Stumbling, he righted himself and continued running. At all sides hoplites and archers ran for the narrow stairs leading up the sloped embankment. Glancing back over his shoulder he saw two swarthy Ileans on his heels. One held the sword that had scored his back. He could almost feel their hot breath on his neck.
Dion spun and threw his spear, making one of his pursuers dodge to the side. He glanced up at the embankment as he reached the bottom of the steps. Risking another look behind him he saw an arrow from above strike the second Ilean’s upper thigh. The yellow-cloaked soldier roared with pain as he fell.
Dion panted as he climbed the steps while arrows smashed against the stone around him. The press of men crowding behind him made him nearly trip into those in front. The short journey up the stairs took an eternity as he expected an arrow to spear his body at any instant.
Finally, he crested the steps.
The first thing he saw was a Phalesian archer dead at his feet. Barely pausing, Dion crouched and picked up the man’s bow and quiver before joining the soldiers forming up along the defensive bastion.
The two forces both paused to gather themselves.
Standing with the last of the defenders arrayed along the summit of the curved stone wall, Dion saw that the fallen of both sides littered the curving shoreline, but the beach was now firmly in the sun king’s hands. The last pair of survivors made it up to the embankment, joining their fellows in guarding the steps that led from the harbor to the agora.
As order gradually came to the ranks of the yellow-cloaked soldiers below, Dion saw a barrel-chested commander, who could only be Kargan, gesturing as he barked orders to his officers. A lanky man with long dark hair and a curled beard, wearing a spiked golden crown and a bright yellow robe – he must be the sun king himself – stood tall on the upper deck of a warship and surveyed the area, before descending a ramp to the shore.
The last defenders waited along the embankment. The Phalesians had lost at least half of their number. The consuls who made up the city’s leadership milled behind them.
He heard Aristocles speaking loud enough for all to hear. ‘No! I refuse to leave the city.’
Dion looked frantically for Chloe, but she wasn’t anywhere to be seen.
Out of bowshot, the sun king’s soldiers prepared to make their final assault. Rank after rank of yellow-cloaked soldiers assembled in orderly rectangles. A silver-haired eldran now stood beside Solon; both were gazing up at the Temple of Aldus. The Ileans had conquered the Phalesian army as easily as they’d crushed the navy.
Dion swiftly assessed the defenders’ numbers. He knew they would fall in the first wave.
A trumpet blared.
The attackers roared. The defenders shook their weapons.
The sun king’s men began to run.
Instantly, every archer atop the bastion drew his bowstring to his cheek and released, and Dion fired with them. But the attackers raised their shields to ward off the volley and few arrows struck home. The Ileans rushed the twin sets of steps and there were suddenly so many soldiers milling below that Dion couldn’t miss striking limb, torso, or shield.
The sun king’s soldiers reached the top of the steps and the Phalesians cut them down. But for every man that fell, another took his place. The rush became a flood, and the flood became a torrent. There were simply too many of them.
Dion continued to loose arrows into the mob below, but he knew that despite his efforts the struggle was pointless. He tried to aim at the Ileans cresting the wall but there was too much chance of striking a Phalesian.
He reached for an arrow, but his quiver was empty.
Then he saw Chloe.
She had a sword in her hand and was high on the cliff, climbing up the steep stairway, heading for the Temple of Aldus. Realizing she planned to defend the ark to the end, Dion scanned the ground, frantic as he bent and his hand closed around the hilt of a fallen soldier’s blade. He tried to push through to the edge of the embankment, striving in vain to reach the base of the steps against the surge of soldiers.
Amos and a hundred hoplites were now the last men trying to hold the wall. Scores of yellow-cloaked soldiers made it to the embankment with every passing moment. Amos fell when a shield struck his forehead. The blue-cloaked soldiers around him turned and ran.
Dion deftly weaved around the fleeing Phalesians as he reached the base of the cliff. He turned and faced the agora, feeling the iron hilt in his hand burn, and knowing the sensation now for what it was, knowing that it stemmed from who he was, what he was.
He prepared to defend the steps, protecting the ark with his life.
Protecting Chloe.
The attacking soldiers knew the sun king’s desire, and as they swarmed into the agora while the consuls fled in front of them, a broad-shouldered Ilean with a plume of orange horsehair cresting his helmet saw Dion, the sole defender of the path to the Temple of Aldus.