"Rams," he answered. "They are battering the gate."
She listened, and Stark saw in her face the beginning of fear.
It was a long fight. Stark watched it hungrily from the roof all that
morning. The soldiers of Kushat did bravely and well, but they were as
folded sheep against the tall killers of the mountains. By noon the
officers were beating the Quarters for men to replace the slain.
Stark and Balin went up again, onto the Wall.
The clans had suffered. Their dead lay in windrows under the Wall, amid
the broken ladders. But Stark knew his barbarians. They had sat restless
and chafing in the valley for many days, and now the battle-madness was
on them and they were not going to be stopped.
Wave after wave of them rolled up, and was cast back, and came on again
relentlessly. The intermittent thunder boomed still from the gates,
where sweating giants swung the rams under cover of their own bowmen.
And everywhere, up and down through the forefront of the fighting, rode
the man in black armor, and wild cheering followed him.