The Bear sotfk-4 Read online

  "They will split our enemy asunder!" one of the nearby commanders shouted. "Even the great Bannagran cannot hold his line together! Swiftly will come the end of Bannagran!"

  "Death to the Bear of Honce!" another commander shouted.

  "Milwellis has come!" King Yeslnik cried, and all about him cheered. "And so you die, Bannagran the traitor!"

  All along the line of Delaval, the cheering heightened, for who else might it be but Laird Milwellis of Palmaristown?

  The force closed, the cheering continued, and King Yeslnik hopped about with glee… and such relief. But gradually, interspersed with those cheers, came questioning remarks from Yeslnik's commanders.

  "Light horses?" one asked.

  "Milwellis is armored," another added.

  King Yeslnik's smile dissolved as he looked around at the gathering, some commanders in trees, others atop wagons, and all peering intently to the northwest.

  "Laird Milwellis was wise enough to lighten a force to come to our cause," Yeslnik said after many more comments and doubts filled the air about him.

  "It is not Laird Milwellis, my king," one commander dared remark, and Yeslnik fixed him with a look of surprise and anger and fear.

  "It is Laird Ethelbert!" another added, as the first shrank back from that dangerous look. "He has come forth in all his power!"

  The blood drained from Yeslnik's thin face. He turned fast to look to his wife for support, to the woman who had given him such courage and daring in these last months.

  But she stood staring wide-eyed, her hands up before her gaping mouth, and when she noted Yeslnik's look, she let out a ghastly screech and retreated fast again to the sanctuary of her armored coach.

  Yeslnik looked back to the approaching force.

  He trembled. He sweat. He tried to call out an order to his commanders to regroup and tighten their lines.

  But all he could do was squeak. Friend or foe?" the driver of the chariot beside Bannagran asked when the identity of the new force entering the field of battle became clear.

  "The men of Ethelbert dos Entel hate Yeslnik," another driver insisted.

  "They hate Laird Bannagran, too," said the first.

  "Follow!" Bannagran commanded, and he swung his chariot around and charged away from the raging battle, straight toward Laird Ethelbert's approaching line. He lifted his great axe high above his head as he came in clear sight of the group and began waving for them to turn north, a course that would veer them from Bannagran's flank and toward the approaching eastern edge of Yeslnik's forces.

  Across the field, horns blew-not the typical trumpets of Honce, but more exotic and rich wind instruments whose sharp notes often graced the wide avenues of Jacintha in Behr. Kirren Howen appeared, astride his charger and surrounded by his trusted generals. He lifted his sword in salute to Bannagran and turned his force to the north, as directed.

  It occurred to Bannagran then that this Dame Gwydre was a most remarkable diplomat. And the Highwayman, too, though it pained him to admit it!

  A cheer went up all around Bannagran, who wasted no time in reversing his direction, and now, with unexpected allies ready to turn the tide of the battle, the Bear of Honce drove even more furiously back into King Yeslnik's ranks, spears flying, his armored team churning men into the mud, the spiked wheels of his famous war chariot cutting enemies apart, his great axe clearing groups of men with a single powerful swipe.

  None stood before Bannagran and his team; more fled than fell, and the integrity of King Yeslnik's line weakened along its entire center.

  East of that press, Ethelbert's charge overwhelmed the spur of Yeslnik's line, speeding to battle, launching volleys of spears from shoulder-held atlatl, swift cavalry cutting through the lines of confused footmen, and, within minutes, it was Yeslnik in danger of being flanked, not Bannagran. Oh, the treachery!" King Yeslnik cried dramatically when it became clear not only that his archenemies had come to the field in support of Bannagran but also that the eastern city's forces would make short work of Yeslnik's northern flank.

  "Go forth, my king!" one of the nearby commanders implored him. "Now is the time when great men may recapture the press of battle."

  "What?" Yeslnik asked him incredulously.

  "Our lines are breaking," another commander explained. "The peasants are confused by the betrayal of Bannagran and the arrival of this new and furious enemy. They need to see you riding among them, rallying them back to the cause of King Yeslnik."

