Daoud felt the blood rush to his head in dizzy excitement.

"You will not ride alone, Lord," said Daoud fiercely.

"No, Bunduqdari, no," said another emir, Bektout, a Kipchaq like
Baibars. "Let us offer our lives to God and ride out with light hearts."

The other officers shouted their eagerness to die for Islam. Daoud felt
full of gratitude. Baibars had put the spirit of war back into them. He
had done what Qutuz could never do.

After the other emirs had ridden back to their troops, Baibars said
quietly to Daoud, "I truly believe I will win. Until the instant that
they kill me, I will know that I am winning."

Back at the head of his own troop, Daoud watched Baibars and waited. For
a moment a silence fell over this part of the field. The drumming of
hooves, the clash of steel, and the screams of men carried clearly from
far to the west.

Baibars on horseback sat a short distance in front of the long dark
ranks of Mamelukes. He turned and beckoned to his standard bearer, who
trotted forward bearing the yellow silk banner inscribed with the words
of the Koran in black letters, "For the safety of the faith, slay the
enemies of Islam."

Baibars took the banner in his right hand and held it high, then lowered
it till its end rested in a leather socket beside his foot. In his left
hand, his sword hand, his long, curved saif, inlaid with gold, flashed
in the sunlight. His fawn half-blood pawed the air with her front
hooves.

"Oh, God, give us victory!" he shouted. "Yah l'Allah!"

An echoing roar came back from the ranks of the right wing. Half
standing in his copper stirrups, guiding his mare with the pressure of
his legs, Baibars sent her into a headlong gallop. Daoud struck his
spurs into his own horse's flanks and raced after him. He squinted into
the wind that blew his beard back against his neck.

The dark blur of struggling Tartars and Mamelukes grew rapidly larger.
Qutuz's banner was nowhere to be seen, but the beast-tail Tartar
standard rose up in the west, and Kalawun's black banner was waving far
to the north.

They were coming on the Tartar horsemen from the flank and rear. Daoud
was close enough to see faces turn and Tartars wheel their ponies to
meet the attack.

Daoud drew his bow out again, picked a big Tartar with a drooping black
mustache, and loosed an arrow at him. The Tartar fell back over his gray
pony's rump, and the pony slowed, trotted out of the Tartar formation,
and stood nibbling on