The Bear

TWENTY-ONE

"They are eager," Dame Gwydre said to the gathered leaders. She and Bransen had returned to the gulf coast to find Dawson and the Vanguard flotilla moored offshore, unloading a force of nearly five thousand Vanguard warriors. As they had then marched west to a position south of St. Mere Abelle, word had come of Milwellis's new march, back north along the river with a force much larger than the one he had commanded when he had left the field before St. Mere Abelle.

And so the brothers had gone forth spiritually over the next few days to monitor the young laird's progress and to follow the Palmaristown fleet as well, which was sailing hard out of the river, no doubt to blockade and bombard St. Mere Abelle yet again.

Every one of those spirit-walking monks had returned to his body shaken by the sight; several legions marched with purpose and good cheer, singing songs with every stride.

"I can get the boats loaded and back to sea," Dawson offered. "Might that we sail our boys all the way to Ethelbert's city but ahead o' them Palmaristown ships at any rate."

"We can fight them at sea," one of the captains said, and others agreed. These were the former leaders of the isolated Vanguard towns and really seemed more akin to Alpinadoran tribal chieftains of their respective followers than the lairds of Honce proper.

"We got only three ships that can fight one of theirs," another of the leaders chimed in. "And we've never sailed a ship that big into a battle. I'll fight 'em on land, not to doubt, and my boys will take down two, nay three, for every one I lose. But not at sea, Dawson. Not even for yourself, and we're all knowing that there's not e'er been a better sailor catching the following seas than Dawson McKeege."

Dame Gwydre looked to Dawson to respond.

"We cannot fight them at sea," Dawson admitted. "Might be that the powries'll hit them again, and so be it."

"Their warships concern me not at all, other than their role in delivering warriors to land," Gwydre concurred.

"So we brothers watch them," Brother Pinower offered, and Dame Gwydre nodded.

"Our more immediate concern is Laird Milwellis and his great force," Gwydre told them.

"Their front ranks have already turned from the river," said Brother Pinower.

"Toward St. Mere Abelle, no doubt," Gwydre replied

"It will take more than he has at his command to break the walls of St. Mere Abelle," Pinower asserted.

Bransen laughed at that, and all eyes settled on him.

"We won't go back in there," he said. "Not if we hope to win. Not if we hope to gain important allies in our cause. With you and your spying brethren supporting us," he said to Pinower, "and a cause we know to be just, we can move about much more easily than Milwellis's cumbersome force."

"And with much less attrition," Gwydre agreed. She shared a look with Bransen that spoke of confidence to those gathered about them, as if they had foreseen this march and now were prepared for it, even welcomed it.

"Particularly if we aid in that attrition," said the Highwayman, and he pulled his mask over his eyes as he finished. "I return after sunset."

"I will keep my candles burning," Dame Gwydre promised.

With a tap of his hand to his forehead, Bransen turned, fell into the magical energy of the magical hematite, and bounded away like a fleeing deer.

"Mobility," Dame Gwydre remarked quietly, and all around her leaned in as she elaborated. "Mobility and information. We will know our enemy's movements, but he will not know ours. We can catch him as we please, but he cannot catch us." She paused and let her gaze drift about the gathering.

"That is why we will win." They are stretching their line, Bransen mused with a knowing smile. The spirit-walking monks had reported as much. By all reports of the commoners, the young laird's march to the river and all the way to Delaval City had been brilliantly executed. He had carved the riverbank like a grid, methodically and swiftly, and cleared each segment. The fleet sailing the river had coordinated all; the powries had been killed and chased away in short order.

But the Book of Jhest had taught Bransen that confidence could be a leader's important ally or his worst failing. In the days since his turn to the east, Laird Milwellis had allowed the growing excitement to get the best of his formation. Apparently expecting no enemies lying in wait, he had erred in allowing those front ranks to get out too far ahead of the main body of his vast army-an army that stretched for miles along the flat stones of the road. All of Milwellis's forward scouts had been spotted by the spirit walkers and caught by the Highwayman. The vast army was running blind into the ambush.

Lying on his belly at the top of a small hill north of the road, Bransen and a score of gemstone-wielding monks watched those front ranks march past. Down the hill behind Bransen, a hundred handpicked warriors lay in wait among the tall grasses, the strongest and most ferocious of the Vanguardsmen and some of the prisoners taken from the lines of Laird Ethelbert, men seething with hatred at the carnage this man, Milwellis, had inflicted upon their homes and their brethren.

