R. Salvatore - The Bear

Bransen felt as if he were sifting through a tangle of roots, as if two willows had joined in battle, their supple appendages whipping and wrapping and twisting until it became impossible to know where one tree ended and the other began. For such was the tangle within poor Brother Giavno's mind.

Every now and then, Bransen could get a sense as to which branch belonged to which tree, Giavno or Ishat (he knew the man's name to be Ishat), but even then the challenge for his disembodied spirit remained, for he, too, was now a willow in the wind, trying to control his own thoughts, trying to keep his own supple mental appendages from grappling with and being entwined with those of Giavno and Ishat. He knew what he wanted to do, though; if he could manage to help Giavno regain a sense of self, a foothold in time and space and a realization that this was his body and place, perhaps the monk would have a fighting chance of expelling the man from Behr.

Bransen had no sense of time in here, for the thoughts piled one above the previous in rapid succession. Most of those moments were spent in mental dodging, pulling away before being caught and held. Every now and then, however, Bransen did find a distinctive thread, a piece of consciousness he knew to be Brother Giavno. On those occasions, he silently screamed at the man to stand firm, to know his sense of self, and to recognize that this was, indeed, his place. And as the surprisingly clear streams of Giavno's consciousness flitted and dispersed, Bransen always warned him that there was no other place to be found, that if he could not win here, he was doomed to nothingness.

Bransen opened wide his eyes and fell back to the side, sliding right off the chair and barely catching himself before staggering several steps. He stood up straight, gasping and trying to find some easy rhythm to his breathing, reminding himself repeatedly of who he was and where he was and what he had just, of necessity, done.

A long while passed as Bransen just stood, deciphering some of the information he had come away with. He was truly surprised to realize that he had learned so much, for when it was being imparted he had barely been aware of it!

He knew of Cormack and Milkeila's latest mission to Bannagran and of the attack by the Hou-lei assassins. Brother Giavno had saved his friends in the south, surely. Giavno had sacrificed himself for the sake of his old friend Cormack. Bransen had felt the intersecting notions of altruism, of greater good, and of compensation within the mad monk, for he knew the tale of Giavno and Cormack and of how Giavno had betrayed Cormack to the sentence of Father De Guilbe in faraway Alpinador. Indeed, Giavno had been the one to carry out the sentence, whipping Cormack nearly to death.

"You are redeemed," Bransen said to the monk, who sat across from him, his head lolling stupidly from side to side. Bransen glanced out the window and noted the sun. Gwydre and Pinower were long out of St. Mere Abelle, moving east along the southern shore of the Gulf of Corona to an assigned spot where they were to meet up with Dawson McKeege and the Vanguard flotilla.

The thought of saying goodbye to Cadayle yet again stung Bransen as he considered his course, but his wife had made her own feelings on this very clear, after all. It was their war, too, hers and Bransen's, and a war worth fighting and worth winning.

"Fight well, Brother Giavno," Bransen said, and he respectfully bowed to the monk and rushed from the room.

"You, as well," Giavno replied, though not loud enough for Bransen to hear. The monk blinked his eyes a few times, taking in his surroundings.

"St. Mere Abelle?" he said, or started to say, but then Ishat attacked again in his mind and his head rolled and he began to babble, and all the world became again a knot of supple appendages and discordant thoughts. It was a kiss of promise, a kiss of hope and desperation, a longing for quiet times ahead-but, Cadayle insisted, quiet times under the rule of a goodly queen.

"Bannagran is key," Bransen said when at last their lips parted and he moved back a finger's breadth from his pretty wife.

"He seems uninterested," Cadayle replied, for Bransen had told her of the news from the south.

Bransen smiled. "I know him. I know who he is."

Cadayle backed off a bit more and looked at Bransen with puzzlement.

"I know his fear," Bransen said. "That is the key to it all, for all of us. Fear is the emotion that most guides our actions."

Cadayle appeared unconvinced.

"In the Book of Jhest, the ancient wisdom of the Jhesta Tu insists that it is fear of death, of that greatest unknown, that guides most lives. Whether moved to goodly deeds or to heinous ones-as with the Samhaists toward your mother-it is that overriding fear of nothingness that allows a man of good heart to rot. Bannagran watched your mother put into the sack with the snake. He allowed it. Master Reandu allowed it."

"They could not stop it," Cadayle replied.

"Half the townsfolk of Pryd watched it and cheered it and allowed it! Perhaps some of them thought it justice, though Callen's crime was hardly worthy of such an awful retribution. Nay, most endured it and embraced it because they were afraid, not of reprisal at that time, but of eternal damnation or nothingness had they not supported the evil Bernivvigar. That was his hold, and as he commanded death itself, so his hold grew stronger."

"You think Laird Bannagran, the Bear of Honce, the greatest champion alive, is afraid of dying?" Cadayle asked skeptically.

Bransen half nodded, half shrugged. "Not exactly that," he replied. "But in many ways, the hero Bannagran is less brave than Laird Delaval or Laird Ethelbert, or even the idiot Yeslnik."

"Yeslnik cowers and shrieks like a child when threatened," Cadayle argued. "Bannagran smiles and attacks."

"Without responsibility," said Bransen. "For that is his fear."

Cadayle spent a long while digesting that and trying to make some sense of it, but in the end, she just conceded the point and asked, "And you believe that you can turn him to our cause?"

Bransen thought, Or to his own, but he kept that to himself and answered, "If I cannot, then the best we can hope for is a retreat to Vanguard, where we will all be so far away that Yeslnik will not think it worth the trouble to pursue us. Even if I do convince Bannagran that our cause is correct and just, Yeslnik holds the upper hand."

Cadayle smiled and came forward, tightening her hug on her husband. "Nay," she whispered. "Gwydre does." She kissed Branson softly. "For Dame Gwyd-Queen Gwydre has my husband at her side, and woe to any who deign to challenge the Highwayman."

She kissed him again, and again, and it seemed to last forever while it was happening, a deep and inviting and warm blackness. But when it ended, all too soon, Bransen felt as if hardly a heartbeat had passed, and, truly, he never wanted to leave Cadayle's side ever again. He let his hand slide down as they embraced, to feel her belly, to feel his child in her womb. What an extraordinary year it had been!

When Bransen rushed out of St. Mere Abelle's front gate a short while later, he understood clearly the stakes in this dangerous game he played: the promise of happiness weighed against the potential of utter ruin.

Just outside, he fell into the malachite again, lessening his weight, using those giant running strides, lifting and floating and propelling himself past any obstacles to cover a tremendous amount of ground in short order. He focused on this task, speed, most of all, finding the limits and balance of the gemstone magic to perfectly complement his powerful strides, with minimum physical and mental effort.

He felt like he could run like this, effortlessly, the leagues rolling out behind him, for all the day long.