Gal POV
The riders from the south pressed toward the counter-formation's front. The spearmen at the line's center held their points forward. The horses in the leading rank checked before them.
Two horses went into the points anyway. One took a point in the shoulder and backed. The other drove through. The spear shaft broke under the horse's weight and the rider was inside the front rank's spacing with his saber working left.
The riders from the eastern cross-street came at the right end of the line where the spearmen were facing south. They could not turn their spears fully east before the horses reached them.
The right end broke in the first twenty seconds. The men there went backward into the men behind them. A gap opened between the right end of the line and the platform's east corner.
From the western cross-street it took thirty seconds longer. When they reached the left end it broke the same way.
The garrison commander on the platform called something south.
