Balin was the first to fall.

Bors had worried about placing the smaller man near the square's edge, but it'd been the same since they were children: you couldn't convince him his size was ever a disadvantage.

For the most part, he was right. If you had big enough balls and a belligerent enough attitude, what was a foot or so in height?

But when push, literally, comes to shove, you need consistency in a shield wall. You want a uniform line of wooden shields presented as one to repel the charge. What you don't want is a visible gap between them into which, say, a particularly motivated Saxon can suicidally leap through.

That attacker was dead, stabbed through by the men standing behind each of Balin's shoulders, before he could do any damage. But, as his corpse landed on top of the short knight, he toppled him to the floor.

His shield mate, Hrunn, stepped forward to provide cover, but the pressure of the rush of Saxons made this as futile as swimming upstream in a flood, and he lost his own footing, slipping and being crushed underfoot as the charge went up and over the two of them.

Slowly, and then very quickly indeed, a breach opened.

Bors watched the disaster play out as if in slow motion as the frontmost corner of the formation started to collapse in on itself. The men of Arthur's Marghekyon were hard, disciplined warriors - veterans all - but even they could not perform the impossible.

Saxons began pouring into the growing breach, and no amount of skill or bravery could force them back. Geraint was run through. Lamorak was stunned by a shield bash and beheaded by a swinging axe. Bedivere was cut off from support and, for a time, was an island of death for any Saxon who dared to try to close. But a flurry of arrows was his undoing, his shield long since crushed to splinters.

All around him, childhood friends were trying and failing to be bulwarks against an irresistible tide of destruction. Bors had always known it would end like this. You were only ever one miscalculation from death in a shield wall, and he'd had more than his share of luck over the years. There was no bitterness here.

He'd just thought he'd have Arthur at his side when the worst happened.

"Fuck it," and with that, he shoved his shield forward with all his might. The Saxon opposite staggered backwards as Bors' spear drove straight through his chest. Instead of pulling back and resetting, which he had been doing for what felt like hours, the giant Briton braced his legs and charged forward, also impaling the man who stood behind his first opponent.

Eliwlod and Palamedes were positioned at his shoulders, and, seeing this anger-fuelled gambit, they copied it. Of course, lacking Bors' immense size and strength, they had less success at creating Saxon kebabs, but, nevertheless, the three charges combined made a spiked wedge, with the big man at the tip, tearing into the attacking force. Those around them, feeling a sudden release of pressure, flowed behind them.

In moments, two distinct battles opened up.

The square formation was no more, dissolving into two halves. On the one side, the cohesion of the British line had wholly collapsed, and the Saxons were running riot. Wolf-clad warriors surged past what remained of the war band whose frenzied assault had broken the line. They offered no quarter to the diminishing number of defenders who died where they stood.

However, just a short distance away, a vicious counter-thrust delivered slaughter in the opposite direction. Following Bors' lead, the British abandoned any thought of defence and were rapidly overrunning the surprised and exhausted Saxons.

And smack in the middle of these two disparate battles going in opposite directions, in a rapidly clearing area of space, was a time-travelling Celt, a Saxon cultivator and what remained of the Prince of the Britons.

Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.

*

"Give me the worst-case scenario."

Your channels explode, triggering a series of knock-on effects that rip a black hole in reality. All known and unknown life in the universe will cease immediately.

"Fuck! Seriously?"

Yes. Of course, the odds of that happening are, there was a brief pause, vanishingly slight. I'm not sure I even have words for the numbers. It would be twice as likely, for example, for the sun to grow a face and begin serenading us with Joe Dolce's mighty hit, 'Shaddap your face.'

"Unusual reference considering the circumstances, but I'm here for it. But if it is so unlikely, why mention it!?!"

You asked for the worst-case scenario of you trying to fast-travel in your current state of Qi exhaustion.

"Yes, in a cost-benefit way. Not in a Steven-King-fever-dream-of-the-most-unlikley-thing-possible kind of way."

My arm suddenly jerked to the left as Drywyn took it upon itself to defend against a charging Saxon. With two quick slashes, it opened the belly of the spearman, who collapsed screaming to the floor, clutching his intestines.

"Dude! What the fuck was that?"

What?

"Why did you do that? What's wrong with killing him normally?"

Fuck's sake. Don't disembowel them. Don't burst into flames when people catch you. What the fuck is it I am allowed to do? How about, just once in a fucking while, we try: 'thank you, Drynwyn. You are literally the only fucking thing standing between us all and immediate death, you fucking legend.'

"Look, it's not that I'm not grateful. Big thank you for the save. It's just," I looked down at the still whimpering man at my feet, "I mean, he's not even dead yet."

Drynwyn jerked downwards, splitting the spearman's head in half.

Problem solved.

I screwed up my eyes for a moment. What with the chaos of battle, Merlin being needlessly literal, and Drynwyn ... being Drynwyn, I was finding concentrating on saving our arses rather tricky. My empathy for Premier League football referees was rapidly increasing.

"Drynwyn, I need to give you to Melehan for a few minutes whilst I think about what to do. Do not burn him."

Sweetcheeks, I burn the unrighteous. Always have, constantly fucking will.

"Well, you better find him righteous when he grabs hold of you, do you hear me? Someone needs to have you so you can fight, and I need to work on getting us out of here. And if you ever call me that again, we're resurrecting your "flaccid noodle" nickname."

I passed the sword to Melehan, who, unsurprisingly, was less than delighted with this development. As he did not spontaneously combust, I presume he was either one of those good Saxons everyone talks about or Drynwyn finally read the room.

"Big M, what's the most likely, hear my words, downside of me just beaming us out of here?"

Thank you for being so precise. You see, it costs nothing to consider your frame of reference properly.

"Sure, let's debate semantics. I'm sure those three angry-looking Saxons coming this way will wait."

Melehan was bodily dragged towards them as Drywyn closed to engage.

The most likely downside would be the rupturing of your channels mid-transfer, and you - and everyone travelling with you - becoming lost in the space between realms.

"And that would be bad, I'm guessing?"

Well, yes. But on the plus side, not for very long.

The three Saxons were already cooling corpses, and Melehan was covered in blood and looking like he was going to be sick.

"Okay. And how likely is that?"

Let's just say, in your current state of Qi exhaustion, if it didn't happen, I'd be pleasantly surprised.

"Awesome. Do you have any other ideas at all?"

Nothing comes to mind.

I looked around at the battlefield. In front of me, things weren't looking too bad. Bors was a fucking nightmare and had, by sheer cussed violence, salvaged a good half of the Marghekyon into some sort of order. It looked to me as if they just kept pressing forward, they would be free and clear.

Behind me, though, was carnage. A few Britons still stood, mostly fighting back to back, but they just hadn't realised they were dead yet. We probably had a minute at most before the mop-up operation was finished, and those Saxons charged towards Bors' island of resistance, wiping us out as collateral damage.

There was, of course, an even worse outcome. Bors could notice our plight and drag men who had just fought their way to freedom back into the meat grinder and certain death. He'd asked me to get Arthur out of here if the line broke. I didn't want the cost of me, once again, falling short of expectations to be the death of over a hundred men. Even for me, that was an exceptionally high failure rate.

"Merlin, is there anything short of fast travel I can try that might be less dangerous?"

Not unless you happen to know how to open and maintain a portal, my dear.

"Funny you should say that."

I looked up and met Melehan's eyes.

Lieutenant Dan seemed to have found his way onto a shrimp boat and was fucking loving it.