R. Salvatore - The Bear

Bransen fell into the magic of his brooch, more fully and deeply than ever before. The serpentine glow came up around him, and flames engulfed him, angry, furious, white-hot flames. He drew forth his sword, his mother's sword, and held it high, and then, with the magic of Abellican malachite lifting his body, the Highwayman leaped from the ridge.

He glided down the slope from on high, a soaring beacon of hope for Dame Gwydre and, soon, a flaming harbinger of doom for the men of Laird Milwellis.

He landed on the field before the center square, a tremendous blast of flames rolling out from his feet. Those front ranks cried out and ducked as the wave of heat washed over them, and several threw spears.

But the Highwayman was already gone, leaping into the air again, clearing those tightening front ranks and crashing down in the middle of the tight formation. Again came an explosion of flames, this one engulfing many men near to the Highwayman's landing.

Screams and chaos shook the square, multiplying many times over as the Highwayman rushed about, flames bursting from him, his sword stabbing with deadly precision at terrified man after woman after man trying desperately to get out of his way.

His ruby magic exploded again, and many died, and he leaped to the back of the square and turned, aiming his sword along a line of archers moving between the center square and the one to the north, and from that sword tip came a stroke of lightning.

As one, the line of archers fell to the ground.

From the other direction came a volley of arrows, as Bransen turned on the second archer line. The missiles flew all about him, but he did not feel their sting, so deeply was he into the magic of the brooch.

A second lightning bolt laid that line low.

The Highwayman bounded away, to the north, leap after leap that ended each time in a devastating fireball.

On one descent, he saw a spear set before him, but he could not sway. And so he cried out in rage and denial, impaling himself as he landed and blowing away all those around him, including the warrior holding the spear. The Highwayman leaped away immediately, trailing no blood, for as the spear had pierced his flesh, so, too, had it punctured the serpentine shield, and the hot flames had cauterized the wound as soon as the Highwayman had leaped back off the bloodied weapon.

He felt no pain. The soul stone in the brooch kept him strong. He bounced back the other way, assaulting the third square.

Up above, Dame Gwydre saw her moment and began her charge. The old ones!" came a cry.

"They fight for the witch Gwydre!"

"Oh, we are doomed!"

"It is Abelle himself, come from the grave!"

The shouts grew more desperate along Milwellis's lines. Those leading formations evaporated, scores of men burning and dead on the western slope, dozens of archers thrashing in the death throes of killing lightning, scores more cut down by the fiery blade of the Highwayman.

That retreat did not halt at the next grouping of military squares, for with the fleeing soldiers came the Highwayman himself, in full, burning glory and power.

"Stop him!" Father De Guilbe shouted from behind Milwellis, who sat beside Harcourt.

"Stop him!" De Guilbe shouted again as another fireball exploded, scattering men, some aflame, all fleeing in abject terror. The monk shouted again as more cried of the old ones or of Abelle himself rising up in support of Dame Gwydre.

Milwellis turned and yelled, "How?" in the monk's face, his frustration clear and consuming. He turned to Harcourt, who had no answers, for the general, like the laird, the monk, and all the men on both sides of the battle, had never seen anything like this display of sheer, unbridled magical power. Godlike, the Highwayman bounced about the field, making his way through the ranks and leaving mounds of bodies in his devastating wake.

"It is magic!" Milwellis shouted, turning back on De Guilbe. "Your magic! You stop him!"

Harcourt grabbed Milwellis by the shoulder and shook him, and Milwellis looked back at the man with shock… until he noted that Harcourt was pointing frantically ahead.

For on came the Highwayman, in all his terrible splendor.

"Archers form! Around me!" yelled Milwellis, and so commanding was his roar that many archers and spearmen heeded his command.

"Fill the air! Shoot him dead!" Laird Milwellis screamed, and a scattering of arrows flew away.

"No! Together, you fools! A barrage to lay him low." Fully engulfed by the magic and the fury, the Highwayman moved without direction but with great purpose. Wherever he saw a concentration of enemies, he bounded and exploded, and darted about, stabbing and killing.

Every blast, every strike, killed a bit of his own soul, he knew, but he held to the promise of Gwydre, the promise of Honce renewed.

Up into the air he went, and only then did he see the great black volley swarming his way. He threw forth a fireball there in midair, the force of it deflecting many missiles aside and disintegrating many others.

But some got through the conflagration, and Bransen felt the iron tips and wooden shafts sliding into his body.

He landed unsteadily, but instinctively sprang away again, veering to the side, trying to get away from the biting arrows, for another volley was in the air. He landed and leaped into a copse of trees.

Confused and with his line of ki-chi-kree wavering, trying hard to fall fully into the soul stone and enact healing magic upon himself, Bransen slammed hard into a tree trunk. He managed to grab on and hold his place some twenty feet from the ground, but the only fires burning then were those in the trees behind him, lit by his flaming wake.

He tried to fall more fully into the one stone that could save him, for now he felt, most profoundly of all, the serious wound from impaling himself. His gut was torn, his line of life energy shivering, breaking. The pain threatened his concentration.

He thought of Cadayle.

Behind him he heard the horns of Gwydre's countering charge. He hoped he had done enough. Break off!" Bannagran commanded his forces repeatedly. He led his chariot group along the lines, pulling back his men.

For the rout was in full now, with King Yeslnik fleeing the field. His army crumbled behind him, men throwing down their weapons and running away, or falling to their knees and begging for mercy.

Mercy that Bannagran was determined to show, for that was what Gwydre had taught him and that was what filled his awakening heart.

As his orders multiplied throughout his forces, warriors and commanders echoing the call for quarter, Bannagran swung back to the east and lashed his team into a full gallop.

"Relent! The day is won!" he shouted as he neared Kirren Howen's legion, and it was strange, indeed, to hear these men of that eastern city cheering for him as he passed among their ranks. He pulled up fast before the three generals.

"All quarter given," he told Kirren Howen.

"You ask much," the new Laird of Ethelbert dos Entel replied. "The day is won, and my men, so long at war, will have their revenge."

"No, laird!" Bannagran demanded. "This is for Honce. All of it."

Kirren Howen and his two generals stared at Bannagran as if he had reached over and slapped the laird across the face.

"Yeslnik is through," Bannagran explained. "He cannot survive this day. It is time to heal the land of Honce."

"Is this mighty and merciless Bannagran I hear before me?" Laird Kirren Howen asked.

The great warrior, the Bear of Honce, smiled and shook his head. "Perhaps it is Dame Gwydre," he admitted. "But it is right, and it is for the best for what will follow this day."

Kirren Howen straightened in his saddle as his generals and his men looked at him curiously. "You will be king, yes?" he asked.