The Gold Falcon

  “Isn’t that the plan you had in mind when the council started?” Salamander said.

  “It is, truly. But the point of a council of war is to see if someone can come up with a better idea or find the weaknesses in the one you’ve got.” Cadryc allowed himself a weary smile. “And with two princes and a gwerbret doing the arguing, these things take time. Now, Prince Voran thought we should wait until we got some sappers and miners here, but Prince Dar pointed out that the longer we sit here at this dun, the more likely it is that the Horsekin will finish their cursed stone wall around their dun before we get there. And so on and on it went.”

  Yet in the end, part of their plan, at least, turned out to be useless. Dawn broke in a sky half-obscured by clouds off to the north. Most of the men ate their breakfast rations standing up, staring at the sky, wondering about rain and dragons both. A troubled silence lay over the camp. Even Gerran succumbed to the mood. He couldn’t shake the feeling that the day would see some momentous occurrence, maybe a defeat, maybe a victory—but something was about to happen at last.

  Sure enough, the sun stood about halfway ’twixt dawn and noon when Honelg’s herald appeared on the dun wall, waving his staff to ask for a parley. The shout went up for Indar, who came running with the ribands on his staff streaming out behind him. This time, rather than meet among Honelg’s earthworks, the two heralds came down very nearly to the gwerbret’s siege line. Gerran followed Cadryc as his lordship squeezed himself in behind Voran to hear the parley.

  “I see no reason to stand upon ceremony, your high nesses and your grace,” the herald said. “My lord Honelg has decided to open his gates. He welcomes you in, should you dare to try to reach them.”

  The herald turned and waved at the dun. When Gerran looked up he saw archers lining the catwalks between every pair of crenels.

  “My lord further suggests,” the herald continued, “that if you don’t care to come visit him, you might quit his lands with all due speed.” He bowed to the assembled lords, then turned and walked back, disappearing between the earthworks surrounding the dun’s motte.

  For a moment, a strange silence lay over both those defending and those attacking the dun, broken at last by the creaking squeak and grumble of a winch pulling open a pair of heavy gates. Up on the walls the archers began laughing, a rising tumble of noise somewhere between hysteria and mirth.

  Ridvar and Voran turned to face one another and seemed to be about to speak, but neither said a word until the laughter died away. Prince Dar set his hands on his hips and stared up at the dun. From his alien face, so preternaturally handsome, it was impossible to tell what he might be feeling.

  “They’re all daft,” Voran said. “They must be!”

  “I’m not so sure of that,” Daralanteriel said. “Daft, mayhap, but clever as well. How many of your men would live to reach the gates, my lords, if we lacked allies with wings?”

  “A good point, Your Highness.” Ridvar finally found his voice. “They would have made us pay high, more than they’re worth, the bastards.”

  “I suggest we have our men arm and ready themselves.” Voran bowed in Daralanteriel’s direction. “If one of your people could alert the dragons?”

  “Gladly,” Daralanteriel said. “And may all of our gods favor us today.”

  While the men armed, Prince Voran and Gwerbret Ridvar squabbled but in an oddly amiable way about the order of the charge, if you could call the run ahead through a twisty maze a charge. Ridvar had the typical young lord’s dream of glory, that he would lead his men personally through the gates, but both princes shouted him down.

  “Until your wife gives you a son, Your Grace,” Voran said, “the rhan needs you alive, and truly, it would be a pleasant thing if you survived a fair bit longer than that as well.”

  The person who ended up leading that charge turned out to be someone that the noble-born had never even considered. The sun had cleared the horizon and was turning the clouds a bright silver when the army assembled in a rough column, four men abreast, at the base of the hill. Since Honelg had been declared in rebellion against the gwerbret, Ridvar’s men would take the lead, but Cadryc, Gerran, and their ten men from the Red Wolf warband had an honorable position near the front. Prince Voran’s men would be the last in, as they were there as a courtesy to the gwerbret rather than out of need.

  The Westfolk archers were the exception. They clustered off to one side, and besides the quivers at their hips and the bows over their backs, they carried coils of rope slung over their shoulders.

  “For scaling the wall once Honelg’s archers are off it,” Warryc told Gerran. “I asked.”

