Cassius Brontus had placed himself at the head of his cavalry. He intended to lead the charge and capture the Princess himself. This was his greatest political and military opportunity yet, and he didn’t intend to allow a little superstitious ceremony to rob him of it. He signaled to the bugler, and the note of the charge rang out.
The entire force of cavalry leaped to the attack, storming up the hill toward the line of housecarls who stood waiting steadily. Thirrin’s voice rose in power above the din of the galloping horses, shouting out the war cry of the Lindenshields: “Blood! Blast! And Fire! Blood! Blast! And Fire! Hold the line, warriors of the Icemark!” and her soldiers answered with their war chant:
“OUT! Out! Out! OUT! Out! Out! OUT! Out! Out!”
Then, with a tremendous roar, they leaped forward to meet the charge. The crashing ring of shield meeting cavalry echoed through the forest, and a volley of pistol shots rang out. The shield-wall bowed dangerously, and Thirrin screamed out the order to stand. Then into the huge calamitous roaring a new sound exploded. It was a noise like an avalanche in the mountains, and the cacophony grew as horses screamed in terror and men shouted. Thirrin stared in amazement as the very trees of the forest seemed to roll forward and smash into both flanks of the cavalry. The oak soldiers had arrived and were driving into their enemy. With a great shout of triumph the housecarls pushed forward and straightened their line, hacking at the troopers before them and dragging them from their saddles.
Cassius Brontus stared about him wildly. This could not be happening! Trees did not fight! Pieces of wood shaped like soldiers could not charge and attack his cavalry! It was madness, yet it was happening and his troopers were being outflanked. Realizing his danger, he gave orders to retreat; his words were translated into bugle calls that rang out above the din of battle. But as the horses were turned around, they found their route of escape blocked by more of the impossible wooden soldiers.
Thirrin seized her moment, and shouting out the battle cry of the Icemark, she led her housecarls in a smashing charge that drove against the trapped cavalry. The Polypontian soldiers fought with a controlled fury that showed their superb discipline. For more than half an hour the cavalry continued to fight a now defensive battle against the allied forces of the Icemark and the Oak King.
The political ambitions of Cassius Brontus were no longer of any importance to him. He simply wanted to save his command from annihilation. In very different circumstances he would have found the situation almost amusing: from arrogant certainty of success to a desperate struggle to survive in less than two hours. But he had no time to consider such ironies. As he barked out his last desperate orders, his cavalry began firing a continual rolling volley of pistol shots, and he led his troopers in a final charge against the part of the trap that had been most weakened by the earlier fighting. But Thirrin had read his thoughts perfectly, and her housecarls stood ready to receive them.
Spurred on by desperation, the Polypontian charge was a maelstrom of disciplined fury. They smashed into the shield-wall, bearing the soldiers of the Icemark back until their line was bent like a drawn bow. But at the center stood the burning figure of Thirrin Freer Strong-in-the-Arm Lindenshield, Wildcat of the North, and she held her housecarls with a will that grew in strength the more she demanded of it. Her high-pitched voice rose like the cry of a hawk above the din of battle, and her soldiers rallied again and again as she called on them to stand and hold the line. Her battle-ax was notched and her shield was hacked and scored by the cavalry sabers of her enemies, but still she stood her ground and her soldiers stood with her.
Then a strange gasp arose from the ranks of the cavalry, and a cry of despair went up. Cassius Brontus had fallen. His exhausted horse had stumbled and immediately soldiers of the Icemark had leaped on him, hacking him to pieces where he lay. An answering cheer burst forth from the housecarls and they drove forward with renewed determination. The cavalry fell back at last, their final hope gone.
For another hour the cavalry fought on against Thirrin and her allies. Toward the end they dismounted and formed a defensive square. The ammunition for their pistols was spent, but they continued with their sabers, standing shoulder to shoulder and defending their standard to the last.
