BARA MIYAN, HIGH PRIEST The crash of six machine-guns clattered into a chattering tumult, muzzles pointed high over the heads of the Jannati Shahr men.

Up into the still, hot air jetted vicious spurts of flame.
The Legion's answer lasted but a minute.

As the trays of blanks became empty, the tumult ceased.
Silence fell, strangely heavy after all that uproar.

This silence lengthened impressively, with the massed horsemen on one side, the Legionaries on the other.

Between them stretched a clear green space of turf.