The monk lying beside Bransen stirred, but Bransen motioned him to hold still and directed his gaze to the east, where a small cluster of farmhouses lay quiet amidst the rolling fields.

Gwydre's army was there, ready for a fight.

"Alone? Are you sure?" the monk beside Bransen whispered to him, and it was not the first time the man had expressed his concern.

Bransen glanced just west of his position, to the thin line of trees reaching down to the road and resuming again not far on the other side. He nodded and smiled, knowing that they had picked their spot very well. "Fast and hard and with a show of explosions," he whispered in reply. The monk nodded and both turned their heads back to the east to see the front ranks of the marching soldiers nearing the farms.

Another smile from Bransen and a definitive nod sent the monk into motion. On his signaling wave, the warriors began their quiet ascent up the backside of the hill. Bransen shifted to the west, inching toward the trees.

Gemstones in hand, the monks led the charge. A great shout went up from the hill, and from on high came the brothers and the warriors, banging their weapons and screaming with every stride.

Milwellis's soldiers on the road began to scramble into position; horns blew a haphazard warning song. The first bolts of lightning reached down to the road, heightening the confusion more than inflicting any real damage. Milwellis's soldiers farther to the east predictably turned and then predictably turned again at the sound of the charge of Gwydre's army.

Bransen watched it all unfolding, measuring the progress and reminding himself to be patient. His timing was the most critical here. He rolled the two gemstones, serpentine and ruby, around in his right palm and keenly felt the connection to the malachite held in his left hand.

Milwellis's forces began to regroup quickly, a testament to the seasoned fighting force. All except for those on the road directly before the charge of the monks and the handpicked warriors, just below Bransen, just to the east of the tree break. More warriors came in, east and west, to try to bolster the battered area.

Bransen tapped his closed fists to his forehead. By the time he brought them down, he was glowing softly, a blue-white hue. He leaped away, a great, malachite-enhanced bound, landing right before the trees nearly a third of the way to the road. As he touched down, he brought forth the power of the ruby, a great, fiery blast that flew out from him in all directions, setting ablaze branches and grasses.

He bounded again, and the fires exploded as he landed. He lifted off in his third great leap and saw Milwellis's warriors on the road before him, screaming in terror and scrambling for their lives. Some desperately threw spears as they fled, some drew their blades and set their feet.

This time Bransen enacted the ruby's power as he descended, just out of reach of the swordsmen, blowing a fiery gap in Milwellis's marching line. He touched down lightly, trying to ignore the screams of men aflame, and leaped away again to the south, extending the firebreak to the other side of the road.

Three jumping strides later, far from the road and the enemies, he turned back. His smile now was grim, but he was indeed smiling, for the influx of reinforcements had been halted and Gwydre's army charged in from the east, overwhelming all before them.

The monks and the lead force held their ground. Bodies piled around them, but they sang and they stabbed, and explosions of lightning crackled and thundered repeatedly. The Highwayman ran to them to bolster their position as the hundreds of enemies who had marched past that spot came rushing back, fleeing Gwydre.

For a long while, Milwellis's men had no organization to their retreat and were cut down with ease. As soon as a determined group had formed and begun its charge, Bransen again leaped out, evoking the largest fireball of all in the road before them. The vice closed as their coordination shattered in that moment of shock.

Most fled haphazardly only to be slain. Others just threw down their weapons and fell to their knees, begging mercy.

"Now turn!" Bransen yelled to the monks and the strike force, for Gwydre's army was upon them and the fight to the east in full control.

From the west, Milwellis's force streamed into battle through the firebreak, but the Highwayman and his allies met and turned them back, pushing right to that choke point between the burning lines of trees, and in that smaller bottleneck their fury and magic could not be withstood. More than a mile back from the fighting, Laird Milwellis, riding beside Harcourt, heard the commotion brewing in the east. He kicked his mount to a trot, pushing through those footmen marching before him until he met up with the fleeing forces and saw the burning trees across the fields before him.

"Dame Gwydre!" men shouted.

"Monks of Chapel Abelle!" others keened in terror.

"We are routed!" yelled one.

Milwellis turned to Harcourt, panic evident on his young face.

"Now is your moment, laird," the general advised.