  "Your presence will strengthen them and turn them back to the battle," a third added.

  "And we will win?" Yeslnik asked, somewhat meekly, his gaze drifting across to Olym on her wagon as he spoke. The severity in her expression was not lost on him.

  The three commanders looked to each other.

  "Or we will die in glory," one finally admitted, and Yeslnik let out a little shriek.

  "My wife is here on this field of death," he said, more to cover his own fear than anything else.

  "The queen to Delaval City!" a commander yelled, and men began hustling all about, putting fresh horses to Queen Olym's wagon and ordering an escort for the desperate run.

  "Now, my king," said the first commander. "Our lines are falling. It is time to ride forth." Behind him came a stableman, pulling Yeslnik's armored white charger, the horse he had typically ridden onto battlefields after the fighting had ended.

  Yeslnik blanched. "No, not here," he stammered.

  Many sets of eyes settled on him.

  "No, behind our walls. The high and thick walls," Yeslnik went on, improvising for all his life now, for he knew with certainty that if he rode out on that field, the Bear of Honce would cut him down. "Yes, yes. To Delaval City we go. All of us. We will regroup and hold these traitors at bay, and Laird Milwellis will come in from behind and crush them against our walls!"

  His great enthusiasm was not met in kind, not from the commanders and not from Olym, who stared at him hard from the next wagon over. How many times had poor Yeslnik seen that look!

  "Go and save the day," the queen even called to him.

  "Shut up, woman!" he heard himself yelling back at her, and he could hardly believe the words as they left his mouth. It didn't matter, though. Not this time. Not with the Bear of Honce running wild out there and vile Laird Ethelbert and his assassins so near at hand.

  "To Delaval City!" Yeslnik commanded all around him. "Turn about and flee!"

  "My king, if we do so, we will be routed, surely," said the first commander. "Half of our men will die on this field or scatter to the corners of Honce, and less than a quarter will ever return to the city."

  "Go! Go!" Yeslnik shouted back at him, disappearing into the wagon and slamming the door.

  Across the way a short while later, Laird Bannagran was not surprised to see the rising dust of frantic retreat as King Yeslnik fled the field. Time to run, lady," said Dawson McKeege as the latest ploy of fiery logs burned themselves out and the vast army before them, stung but not terribly wounded, regrouped and once more began their inexorable march.

  Dame Gwydre reflexively glanced to the south, as if she expected a great army led by Bannagran marching to her aid.

  But there was nothing, and she turned back to Dawson and resignedly nodded. She knew the peril here; while she and some of her forces might escape, the battle would prove disastrous to her cause. And now, if Bannagran had not come and would not come, her cause was lost.

  Shouts from Brother Pinower turned them both around, to see the monk running toward them and escorting a pair of riders, Cormack and Milkeila.

  "Bannagran has come forth!" Cormack cried. "He battles King Yeslnik down the western road!"

  "There's our course," Dawson said, and Gwydre nodded, a bit of hope returning to her dark expression. "We get to him, and we'll fight them all!"

  "How fares he?" Gwydre asked.

  "We know not," said Milkeila.

  "We were sent straightaway before the fight was joined," said Cormack. "But joined it
was, for we heard the first ring of battle as we rode hard to find you."

  "Then let us be gone and quickly," said Gwydre. "Perhaps the outcome is not yet decided."

  "No," another voice joined in, and Bransen walked over to the group. He nodded at Cormack and Milkeila and managed to grasp Milkeila's hand as he walked past her to stand before Dame Gwydre. "Not yet," he said. "We have not hurt Milwellis enough." His voice was strangely calm, the timbre of it more intriguing than the surprising words.

  "If we retreat to Bannagran, so, too, follows Milwellis," Bransen went on, "and with Yeslnik's thousands bolstered by this massive force before us, our loss will be complete."

  Hopeful smiles turned fast to dour expressions, for it was hard to argue that assessment with so great an army marching up the rise at them.

  "Then what would you have me do?" Dame Gwydre asked him, calmly and reasonably.

