The Gathering Storm (132 page)

“The men are falling back as we arranged, to hold the siege line. I’ve thrown Lord Druthmar in at the hinge where the streambed meets the river. Bands of Aostan light cavalry had
broken past and were harrying the camp. One group of Bwr has lent support to the center.”

The captain in charge of the centaurs, a big, stocky mare whose cream coat and blue-black hair made her stand out from a distance, galloped up to him. “My lord prince.” She had been designated captain in part, Sanglant supposed, by reason of age and seniority, in the manner of mares, and in part because she could speak Ungrian. “We thought you lost.”

“I am not, Capi’ra, as you see. How many of your folk have yet to be committed to the field?”

She stamped one hoof. “Two centuries wait.” She indicated the Bwr reserve just visible behind the clouds of dust that marked the field of battle.

“Ride with me to the wood. Fulk, I’ll need a new mount. Fest, if you have him close by.”

The bay gelding was being held in reserve, and when he was brought forward, Capi’ra eyed him sidelong. Like the other centaurs she had unusually mobile, elongated ears, which she flicked now, but he could not discern emotion in her bland expression. “Have you no pura to ride?”

“No.” He said it more sharply than he intended.

“What is your plan, my lord prince?” Fulk asked.

He took a last swig of wine. “We must hold our line on this field at whatever cost. Adelheid’s forces will attack at a prearranged signal, so be on your guard against it. I think they will wait until Liutgard can flank us. That will be the crux of the battle. Right now her forces are strung out through the woods. We must rout them there before Henry can catch up to them. I need a shield.”

“Your Highness.” Hathui stepped forward. “Would it not be better for you to command from the rear? Send someone else?”

Sanglant’s mood changed and he laughed. “Nay, Eagle. I trust Fulk for his steadiness, and steadiness is what is needed on the field. If we’re not quick, we’ll be engulfed. As well, there is a chance I may meet my father in the woods.”

He took the shield Malbert brought, and as soon as the captain called her troops in, they rode, the centaurs falling in behind him and Capi’ra.

“We must rout Liutgard’s forces quickly and turn back to support the Quman left,” he told her.

The centaurs had exceptional stamina, and the heat did not seem to bother them as much as it did him and Fest. They raced up along the western side of the river to the bluff, moving in among the trees below the western slopes. Their pace slowed once they were in the wood, where shade gave relief from the sun. It was now the hottest part of the afternoon and Sanglant knew that as many men would fall to the heat as to the enemy.

It seemed that they traveled well into the forest before the lead scouts of Liutgard’s troops were spotted with the rest of her riders strung back along the path, hidden from view, moving single-file or two abreast. The Bwr communicated with snorts and stamps whose meaning was unintelligible to him, but they moved away to form a line two deep winding through the woods parallel to the path. Those in the second rank had bows at the ready while the front rank held spears and shields.

Too late Liutgard’s forward troops realized the threat. Capi’ra blew a sharp blat on a ram’s horn and her centaurs closed at a trot. The Bwr had horn bows and they loosed arrows as they advanced, surprisingly agile at fending off tree branches and leaping around or over bushes as they plunged through the woods. Their skill with a bow was unsurpassed even by the Quman, who were renowned and dreaded as horse archers, and this skill began to take a toll. By the time he reached Liutgard’s vanguard most of the forward soldiers were down although only one horse had been hit. There was no one to fight. Fest leaped corpses as he followed the centaurs back into the trees; the gelding had steady nerves but lacked imagination and thus was well suited for this kind of skirmish. Their group wheeled around to attack again.

He heard Liutgard’s voice—he could scarcely fail to recognize it, since they had grown up together at court—as she shouted for her people to form up for a charge. Yet as the centaurs drove forward again, shooting at will, whistling and calling in their high-pitched voices, the mounts belonging to the human soldiers did not shift, as if under a spell. Liutgard and her soldiers were stuck on horseback, unable to move, absorbing
one after another flight of arrows. Her men began to panic as the front line of Bwr closed with spears lowered.

They hit the central rank of Liutgard’s line with a resounding crash. Spears that did not strike flesh stuck in shields, and as the centaurs passed through the line, cutting to each side with long knives or thrusting with their spears, the horses began to buck and kick. Riders were dumped onto the ground. Men trying to fight back could not hang on or even get in a good blow, but it was the betrayal of their mounts that panicked them most. In ancient legend it was said that the Bwr spoke to horses, and now it appeared to be true. One by one, unhorsed, Liutgard’s soldiers broke into reckless flight.

“At them,” cried Sanglant, encouraging the pursuit. The centaurs answered with shrill, inhuman calls. He pressed Fest forward. The pursuit must be swift; Liutgard could be allowed no time to regroup. Yet the forest favored men on foot. Sanglant himself traded only a few blows, wounding one man before that one and his two companions leaped into a bristling thicket of thornbush and scrabbled away through its branches where he could not follow without dismounting.

Some centaurs pursued men through the woods while others shot arrows into those clumps of men hiding in the underbrush. Circling, the centaurs chose each shot carefully, seeking the best angle around a shield or a favorable gap in the branches.

They had not the numbers to keep the advantage for long. Behind the skirmishing line rose a cry.

“To me! To me! Fall back to the Eagle of Fesse!”

Duchess Liutgard, still mounted on a black mare and herself carrying her banner, rallied her men. A shield wall swelled around her as dismounted men overcame their fear. It was natural to him that the ebb and flow of battle would dictate each move, each objective. Liutgard and her banner must fall to complete the rout.

A bristling wood of spears formed up in front of the duchess. A dozen centaurs joined him as they probed around the right flank of Liutgard’s position. He saw his cousin clearly, just as she saw him: she was a proud, experienced fighter who knew how to shift ground in a skirmish depending on changing circumstances. She shouted commands, directing
men to fill gaps or pointing out targets for her few archers, but it was obvious she knew exactly where Sanglant was.