And so it was. Milwellis had seen enough combat to understand the implications of a rout, the potential catastrophe suffered by a force turning and fleeing in terror. He had used such tactics to turn the enemy forces at Pollcree; those enemies had never recovered.

Gwydre could do real damage here. He didn't believe that she had a sizable force, but that wouldn't matter.

Milwellis drew out his sword and lifted it high in the air to catch the light of the morning sun. He called for his trumpeters to blow loudly as he kicked his mount into a gallop off the road to the south, then swung about to the north.

"This is our moment!" he shouted in his booming, resonant voice. "Our foes have left the walls of their chapel prison! They cannot match us! They cannot withstand us! Charge, o you from the west! Form your groups and charge! Bang your shields and know that we win the war here and now!"

He looked to Harcourt as he finished, motioning his chin back to the west. The general kicked his mount into a run to help the formations and organize the waves of metal and flesh.

But Milwellis did not ride to join him. Determined that Dame Gwydre would not inflict a major wound on his army, the Laird of Palmaristown rode the opposite way, to the east, rallying the fleeing men to his wake as he went, calling for defensive squares upon every piece of high ground, reminding the warriors of who they were and who they served. The Highwayman led the charge through the firebreak, running down fleeing soldiers and turning more in terror before him.

But then he saw Laird Milwellis upon his steed, rallying his forces. How he wanted to rush out and engage the man then and there, to decapitate this invading army so soon into the campaign!

But he could not take that risk, for beyond Milwellis came the dark cloud of an army more vast than anything Bransen had ever imagined possible, rolling across the fields like a swarm of locusts with such girth and depth that Bransen could not understand why the earth itself did not collapse beneath their boots.

"To the firebreak! To the firebreak!" he called to monk and warrior alike, charging to and fro, collecting brothers and warriors and turning them back. He kept glancing at the distant Milwellis as he did, though, hoping for some opportunity for a personal battle to present itself.

It didn't, and Dame Gwydre and Brother Pinower were waiting for him when he came back through the firebreak.

"We must be gone from here at once," Bransen said to her. "The fires burn low, and Laird Milwellis will vigorously pursue."

No argument came back at him. This had already been decided long ago, a quick strike and a quicker retreat.

Dame Gwydre directed his gaze to the northeast, where a sizable force was already fleeing the field. "The prisoners, many score, to St. Mere Abelle," she explained. "We must hold here long enough for them to be safely away."

Bransen looked to Brother Pinower.

"Do you wish to attempt it?" the monk asked, and Bransen nodded.

Pinower immediately began rounding up the many brothers. "Graphite!" he instructed them, forming a long line just back from the firebreak while Dame Gwydre and Dawson set up a shield wall at the breach itself.

Milwellis's bulging front line came on, stopping short and filling the air with spears. Up went the shields, but still many men fell screaming, monk and warrior alike.

With a roar, the army of Palmaristown and Delaval came on.

The shield wall re-formed but seemed a puny thing before that massive charge, seemed as if it would surely be swept aside like parchment in a gale. At the last moment, Dawson shouted the command and the shield wall collapsed-just fell to the ground-and the line of monks, Bransen at their center, all joining hands left and right, leaped forward past them.

As one, the brothers fell into their graphite stones, building the charge and sending the lightning forth before them. Bransen improvised, reaching his own lightning out, angled left and right. His bolts intersected those of his companions, crossed them and caught them and turned the whole of the barrage into more of a net of lightning than a series of sharp bursts.

"Continue!" Brother Pinower cried. "Let the magic of the stones flow through you!"

And they did, and if one faltered, another rushed in to take his place. Bransen did not falter, though. His energy was the binding force here, the cross-link of the web, and the crackling air fanned out before them, engulfing Milwellis's front ranks as they neared.

Men stumbled, others toppled, and even those who somehow held their feet could not move forward with any force or determination. More warriors piled in behind, but the stubborn net of lightning did not dissipate, and they, too, were stopped short, shaking, teeth chattering, as they fell to the ground.

Behind the monks, Gwydre called for the retreat to the southeast.

Bransen fell into his soul stone at that call, sending his thoughts out left and right, connecting with the brothers. He felt the magic coursing through them, exiting their hands to fill the air before them. He heard Brother Pinower call for them to run away behind Gwydre's retreat. He heard Pinower call for him, the monk's voice growing distant, for he, too, obviously, had fled. But the Highwayman held his ground and somehow held the web of lightning intact. It seemed to him for many heartbeats as if he were somehow keeping that energy of his brethren left and right alive, as if he had stolen their magic with his own.

