The river ran cold as iron beneath the evening sky, its shallows stained with churned mud and blood. Among the rippling currents, the first to break were the horse-handlers. Bereft of weapons, drenched to the bone, and trembling from cold and terror, they were the ones to lay down their arms and kneel. Their surrender loosened the sinews of the others. One by one, soldiers followed suit, their shields and spears dropping into the black water with dull splashes, until more than a hundred souls—mud-caked and shivering—stood disarmed beneath the northern trees.
Yet the battle was far from over. The horses, unlike their masters, knew nothing of truce. When a few of their kind fell screaming to arrows, the rest were seized by panic. In an instant, the marshland thundered to life as the herd scattered madly toward every compass point—east, north, and west—hooves pounding like war-drums against the flooded earth.