Three times Thirrin offered them terms, but each time they refused. Soldiers of the Empire had never surrendered. And so, as the last rays of the winter sunset bathed the naked trees in a glorious light of red and gold, they were all cut down where they stood around their banner.
The housecarls and soldiers of the Oak King drew back and stood in silence, staring at the fallen troopers before them. Thirrin finally removed her helmet, leaned her shield against her legs, and for a moment allowed herself to be a fourteen-year-old girl once more. She wept for the deaths all around her, she wept for her people forced from their homes into the harsh winter of the Icemark, and she wept for the young Polypontian trooper who lay at her feet, the blood seeping from the wound in his neck where her ax had bitten deep.
And as the tears streamed from her eyes, a line of steel-gray clouds drew down upon the land and released the first snows of the winter in a swirling tangle of white that would shroud the fallen and preserve their bodies for months.
11
The first of the winter storms died out during the night, and at daybreak the sun was reflected brilliantly by an unbroken blanket of snow. The people of Frostmarris looked even more ragged and dirty than usual set against the freezing, fresh white of the new day, but now that the storm was over, their mood had lightened. The snows had arrived at last, and they could begin to hope that the bad omen of their late appearance would begin to lift.
As usual, Oskan and Maggiore led the way, and soon they noticed that the trees were slowly beginning to thin out. They were coming to the end of the forest, and by midday they reached its eaves. Before them lay a wide snow-covered plain, brilliant and glittering under the winter sun. The road was only just discernible as a slight hollow in the softly undulating surface, and when the next storm hit the old highway, it would be completely lost until the spring thaw.
After a brief pause to view the sight before them, the people plodded on. Maggiore turned in his saddle to look back over the refugees and then said casually, “You don’t feel a need to ride back to see how the Princess is faring, at all?”
Oskan looked at him and smiled. “No. I know she is safe. She’s won her first battle, Maggie. She’s proved herself the warrior we all knew she was. And besides, I don’t fancy being flayed alive by her tongue for leaving the people to the mercy of the weather. The fact that we’ve got at least two days before the next storm won’t make any difference to her.”
“No. I suppose not,” the neat little man answered automatically. But his mind and attention had suddenly wandered elsewhere. Thirrin had won her battle and they had at least two days before the next storm! After a quick calculation he realized that they would reach the main Hypolitan city before bad weather hit again. With a whoop of joy he urged his mare to a plunging gallop through the snow, throwing his hat into the air and laughing aloud while the people watched and cheered.
Then he reined to a halt and considered how he’d changed over the last few weeks: The rational man of science was now quite ready to accept without question the word of a dubiously educated peasant boy! And he really didn’t mind at all! So far Oskan had always been proved right, and what sort of rationality rejects proof just because it seems a little … colorful?
Maggiore sang bright, lilting songs of the Southern Continent for the rest of the day. His voice fell completely flat in the dense silence of the snow-covered land, but he didn’t seem to care, and the people added their own voices in a tangle of different songs and tunes that burst from the column of refugees like a flock of noisy birds.
It was Oskan who first spotted the splash of bright color moving steadily toward them across the white of the land. His keen eyes soon showed them to be cavalry of some sort coming from the north along the main hi
ghway.
He called Maggiore over and pointed ahead. “The Hypolitan have found us,” he said simply.
Thirrin led the march through the forest at an unfaltering pace, one they could keep up for hours. She wanted to put the trees behind them as quickly as possible. They had sufficient rations to last them for three days, but if a really bad snowstorm hit, they could be forced to stop for a week or more. In truth, she hadn’t expected any of them to survive the fight with the Empire cavalry, so she’d only given sketchy thought to the idea of rations to see them safely to the Hypolitan. But it was Oskan who’d insisted that she check and recheck their supplies before he’d left for the column the night before the battle. She was glad she’d listened to him now, but despite the shock of her first taste of open warfare, enough of the Princess still survived in her personality to be annoyed with him for not telling her to pack more. But, she eventually conceded, they were both novices when it came to provisions and rations; it was an easy enough mistake. Come to think of it, they were both novices at everything!
