Crown of Vengeance (Dragon Prophecy) (72 page)

“They’ll like him less a candlemark from now,” Vieliessar said, and Nadalforo laughed.

Nadalforo raised the signal whistle to her lips and blew a complicated pattern of notes. Vieliessar reined Snapdragon to a stop as the former mercenary companies detached themselves from the line of march and formed into two ranks facing the enemy. Inglethendragir’s grand-tailles broke away from the vanguard and began to move over the ice, spreading from column into line as they did. When they were in formation, they moved to a trot.

“Are you ready?” Vieliessar asked Terandamil.

“We are,” the Master of the Archers replied.

Inglethendragir advanced. Vieliessar’s force waited. The belling of her banner on the wind—the High King’s banner defiantly displayed—was the only movement. The attackers moved from trot to canter to gallop and still Vieliessar’s force waited.

“
Now
,” Terandamil said.

In one smooth movement, infantry stepped from behind the second rank of destriers and moved into the open spaces between the first rank. Once they had been favored servants of their domains, huntsmen and foresters. Each carried a forester’s bow. Terandamil had not honed their deadly skill, for that was a thing only years could do. But it was Terandamil who had told them they were warriors.

They loosed their arrows, and the shots came so close together that the release of the bowstrings was like a rippling chord of harpsong. Three heartbeats later another volley of arrows sang forth, and three heartbeats later, another. The music of the third volley was drowned out by agonized screaming. The ice had grown bright and slick with blood. At the ends of the enemy line a few wounded destriers thrashed.

Most of the rest were dead.

The enemy center was still intact. Some of the knights tried to rein in and turn back. Their mounts skidded and slipped—some fell, and over all the other sounds, in a freakish heartbeat of silence, there was the sound of a leg bone breaking, loud and sharp. Others galloped on, or tried to turn at the gallop, simply did their best to
slow down
.

Whatever they did, nothing saved them.

Terandamil’s rangers nocked and loosed, nocked and loosed, and the long, heavy arrows flew low over the ice in flights as regular and inexorable as the beats of a war drum. Behind the lines of mercenaries a line of palfreys waited, each with a rider already in its saddle. As the archers ran out of arrows, or when a string or bow snapped, that archer retreated. Each archer moved with calm precision, though the bitter cold numbed bare fingers and made bowstrings brittle. Each arrow struck its target: the destriers—and only the destriers. Warhorses were precious and nearly irreplaceable. The fewer warhorses the Alliance possessed, the fewer
komen
they could send against her. And when Terandamil’s archers were done, the Alliance had two grand-tailles less.

When all the destriers were dead or dying, the archers walked away, quietly, without display. It was as much a warning to their noble comrades as it was to their enemy.

The attack was over so swiftly the Alliance commanders had no time to ride to Inglethendragir’s aid—or summon their Lightborn to Shield them. A few single knights rode out from the Alliance column and loosed arrows, but the horseman’s bow had less range than the forester’s bow, so the shafts fell harmlessly to the ground. The destriers of Inglethendragir lay slewed across the blood-smeared ice. Some riders had been thrown, some had jumped clear as their mounts went down, some still lay trapped beneath the dead and dying animals. A few moved with daggers to end the lives of the still-suffering beasts.

“It would be funny if it weren’t so sad,” Nadalforo said quietly, watching. “Even if you lose, it’s the end of the
komentai’a
. Everyone now knows a meisne armed with forester’s bows can slaughter a troop of knights any time it chooses to. That won’t make them massacre their foresters. They’ll all scurry to find and train them. We’ll be facing them ourselves if this war goes on long enough.”

“It won’t,” Vieliessar said.
It can’t.

“As I say, Lord Vieliessar, I hope you win,” Nadalforo said. She reined her destrier around and trotted after the army.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

WIND AND DUST

For the road is long and the world is wide

The wind is cold and the way is dark

When again shall I see her, Celephriandullias-Tildorangelor, beloved who has turned her face from me?”

—Perhael Storysinger,
Perhael’s Song

That night Terandamil’s archers celebrated their victory and the rest of the infantry joined them. The
komen
and their lords withdrew to their own precincts and the mood of the encampment was unsettled. Vieliessar made a brief visit to the victory feast, then spent a long, fruitless evening pouring over maps of the Uradabhur before retiring to her sleeping chamber.