He charged, not at her line but at a group of men seeking to join her, scattering them and dropping two before he continued around to the thinnest point in the wall of spears and shields.

“We must take her! Now!”

Capi’ra sounded her horn. More centaurs joined him, and they pressed forward through the trees as others attacked from the flanks. He was almost unhorsed when he glanced aside for one moment only to be thwacked hard on the helm by a tree limb. He fell sideways, caught himself on Fest’s neck, and dragged himself upright in the saddle.

In close formation, the dismounted men had the advantage over the centaurs, but Capi’ra urged her troops on and they went without hesitation. He chased after them, ears still ringing, and where the clash unfolded he pushed forward to try to break a gap through to Liutgard herself, who had retreated a few paces back on the path. The melee had a muffled sound, arrows fluttering through leaves, the grunt of a man absorbing a spear blow to his shield, a yelp where a centaur was hit, the crack and snap of branches and dry leaf litter under the press of feet and hooves as soldiers shifted their position or fell. Some among the centaurs sat back and took leisurely aim, but with shields held close it was more difficult to pierce the enemy’s ranks. This slow dance of attrition would not aid his cause. He pushed forward and struck hard to either side. Men gave way before him. He punched spear thrusts away with his shield. The line bowed inward as they gave ground.

Liutgard’s voice carried above the fray.

“Sanglant! Give up this rebellion! Throw down your arms and your father will show you mercy!”

He could not answer. He broke through and with a dozen or more centaurs behind him galloped along the path, bearing down on Liutgard. She was easy to mark: she wore a surcoat of white and gold, royal colors, although her banner was furled for the ride through the trees. She had loosened the straps of her helmet and pushed it back the better for her voice to be heard.

As Sanglant closed, she pulled her helmet down and braced. Five men stood between him and the duchess, and he fought furiously to reach her. He took the arm off an ax man and punched another aside with his shield, kicked a third man in the face who was attempting to rise after being bowled over by Fest.

He closed, and he met Liutgard’s defiant gaze.

She is my favorite cousin
.

The thought fled, and in its passing he hesitated. Then he struck, but the eagle banner swept down over him before his blow landed, blinding him, trapping him in the cloth. She had caught him. His blade rang against hers as she parried, all the while pressing the banner against him that he might not escape it or bat it aside.

“To the Duchess!”

“Get him!”

“For Fesse!”

A spear slammed against his breastplate but did not penetrate; a sword glanced off his greave. The ululations of the centaurs guided him as he cut into the banner pole’s shaft. The cloth slithered down off him, falling to the ground and clearing his sight.

The press of men around him forced him back together with the centaurs who had come to his rescue. They formed a small phalanx and he shouted, calling others to join up with them. Liutgard fell back. Her ripped banner, its broken haft grasped by a sergeant, rose to shouts of triumph.

From up on the bluff a horn rang out three times. She had only to hang on until Henry reached her.

“Mark her! Mark her!” he cried to the centaurs at his back. If Bayan could die with an arrow in his throat, so could Liutgard. Fesse arrows struck his shield and one stuck, quivering there. Fest veered and stumbled as a spear grazed his withers.

Two centaurs fell; the others ululated and first Liutgard’s horse and then the others around her went crazy, and she could not run or fight. He closed.

A horn sounded to his left. Out of the woodland to the north swarmed many more men, some on horseback, some running. They wore the colors of Avaria.

“For Henry!” they cried. “Murderer! You murdered our lady! Traitor! Deceiver!”

In another ten breaths they would be upon him. A glance told him what took his breath away: These were Wendilgard’s men.

Avaria’s heir had betrayed him.

He had no choice but to retreat or else sacrifice what remained of his strike force. They lost three centaurs pulling out, but with the enemy fighting their own mounts and using the cover of the trees they were able to pull back out of range where he found Capi’ra bleeding from a dozen shallow wounds.

He caught his breath while she tallied her forces. His mouth was parched and his neck and back soaked through with sweat. The pursuit came close behind; they had to move on, and quickly. He had to decide what to do. If he stopped even for a moment to think, to consider that he had been so close to murdering his own kinswoman, he would lose all.

“No worse than I expected,” Capi’ra said in such a stolid and unemotional voice that her calmness struck him like a slap in the face. “No more than twenty dead. Yet we cannot take on such a large force, even broken up as they are within the woods.”

“No,” he agreed. The truth hurt, but he had to face it. “No. Henry closes in. Wendilgard has moved against us. Adelheid will attack our rear. We must pull the entire army back west and north through the woods before we are surrounded. We’ve lost the battle.”

IN Alba, at twilight, Stronghand strolled up to the stone crown and stared out over the fens. The horizon on all sides and most of the flat waters and half-drowned hillocks were hidden by a thick haze shrouding the land, but the sky above was so clear that it seemed stretched and thin, almost white. The sun was sliding into that haze, drowning. Soon the stars would come out.

He ruled Eika and human alike; his ships roamed the seas and struck the coast at will; all of Eikaland lay under his rule, and most of Alba had capitulated and was falling into line. But when OldMother commanded, he must obey. He had reached Alba three days ago. Thoughts of Alain chafed him, always, but he had been given a task to complete.

“Father Reginar,” he said, greeting the young churchman who waited eagerly and anxiously beside the stone crown together with five other clerics.

“Prince Stronghand.” Reginar was young, callow, and arrogant, and hadn’t the ability to hide his scorn, but he was no fool. Stronghand’s soldiers guarded him against those who
might interfere with the spell he and his comrades meant to weave this night. For that reason, Reginar tolerated the Eika.