Cirion looked out over the windswept battlefield.  General Vorandur had reformed the line.  Now he was fully engaged briefing his commanders on the next vital move and the overall plan. To the south, the vanguard of the once missing Balchoth legion was approaching the line.  The remainder of the enemy forces were surging in from the east, attacking the newly formed shield wall. 

To the west, writhing bolts of lightning were tearing into the plain.  Thunder ripped the air and shook the ground.  Cirion felt a spat of rain spatter his cheek.  The time was now.  He gave the signal to the trumpets.  Across the darkening land the bray of trumpets sounded the retreat.  Not a fighting retreat, but an exodus en masse, at a fast march, creating a momentary separation between the lines.  At that instant the two battalions of archers released a volley of a thousand steel tipped shafts, winged death in a whoosh of air. 

He watched their inexorable arc then saw men falling by the dozens, first from the south and then along the rest of the line.  Then a second volley taking out scores more, creating momentary chaos in the Balchoth advance.  Cirion waved the archers on to quickly retreat, their job done.

He had timed it perfectly.  For at that moment a great dark curtain swept the battlefield.  A roaring gale overtook the land.  Blinding rain left men fighting for breath.  White hot ropes of lightning gouged the earth, lit up faces tensed in fear.  Thunder cracked and boomed, challenging the voices of mere men.  Cirion galloped ahead due north through the tempest, taking the lead ahead of the army, barely visible beyond twenty paces.  Behind him, General Vorandur was exhorting his commanders to maintain formation.

In the lines Brandor chugged along at a fast march, slogging through the wet grass and mud.  Great sheets of rain stung his face and soaked the padded tunic beneath his chain mail.  He heard shouts of orders between the violent claps of thunder pummeling the plains.  His world had reduced to grey shapes of men on either side and in front, gasping for breath, lashed by the storm. 

It was a maneuver they had practiced, a strategic retreat.  But that was on an empty training field in the sunshine three months past.  Now, even though he knew not their direction, he knew he need only follow the men nearest him and stay in formation.  The Steward and his commanders had a plan.  They too wished to live.

It was their only hope.

The same thought echoed in Cirion’s mind as he prodded his reluctant mount forward into the teeth of the gale.  In this storm they would steal away to the north while the enemy was confused and disoriented by their sudden tactics and the fury of the violent deluge.

With luck he would put a league between his tired army and the Balchoth before they could regroup.  That would allow them to reach and cross the Limlight by day’s end, utterly exhausted but alive for a final confrontation tomorrow.