Sleep did not come. Her mind was too full of problems. The arming of the commons to fight beside the
komen
had always been the point on which her army could fracture. Only the Light could raise one of the commonfolk to the level of the Lords
Komen
. The lords of the Hundred Houses had been convinced the Light was Pelashia’s Gift: rare, valued, mysterious. They had even been able to blind themselves to the fact that the mercenary companies, whose warriors were the equal in skill of any
komen,
had held more former farmers than former knights among their ranks.

It was harder to unsee a forester’s skill turned to a tool of war, but everyone knew mastery of the forester’s bow was a task of years; not even Lightborn spellcraft could change that.
But the pike can be learned in a few sennights of practice, and the infantry have already proven their worth in battle. They cannot stand against charging warhorses—but even
komen
do not do that unless they must.

Nadalforo would tell her she was worrying about things that would not matter if she lost. Rithdeliel would tell her this would only last for a brief while, for Vieliessar knew that in his heart, he could not accept the idea that war would never again be a contest of skills that were both art and homage. Gunedwaen …

He would tell you victory is as much a battle as war. I only wish Arilcarion had written a scroll about that!

*   *   *

By Snow Moon, storms battered both armies mercilessly, and no matter what the Alliance did, Vieliessar did something unexpected, as if she played
gan
when they played
xaique
. And victory slid further from their grasp each day.

They could have won. While they were still in Jaeglenhend, they could have won—if Vieliessar were dead. Her death would have left her army leaderless. Disheartened. They could have spent the winter picking it to pieces.

After Jaeglenhend, Runacarendalur would have cut his own throat gladly. He could not. He’d tried many times to end the life that would end hers.

He’d gone to Lord Bolecthindial and accused Ivrulion of plotting against Caerthalien. Bolecthindial hadn’t taken him seriously enough to even become angry.

He’d tried risking his life on the field, but all he’d managed to do was get Gwaenor killed.

He’d begged Ivrulion, humbling himself before his faithless witchborn brother. Ivrulion had laughed.

He tried to murder Ivrulion in a thousand ways. Poison failed and assassins vanished. Runacarendalur couldn’t even seek his own death in a Challenge Circle: Aramenthiali had gotten the War Council to forbid personal challenges. With nothing to occupy them—no entertainment, no comforts, and only the faintest chance of fighting—the
komen
were becoming increasingly restive. It was one thing to use a break in the winter weather to go hunting, another to spend sennight after sennight living in a freezing pavilion and slogging through snow all day.

There wasn’t any game to hunt anyway. Vieliessar’s army devoured everything in its path like a raging fire. Even the border steadings the Alliance reached were nothing more than stones and beaten earth. The night watches had been doubled and doubled again, not because there was any likelihood of an attack, but because the laborers and servants kept slinking away in the dark.

At least with half the camp on watch, they could be sure the
komen
weren’t going to run off as well.

Each morning we arise to see nothing ahead but trackless white; each night there is no fire or Silverlight to be seen but ours. The only way to truly know she still flees us is to send out a sortie party to catch up to her. But no! The War Council is as bored as I am! It wishes an entertaining surprise, whenever the
High King
chooses to deliver it!

And soon, whether she could claim victory or not, the Alliance Army would be destroyed. Runacarendalur growled low in his throat at the thought, gaining him a startled look from a Household servant. It was just dawn, and the encampment was readying itself for another useless day of following Vieliessar Farcarinon, who seemed to have the ability to make an army numbering nine thousand tailles vanish like windblown smoke. If not for the impossibility of provisioning such a force, he wouldn’t put it past her to have laid a trail into the teeth of the first heavy snow and then have settled somewhere to spend the winter in comfort. Laughing at them.

At least today the weather was clear. And while no one in command of this ill-starred expedition would consider permitting another sortie party after Inglethendragir’s disastrous defeat, the War Princes knew entirely forbidding their
komen
to ride out would cause them to go into open revolt. Runacarendalur pulled the hood of his stormcloak further over his head as he reached the Caerthalien horselines. He meant to spend his day—and his foul temper—schooling his new destrier. Bentrain would never be the match of his beloved Gwaenor, but he’d been lucky to replace Gwaenor at all. There were already
komen
in the army without warhorses.

