He meant it as he had meant to murder Deanna’s own brothers and sister that night in Carlisle.
It took all the woman’s resolve and years of training for her to hold her thoughts private, and properly shield her emotions. She wanted to lash out at the evil king then and there, force Brind’Amour into the fight so that she could pay this wretched man back for the deaths of her family.
She grinned wickedly instead, nodding.
“You,” Greensparrow snapped at one of his Praetorian Guard escorts. The brute immediately jumped forward, fearing a fate similar to that of Undercommander Kreignik.
“What is your name?”
“Akrass.”
“Undercommander Akrass,” Greensparrow corrected. “You are to follow Duchess Wellworth’s commands as you would have followed those of Duke Theredon Rees.”
Akrass shook its head. “I cannot,” the brute replied. “My orders are to stand by you, and you alone, to the death.”
Greensparrow chuckled and nodded. “You have passed the test,” he assured the brute. “But the test is no more, by my own words.
“Deanna Wellworth is the duchess of Warchester,” he went on, then to Deanna, he added, “Temporarily.”
This caught the five Praetorian Guards by surprise, and Akrass even dared to look back to the others.
Deanna nodded. “I will not fail in this,” she said with clear resolve, and she meant every word, though her intended mission was not what King Greensparrow had in mind.
Not at all.
“You are leaving?” Deanna asked as Greensparrow suddenly swept away.
“I am off to the coast to see about Ashannon,” he snarled.
Deanna was glad that he turned back to the corridor before realizing how pale her face suddenly went.
“You should fly to the east instead,” she blurted, stopping Greensparrow short. He turned slowly to regard her.
“New information,” she stammered, searching for something to tell this tyrant. “I fear that some Huegoths have joined in with our enemies. Their western fleet . . .”
Greensparrow’s face screwed up with rage.
“I wanted to search it out more before speaking with you,” Deanna tried to explain. “I cannot be certain. But now, I have other duties, more important.” She straightened her shoulders, finding her courage. “You should fly out to the east and determine if the information is true. Ashannon will see to the Eriadoran fleet, and I will strike back to the north. We will await you in Montfort!”
Greensparrow let his gaze linger a bit longer on the woman, then turned and pushed through the Praetorian Guards.
Deanna nearly fainted with relief.
In a room not so far away, Brind’Amour sighed.
Luthien had heard the earlier reports that a great winged creature had landed on the fields south of Warchester. The descriptions had been vague—the army was still several miles from the city, and miles further from those southern fields—but the young Bedwyr could guess at what his scouts were talking about.
This time, he, too, spotted the beast, its great lizardlike form, widespread wings, and long, serpentine tail, as it flew far off to the south and east. Some on the hillock beside him called it a bird, but Luthien knew better.
It was a dragon.
Luthien’s heart sank at the sight. He was one of the very few people alive in all the world who had faced a dragon before, and only dumb luck and the work of Brind’Amour had allowed him to escape. The young Bedwyr couldn’t even imagine fighting such an enemy; he wondered if his entire army could even harm the great beast if it turned suddenly to the north and attacked.
Luthien shook that thought away; if such was true, then the dragon would have come north, breathing its fire and rending man and dwarf. The young Bedwyr looked back over his troops, and took heart. Let the wyrm come north, he decided, and they would put up such a barrage of arrows that the sheer weight of the volley would bring the beast down!
The dragon continued to the east, Luthien saw as he looked back, and was now no more than a speck on the distant horizon.
“Keep going,” Luthien prayed quietly. He suspected that he would see this one again, though. It had landed south of Warchester, which meant that Greensparrow’s allies included more than cyclopians and a handful of wizards.
“How could you tell him?” Brind’Amour asked, comfortable in his own form again when he and Deanna were alone in the locked and magically secured room.
Deanna held up her hands.
“Of the Huegoths,” Brind’Amour explained impatiently, for she knew what he meant. “How could you tell Greensparrow of the Huegoths?”
Deanna shrugged. “It seemed the lesser evil,” she replied casually. “If Greensparrow had gone to the west, as he had intended, then Ashannon and our fleets would be sorely pressed—likely destroyed even, when you consider the power such a wizard might exert over the cloth and wood of sailing ships. Even worse for us all, if Greensparrow flew west, he would likely discern the truth of it all. Flying east, he will spend many days confirming the information of the Huegoths, if they are as far offshore as you believe, days that we will need if we ever hope to get to Carlisle.”
Brind’Amour was upset, but he understood Deanna’s reasoning. There had to be a measure of truth within a web of lies, the wizard realized, and that truth had to be convincing. Deanna had thrown Greensparrow a bit of valuable information that she might keep his trust, something that she and Brind’Amour certainly needed. It was only that confidence Greensparrow held, in himself and in those he had subjugated, that had thus far kept him oblivious to the treachery. Still, it occurred to Brind’Amour that Deanna’s goals and his own were not one and the same. Both wanted Greensparrow thrown down, but Brind’Amour didn’t think that the duchess would shed many tears if the Eriadoran, dwarvish, and Huegoth forces were badly diminished in the effort.