She’d actually recovered from the trauma of combat sooner than she could have ever imagined and now knew that she could lead her soldiers in battle with confidence and skill. As the housecarls themselves put it, she had “blood-proof,” and the veterans of her first fight would proudly boast of it for the rest of their lives.
Within half an hour of the last Polypontian soldier falling, she’d regained enough of her composure to remember to thank the soldiers of the Oak King, and had even presented them with the spoils of war in the form of the weapons and armor of the fallen soldiers. They had bowed low in reply, then melted back into the fabric of the forest once more, their bodies absorbed by tree and earth, leaving Thirrin and her housecarls standing alone on the road.
That was more than a day ago, and since then the first snows had fallen, prompting Thirrin to order a forced march through the night in an attempt to catch up with the column of refugees. But if more snow fell before she reached them, her first victory could be her last.
Just after midday they came to a cairn of rocks piled in the center of the road. Thirrin gave orders for it to be dismantled, and inside they found sacks of nuts, berries, and other dried fruits of the forest. The Oak King had sent them supplies. The housecarls cheered and beat their swords and axes on their shields in salute, while Thirrin simply called, “Thank you — this won’t be forgotten!” into the surrounding woodland.
The following night was even colder than usual for an Icemark winter. Even when they’d built huge blazing fires, the freezing winds reached icy fingers into the small domes of warmth and light that hugged the flames. Ten of the older soldiers died overnight, their gray housecarl beards white with frost and their hands frozen to the hilts of their swords. With a sense of quiet despair Thirrin realized that it wouldn’t be long before the younger soldiers started to die, too, but there was nothing she could do about it. She guessed that unless they reached shelter within two days she could lose up to a quarter of the soldiers who’d survived the battle. With this thought in mind she set a punishing pace along the road, driving the housecarls along by reminding them it was not only ferocity in battle that marked a good soldier but also stamina and endurance.
They marched through the night again, their pace slowing to a crawl in the darkest hours. The forest distantly echoed with strange calls and bellows as though giant beasts were hunting them. Once, Thirrin thought she heard howling, but it was very faint and she had no way of knowing if it was the sound of ordinary wolves driven down from the hills by hunger or if they were the cries of the Wolffolk, her allies. Then just before dawn, all fell silent as they trudged along, the only sound being the faint crunch as their feet broke through the crisp shell of frozen snow to the loose powder beneath. Thirrin was exhausted, and so were her housecarls. They would have to stop, if only for an hour or so, to eat rations and warm their frozen hands and feet at a fire.
She’d just given the order to halt when she caught the sound of hoofbeats approaching steadily. Without a word the shield-wall was raised and she took up her place at its very center. All her soldiers were staring ahead to a point in the road where it bent out of sight under the trees. Thirrin found herself wondering if they could put up much of a fight in their present condition. But she forgot all such thoughts as the horses came into view. They were about five hundred yards away, and in the cold clarity of the morning air Thirrin could see there were two columns, one made up of small sinewy animals and the other of larger horses. Both were carrying soldiers in brightly colored clothing.
One of the smaller horses was leading the columns, and its rider was wearing a scarlet cap with cheek flaps that looked somehow familiar to Thirrin. Seeing the shield-wall before them, the leader gave orders to halt before riding forward with another soldier who was on one of the larger horses. As they got nearer, Thirrin could see that the commander of the cavalry was a woman and she was holding up her hand in a gesture of peace.
“Who are you that rides armed in the forest in these times of war?” Thirrin called.
The woman didn’t reply but dismounted and walked forward to within a few feet of the housecarls’ shield-wall. Her face was stern and coldly beautiful, and Thirrin guessed she would be about Redrought’s age. Suddenly the woman dropped to one knee.
“Hail, Princess Thirrin Freer Strong-in-the-Arm Lindenshield. I am your vassal Elemnestra Celeste, Basilea of the Hypolitan, and this,” she said, indicating the huge man who stood respectfully some feet behind her, “is my consort Olememnon.”
