The first arrow left the wall before Caldan gave the order.
Some archer on the far end of the eastern battlement — some boy with shaking hands and a bowstring pulled too tight — let it fly a full three seconds early. Caldan watched it arc across the grey dawn, a single flame tracing a lonely path through the sky, and thought, Well. There goes the element of surprise.
Not that it mattered.
Dhaelon already knew.
"Fire!" Caldan roared, and two hundred bowstrings sang in answer.
The sky filled with burning arrows. They fell like a swarm of dying stars, trailing smoke and heat, and when they hit the front ranks of the silent army, the sound was something Caldan knew he would hear in his sleep for the rest of his life. The wet, heavy thunk of iron burying into flesh. The hiss of fire catching cloth. The crackle of hair and skin.
Not one of them screamed.
Not one.
