The Bear

  “That she will never do,” came a woman’s voice from the doorway, and both men turned to see Gwydre herself standing there, wearing nothing but a simple nightshirt, her short hair rumpled as if she had just awakened.

  “Then you do a disservice to those you claim to champion, lady,” Bannagran said. “I have more warriors here in Pryd Town alone than you and Ethelbert together might muster, and my force is a third of what King Yeslnik can put on the field against you, less than a third!”

  “It matters not at all,” the unshaken woman replied. “I follow the cause of justice. I can march no other way, and justice demands the defeat of King Yeslnik. This is not about me, Laird Bannagran, nor is it about you, nor about Bransen. It is about the people of Honce, the farmers and the fishermen, the children and the elders so full of wisdom. They call out in voices thinned by the thunderous march of armies, but I hear them. And Bransen hears them. Does Bannagran?”

  The Bear of Honce laughed and walked over to stand right before her. “For them, Dame? Or should I call you Queen Gwydre?” he asked sarcastically.

  “It is not about me,” Gwydre said quietly.

  “Is it not?” Bannagran shouted in her face. “You feign humility and generosity and will send a thousand more to their graves, and all, and only, so that you can be queen!”

  Gwydre slapped him across the face, and Bransen sucked in his breath.

  Bannagran laughed, though, and Gwydre moved to slap him again, but this time, he caught her by the wrist. Undaunted, the woman slapped at him with her left hand, but again, Bannagran caught that one, too, in his iron grip, and with a quick tug, he brought Dame Gwydre right up against him.

  And then he kissed her.

  Bransen tried to shout in protest, but he had no voice with which to yell. He started forward just as Gwydre finally managed to pull back from Bannagran.

  She held her hand up to stop Bransen.

  “Get out,” Bannagran called over his shoulder to Bransen, and he tossed the bandanna and the soul stone to the floor near the wiry man. “The same way you came in.”

  “I’ll not leave Dame Gwy—”

  “Bransen, go,” Gwydre bade him.

  “And you, lady, would do well to get yourself back to your room, lest one of my sentries see you with your charms so exposed and . . . well, do what a man will do.”

  “It is not about me, Laird Bannagran,” Gwydre said as she moved to the room’s door, where, indeed, a sentry stood and stared at her with a rather lewd smile. Dame Gwydre just ignored him.

  “I’ll not make you the Queen of Honce, lady,” Bannagran assured her.

  “Then make yourself the King of Honce,” Gwydre said and exited.

  Bannagran had no response to that. He stood staring at the open doorway, and behind him stood Bransen, frozen in place with his hands tying the bandanna about his head.

  Finally, Bannagran managed to turn about and fix Bransen with a glare. With a tapped salute, Bransen slipped out the window and disappeared into the night.

  The Highwayman wandered for more than an hour, ending up at the lake, not far from the house where he had lived with Garibond. He looked back at that dark structure now and thought of all the good times he had shared with Garibond. Fishing, reading the secrets of his father’s Book of Jhest, just those moments of quiet and serenity sitting across the table from his adoptive father, a man who needed little and asked for nothing.

  The distraction of that pleasant memory could not hold, however, and Bransen found himself staring across the dark waters, wondering what in the world had prompted Dame Gwydre’s parting remark to Bannagran.

  “King Bannagran,” Bransen said aloud, just to hear it, just to try to absorb it.

  He couldn’t. No matter how many times he whispered the name, it sounded discordant in his heart—a heart still broken from the loss of Garibond, a heart still stung by the actions of Bannagran. Bransen had thought that he had put most of this behind him. Had he not come here, Gwydre in tow, to make peace with the man, after all? Had he not come here to teach Bannagran the truth of Bannagran, for it was, in many regards, the same truth Bransen had finally come to know about himself?

  So why had Dame Gwydre’s words so unsettled him?

  Because he had come to enlist Bannagran in the cause of Dame Gwydre, a goodly cause. He had come to Pryd to give Bannagran a chance at redemption and perhaps a greater opportunity to follow a more just road going forward. But this was different, for if Bannagran fought for the cause of Bannagran there was no altruism, no penance, no redemption, and in that void, how could Bransen ever consider the man worthy of the title?

