R. Salvatore - The Bear

He caught up to Pinower and the trailing brothers almost immediately, Milwellis's force coming in fierce pursuit. The lightning web had killed no one, Bransen knew, but he thought himself quite clever, indeed, for when they had laid out the battlefield plan, they had determined their retreat through a small forest surrounding some hills to the southeast.

Now that forest loomed before them, and they knew if they could get into it, Milwellis could not catch them.

For the last ones in-Bransen and Brother Pinower-set the woods ablaze. On his mount in the fields before the firestorm that engulfed the forest, Laird Milwellis could only stare hatefully at the blocked trail.

"We will catch them, laird," Harcourt assured him. "We have seen their tricks, and they flee away from Chapel Abelle, their only possible refuge."

"They are small and fleet."

"But we will ensnare them, do not doubt."

Milwellis looked to his trusted friend and nodded. "Send a long arm straight east," he instructed. "They are not to gain a northward march-cut them off from Chapel Abelle."

Laird Milwellis was not discouraged when he went back to the road and the original battlefield. He had lost about three hundred men, but no matter, for his enemy had played her hand, and now she was removed from Chapel Abelle's strong walls.

It was only a matter of time. The man stumbled but held his balance, clutching his face all the while, blood running from between his fingers.

Seated before him, Bannagran knew that he shouldn't have slugged the messenger. The poor sot was just a messenger, after all. But since King Yeslnik was far away, the messenger had to suffice.

Bannagran looked down at the crumpled parchment in his hand, the newest order from King Yeslnik. The fool had recalled him again. Abandon the march to Ethelbert dos Entel! the note read. Return to Pryd Town and hold the center region as brave Laird Milwellis catches our enemy Gwydre and destroys her.

Bannagran threw the parchment to the floor and turned an exasperated expression on Master Reandu, standing beside him. Reandu backed away a step. He, after all, had read the note to Bannagran. Judging by the man still stumbling before the throne, the news had not been well received.

"Do you think that Yeslnik even knows that we never left Pryd Town after his last reversal?" Bannagran asked.

"I think that many things are happening, and quickly," Reandu answered. "The king is reacting to a shifting situation."

"He is purely reacting," Bannagran replied contemptuously. "His plans shift with the change of the wind."

"Gwydre came forth from St. Mere Abelle," Reandu reminded.

"And the brave Laird Milwellis will hunt her and kill her."

The sarcasm and anger in Bannagran's tone was not lost on anyone in the room, and many cautious looks came back at him. He laughed at himself, shook his head, and pointed to the trembling messenger. "Heal the man!" he ordered Reandu.

The monk hustled to do just that, while Bannagran focused again on the crumpled parchment. Why had it so angered him, particularly given his decision that he wasn't marching to Ethelbert dos Entel anyway? The stupidity disturbed him, surely, for this was Yeslnik's third reversal of the marching order. But no, it was more than the typical failings of Yeslnik, Bannagran had to admit, particularly in light of his inadvertent tone when he had spoken of Laird Milwellis. For a long while now, Bannagran and Milwellis had been viewed as competing for the favor of King Yeslnik, and while Bannagran had mostly avoided any confirmation of that seemingly ridiculous notion, the building rivalry was obviously in his thoughts.

Did he really care about Yeslnik's favor, or was this simply an expression of his pride and determination in bettering his perceived rival?

"The brave Milwellis," he muttered under his breath, and he remembered a day during the campaign in the east when he had arrived at Yeslnik's encampment with a large group of prisoners. Yeslnik had ordered him to execute them, and when he had balked, the king had turned the duty over to the other arriving general, then Prince Milwellis of Palmaristown. Milwellis had done the deed, gleefully, so Bannagran had heard.

Bannagran spat at the parchment. He rubbed his bearded face and closed his eyes, only to find an image of Dame Gwydre waiting for him.

They found the town of Pollcree deserted that hot early-summer day. They had expected as much, for the approach of an army-any army-struck sheer terror into the hearts of the beleaguered Honce citizens after these brutal years of war.

Fortunately for the folk of Pollcree, though, this was Dame Gwydre's army, with no intention of causing mischief. Even more fortunately for Pollcree, the spirit-walking monks knew precisely where the townsfolk had gone to hide.

By design, Bransen was first to that spot, a series of well-hidden caves more than a mile to the south of the town itself. He approached silently and in the shadows, taking a lay of the ground and noting several disguised entrances. He went to the largest, near the center of the line along a long running ridge.

"Belay your spears," he called as he neared. "I am no enemy. I am the Highwayman of Pryd Town, sick of war and of lairds who claim dominion over lands they do not own."

There was no movement from the shadows behind the brush that had been piled before the opening, but Bransen knew that guards watched him from within. Still he approached openly, confident that he could dodge any spear or arrow coming forth.

"Will you greet me, or will you cower?" he asked. "For I know you are in these caves, hiding from the march of another army."

He shuffled forward slowly, hands up before him unthreateningly. He heard a whisper, "Kill him!" followed by some tussling and objections.

"What will you gain by killing me?" he asked, straightening. "I come to you unarmed and in peace, with information and to serve as your prisoner if you so determine that necessary."

He was right at the brush by then, where he paused and listened. But no sound came forth, and he could well imagine several guards just inside the cave, holding their collective breath.

"Your leaders will wish to hear what I have to say," he remarked and began to pull brush away from the pile.

"No!" came a call from above and to Bransen's right. He looked up and tried to hide his surprise when he saw two guards-a man and a woman-standing on an outcropping barely fifteen feet from him. The man held a sword, the woman a bow, leveled his way.

Bransen held up his hands.

"Not through there," the man instructed, waving Bransen up to him.

For a moment, Bransen considered falling into his malachite magic and leaping the fifteen feet to stand before the pair, but he wisely decided against that course, realizing that it might bring a frightened shot from the archer. So he climbed up agilely instead, wiping the dirt from his hands as he stood before the pair.

"The Highwayman of Pryd Town?" the woman asked, seeming unimpressed.

But the man added, "I have heard tell of you."

Bransen bowed politely.

"Why have you come?" the woman asked sharply.

"With information. To tell you of the army that approaches-one you need not fear-and of the momentous happenings in Honce."

"We know all too much of those," said the man.

Bransen bowed again.

The woman motioned with her bow to an opening in the hillside, barely visible behind a large stone. With the bow still trained on him, Bransen led the way in.

As his eyes adjusted to the dimness of the cave beyond, with few torches burning and only a few openings letting in meager bits of daylight, he noted a sight that had become all too familiar about Honce: the beleaguered civilians of an awful war, mostly very young and very old, their faces haggard, eyes full of fear. But fear tinged with deep resignation, Bransen noted, and that made it all the more heartbreaking.