R. Salvatore - The Dame

And Gwydre ate with them and danced with them and led them in song. I looked upon her and wished that she were not so atypical a laird, that all the people of Honce, of all the world indeed, could be so blessed to live under the care of such a ruler.

She shames the callous heart of the Highwayman. She frightens me because she did something to me. Dame Gwydre made me, at long last and against all expectation, hope.

Hope. She made me hope. She made me believe that the world could change. But hope is not as easy an emotion as is surrender. For that is what I have done, Dame Gwydre has shown me to my great discomfort. When the Stork became the Highwayman, the Stork surrendered.

I care not for the war in the south, so I declare. I cared not for Gwydre’s war, so I declared. I fought only because of Gwydre’s deception and blackmail. Beyond Cadayle and Callen and my own needs, I declared myself removed, uncaring, not responsible.

She shames me, and the hope I feel when I look upon her scares me.

Who would I be had I been raised in Pellinor instead of Pryd? I doubt that the Highwayman would exist, and that is a notion that bothers me profoundly. But how might that persona of the Highwayman have grown in such a climate as Pellinor? Would Father Premujon have treated me as the brothers in Chapel Pryd treated the Stork? Would Gwydre have allowed it?

No. Not up here. Up here, even the relationship between Castle Pellinor and Chapel Pellinor is a very different one than that I experienced in Pryd Town. Back home, the brothers were terrified of the laird and would not go against him even when they knew he was wrong. But here Premujon and Gwydre are friends, and she supports him in his work most of all when his work is benefiting the people, the common folk. Both Gwydre and Premujon act as if they serve the folk and not as if the people were put here as pawns for their pleasure.

Perhaps it is the harsh climate of Vanguard and the simple pragmatism the difficult environment demands. Up here, the folk stand as one, or die alone. Would the common folk suffer the selfishness so typical in the southern lairds and nobles? Would they sit idly by, freezing and dying, while their leaders of castle and chapel hoarded the winter supplies?

I doubt they would… but as I reflect on this matter, I realize that I am applying a pragmatism to my observations of character that is unfair to Dame Gwydre. I so clearly see her heart in the way she dances in a snowstorm or sings to the people of Pellinor.

She would be a good leader of good heart wherever her holding. And had he grown among the pines of Pellinor, the Highwayman would not exist.

And Garibond Womak would still be alive. Alive and friend to Bran Dynard and Sen Wi.

So it is not Gwydre I fear in the end but the hope she lights in my heart and soul, in the way she forces me to feel responsibility beyond the boundaries of my own needs.

Had I known the light that is Gwydre before, I wonder what I might have answered when she came to me with no threat or deception and asked me, for no reason other than the good of the folk of Vanguard, to go north and do battle with Ancient Badden.

She has shaken my beliefs to the core. -BRANSEN GARIBOND

We’re driving them hard,” shouted Erolis, a nobleman from Pryd who had so distinguished himself in the fighting that Bannagran had given him one of the ten chariots in his elite team.

Bannagran could only nod as others chimed in above the din of pounding hooves and rolling wheels. They had started to the north on the hunt for the Highwayman, as Yeslnik had demanded. That alone had bothered Bannagran more than a bit, given the Highwayman’s reputation among the commoners. Indeed, Bannagran had let Bransen go after the death of Prydae for just that reason, a potential revolt among the people of Pryd Holding.

Word had caught up to them after their departure, though, that King Yeslnik was soon to be engaging the forces of Laird Ethelbert far to the east of Pryd, along the western banks of Felidan Bay, the long inlet that separated Honce proper from the large peninsula of the easternmost regions known as the Mantis Arm. Yeslnik had recalled Bannagran with all speed.

And so the good general had followed his orders, wheeling his group of ten back to the south and then east, rumbling to the limit of the horses’ strength along the cobblestone roads. They were getting close, Bannagran knew, and that was a good thing, for more than a few of the twenty horses drawing the war chariots would need to be replaced.

“Smoke in the northeast,” Erolis called as they neared an intersection in the road.

“Stay east,” Bannagran replied. He knew this land-he and Prydae had battled powries throughout this region, driving them to the sea, years before.

“Some town is burning,” one of the others said.

“Good enough for them,” another added.

Within a half hour, they came upon the stragglers of Yeslnik’s rearguard and, they learned, southern flank.

“Ah, but never have me eyes looked upon a more blessed sight!” cried one man-a man from Pryd, Bannagran knew.

Bannagran pulled his chariot up beside the beleaguered footman. “You are Farmer Grees?”

“Ah, Laird Bannagran,” the man replied with a low bow.

Bannagran scowled at him from the chariot for using that title, one not yet officially proclaimed. “Where is King Yeslnik?”

Grees halfheartedly waved generally north.

“The town and smoke?”

“Nay,” Grees answered. “That’d be Milwellis, we’re hearing. The king’s due north of us-might even be back to the west a bit.”

Bannagran didn’t have to probe further to get the hidden meaning there, that Yeslnik, as usual, was safely to the rear of the fighting.

“Can ye go to him?” the man asked suddenly. Bannagran looked at him with surprise.

“Might I be speaking without getting yer spear in me chest?” Grees asked, his voice low.

“What are you about?”

“About to die, I’m guessing,” Grees answered.

Bannagran scowled; behind Grees several other footmen shifted nervously.

“Go and tell King Yeslnik, I beg ye,” Grees pressed.

“Tell him what?”

“He’s got us spearheading straight east,” Grees explained. “And the front groups’re making great gains. The enemy’re falling back before them.” He sighed and lowered his voice as he added, “None to the south of us. None of us, I mean, guarding our flank. But there’s a road there.”

Bannagran looked to the east, then the south, trying to get a feel for the situation. Farmer Grees was a veteran of many battles, as were most of the men of Pryd. His tone spoke volumes more than his actual words.

“Mighty spearmen are the folk o’ the Mantis Arm,” Grees added. “Who spend their days harpooning the fishes.”

“They’ve crossed the bay?”

“Aye, Prince Milwellis hit them hard in the north and cut them off from the mainland-he’s built a fortress at the north tip o’ Felidan to keep the men o’ the peninsula on the peninsula. But aye, they’ve got boats a’plenty.”

“You’re being flanked to the south,” Bannagran reasoned. “While the Felidan Bay villagers retreat, their allies from across the bay are sliding in beside and behind you.”

Grees didn’t have to answer.

“How many? How far west have they pushed? And how far east are the front runners of your surge?”

“I can’t be knowing, but they’re there. They’re falling too fast afore us, letting us push east and stretch thin. These folk are no strangers to the way of battle-they’ve been fighting powries all their lives.”

“Why are you men back here?” Erolis interjected, accusation heavy in his tone. “If your line advances with all speed, then why are you so far behind?”