The steel line was actually bending. Andreyis was so tired he could barely lift his shield arm, but as he took his rest for an uncounted time, he could see beyond the press that this entire portion of the Enoran formation had bent back upon itself. About him, lay Enoran and Lenay bodies in equal numbers, many groaning or struggling to move. He did not know where Teriyan was, and could not see any Baerlyners, yet there were many faces that had become familiar on the march, or in the past morning’s fighting. These were his brothers now.
For the third time that morning, the Steel infantry formation began to lose its discipline, as tired Enorans struggled to move into line as the previous line fell back. Andreyis did not see how it happened, perhaps someone tripped, or several in the same place fell to Lenay blades, but suddenly the Valhanans were into their midst with a roar, forcing gaps between the shields, knocking men down with sheer bodily force to cause a cascade that rippled through the entire Enoran rank.
Isolated from their protection, Enorans formed small groups and fought furiously, attempting to fall back. Andreyis’s rear formation surged forward, trying to find a way in…. He suddenly found a space and darted within, saw an outnumbered Enoran fighting with remarkable skill, felling one Lenay while blocking two more.
Andreyis came at him with an overhead, but the Enoran blocked it, then rammed the shield back into Andreyis, driving him back, then spinning to cut at another on his side. Two Enoran comrades came to help, and pulled him back into the regrouping formation behind. Andreyis tried to cut around their shields, but his aching arm lacked power, and an Enoran shield thrust knocked his own smaller shield aside, with the following short-sword thrust slicing through shoulder leather as he barely ducked away in time.
There were arrows falling now amongst the Enoran rear ranks, Torovan archers braving the artillery zone behind to fire into that armoured mass. It seemed to do little damage, but it kept the rear ranks holding their shields above their heads instead of resting, and the Enorans seemed as exhausted as the Lenays.
“Keep ’em moving back!” men were yelling. “Keep the pressure on, lads! Move ’em, move ’em!” Defeating an Enoran formation by killing a majority of its men hand to hand seemed unlikely, particularly now that exhaustion was setting in. But moving them backwards and out of position would breach the entire Enoran formation, and open spaces for the cavalry. From there, a collapse could occur relatively quickly. Lenay militia knew this for a fact, and motivated themselves and each other without a need for higher command.
Trumpets sounded above the whistles of rank change. Yells from the Enoran officers, unintelligible in that foreign tongue. Suddenly the entire Enoran line was falling back. Lenay men howled in triumph, and surged forward. Too exhausted to join in immediately, Andreyis managed only a walk. As he fell behind the front line, he noticed that the Enoran line to the left was not falling back evenly, but rather pivoting, as though on a hinge. He stared across to the right as Valhanans jostled past around him, and saw that on that side, the formation was doing the same.
“Wait!” he yelled. “Wait, it’s a trap!”
Ahead, though he could not see, the renewed sound of battle assured him that the sudden Lenay advance had stopped dead. The Enorans had moved up the reserve, he realised…and unlike the Army of Lenayin, with its Torovan reserve, the Enoran reserve would be every bit the quality of its front-line troops, only fresh and itching to fight. The Enoran general had spotted this part of his line about to break, and had shored it up.
And now, the line they had been facing had become the walls of a box, while the new reserve formed the floor. The Valhanans were in the middle, surrounded on three sides.
“Fall back!” Andreyis yelled, pushing forward so that the front ranks might hear. “Fall back, it’s a trap!” The roar of fighting resumed to either side, as the walls of the box began pressing in. Other Valhanans took up the cry, and as quickly as they’d advanced, the Lenays were soon fighting a fast retreat as the box’s steel walls began closing in around them. Unprepared men who had thought themselves in the rear, suddenly found themselves exposed and fighting on a flank, as the Enorans attacked with renewed vigour. In the confusion, the Lenays lost their spacing, became crushed together, and abruptly the advantage swung back to the Enorans, whose short blades and lightning stabs were far more suited to the cramped quarters. Lenays pressed against that Enoran line fell, unable to defend from two or three possible threats at once, unable to see the blow coming behind its shield, and without the space in which to perform a proper parry in the Lenay style.
Andreyis ran back with the retreat as the Enoran reserve built up momentum, moving at a powerful jog, trampling any who fell underfoot. The sudden crush of men was alarming, and he held his blade aloft as he ran so as not to accidentally cut anyone.
The Enorans did not stop their advance, as the entire line began to regain the ground it had lost. Andreyis stepped back over the bodies of men left behind, now smothered once more by the shifting tide of battle. Lenays fought furiously to halt the retreat, but footing was hard to attain while moving backwards over bodies.
Above the deafening confusion, Andreyis heard warning yells, and the thunder of approaching cavalry. It was coming from the Lenay right flank, hurtling across the devastated artillery zone. Some galloping horsemen on the far side of the onrushing group were clearly Lenay, and Andreyis felt a huge relief…until he realised that they were a minority, and were in fact chasing the others, and trying to cut them from their saddles.
The majority of the oncoming riders, in scattered wheeling groups, were serrin. There had to be at least a thousand of them. And they were firing into the infantry’s backs as fast as they could reload.
Lenay men were falling as the racing talmaad horsemen drew level. And then, they were coming across behind the retreating Valhanan lines. Andreyis threw up his shield and crouched, trying to hide as much of his body behind it as possible. Arrows hissed and snapped left and right, men to his side took shots through their shields, others less attentive took them through necks, shoulders, chests, legs and faces.
Bodies tumbled, and continued to tumble, as passing serrin riders lifted their aim above those closest them. Andreyis risked a glimpse back toward the Enorans, and saw Lenay men struck squarely between the shoulder blades, one moment yelling in support or preparing to swing a weapon at Enoran infantry, the next clutching the air and falling, pierced through chain mail and leathers by the terrible power of serrin longbows.