  "I would have you tell me that this war is worth all the misery," Bransen replied, and many eyebrows arched at that. "I would have you promise me that your ascent is worth the price of so many innocent lives and the agony so many families will know when this day is done."

  "Bransen," Dame Gwydre stammered in response, "what would you have me say? How might I weigh the price of such misery?"

  "By promising me that Queen Gwydre of Honce will be as Dame Gwydre of Vanguard," Bransen said, and he grasped her by the shoulders and locked her eyes with his own. "You will care for them, all of them, throughout your reign. You will make their lives better, subjects of every remote corner of this land. You will end these miserable wars and seek peace among the lairds and among the kingdoms."

  "You're rambling, boy," said Dawson.

  "No!" Bransen yelled at him. "No. I will hear it. I must believe it. I must know it before…"

  "Before?" Dame Gwydre asked.

  "I have killed so many men and women this day," Bransen lamented. "Common folk who did not deserve to die. Men and women who are here because they were given no choice in the matter, to fight for a cause they neither understand nor endorse. Whether the misplaced rage of Palmaristown warriors or the helpless victims of Yeslnik's press-gangs, they do not fight to support the cause of an evil king. Nay, they fight because if they did not they would be put to the stake."

  "It's the nature of things," Dawson remarked.

  "No more!" Bransen shouted, and he turned fiercely on Dame Gwydre. "Promise me!" he shouted at her, tears streaming from his eyes. "We will win this day, here and now, and many, many will die, but only if Dame Gwydre is who I have come to trust her to be."

  Again Dawson started to chastise Bransen, but this time Dame Gwydre held up her hand to silence him. She stared at Bransen, hard at first, but then her visage softening as she reached up to gently stroke his young and innocent face.

  "I am," she whispered. "For myself I seek nothing. For Honce I seek everything."

  "And it is worth the pain and the misery?"

  "Who can know, Bransen? But surely it is a better outcome by far than that of a crowned King Yeslnik."

  "I need more than that."

  "The hand is played-the ugly hand-but there is a difference in victory or defeat. A profound difference for all the folk of Honce."

  "Promise me."

  "I promise." She leaned in and kissed Bransen on the cheek.

  "For Cadayle," he whispered.

  "I promise," Gwydre replied.

  Bransen stepped back and took a deep breath. He turned to all of them. "Do not flee. You will know when your victory is at hand." He moved away, leaving Dawson, Pinower, Cormack, and Milkeila staring at each other incredulously, and both Pinower and Dawson lifted their open palms helplessly, completely befuddled.

  "What's it about?" Dawson asked Gwydre.

  The woman turned and faced Blenden Coe, where Milwellis's forces dangerously neared, three intact squares already moving steadily up the rise and with nothing substantial to oppose them, no tricks and not nearly enough forces.

  "About honor," she replied. "And decency. And the demands of conscience and the strength of sacrifice." Bransen looked down on Blenden Coe. He thought of Affwin Wi, then, strangely. What secrets had she learned from her time in the Walk of Clouds among the Jhesta Tu? Were the answers of his life, of his freedom, there in that distant and mystical place?

  A tinge of regret stung the young man. Perhaps he should have gone south with Cadayle and Callen when first they had left Pryd. Perhaps he should have been stronger in his convictions and more determined to follow his father's footsteps to learn if that wondrous book he had so revered as a child, that wondrous tome that had guided his life, was the hint of something great or if he, in his desperation, had attributed to it more promise than the actual truth of the Jhesta Tu.

  He glanced over at Dame Gwydre, at Queen Gwydre.

  Or was this his destiny? He silently replayed her promises in his head, her assurance that the gain would be worth the price.

  Bransen fell into the magic of his brooch, more fully and deeply than ever before. The serpentine glow came up around him, and flames engulfed him, angry, furious, white-hot flames. He drew forth his sword, his mother's sword, and held it high, and then, with the magic of Abellican malachite lifting his body, the Highwayman leaped from the ridge.

  He glided down the slope from on high, a soaring beacon of hope for Dame Gwydre and, soon, a flaming harbinger of doom for the men of Laird Milwellis.