The housecarls began to cheer, but Thirrin curtly waved for silence. Something about the woman warned her not to hold herself with anything other than supreme dignity in this first meeting.
“Greetings, Elemnestra Celeste, Basilea of the Hypolitan. I would inform you that you have not given my due titles fully, as you missed the fighting epithet ‘Wildcat of the North,’ given to me by my father, Redrought, King of this land,” she said proudly.
The woman returned her gaze steadily for a moment and then bowed her head. “Forgive me, My Lady. We had not been informed of this addition to your titles, but I will say that it is a fitting epithet for one who has just achieved her first victory with such glory.” The woman then looked up and smiled, her whole face transformed into a warm and radiant beauty.
She stood up before adding, “And while we are talking of titles, you have missed one of mine, My Lady. That of ‘Aunt’; your mother was my youngest sister.”
Of course Thirrin knew that the Basilea, or governor, of the Hypolitan was her aunt. But she had never met her mother’s relatives before, and after the trauma of the last few days she thought she could be forgiven if it had temporarily slipped her mind.
“Greetings, then, Aunt Elemnestra. And this must be my uncle Olememnon,” Thirrin answered, nodding at the huge man who stood quietly waiting.
“Well, yes … I suppose so,” Elemnestra answered, as though it had never occurred to her that a man could hold such a position. “Olememnon. Come forward and greet your … niece.”
The governor’s consort stepped forward and smiled as he dropped to one knee. He was massively built, with wide shoulders and a deep barrel chest, but oddly, he had no beard. Thirrin wondered if he’d had some dreadful accident, but then noticed that none of the other soldiers on the larger horses, all men, had beards, either. The common-sense answer occurred to her at last. Of course, they shaved. She was almost shocked. It was strange to look on men of the Icemark with no beards. It was almost like looking at older versions of Oskan, except that all of these soldiers had the stature of full-grown men.
The other soldiers on the smaller horses were women, and were as tall and slender as their Basilea. They carried short compound bows, spears, and crescent-shaped shields made of strengthened wicker, while the men carried round shields and axes like her own housecarls. But they all dressed the same, in brightly embroidered pants, coats, and scarlet caps with cheek flaps.
Thirrin tu
rned her attention back to Olememnon, who was still kneeling before her, and stepping out of the shield-wall she took his hand and helped him to his feet.
“Greetings, Uncle,” she said formally, and kissed his shaven cheek.
“Greetings, My Lady,” he answered in a deep yet quiet voice, and smiled back at her.
Thirrin then turned to her aunt and, stepping forward, embraced her. A huge cheer rang out from the housecarls and this time Thirrin didn’t try to stop it.
Maggiore looked around him. The rooms were light and spacious, and the white-plastered walls with their murals of hills and trees reminded him of his childhood home. Except these hills were bigger, of course. And they were in the north, not far from the lands of permanent ice where the days and the nights were six months long. So how did the artists of this cold land know about the low hills and different species of trees found far to the south? How could they know of the countries where the sun is kind and the rains are well mannered enough to come at set times of the year so the people can prepare for them? It was a puzzle, though he supposed that they had simply copied works they had seen while traveling. Even so, the murals were to be found everywhere in the Basilea’s palace, and they were so vivid and of such high quality that Maggiore was almost convinced that they proved some sort of link between the Hypolitan and the regions of the south.
But he was happy to let the mystery of the decor remain unsolved for a while. He was still enjoying the unusual luxury of being warm. A huge fire blazed in the log basket that sat in the center of the room, and the windows were tightly shuttered against the howling blizzard that was raging around the city of Bendis, the chief settlement of the Hypolitan. Warmth and good-sized food rations were just what he needed after that hellish journey, though he had to admit, things could have been far worse. “Thank whatever gods an agnostic like myself can believe in that the Basilea got our messages and brought help,” Maggiore murmured to himself.