Bentrain stood waiting placidly. Runacarendalur unhooked the destrier’s halter and led him to the saddling paddock. With the ease of long practice, he tossed the heavy war saddle onto the stallion’s back, buckled the twin girths into place, brought the chestpiece around, buckled the upper strap to the saddle, and ducked under Bentrain’s neck to thread the lower strap through the ring on the forward girth.

When he straightened again, he saw Ivrulion leading his own mount into the saddling paddock. The palfrey mare was a grey as pale as ice, and every line of her spoke of speed and fire. It no longer surprised Runacarendalur that Ivrulion had managed to keep one of the best animals in the entire army for his personal use.

“I thought I might ride out with you this morning, dear brother,” Ivrulion said dulcetly. An ostler hurried forward with the palfrey’s saddle—green leather stamped with the Caerthalien stars in gold—and began saddling the mare.

“You must be feeling unusually brave this morning,
brother,
” Runacarendalur replied acidly. He turned his back and worked at making Bentrain accept the double bit.

“Merely desirous of a morning’s exercise,” Ivrulion replied easily. “It grows tedious to spend my days trudging from nowhere to nowhere.”

“Then why don’t you tell Lord Bolecthindial so, and we’ll all go home?” Runacarendalur snapped. He set his foot in the stirrup and swung into the saddle. Bentrain took his usual side step away, but Runacarendalur was already used to the animal’s tricks. He gathered the reins, took the bit away from Bentrain, and trotted him out of the paddock.

Ivrulion caught up to him even before he passed the wagons. They rode in silence for nearly a candlemark, until the sound of horns and whistles behind them indicated the army was finally ready to move.

“Are you planning to turn back, or do you mean to ride all the way to Utheleres this morning?” Ivrulion asked.

“I have work to do with Bentrain,” Runacarendalur said curtly. “I can’t do it if I’m constantly being overtaken by the army.”

“Small chance of that,” Ivrulion answered lightly. “We seem to be slower to get under way every morning. I believe it may be the cold,” he added guilelessly.

More likely the laziness and rebellion of servants their masters will not punish!
With a growl of exasperation, Runacarendalur set spurs to his stallion’s sides. There was one thing he and Bentrain could agree on: galloping.

The wind pulled Runacarendalur’s stormcloak from his head and shoulders and the air was freezing, but the sensation of freedom was too sweet to ignore. He let the pounding rhythm of iron-shod hooves against iron-hard ground lull him for what seemed all too brief a time, then—reluctantly—reined Bentrain in.

Ivrulion cantered up to them before Bentrain had slowed to a trot. “If he fell and broke a leg, you’d have regretted this,” Ivrulion said.

“You’d Heal him,” Runacarendalur answered. “You must be good for something.”

The remark earned him one of Ivrulion’s faint, cool smiles. “I’m good for a great many things. I simply won’t do what you want me to.”

“
Why not?
” Runacarendalur shouted.

“You die, she dies, what changes?” Ivrulion answered, apparently moved to candor for once. “We don’t know where she is. Her lords aren’t likely to come begging forgiveness if they lose their precious High King. They’ll simply become utterly unpredictable and far more dangerous.”

“True now,” Runacarendalur snapped. “A moonturn or two ago we could have had them!”
We could have kept the War Princes’ households alive until we were sure we’d won, instead of giving two dozen domains every cause to seek vengeance on us forever.

“Maybe,” Ivrulion said. “And you would be dead, Caerthalien would be in disarray—and we would all still be here. If you think retracing our path across three domains in utter anarchy is a safe and simple matter, I do not.”

“It would be easier if we
did it now!
”
Before our mounts are starving, before some gaggle of hedge knights goes into revolt, before this so-called Alliance shatters into a million shards.
He ground his teeth to keep the words behind them; if Ivrulion was loyal to anything but himself, it was not to Runacarendalur.
I lost all hope of his loyalty when I told him I’d never live to rule.
The thought was bitter, but far from new.