And, indeed, he had. He couldn't hold it, of course, not for any length of time, but when he at last released it in one final burst of power, he opened his eyes to see piles of trembling, shaking men, lines of disoriented and fallen soldiers so deep that those pressing in had to pick their way, their long way, to come at him.

A hundred spears did reach out at him, thrown in frustration by those behind the cluster of fallen attackers, but they landed harmlessly, for Bransen reached again into his malachite and sprang away ahead of the barrage, leaping far to the southeast.

He caught up to Pinower and the trailing brothers almost immediately, Milwellis's force coming in fierce pursuit. The lightning web had killed no one, Bransen knew, but he thought himself quite clever, indeed, for when they had laid out the battlefield plan, they had determined their retreat through a small forest surrounding some hills to the southeast.

Now that forest loomed before them, and they knew if they could get into it, Milwellis could not catch them.

For the last ones in-Bransen and Brother Pinower-set the woods ablaze. On his mount in the fields before the firestorm that engulfed the forest, Laird Milwellis could only stare hatefully at the blocked trail.

"We will catch them, laird," Harcourt assured him. "We have seen their tricks, and they flee away from Chapel Abelle, their only possible refuge."

"They are small and fleet."

"But we will ensnare them, do not doubt."

Milwellis looked to his trusted friend and nodded. "Send a long arm straight east," he instructed. "They are not to gain a northward march-cut them off from Chapel Abelle."

Laird Milwellis was not discouraged when he went back to the road and the original battlefield. He had lost about three hundred men, but no matter, for his enemy had played her hand, and now she was removed from Chapel Abelle's strong walls.

It was only a matter of time. The man stumbled but held his balance, clutching his face all the while, blood running from between his fingers.

Seated before him, Bannagran knew that he shouldn't have slugged the messenger. The poor sot was just a messenger, after all. But since King Yeslnik was far away, the messenger had to suffice.

Bannagran looked down at the crumpled parchment in his hand, the newest order from King Yeslnik. The fool had recalled him again. Abandon the march to Ethelbert dos Entel! the note read. Return to Pryd Town and hold the center region as brave Laird Milwellis catches our enemy Gwydre and destroys her.

Bannagran threw the parchment to the floor and turned an exasperated expression on Master Reandu, standing beside him. Reandu backed away a step. He, after all, had read the note to Bannagran. Judging by the man still stumbling before the throne, the news had not been well received.

"Do you think that Yeslnik even knows that we never left Pryd Town after his last reversal?" Bannagran asked.

"I think that many things are happening, and quickly," Reandu answered. "The king is reacting to a shifting situation."

"He is purely reacting," Bannagran replied contemptuously. "His plans shift with the change of the wind."

"Gwydre came forth from St. Mere Abelle," Reandu reminded.

"And the brave Laird Milwellis will hunt her and kill her."

The sarcasm and anger in Bannagran's tone was not lost on anyone in the room, and many cautious looks came back at him. He laughed at himself, shook his head, and pointed to the trembling messenger. "Heal the man!" he ordered Reandu.

The monk hustled to do just that, while Bannagran focused again on the crumpled parchment. Why had it so angered him, particularly given his decision that he wasn't marching to Ethelbert dos Entel anyway? The stupidity disturbed him, surely, for this was Yeslnik's third reversal of the marching order. But no, it was more than the typical failings of Yeslnik, Bannagran had to admit, particularly in light of his inadvertent tone when he had spoken of Laird Milwellis. For a long while now, Bannagran and Milwellis had been viewed as competing for the favor of King Yeslnik, and while Bannagran had mostly avoided any confirmation of that seemingly ridiculous notion, the building rivalry was obviously in his thoughts.

Did he really care about Yeslnik's favor, or was this simply an expression of his pride and determination in bettering his perceived rival?

"The brave Milwellis," he muttered under his breath, and he remembered a day during the campaign in the east when he had arrived at Yeslnik's encampment with a large group of prisoners. Yeslnik had ordered him to execute them, and when he had balked, the king had turned the duty over to the other arriving general, then Prince Milwellis of Palmaristown. Milwellis had done the deed, gleefully, so Bannagran had heard.

Bannagran spat at the parchment. He rubbed his bearded face and closed his eyes, only to find an image of Dame Gwydre waiting for him.