  “My thanks,” Gerran said. “I wondered.”

  “I was talking to the men in Ridvar’s lead squad. They’re cursed glad they won’t have to carry a blasted ram up the hill.” Warryc was grinning as he spoke.

  “Oh, they’ll have their day. Don’t forget, Zakh Gral’s waiting for us. Today’s only the first skirmish in a long war.”

  Warryc’s smile disappeared. Gerran put on his helm over his padded cap and twisted it slightly to settle the nasal bar in place. He drew his sword, then went back to watching Ridvar’s captain, who held a silver horn at the ready. Before he could signal the charge, however, Gerran heard another sort of music, the drum beat of enormous wings, coming fast and steadily. With a roar the silver dragon swooped out of the cloudy sky and launched himself for the dun.

  Honelg’s men shouted, screamed, dodged this way and that on their catwalks. The dragon roared like a river in spate, a rumbling thunder that drowned out their panic. On huge silver wings he rose into the sky and turned in a wide swing for another pass. The archers on the wall steadied themselves. When he swooped again, a barrage of arrows sprang to meet him, but with a strong beat of his wings, he sent them tumbling every which way, harmless in the air.

  Shouts of rage and shrieks of terror rose from the wall. The silver dragon swooped up high, disappearing into the brightness of the rising sun. At this seeming retreat Gerran felt sick with disappointment, but only for a moment. With a roar and a rush of wings like a winter storm, the dragon reappeared to stoop and plunge. Straight down he came, fast, faster, plummeting toward the dun. Just when it seemed he’d crash into the broch tower, he twisted, swooped over the outer wall, and rose with a screaming archer in his claws. A swarm of arrows rose from the battlements, fluttered, and fell short.

  Not one man among the besiegers cheered or even called out a warcry. The archer may have been an enemy, but he was also a fellow human being, and he kept screaming and screaming in agony and terror as the silver dragon climbed the sky. With a quick banking of his wings, the dragon swooped over the dun once more—and let him go. With a last horrible shriek the archer fell, flailing his arms, till he disappeared from the besiegers’ view behind the walls that had so badly failed to protect him. All at once the shriek died in mid-note. A brief hush fell over dun and siege lines both; then archers began disappearing from the walls as fast as they could climb down. Gerran could guess that they were running for the safety of the broch.

  “Now!” Gerran yelled. “Let’s go!”

  Gerran took off running for the path up to the dun. Behind him he heard yells break out, warcries and howling as his men streamed after him, and an answering babble of warcries from the gwerbret’s men. As he rounded the first bend in the path, he got a glimpse back and saw Ridvar’s captain leading his men directly after. Silver horns rang out down at the foot of the motte. Another turn, and Gerran glanced behind to see the Westfolk archers not on the path but on the dirt banks bordering it. Like deer they leaped from one bank to another as they aimed for the dun walls. Gerran felt his breath begin to come hard, but one more turn brought him to the gates.

  “They’re open!” he screamed with what air he had left. “The bastards meant it.”

  Gerran paused to breathe and to let his men mass behind him. Through the gates he could see the silver wyrm making another pass, swooping low over the
dun as if looking for stragglers. From the window-slits high in the broch, arrows flew and hissed through the air, but the dragon’s wings were making such a strong wind that they twisted and fell. With a roar like a river in flood Arzosah swept down from the clouds and joined her mate. Round and round the broch they flew, and the gusts from their powerful wings knocked the flying arrows every which way. They clubbed the air like giants drumming, pounding, pounding, pounding as they flew.

  “Now, lads!” Gerran shouted. “Before the wyrms tire!”

  With a shriek of war cries rising behind him, Gerran charged into the ward. At first arrows dropped feebly around him, but the wooden rain died away fast. He could see that the door to the great hall stood open. He knew that the first man through would die, but he saw no way out of plunging in. If he flinched now, the men behind him would as well, and if they were milling around the ward leaderless, they’d be easy prey for a sally. His entire life had swept him to this last charge. For the first time in that life Gerran howled a war cry.

  “For the Red Wolf!”