  And in that regard, could Bransen really fight for Bannagran as he had chosen to fight for Dame Gwydre? He had no answers to those unsettling questions, none at all. But he had to find them. He stared at the water, reached up, and untied his bandanna with one hand, dropping his soul stone into the other.

  Bransen took a deep breath, then another, afraid of the journey before him. He thought of Giavno, forever wounded, and reminded himself that Bannagran, though untrained in the magic of the sacred gemstones, was a man of great discipline and fortitude.

  But Bransen had to know.

  He closed his eyes and brought his clenched fist and the soul stone right between his eyes, focusing on its teeming energy, seeking its inviting depths. In the gray smoothness, Bransen found release, his spirit drawing from his corporeal form and flying free into the dark Pryd night.

  Straight for Castle Pryd, he flew, up high along the keep’s sides and to the same windowsill through which he had charged earlier that night.

  Snoring, Bannagran lay sprawled in his cushiony chair before the now dark hearth, his arms hanging out to either side, legs straight out before him. He still wore his muddy boots and had his great axe near at hand, leaning on the side of the chair. Two bottles lay on the floor, one empty, one nearly so.

  Bransen built a picture in his mind—a scroll Father Artolivan had shown him of the order from Yeslnik that all of the prisoners from Laird Ethelbert’s forces be executed. Bransen wasn’t sure of the exact wording, but he formulated the thought clearly—Ethelbert’s men were to be executed—and used that solid notion to lead the way into the spirit of the sleeping man.

  Bannagran snorted and stirred, and an image of Dame Gwydre in her revealing nightshirt—more revealing than Bransen remembered it by far!—flashed in Bransen’s consciousness. More images of the woman flitted about, but Bransen didn’t pause to reflect upon them.

  He stabbed at Bannagran’s dream—Execute the prisoners!

  A wall of anger came back at Bransen, accompanied by a jumble of thoughts: that it would outrage the peasants, that such an action would dispirit their own soldiers, that such an edict would push the one ascendant church away, and, finally and most important to Bransen, that it was simply wrong.

  The order was an action without honor.

  There the Highwayman had his answer, so quickly and so concisely, that Bannagran, the great Bear of Honce, the fearless and ferocious warrior who had cut so many enemies down, was, as Bransen had guessed, possessed of some measure of honor.

  A great measure, considering the anger that continued to roil in the man.

  Bransen felt drawn deeper into this complicated mind. He thought of Giavno again, briefly, but couldn’t help himself as Bannagran’s dreams invited him in.

  Yeslnik! Bransen’s thoughts shouted, for he wanted to capture an unvarnished response, a sense of the man’s gut, before the inevitable moment when Bannagran recognized the horrific intrusion and instinctively fought back.

  Yeslnik!

  Bransen felt the roar of revulsion as intimately as if it were his own, and, for a brief moment, he thought it was aimed at him, at his intrusion. But no, he realized, Bannagran hadn’t yet registered the possession for what it was, and so the revulsion was aimed squarely at the would-be King of Honce.

  Gwydre! Bransen fired at him, and the images flowed freely, and Bannagran stirred aga
in, even physically thrashed a bit on the cushiony chair. Bransen felt the warmth there . . . no, not warmth but heat.

  He thought of Cadayle; he couldn’t help but think of Cadayle!

  And then there was Bannagran, thoughts afire, but not about Gwydre, nay, about the horror of this nightmare, of this intrusion.

  Bransen retreated and ran away. With every bit of discipline he could muster—with every memory of lost Giavno playing loudly—Bransen resisted the primal urge to remain and to possess, the temptation that had destroyed so many monks, and he ran away. His spirit flew out the window and across the castle courtyard, over the wall, and out to the lake in the east, to the beacon of light that was the soul stone.

  He came back to physical consciousness sitting on the rock by the lake, his hands trembling and mouth agape, gasping for breath. Reflexively, he glanced back toward the distant castle, as if he expected Bannagran to be exiting the gates, leading an army to find him and kill him for his violation.

  Gradually Bransen calmed and sorted through the tumult of thoughts and images, the revulsion at the order of execution and at Yeslnik himself, and the strength of arousal at the notion of Dame Gwydre!

