R. Salvatore - The Bear

"A marvelous possibility," Milwellis said. "But one stride forward at a time, my friend. Let us crush Gwydre and quickly, that none share in our glory. Then we will let King Yeslnik determine our course, be it to Chapel Abelle or even to distant Ethelbert dos Entel. I will be the good and loyal prince." He glanced down at the parchment from Pryd Town. "While Bannagran pauses to irrelevance."

A wry smile spread across Milwellis's face. He looked to the south, toward the distant army of Vanguard, soon, perhaps even this fine day, to be conquered.

"An interesting proposal," he repeated back to Harcourt, who nodded in silent applause to the obvious inner workings of Laird Milwellis. This will be the field of battle," Dame Gwydre decided as the great force pursuing her grew closer throughout that day. She stood on a ridge, looking east across a descending slope to a wide field interspersed with small copses of maples and elms.

"Blenden Coe," said one of the nearby monks, a man from the region. "There have been other notable battles here."

"I had thought we would find higher ground, more rocky and defensible," Brother Pinower remarked.

So had Gwydre, but the choice had been forced by the proximity of King Yeslnik's forces in the other direction. She had walked into the trap determinedly and knowing all the while that any chance of survival hinged on the magical prowess of Pinower's monks and any chance of victory on the decision of Bannagran, whose forces sat immediately south of her position.

She looked that way as she considered the Laird of Pryd, and her turn did not go unnoticed.

"If he does not come?" Pinower asked, the question that was on the minds of all, save Bransen.

"Then we flee to him," Gwydre replied. "He'll not stop our run."

"Bannagran will come," the Highwayman assured them all. "He goaded Milwellis forward with a message and gave King Yeslnik pause. That was his intent, and only because he would have us fight them separately."

Dawson's sigh turned the lady and Bransen his way, her expression one of surprise and curiosity.

"There's no telling what a man like that'll do when his world's on the line," Dawson said. "He's all a friend to ye when you visit, to be sure, but how might that friendship hold when fifty thousand warriors are chasing you to his town?"

Gwydre held her hand up in concession, and, for a brief moment, she appeared very old and tired to those around her. She had taken an awful risk here, and now, faced with the converging armies-either of them far outnumbering her own-she couldn't help but second-guess her gamble. She could have left her five thousand in Vanguard, far from Yeslnik's reach. Surely, he could not have so easily sent tens of thousands against her in that remote and forbidding wilderness. She could have left the prisoner army and the brothers inside the thick walls of St. Mere Abelle, for would any army ever breach that mighty fortress?

"This is not about us," Bransen interjected, and he stepped up beside Gwydre, who was glad for his support. "We are here for the people of Honce and the misery they will surely know if we desert them to the whims of King Yeslnik."

"This will be the field of battle," Dame Gwydre said again, more resolutely. "Prepare it quickly, for Milwellis will come on eagerly and will not pause to wait for King Yeslnik. All glory to him, he believes, and Yeslnik is a day's march away at the least."

"The rise is for me and my brethren to defend," Brother Pinower explained, pointing halfway down the descent.

"Their horsemen will break into a charge at the base, no doubt," said Bransen.

"And that is the time to hit them the hardest," Pinower agreed.

"What else?" Dame Gwydre asked Bransen when Pinower scurried away. Bransen's surprise at her obvious uncertainty was clear. "This is not the type of battle we fight in Vanguard," the dame admitted. "Rarely do armies there number in the hundreds, and here we face thousands with thousands."

Bransen swallowed hard, realizing only then the responsibility that would be his. He thought of the Book of Jhest, that marvelous tome he had memorized in his youth. Much of the book was devoted to personal fighting styles and philosophy, but there were many verses regarding the great battles of the great wars.

Bransen looked around at the landscape, picturing the battle in his head, playing it out as a bird might witness it. "Logs," he said.

"Logs?" Gwydre and Dawson asked together. Word traveled fast along King Yeslnik's line: Dame Gwydre had stopped and turned to face Milwellis before the jaws of their trap could engulf her.

"Faster, then!" demanded Queen Olym when the word reached the pair, riding atop their respective coaches. "I would see their blood!"

"Drive on!" King Yeslnik agreed. "And where is Bannagran? Bid him come forth! There can be no escape for the witch of Vanguard!"

Within an hour, King Yeslnik had his answer, for across the wide fields to the south appeared an army more than half the size of his own and flying the wolf-emblazoned pennants of Pryd Town.

"Gwydre's end!" Yeslnik proclaimed at the sight, and he flailed his fist into the air, overwhelmed with joy. Where could she go, caught between three forces, each far superior to her own?

Soon after, a contingent of heavy war chariots rumbled across the fields, and cheers for Laird Bannagran preceded the man's ride to Yeslnik's coach.

"I feared that I would have to ride all the way to Pryd Town to pry you from your hole," the king greeted the laird. Yeslnik seemed quite pleased with himself as he looked down at Bannagran from on high.

"I sent you a courier, an offer," Bannagran replied, and he didn't bow and didn't refer at all to Yeslnik's title, as protocol demanded.

Yeslnik sputtered, trying to find a reply.

"Five holdings and an end to the war," Bannagran clarified.

"The war ends this day!" Yeslnik screamed back at him. "Dame Gwydre will fall to Laird Milwellis right before our eyes and to our blades as well, if we do not tarry."

"Even were that so, it would only preface a continuing war."

"Ethelbert?" Yeslnik said with a dismissive snicker.

"And the brothers of Abelle and Vanguard itself." Bannagran paused and stared hard at the King. "And…" he hinted.

"What do you say?" King Yeslnik demanded.

"I have your answer?" asked Bannagran.

Yeslnik sputtered again. "My answer?" he shouted incredulously, angrily.

"I ask you one more time," Bannagran said calmly, "abandon this war and divide Honce accordingly."

King Yeslnik trembled with rage. "Honce is mine!" he screeched. "Mine! From Delaval to Ethelbert dos Entel, from the Belt-and-Buckle to the forests of Vanguard. Mine! How dare you? Honce is mine!"

"We shall see," said Bannagran, and on his nod his practiced brigade whipped their teams into a gallop and rumbling turn.

"What?" Yeslnik yelled behind them as they rumbled away. "Treason!" he shouted. "Stop them!"

And, indeed, some of the king's men moved to do just that, with one in particular barking commands at his soldiers and at Bannagran to surrender.

The Laird of Pryd lifted a spear from the bucket at his feet. His throw was true, as usual, and strong, the spear plunging through the commander's chest and driving behind him to the ground, pinning him in place. He was still standing, but his arms swung limply at his sides, for he was also quite dead.

With Bannagran at their tip, the wedge of his skilled charioteers thundered through the scattering ranks of confused Delaval soldiers, back to the south and their lines.

"My king?" more than one of Yeslnik's commanders pleaded with him back at the coaches.

"Fight them! Kill him!" was all that the stunned and terrified Yeslnik could demand. He leaped from his throne and scrambled down the ladder at the side of his coach, disappearing inside and slamming the armored door behind him.