First cast in the game had gone to Ruthar. The horsemen of Ad were routed and pushed back—all those who could go. Those that remained were done with fighting.
From the earthen wall of his camp, standing among his golden-armored generals, Bel-Ar saw his cavalry broken and flung back—saw it, and laughed aloud.
"They fight well, these mountain wolves," he said. "But that was the play of children. Now will we send them a taste of the swords of Ad."
Beyond the wall of the camp were massed the legions of the Maeronican heavy infantry, flower of the fighting men of seven cities, the core of which was formed of the garrison of Adlaz itself, fifteen thousand veteran men-at-arms.
Bidding his captains go forward, the king called for his horse.
Somber as he had appeared in his dull garments in the midst of his butterfly court, Bel-Ar, among his captains, offered an even greater contrast. He loved the pomp and pride of power, its show and its glitter, but not in his own person. While his generals rode in gold, and the armor of some of them blazed with gems and patterns in orichalcum that made them glow like fireflies in the night, the king wore a simple suit of arms of black steel, plain of design and undecked by any flashing gauds. Only the majesty that dwelt in his pallid face and the fires of his mystic's eyes distinguished him from some humble gentleman of poor estate.
Mounting his war-horse, a gaunt, powerful roan beast of vicious temper, the king, with a number of his favorite captains, rode down the field in the wake of his advancing phalanxes. With them was advanced the blue and gold battle-standard.
Bel-Ar marshaled his legions in wide divisions, each of nearly a thousand men, marching in quadruple lines, and the divisions in such close touch that they might form, when there was need, a solid front. At the wings of the force were stationed the light-armed men and archers. Behind those, two wedge-shaped masses of chariots rolled forth from the camp gates and rumbled across the plain.
At the foot of a gentle dip of the land the Rutharians had met and hurled back the horsemen. There they elected to remain and await the enemy's sterner onset.