'They're not stopping. The arrows aren't stopping.'
Pyrrhus watched an arrow bury itself in a soldier's chest, pass through, emerge from his back trailing red mist, and continue into the man behind him. When that man fell, the arrow pulled itself free, hung in the air for a fraction of a breath, and drove itself into a third soldier who had been trying to crawl away.
These were not arrows. These were hounds!
"Retaliate! Archers, return fire! Target the ridge!"
The Imperial archers who were still alive nocked and fired upward. Their arrows flew true, climbing toward the figures on the ridge. Pyrrhus watched them rise, expecting to see the enemy scatter or shield.
The arrows slowed.
About twenty meters from the archers on the ridge, every Imperial arrow began to drag as though the air had thickened into mud. They lost speed, lost trajectory, tumbled, and fell short. Some barely reached the lip of the canyon before clattering uselessly against stone.
Pyrrhus stared.
