R. Salvatore - The Dame

“He is alive, or was, when we left Lake Mithranidoon,” Father De Guilbe interrupted. It was obvious that the man had been waiting for an opportunity to jump in ever since Jameston had entered the room.

“What do you know of it?” Dame Gwydre asked.

“As I was explaining before we were sent aside,” De Guilbe began peevishly, “we left the lake because word came to us of the designs of this very same Ancient Badden. Word from this man, this Highwayman, as you call him. So, yes, Dame Gwydre, he survived to the glacier, at least. If we’re to believe the word of our fallen brethren, he also survived a fall from the glacier.”

“The Highwayman came to enlist you against Ancient Badden?” Gwydre asked incredulously.

“He came to warn us that Ancient Badden meant to destroy everyone living on the islands across the lake,” Father De Guilbe carefully equivocated. “And so we left, as my directives clearly demand.”

“You did not go and do battle with Badden?”

De Guilbe bristled. “It is not my place.”

“So who or what are we to blame for this new alliance between Abellicans and Samhaists?” Dawson McKeege asked sharply.

“Alliance and enmity have degrees in between, friend,” said De Guilbe. “And we were ignorant of your current struggles with Ancient Badden and his followers, or of any edict from Father Premujon of Chapel Pellinor or Father Artolivan of Chapel Abelle decreeing that the Brothers of Abelle were at war with the Samhaists. We have been on the roads of Alpinador for years. It was not my place to go and start such a war.”

“Surely you could have found your answers from the Highwayman!” Dawson protested.

“Who came to us with a traitor to our order!” De Guilbe shot right back.

“Who came to you with information enough to send you running to the south!” said Dawson.

“Enough!” Dame Gwydre interrupted.

“Makes me miss the birdsong and chirping toads,” Jameston mumbled. Gwydre shot him a sly twinkle to let him know that she didn’t disagree, for she, too, would surely have preferred a walk in the forest to this inane bickering.

“So at least we know that the Highwayman survived the ordeal of the troll capture,” Gwydre recounted to Jameston. “To your great surprise.”

“I’m not arguing.”

“And he returned to do battle with Badden?” Gwydre asked De Guilbe.

“As far as I know,” he said stiffly.

“Could you elaborate?” There was no missing the sharp edge creeping into Gwydre’s tone or her weariness at De Guilbe’s annoying verbal dance.

“He went with the traitor to our order and his woman, a barbarian girl,” the large monk grudgingly explained.

“Ah, then, not to wonder why you kicked him out of your church,” Jameston interjected. Gwydre hushed him with a look.

“Her people were joining in the battle, as were the powries of Mithranidoon,” Brother Giavno interjected. Father De Guilbe shot a threatening glare of his own to back the monk down.

“Truly?” asked Gwydre. “Then there is hope.”

“They are all dead,” De Guilbe stated flatly.

Gwydre arched an eyebrow. “You know this? Or you presume?”

The large monk shrugged impatiently.

Gwydre nodded and turned back to Jameston.

“Any odds for armies going against Badden aren’t good odds,” the scout reminded.

“But the Highwayman had already been up there, so he knew…”

Jameston’s laugh cut her short, and she stared at him, seeming less than amused.

“Your pardon,” the scout said with a low bow, even bringing his hat down to arm’s length to sweep it across the floor. “I’m always enamored of Dame Gwydre’s optimism. Sure but you are a warm ray of sunshine on a dark forest trail.”

“Take care in how you address the Dame of Vanguard,” Father Premujon warned, which only made Jameston chuckle harder.

“Then we can hope,” said Gwydre. She put her hand familiarly and warmly on the strong shoulder of tall Jameston Sequin, much to the annoyance of Premujon and every other Abellican brother in the room. “Then we can hope.”

“Always that,” Jameston replied.

They didn’t have to wait long for their hopes to be fulfilled, for word rang out later that same afternoon of more travelers coming down the northern road. The alarms sounded loud and clear long before this second group neared the town, for among its ranks were reportedly at least two powries and a tall man wearing the beret of a bloody-cap dwarf.

Many people went into the streets to await the arrival, and Dame Gwydre and her entourage moved to the front of that throng. Soldiers and scouts slipped out all about the town perimeter, watching, their elm bows drawn and ready.

The approaching band came into view at last, over a rise to the north, and many in the crowd gasped, “powries,” at the unusual sight. But Dame Gwydre was not looking at the bloody-cap dwarves. She was smiling, her eyes on Bransen the Highwayman and on Brother Jond beside him. She led the gathering right out of the gates, doing all she could to stop herself from breaking into a full run at the very welcome sight.

“We feared you dead!” she said when she stood before the band of six. Gwydre gasped then, and so did others around her, noting the garish wound on the face of the beloved Jond. Immediately a group rushed from Father Premujon’s ranks to attend to the man.

“Yach, but so did we,” said one of the dwarves, and he and his fellow laughed.

“Ancient Badden hoped that to be the case, I assure you,” said the Highwayman. He rolled his sack off his shoulder and dumped its gruesome contents-the ancient’s head-onto the ground before Dame Gwydre.

More gasps arose and several wails of protest.

“Remove that wretched thing!” one man demanded.

But Gwydre held up her hand to silence them. “Truly, I have never seen a more beautiful thing in all my life.”

“Let it thaw a bit so ye can enjoy the stink of it, as well,” advised the same powrie. Again he and his friend exploded into laughter.

Dame Gwydre looked from one to the other curiously, then stared hard at Bransen.

“We have a lot to talk about,” the Highwayman admitted sheepishly.

Bannagran stood at the top of the main keep of Castle Pryd, staring to the east. He could make out the light of some campfires, seeming to twinkle on and off as the many trees waved in the evening wind. The savvy leader had set the torch on the wall near to him so that any milling about the streets of Pryd would see him up there in his shining bronze breastplate, cut to accentuate his solid and muscular form. He wore no overcoat and his arms were bare, showing the man’s powerful muscles. Bannagran leaned forward so that his strong features reflected the torchlight. He kept his visage solid and determined, to direct the gaze of any onlookers to the plumed bronze open-faced helmet he had also set on the stone. How many times had the men and women of Pryd Town seen Bannagran adorned in that helm, his oft-broken nose crookedly protruding from the single line of bronze that ran down the front below his brow? They had seen that inspiring sight not once in the course of defeat, only in victory.

This was his role, he knew, and he had been taught well by his friend Prydae. As mighty as he was in battle, his biggest role was to serve as inspiration. “Better to kill one enemy loudly than ten silently,” Prydae once said to him. He had to look and act the part of leader. If the warriors didn’t trust in him, they could be routed and turned at the first sign of defeat, leading any one of a battle’s ebbs and flows into a self-fulfilling prophecy of disaster.

So Bannagran wore his decorated bronze breastplate on the tower top that night. He was too far up for any below to make out the details of that crafted suit, of course, but just seeing the shine would remind them of the craftsmanship, of the line of carved silver wolves running across the chest and the multitude of jewels inlaid above and below that bas-relief. Bannagran was a simple man and had never been overly fond of such finery but, again, he knew his role. He hadn’t come up here simply for appearance, however.