  He ran toward the open door, but well before he could reach the broch, men poured out of it, Lord Honelg and his captain, Rhwn, at their head. They’d chosen not to cower inside but to make one last charge of their own. Behind them came the villagers, armed with clubs, threshing flails, improvised pikes, any weapon they could grab now that their bows had failed them. The only armor that any of them wore were leather jerkins, and not many of them had those. Gerran felt a brief moment of pity, a moment cut short by the charge.

  “Falcon!” Rhwn was heading straight for him. “You’re mine!”

  The lines clashed in a crazed swirl of fighting. The poorly-armed villagers were slashing around them randomly, trying to get a clean strike on someone, anyone, while the swordsmen struggled to face off with an equal. Gerran ducked under a clumsy swing of a flail and managed to reach Rhwn. He got one solid strike on Rhwn’s shield and parried the answering blow just as a man fell against Rhwn from behind and shoved him half to the ground. Gerran stepped back to let him gain his feet. Rhwn steadied himself, then lunged forward with a hard swing of his blade from below. Gerran dodged, slashed, and cut him hard across the throat. Blood welled as his knees buckled, and he fell onto the cobbles. Gerran spun around, looking for another enemy.

  All at once the shouts turned to screams from the villagers. Arrows hissed past him, but these weren’t coming down from the broch. The Westfolk archers had gained the walls. Gerran could hear Honelg’s men shouting Alshandra’s name in a last terrified chorus. He watched in something like horror as Westfolk arrows slithered through the air and struck home, bursting through good solid mail. Honelg’s men fell clawing at the death piercing their chests.

  With a last roar the two dragons flew off. The Westfolk loosed shaft after shaft. Villagers in their futile bits of leather armor dropped and died or fell screaming, wounded and writhing as their hayforks and scythes clattered on the cobbles of the ward. Gerran took two steps toward the slaughter, then found himself remembering the villagers mowed down by Horsekin raiders. For a terrible moment he wondered if he were any different from the raiders, bringing death to men who couldn’t fight back, and he stayed where he was, merely watching.

  Most of Honelg’s riders had already followed their captain into the Otherlands. A few held out, backs to the broch wall, but Ridvar’s men mobbed them and cut them down. Gerran turned back and knelt down next to Rhwn’s body. Here, at least, was someone who’d been able to defend himself. As the battle fit left him, Gerran realized that he’d just killed a man whom he’d once considered an ally, if not a friend.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “It wasn’t even much of a fight, was it?” He wondered why he’d spoken aloud. Rhwn couldn’t hear him. He stood up, sword still in his hand, and saw the man who’d rolled against the captain and made him stagger.

  Warryc lay sprawled on the ground, killed by a stab in the back. Gerran knelt down beside his body and closed its eyes. One of his men, killed from behind.

  “Gerro!” Neb ran over to him. “I’ll help you carry him inside. That battle’s over. The chirurgeons have taken over the great hall.”

  “That’s of no use,” Gerran said. “He’s dead.”

  Neb let out his breath in a sharp puff. “May he find rest in the Otherlands,” he said. “My heart aches over the losing of him. I’d hoped it was only a wound.”

  “So did I. Who gave it to him? Did anyone see?”

  “One of Ridvar’s men told me that it was Honelg himself.”

  “Where’s Honelg’s body? I want to spit on his corpse.”

  “I don’t know.”

  Neither did anyone else, apparently, when Gerran set about searching the dun. None of the men he came across had seen Honelg, alive or dead, since the very start of the battle. The end result of havoc lay strewn over the ward. Gerran strode past wounded men, heard men weeping, stepped over dead men, kicked a litter of dropped or broken weapons out of his way as he walked. Eventually he met up with Prince Voran, who was searching for the lord as well with a squad of his own men.

  “I want to give him a proper burial,” Voran remarked, “but for his wife’s sake, not his. No one’s found his son either.”

  “His son’s but seven summers old, Your Highness,” Gerran said.

  Voran winced. “Well, then, let’s hope he’s still alive. I begin to think his father must be.”

  “Indeed, Your Highness, since no one’s found him. I want a word with his lordship, you see. He stabbed one of my men in the back.”

  “Perhaps we won’t bother with the proper burial, then. I wonder where he’s gone to earth?”

