Elizabeth Moon - Oath of Gold

“But—my lord—the supplies—” Ammerlin hesitated, looking back.

Paks remembered the king’s gesture from her years in his Company, but his voice stayed calm. “Ammerlin, we know they have reserves. All that we had behind us is now with us. Our hopes lie before us—and only there. If we can fight through—”

“But—” Paks saw the indecision in his face, and rode toward him. His face turned to her. “And—and that—”

“Paksenarrion,” said the king quietly. “A paladin of Gird.”

“Ammerlin,” said Paks, “take courage. Gird is with us.” Ammerlin nodded, his eyes bright. She turned to the king. “My lord king—”

“To Lyonya,” he said. And with a few quick commands to Dorrin and the Marshals, the defenders were ready to move.

At first it seemed they might break through to the higher ground along the east road. The priests of Liart commanded a motley crowd of ill-armed peasantry; these could not stand against disciplined troops. The enemy cohorts—Pargunese by their speech, though they showed no standard—put up more resistance, but gave way step by step. Paks could see something back in the trees—brigands, or perhaps orcs—waiting for a chance, but unwilling to fight in close formation.

The Tsaian heavy horse charged again and again, breaking open the enemy formation and letting the foot soldiers advance a few strides with ease. But once on the slope up the next ridge, they could not break through; the enemy still had the higher ground, and outnumbered the defenders two to one. Paks looked around for more of Liart’s priests; she was sure more were nearby, but they kept out of sight, only occasionally showing themselves in the midst of their fighters.

They had gained perhaps half the upward slope, when Paks heard a battle-horn’s cry above the clamor. At once the enemy attacked in full force, slamming into the defender’s lines and forcing them back down the hill. It was all they could do to keep their formation in this retreat; one after another staggered and fell, to be trampled underfoot. Paks sent the red horse directly at the enemy; those in front of her melted away, but on either side they drove on. She found herself surrounded, fought her way back through to stiffen the defense. When she looked up again, the eastward road was full of men: two full cohorts of heavy infantry, in Verrakai blue and silver that gleamed in the afternoon sun. A half-cohort of archers in rose and dark green halted above them and shot down the hill into the defenders. As the Verrakaien infantry charged downhill, the enemy opened to let them through, the force of their charge undamped.

But the king had seen all this as soon as Paks; in moments Dorrin had swung her cohort and the yeomen off the road just enough that the Verrakaien charge slid along the flank of the defenders rather than hitting it squarely. Now they scrambled downhill to level ground as best they could, losing in seconds ground it had cost hours to gain. By the time they were reorganized in the valley, more than a dozen yeomen, and eight of Dorrin’s veterans, lay dead.

Shadow already streaked me little valley. They had been fighting for hours; Paks herself felt little fatigue, but she saw in the drawn faces around her that they could not keep going without a respite. Meanwhile the Verrakaien, finding stiff resistance, had slowed. As the day turned on toward evening, they eased their attack, and disengaged. Paks could see their supply train coming down the road; Liart’s followers were scavenging in the king’s, pulling packs off the dead horses and mules. The defenders rested as best they could, locked in a tight square, with the king in the center.

When the attackers pulled back, all three Marshals began healing the wounded they could find. By unspoken agreement, Paks stayed alert for any arcane attack of evil. She knew that the Liartian priests were not finished; they would have something else planned. Enemy campfires began to flicker in the fading light. Soon the smell of cooking would come along the wind, tantalizing the defenders. Dorrin edged over to her.

“Paks, my troops have some food—trail bread—and we still have four of our mules. That’s enough for one meal, perhaps.”

“What about the yeomen?” Paks remembered seeing them stuff food into pockets and sacks.

“I didn’t think they’d have any—I’ll ask.”

In the end, only the Tsaian Royal Guard had nothing; when the rest was shared out, all had an almost normal ration: cold, but strengthening. Water was a harder problem, but one of the yeomen solved it for them. They had been driven back nearly to the ford, but one unit of enemy troops had cut them off from the water. The yeoman, however, knew this stream, and said that its water came near the surface some distance from the stream itself. So it proved: a hole scarcely knee-deep filled with fresh water. They widened the hole until several could fill their helmets at once; the water sufficed for both men and horses. Before full dark, all had drunk their fill, and had eaten enough to feel refreshed.

Yet they were surrounded now by a force three times or more their size. With the Marshals’ healing aid, their losses that afternoon were not as severe as might have been expected, but even so too many defenders lay stiffening on the hill. In the center of the square, Paks urged the king to rest while he could. They had made an inner square of the horses, and knights, leaving an open space where it was possible to lie, out of sight of archers (though not, of course, out of range.)

With dark came new troubles. First was the Verrakai commander, who came forward under a parley flag lit by torches. He accused Phelan of invading Verrakai lands, and refused to accept the royal pass Dorrin carried.

“That princeling has no right to give passes—only the Council can. These are Verrakai lands, and Verrakai’s road, and you have no right to invade on behalf of that northern bastard.”

“Hold your tongue!” bellowed High Marshal Seklis. “He’s the rightful king of Lyonya, and no bastard.”

“And who are you?” asked the commander.

“High Marshal Seklis, of the court at Tsaia, and you’ll have the Fellowship of Gird on you for this cowardly attack, sir.”

The commander laughed. “The Fellowship of Gird is far away, Marshal; if you insist on sharing this dukeling’s fate, it will never know what happened.”

“Share his fate—Gird’s blood, sir, I’d rather share his fate than yours.”

“Besides,” the commander went on, raising his voice, “I’ve heard he sacrificed a Gird’s paladin to save his own skin. What kind of a king is that? What kind of commander, for that matter? If you had any honor at all, you’d turn on him now.”

Paks called her light and stood forward. “Sir, you know not what you speak of. This king never sacrificed a paladin—I am the paladin involved, and I know.”

In her light, the commander’s eyes were wide, white-rimmed. “You! But I heard—”

“You heard lies, commander.” She saw a ripple of alarm pass through the commander’s escort, and her light extended in response. “Would you risk your life—and more than your life, your soul—against a paladin as well as these Marshals and Lyonya’s king?”

“It is my command.”

“Indeed. Despite the commands of your rightful liege lord, the crown prince—”

“He hasn’t been crowned yet—not until Summereve—”

Paks laughed. “Sir, you argue like a judicar, not like a soldier. Unless some treachery falls on him, as this has fallen on the king of Lyonya, he will be your ruler, and acts now as such. You must know that the Council and prince together gave Lyonya’s king not only passage but also royal escort—have you never see the Tsaian Royal Guard before?”