He would have to keep a close eye on Deanna Wellworth. With that in mind, the wizard closed his eyes and began his transformation once more, assuming the form of Theredon Rees.
“Have you the strength for the illusion?” Deanna asked, drawing the wizard from his contemplations.
Brind’Amour stared at her blankly.
“Dusk is nearly upon us.”
Brind’Amour nodded, catching on. Akrass was busy assembling the ten thousand who would go out from Warchester under cover of darkness.
“The mantle of Duke Theredon is ready to be donned,” Brind’Amour assured her.
Deanna wasn’t sure if that would even be necessary—or wise, since they would have to make up yet another story to satisfy the curiosity of Akrass. Greensparrow had publicly given her power over the entire Warchester garrison, after all, and Theredon was not needed.
Brind’Amour understood the same, but he wasn’t about to let ten thousand cyclopians march out of Warchester under Deanna’s control with his own forces so vulnerable if things were not handled just right. Not yet.
The pair left the room soon after to meet with Akrass, Deanna explaining quickly that since Theredon had returned—and wouldn’t Greensparrow be pleased to learn that his duke was indeed still alive?—she was relinquishing command to him, but also that Greensparrow’s words concerning her own power still held, and she would serve as the duke’s second.
Akrass believed it—what choice did the poor brute have?
They came out of the gates after sunset, the full moon rising in the east. “Theredon” and Deanna headed the procession, in step with the cyclopian Akrass, whose chest was swollen with pride. The one-eye wasted no time in beating any who ventured too near, or who showed even the least amount of disrespect.
Before they had gone very far, before the entire cyclopian line had even crossed under the huge gates, Brind’Amour put out a whistling call that was answered, a moment later, by a small owl, which flew down to the wizard’s arm and cocked its head curiously.
Brind’Amour whispered into the bird’s ear and sent it away, flying north with all speed.
“What do you do?” Akrass asked.
Brind’Amour scowled at him, reminding him that his newly granted power did not include questioning the duke of Warchester! The cyclopian lowered its gaze accordingly.
“Now we have eyes,” Brind’Amour remarked to Deanna.
“Eyes and a plan,” the duchess replied.
That plan was fairly simple: the cyclopians broke up into three groups, with three thousand going over the Dunkery River to flank the Eriadorans on the right, three thousand going over the Eorn River to flank the enemy on the left, and the remaining four thousand, including a fair amount of ponypig cavalry, going straight north, between the rivers, headlong into the Eriadoran encampment with the initial attack. The confusion caused within the Eriadoran army’s ranks would turn to sheer panic, it was reasoned, as soon as the one-eyes came across the Dunkery and the Eorn, squeezing like a vise.
Of course, Brind’Amour and Deanna had other ideas.
Luthien, Bellick, and Siobhan were quick to respond when word reached them that a talking bird had entered the camp. The young Bedwyr prayed that this might be the work of Brind’Amour, even the wizard himself in a transformed body.
He was a bit disappointed when he found the owl perching on a low branch. It seemed oblivious, and though Brind’Amour often appeared that way, Luthien knew that this was not the wizard. Still there was no doubt that there was a bit of magic about the bird, for it was indeed speaking, uttering only one word: “Princetown.”
“Brind’Amour has gone to Princetown?” Siobhan asked the bird.
“Princetown,” the owl replied.
“At least we now know where the wizard has gone off to,” Bellick remarked sourly, not thrilled to think that Brind’Amour would not rejoin them for their all-important attack against Warchester. As far as any of those in the camp knew, there was an enemy wizard ready to meet that charge.
Luthien wasn’t convinced. He tried questioning the bird along different lines: “Are we to go to Princetown?” and “Has Princetown claimed allegiance with Eriador?” but all that the bird would reply was that one word.
Until Luthien and the other two turned to leave. Then the owl said suddenly, “Glen Durritch.”
As one, the three turned back to the bird. “Princetown, Glen Durritch,” grumbled Bellick, not catching on.
“Left, right, straight ahead,” said the bird, and then, as though the enchantment put over the creature had expired, the owl silently flew off into the darkness.
Luthien’s face brightened.
“What do you know?” Siobhan asked him.
“Only once have we gone against a fortified Avon city,” Luthien replied. “And we won a smashing victory.”
“Princetown,” Bellick put in.
“But we did not actually battle against the city,” Siobhan objected.
“We fought in Glen Durritch,” said Luthien. Siobhan’s face brightened next, but Bellick, who had come on the scene in Princetown near the end of the battle and really didn’t know how things had fallen out so favorably, remained in the dark.
“Brind’Amour took the form of Princetown’s Duke Paragor and sent the city’s garrison out from behind the high walls,” Luthien explained.
Bellick’s gaze snapped to the south, toward Warchester. “You’re not thinking . . .” the dwarf began.
“That is exactly what I am thinking,” Luthien replied.
Siobhan called for the scouts to go out in force, and for the camp to be roused and readied for battle.
“This was a warning from Brind’Amour,” Luthien insisted, joining Bellick as the dwarf continued to stare out to the south. “The garrison is coming out, and we must be ready for them.”
For the three cyclopian groups, the one crossing the swift Dunkery had the most difficult time.