  Gerran remembered the mysterious light he’d seen and Dallandra’s talk of a shrine to Honelg’s goddess. “I’ve got an idea about that, Your Highness,” he said. “There’s some sort of hidden chamber inside the dun walls. The gerthddyn will know where it is.”

  “Your Highness?” One of Voran’s men spoke up. “I saw the gerthddyn helping carry the wounded. He’s doubtless in the great hall.”

  Voran took the lead as they strode around the broch. They found Salamander just coming out. Some other man’s blood soaked the front of his shirt.

  “Gerro!” Salamander trotted over to him, then saw Prince Voran and started to kneel.

  “Stay on your feet, man,” Voran said. “This is no time to worry about courtesies.”

  “My humble thanks, Your Highness,” Salamander said. “Gerro, Daumyr told me about Warryc. You must be hunting for Honelg.”

  “I am. How did you know?”

  “The look on your face. Pure death and twice as cold.”

  “Oh. Do you know where the shrine is? I’d wager that he’s in there.”

  “A good guess, but if you’re right, getting him out again’s not going to be an easy task. There’s one narrow door, and it’ll be shadowy inside.”

  “Just show me where it is. I’ll get him out of it. The prince’s men can handle the rest of the traitors, if there be any with him.”

  Salamander led them around the walls to a door made of rough wood planks. Gerran would have thought it the entrance to a storage shed if Salamander hadn’t pointed to it and mouthed the words “in there.”

  Gerran strode up to the door and kicked it as hard as he could. With a groan it splintered down the middle. The pieces swung inside to a gloom lit by splinters of sunlight. At the far end, on what appeared to be a stone altar, a man lay sprawled on his back. Honelg? Gerran wondered. Someone else, however, knelt before it. When he stood and turned to face the door, Gerran recognized the lord. A pot helm dangled from his left hand.

  “Honelg!” Gerran shouted. “I’m challenging you. If you think your lying whore of a goddess will protect you, you’re wrong. Get out here!”

  “I’ll take your challenge, Falcon,” Honelg called back, “if you’ll promise me one thing on your word of honor.”

  “What it is?”

  “That I won’t be mobbed and killed bef
ore I can get clear of the door.”

  “Fair enough. You have my sworn word that you’ll face me and me alone.”

  “Done, then!”

  Gerran heard the men behind him begin moving back as Prince Voran gave orders to clear a combat ground. Honelg walked half the distance to the door. When he paused in a shaft of sunlight to toss his helm aside, Gerran could see that the lord was wearing only a linen shirt with his brigga.

  “Ye gods!” Gerran said. “Where’s your mail? If you’ve not got a hauberk at least, we’ll lend you one.”

  Honelg laughed, and an oddly merry laugh at that. “I have Alshandra, and you have your armor,” he said. “I declare this a fair fight.”

  “Well and good, then, but if you won’t wear a helm, then I’ll lay mine aside, too.”

  Behind him a babble rose, calling him daft, urging him to keep the helm on. Gerran took it off and held helm and shield both out in Salamander’s general direction. The gerthddyn took them, then darted back out of the way.

  “I warn you.” Honelg sounded as calm as if he were discussing some tedious everyday detail. “You’ll never gain this victory. My goddess will either see to it that you’re slain, or else she’ll take me to my true home at last.”

  “Oh, will she now? Then let’s not keep the lady waiting.”

  Honelg drew his sword with his right hand, then pulled his dagger from his belt with his left and walked to the door of the shrine. Gerran stepped back to let Honelg’s eyes grow used to the sunlight.

  “On the altar you’ll find one of my servants,” Honelg said. “He was going to surrender to your prince, so I slew him for her sake. Hang his corpse for the ravens, will you?”

  “I’ll see to it he’s buried decently, more like.” Gerran let his sword lie easy in his hand, point down, as if he were off his guard. “Get out here, you pisspoor excuse for a man!”

  Honelg’s face flushed red. With a howl of “Alshandra!” he flung up his sword and charged. Gerran stepped to one side and flicked his blade up, catching the lord high across the ribs. Blood spread through his shirt as Honelg turned, gasping, to face him, only to meet Gerran’s blade on the back swing. Gerran cut him low, this time, splitting his belly like an overripe peach. The force of the blow spun the lord half-around.