  Bransen didn’t return to Chapel Pryd that night but found some sleep right there beside the quiet lake, whose stillness so contrasted with the turbulence that roared in Bransen’s spinning thoughts.

  The next morning, Dame Gwydre found Bannagran sitting on his throne in the main hall of the ground floor of Castle Pryd, his bearded chin in his hands and a look of great consternation on his dark face.

  “You will honor the agreement and flag of parlay?” she asked. When he didn’t answer, she added, “I will be out to the north and rid of Pryd Town this very morning.”

  Bannagran lifted his head and looked up at her, appearing as if her words had not at all registered.

  Gwydre eyed him curiously. “The flag of parlay?” she asked.

  “Go where you will.”

  “Laird?”

  “He’s turned me back to the east,” Bannagran replied, which only made Gwydre’s puzzled expression screw up even more.

  After a moment of consideration, she asked, “King Yeslnik?”

  “I’m not needed along the Masur Delaval,” Bannagran informed her. “And so it is back to Ethelbert dos Entel for my forces. There you have it, lady, get your Vanguardsmen to Laird Ethelbert’s side and perhaps you can sting King Yeslnik’s smaller force, far from home for both of us.”

  “Why would you tell me . . . ?” Gwydre’s voice trailed off. “You were sent there to vanquish Laird Ethelbert, then recalled, and now, so soon, you are being turned about once more?”

  “I lose ten men for every league we march,” Bannagran replied. “Provisions have grown scarce from our passage, there and back, and the folk of all the towns between Pryd and Ethelbert dos Entel now flee when they hear word of an army, any army, drawing near—they flee, and quite efficiently, leaving little behind for hungry scavengers.”

  “You would tell this to King Yeslnik, but he wouldn’t hear.”

  Bannagran snickered helplessly.

  “Would General Bannagran advise this march at this time?” Gwydre asked.

  “No.”

  “But Laird Ethelbert is a dangerous foe.”

  “Be gone, lady,” Bannagran bade her.

  “You know that this man you follow is not worthy to be king,” Gwydre said. Bannagran looked up to glare at her, but she didn’t back down. “You know it. Indeed, you know that his reign will be disastrous throughout its length, short may it be.”

  “Be gone, lady,” Bannagran said again, this time with an ominous tone in his voice, one that told Gwydre that she was pushing him too hard.

  “Perhaps I will return to you in the coming weeks,” she said, and Bannagran looked at her as if she were insane. “When you can better judge my actions against your King Yeslnik. When you see the truth of who I am and what I do and how I do it. Will you honor my flag of parlay again, Laird Bannagran?”

  Bannagran snorted, shook his head, and chuckled helplessly. “If you have something to say worth hearing, lady.”

  Gwydre smiled coyly. “I always do.”

  She bowed and moved away, out the castle doors and across the courtyard. She arrived at Chapel Pryd, standing before Master Reandu, at the same time as Bransen arrived from the lake.

  “The parlay is ended,” she told the monk.

  “Profitably, I hope.”

  “We shall see,” Gwydre started to say, but Bransen interrupted with a sly, “Yes.”

  Gwydre and Reandu looked at him curiously. “What do you know?” the Dame of Vanguard asked.

  “I know Bannagran,” Bransen replied cryptically, and as the others stared, he offered no more.

  Finally, with a shrug, Gwydre addressed Reandu. “I may return in time.”

  “That would be advised,” said a still smiling Bransen, and again the other two looked at him curiously.

  “We may be gone,” Master Reandu replied. “There are rumors afoot that Laird Bannagran has been ordered back to the east to do battle with Laird Ethelbert.”

  “He has,” Gwydre confirmed. “But I doubt he’ll go. The events in the heart of Honce will change quickly, and King Yeslnik will find that he needs Laird Bannagran right here in Pryd Town to protect his flank.”

  “We are all weary of the road and the war,” said Reandu.

  “Not all,” Bransen said with a grin.

  “Come,” Gwydre bade Bransen. “We have much to do.”

  They set off to the north, bounding across the fields in great, gemstone-enhanced strides.

  TWENTY-ONE

  Scout and Speed

  “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 re
plied

  “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.