  He landed on the field before the center square, a tremendous blast of flames rolling out from his feet. Those front ranks cried out and ducked as the wave of heat washed over them, and several threw spears.

  But the Highwayman was already gone, leaping into the air again, clearing those tightening front ranks and crashing down in the middle of the tight formation. Again came an explosion of flames, this one engulfing many men near to the Highwayman's landing.

  Screams and chaos shook the square, multiplying many times over as the Highwayman rushed about, flames bursting from him, his sword stabbing with deadly precision at terrified man after woman after man trying desperately to get out of his way.

  His ruby magic exploded again, and many died, and he leaped to the back of the square and turned, aiming his sword along a line of archers moving between the center square and the one to the north, and from that sword tip came a stroke of lightning.

  As one, the line of archers fell to the ground.

  From the other direction came a volley of arrows, as Bransen turned on the second archer line. The missiles flew all about him, but he did not feel their sting, so deeply was he into the magic of the brooch.

  A second lightning bolt laid that line low.

  The Highwayman bounded away, to the north, leap after leap that ended each time in a devastating fireball.

  On one descent, he saw a spear set before him, but he could not sway. And so he cried out in rage and denial, impaling himself as he landed and blowing away all those around him, including the warrior holding the spear. The Highwayman leaped away immediately, trailing no blood, for as the spear had pierced his flesh, so, too, had it punctured the serpentine shield, and the hot flames had cauterized the wound as soon as the Highwayman had leaped back off the bloodied weapon.

  He felt no pain. The soul stone in the brooch kept him strong. He bounced back the other way, assaulting the third square.

  Up above, Dame Gwydre saw her moment and began her charge. The old ones!" came a cry.

  "They fight for the witch Gwydre!"

  "Oh, we are doomed!"

  "It is Abelle himself, come from the grave!"

  The shouts grew more desperate along Milwellis's lines. Those leading formations evaporated, scores of men burning and dead on the western slope, dozens of archers thrashing in the death throes of killing lightning, scores more cut down by the fiery blade of the Highwayman.

  That retreat did not halt at the next grouping of military squares, for with the fleeing soldiers came the Highwayman himself, in full, burning glory and power.

&n
bsp; "Stop him!" Father De Guilbe shouted from behind Milwellis, who sat beside Harcourt.

  "Stop him!" De Guilbe shouted again as another fireball exploded, scattering men, some aflame, all fleeing in abject terror. The monk shouted again as more cried of the old ones or of Abelle himself rising up in support of Dame Gwydre.

  Milwellis turned and yelled, "How?" in the monk's face, his frustration clear and consuming. He turned to Harcourt, who had no answers, for the general, like the laird, the monk, and all the men on both sides of the battle, had never seen anything like this display of sheer, unbridled magical power. Godlike, the Highwayman bounced about the field, making his way through the ranks and leaving mounds of bodies in his devastating wake.

  "It is magic!" Milwellis shouted, turning back on De Guilbe. "Your magic! You stop him!"

  Harcourt grabbed Milwellis by the shoulder and shook him, and Milwellis looked back at the man with shock… until he noted that Harcourt was pointing frantically ahead.

  For on came the Highwayman, in all his terrible splendor.

  "Archers form! Around me!" yelled Milwellis, and so commanding was his roar that many archers and spearmen heeded his command.

  "Fill the air! Shoot him dead!" Laird Milwellis screamed, and a scattering of arrows flew away.

  "No! Together, you fools! A barrage to lay him low." Fully engulfed by the magic and the fury, the Highwayman moved without direction but with great purpose. Wherever he saw a concentration of enemies, he bounded and exploded, and darted about, stabbing and killing.

  Every blast, every strike, killed a bit of his own soul, he knew, but he held to the promise of Gwydre, the promise of Honce renewed.

  Up into the air he went, and only then did he see the great black volley swarming his way. He threw forth a fireball there in midair, the force of it deflecting many missiles aside and disintegrating many others.

  But some got through the conflagration, and Bransen felt the iron tips and wooden shafts sliding into his body.