Even worse for the one-eyes, Bellick had realized that they would.
The cyclopian flank was split, a third already across the river, a third in the water, and the rest lining the eastern bank, preparing to cross, when the Eriadorans hit. The cavalry, led by Luthien and Siobhan, sliced down the eastern bank, while archers opened mercilessly on those brutes struggling in the water, their thrashing forms clearly illuminated by the full moon. At the same time, Bellick’s dwarven charges overwhelmed those on the western bank, pushing them back into the river.
The waters ran red with cyclopian blood; even more brutes drowned in the swift current, their support lines chopped by dwarvish axes. Those one-eyes on the eastern bank were the most fortunate, for some of them, anyway, managed to run off into the night, screaming and without any semblance of order.
It was over quickly.
But though the rout was in full spate, the Eriadorans had just begun this night’s work. Spearheaded by Luthien’s cavalry, the force charged off to the south, determined to get to Warchester ahead of the remaining two cyclopian groups, to ambush them out on the field.
“It is empty!” Akrass roared, kicking at a bedroll—a bedroll stuffed with leaves and stones so as to appear full. Every fire in the vast encampment burned low, every blanket, every bedroll, covered nothing more than inanimate stuffing.
Before the cyclopian could even begin to express its outrage, the sounds of battle drifted in from the east, from the Dunkery.
“They have gone out to meet our flank!” yelled Brind’Amour, still in Theredon’s guise but growing more weary by the moment.
Akrass called for formations, thinking to charge right off to the east and ambush the ambushers. With his duke’s blessing, the undercommander did just that, so he thought.
The moon could be a curious thing when wizards were nearby. Simple spells of reflection could make the pale orb seem to shift its position. Similarly, spells of echo reflection could alter the apparent source of clear noise. And so the disoriented Akrass led his four thousand straight to the north instead of the east.
“Nice moon,” Brind’Amour remarked to Deanna as they put their horses in line for the march, as the old wizard realized just how well Deanna had executed the enchantment.
“Simple trick,” the woman replied humbly.
Brind’Amour was truly pleased. “Simple but effective.”
The last of the Warchester formations trudged across the low and muddy Eorn without incident. They were too far away to hear the sounds of battle, or the rumble of the cyclopian thrust to the north, and so they, like Akrass’s group, were caught completely by surprise when they happened upon the Eriadoran encampment, expecting to find the battle underway, but discovering nothing but empty bedrolls.
By that time, the fields to the east were quiet once more.
The cyclopian leader of this group, without Theredon or Deanna or even Akrass to guide it, ordered a full retreat, and so the force set out back down the Eorn, this time on the river’s eastern bank. They looked over their shoulders every step, hoping that their comrades would come marching down behind them, but fearing that the charge from behind might come from the sneaky Eriadorans.
Their defensive posture was to the rear then, as in any good retreat.
Except that this time they got hit from the front, and then from both sides as the superior Eriadoran forces closed on them like the jaws of a hungry wolf. It took several minutes for all the one-eyes to realize that these were their enemies; many thought that they were being greeted, and then erroneously attacked, by the garrison that had remained at Warchester!
They figured out the truth eventually, those that were still alive, but by that time it was far too late. Confusion turned to panic; cyclopians ran off in every direction, though the dark silhouette of high-walled Warchester was clearly visible to the south. Some desperately called for the garrison to come out to their aid, but the one-eyes inside the high walls, with typical selfish cowardice, would not dare desert the defensible city to save their kin.
“Long enough,” Brind’Amour and Deanna decided, though it was a moot point. The leading edge of the cyclopian force, Akrass riding among them, had come in
to a village—and recognized the place as Billingsby, a hamlet five miles north of Warchester.
Deanna trotted her horse ahead of the main group to meet with the undercommander as Akrass came thundering back from Billingsby.
“The Eriadoran wizard-king, Brind’Amour, has struck,” she said in despair. “He has obviously deceived us and led us in the wrong direction!”
Akrass wanted to strike the woman; Deanna could see that.
“Greensparrow will blame me,” Deanna said, intercepting the brute’s intentions.
The furious cyclopian backed off immediately, figuring that if it attacked Deanna now, perhaps even killing her, Greensparrow’s ire might fall squarely on its own shoulders.
“To Warchester!” the cyclopian undercommander howled, waiting for no commands from the wizards. Akrass galloped his ponypig up and down the line, sweeping up the marching cyclopians in its wake, thundering back to the south.
By the time the battle was finished, the eastern sky had turned a lighter shade of blue, dawn fast approaching. Bellick’s Cutter scouts came riding hard, informing the dwarf king that the third and largest force had swung about and was double-timing it back to the south, straight for Warchester.
King Bellick stroked his fiery orange beard and considered his options. His army was tired, obviously so, for they had fought two vicious encounters already. And with the daylight, and the warning cries that would no doubt come out from Warchester, it didn’t seem likely that this third group would be caught so unawares.
Bellick split his forces, east and west, marching them out of sight of the city, with orders to let the one-eyes pass, then come in hard at the back of their line.
The men and dwarfs and Fairborn, bone-weary, covered in blood of kin and enemy, eagerly agreed.