R. Salvatore - The Bear

"You believe that?" Cormack asked.

"I do," said Bransen. "And more than that, I believe it to be the worst of the possible scenarios. This meeting with Bannagran is not over. I did not carry Dame Gwydre halfway across Honce to so easily let Bannagran avoid facing the truth of his decisions."

Bransen smiled wryly, walked back to the sill, and swung his legs out the window. "In fact, I think I will pay our Laird of Pryd a visit at this very late hour."

"Wait!" Reandu called as Bransen started to slip outside. "What has happened to you?" Reandu asked. "When last we parted…"

Standing on the lawn before the window then, Bransen turned to regard the master. "In the midst of a war, I have found peace," Bransen replied. He left it at that, though many more thoughts streamed through his mind. His voice was strong and he felt strong, though he wouldn't take the chance of removing the soul stone strapped to his forehead; too much was at stake for him to risk the return of the Stork. That strength of body reflected his inner calm, he knew, his newfound purpose and understanding.

It was worth it. He believed that now. With a nod to his friends, he started off across the courtyard, not to the front gate, but to the side wall that separated the grounds of Chapel Pryd from those of Castle Pryd.

Bransen considered the structure before him as he silently came over the wall. Castle Pryd was not large, really just a solid and thick central keep with a trio of smaller one-storey wings about it. Bransen knew the building fairly well, particularly the keep itself. He noted a light burning in a narrow window on the third and top floor and recognized that as the room once belonging to Laird Prydae and to Laird Pryd before him. Bannagran would have taken it as his own, Bransen surmised, and so he moved quiet as a whisper across the courtyard to the corner where the two nearest wings met at the base of the keep. There, he fell into the malachite magic and began his spiderlike climb, first to the roof of one of the low wings, then, when he was confident that no sentries were looking his way, up the tower itself.

He picked his way along the cracks in the stone, his strong grip easily finding handholds sufficient to support his nearly weightless body. He went beside a window about halfway up and glanced in, noting the stairway where he had once, long ago, pursued Laird Prydae, where Master Bathelais had tried to lash at him with gemstone lightning, but had been stopped by the courage of Reandu.

It seemed like a lifetime ago to the young man who had known such an adventurous and interesting year.

"A year," Bransen mouthed silently. "Just a year." How much had changed!

His nostalgia flew away then as he noted a figure climbing the stairway. He quickly moved back from the window so that he would not be noticed, a dark silhouette against a lighter sky, for the man carried no torch.

He carried no torch…

Why would that be? Bransen tried to find a logical explanation for that. The stairs were steep, dark, and treacherous. Why would anyone climb them on a dark night without a source of light?

Bransen held his breath, hearing footsteps, very light, made by no boot. He dared move his head back to get an angled look at the window and just noted the man's passage, seeing no more than the back of his pant leg.

Silken and black.

Bransen had to remind himself to breathe. He thought of going right into the window behind the Hou-lei, but he scaled the side instead, rushing up hand over hand. All notion of stealth fled in his rush, and before he had gone five feet he heard shouting from the courtyard below. He ignored it and pressed on until he was staring into Bannagran's room on the keep's top floor.

Bannagran slumped in a wide chair before the hearth, an open and nearly empty bottle in his hand. He might have been asleep, and certainly he was near to dozing. Behind him, directly across the room from Bransen, the door eased open and the black-clothed assassin slipped in. The Hou-lei warrior paused right there, for beside the door sat a rack of knives.

He took one and eased his way toward the clueless Laird of Pryd.

Bransen could hardly register the scene unfolding before him. His mind darted in a hundred different directions all at once. Would the death of Bannagran benefit Dame Gwydre and Honce? Was this acceptable justice for the man who had murdered his father? Should he allow it? Could he stop it?

By the time he blinked the myriad questions aside, Bransen figured that he had been stupefied for too long, that the choice had been taken from him. His hesitation had decided his course.

Or not.

"Bannagran!" he shouted, flinging himself through the window, a forward roll that brought him back to his feet and in a dead run at the seated Laird of Pryd.

Bannagran's eyes went wide with terror, and he threw his hands up before him as Bransen roared in… and leaped above him, diagonally over his wide chair. Bransen landed before the assassin, who lashed at him with the knife. Instinct alone saved the Highwayman, as he pulled up short and threw his head to the side, leaning away just out of reach.

The assassin reversed his grip smoothly and chopped a backhand. The Highwayman again ducked his head and shoulders back, but this time he snapped his right arm up vertically inside the reach of the knife so that it connected, forearm to forearm, with the assassin. At the same time, Bransen brought his left arm across his chest, then swept it before him as he shoved a backhand with his right, a powerful crossing motion of his arms.

His satisfaction as the knife went flying lasted only as long as it took him to realize, at the painful end of a lifted foot, that the assassin had surrendered the knife willingly in exchange for the clean strike.

Bransen staggered backward, trying to stand straight and keep his defenses up. Tears welled in his eyes as explosions of pain and waves of numbness washed over him from his smashed groin. His opponent saw his vulnerability and came on hard, striking with open palms, kneeing and kicking.

Sheer terror stole the pain from Bransen, and he worked furiously to counter and block, falling fast into a smooth rhythm. Many heartbeats passed before he even realized that he had caught up to his opponent's swift and accurate moves.

The Highwayman could hardly believe that he had suffered no serious or debilitating strikes as the two settled into a more measured and balanced routine. Wahloon was good, very good, and kept the initiative, pressing forward, fingers stabbing. He swung a right hook and kept going around when the punch didn't land. It seemed almost as if he were screwing himself into the ground, for as he spun, he went down low in a crouch.

Instinctively, Bransen hopped, and just in time, as Wahloon's leg swept harmlessly under him. Bransen landed gracefully and in a powerful pivot position, left foot forward. Immediately, he rotated his hips and kicked out with his right, but the assassin, rising fast, had his hands in place to double block, and it was all Bransen could do to stop from having his foot grabbed and caught. Still, as he brought his foot in, he kept his presence of mind enough to reverse his momentum and go forward with his upper body, jabbing left and right with a flurry of strikes.

Wahloon leaned back out of reach, his open hands blocking and slapping at the punching Highwayman, who kept coming forward, for Bransen was determined to press his advantage while he had the assassin backing and somewhat off balance.

Wahloon launched into a backflip, kicking out as he turned horizontal, a surprising strike that clipped Bransen high on one arm and slowed his pursuit. Over went the assassin to land on his feet, and he bounced away into a second somersault, this one sidelong and high and right over another of the cushiony chairs.