. More bomblets dived from the orbiting flock, now striking at the steel ants that had feasted on the flanks of the enemy. Shalanda went down as her runner was struck, and Rayne attacked the Keldon warriors who rushed to kill her aide. The mantises fired rockets, but many had already fallen or were crippled, and only a few barges exploded.

More of the tiny bombs launched into the air, and Barrin knew that only magic could save the day.

"Throw fire and lightning!" he called to the magical reserves.

A long stream of power leaped from Barrin up into the sky. Explosions rippled through the flock, disrupting its structure and sending many of the birds spiraling to the ground. The League and the Keldons suffered equally as men died and huddled for shelter. From the circle of magic behind him, a diffuse cloud of flame moved toward the birds. The birds began to detonate as the outskirts of the flock flew within the League spell. Barrin sent energy to shield the friendly forces, but the battlefield was too large. He concentrated on shielding Rayne and Shalanda as the rest of the fire-swallows fell out of the sky. Finally the rain of death stopped, but the League center was down, and Keldons rushed into the defensive works.