Gal POV
The wedge was at a canter when the arrows start to rain from watchtowers.
It came down on the line that tower height gave it, nearly vertical at this range, and found the neck of the horse two positions ahead, the point driving into the muscle at the base of the skull.
The animal's legs stopped.
There was no stumble, no recovery step, the horse's full mass going directly to the ground at speed, and the rider went over the neck and into the open ground in front of him.
The riders immediately behind split around the fallen animal and kept their pace.
Orkhon was still to Gal's left, with the shaft on his forearm.
He was watching the gate.
Gal looked at the gate.
One hundred and sixty meters.
The bar's char was visible across its full face now, the dark spreading outward toward both ends from where the fire below had climbed it.