The serrin seemed to take forever to pass, those nearest them like Andreyis not daring to lower their shields, while those closer to the Enorans dared not turn their backs on the oncoming Steel. Many Lenays stood to protect the backs of those men with their shields, but Lenay shields were smaller, and many fell with shafts through their legs instead.
Then it seemed the serrin procession was splitting, and Andreyis saw their train mixed with many Lenay and Torovan riders who tried to kill them as the serrin evaded, and continued to find targets. Some horses came racing near, dodging wildly with Lenay riders in pursuit. Andreyis saw serrin tucking their bows into canvas bags behind their leg, drawing swords and charging through the closer Lenay infantry, as much to distract the riders chasing as to cause damage. With shields drawn, and bewildered still from the ferocity of the archery, Lenay men scattered before the onrushing horses.
A man darted from Andreyis’s side to swing at a passing serrin, only for the serrin’s razored blade to sever his sword arm midlength. Another took an arrow through the middle, and stumbled into the path of galloping horses. Andreyis ran at him, intent on dragging him away from their path, but he’d barely begun to move when a horse changed direction to come straight at him. The last things Andreyis saw were fast, galloping hooves and a swinging silver blade.
Sasha had barely rested from her assault on the Enoran artillery when the serrin began pouring across the fields. Where they’d come from she did not know, nor how so many had managed to slip past as many Lenay and Torovan horsemen as comprised the army’s right flank. But come they did, at hurtling speed, a swirling, deadly mass with no respect for formation or self-preservation.
She turned her exhausted horse about and charged at them, her men doing the same, as others tore into the serrin mass’s flanks. The serrin kept riding, weaving back and forth, criss-crossing paths with Lenay cavalry to keep them at bay. Sasha held her left-arm shield across her body to guard her right, where most of the serrin were riding. She could see them firing away from her, into the Lenay infantry, and saw men falling by the score. Any of them could have been a friend. All of them were her countrymen. She kicked her horse to greater speed, as several serrin turned and fired her way.
One of them saw her. A man, silver haired and sharp-blue eyed. Their eyes met, and the serrin’s fixed, with recognition. He crossed his bow to opposite hands across his saddle horn, nocked and drew with effortless strength and balance. Sasha hauled the mare’s reins to the right, but the tired animal was slow to respond. The shield was awkward to use, and left too much exposed. The serrin fired, and as the arrow lunged from the string, Sasha knew that it was her approaching death.
But it was her horse’s. The shaft struck somewhere before her hands, and the animal’s legs simply folded. Sasha did not even manage a yell as her saddle disappeared from under her, throwing her sword clear and trying to roll…
And awoke, hooves still thundering, horses whinnying, warriors yelling, swords clashing shields and armour, arrows zipping, men shrieking and dying. The music of her life.
She half-rolled and raised her head, and her vision swam. Her left arm hurt, and her shield lay several paces away, its straps broken. She looked about to find her sword, then staggered to her feet, and limped on a wrenched leg to examine her horse. The retched animal still lived, nostrils wide and frothing, staring at her with the one visible, rolling eye. It kicked and tried to rise, its neck soaked in blood about the serrin’s arrow, only the tail of which was visible in its neck.
Sasha whispered a calling to the animal’s soul, performed the correct sign to her head and its own, then cut its throat. And turned away so she did not have to watch the blood gushing, and the final, feeble struggles of life.
The last of the serrin incursion was passing now, its final riders weaving in mad evasion of many times their number of pursuing Lenay and Torovan cavalry. Serrin were falling as cavalry blades found them, yet still most paid more attention to targets amidst the infantry than to defending themselves.
Several Isfayen were circling back to pick Sasha up. She extended an arm and one dragged her astride with brute strength, Sasha clutching to his back as they set off in pursuit of the serrin, and possibly a riderless horse.
Peering past the Isfayen’s shoulder, Sasha saw the leading serrin riders dividing, then splitting as a wall of charging Lenay cavalry tore into them from the opposing direction. The northerners from the left flank, she guessed. The serrin had charged squarely into the middle of the Lenay formation, and were trapped. Evading riders were decapitated by huge, black-armoured men astride their great horses, who spurred directly into the serrins’ midst with little fear of collision. More and more serrin scattered as the northerners worked their way up the line, striking left and right. Others broke off to pursue desperate escapes, serrin cavalry zigzagging madly toward the rear, where five thousand Torovan infantry reserve blocked their way.
“Stop!” Sasha yelled in her rider’s ear, as he angled as though to pursue. “Stop here, there’s no point.”
He stopped, three companions with him, turning his horse sideways so Sasha could see. Many serrin had turned back, and were heading this way, still firing into the Lenay infantry’s rear…but northern cavalry now overtook them as well, jostling the smaller, sleeker serrin horses, and killing their riders with brutal power. Soon there were but a few visible, each leading perhaps ten Lenay riders in a merry dance around and around, a final defiance of cunning over brawn. Not one attempted to surrender. Several came galloping back past Sasha’s position, well wide of her riders, and with many Lenays in pursuit. No Isfayen man bothered to join the chase.
“Ilayen,” said one of the Isfayen sombrely, and held his sword aloft in salute.
“Ilayen,” echoed the others.
“That,” Sasha’s rider said dourly, “is the bravest thing I have ever seen.”
The roar from the infantry lines was louder now, and the accent of the voices was not Lenay. Sasha looked, and saw Lenay men being forced back, their already depleted ranks thinned dramatically further by serrin archery. She could see confusion in the rear ranks, men helping wounded friends, others yelling at them to fight instead, wild gesticulations, others gathering support to run quickly to parts of the line that were about to break. All were falling back, an inexorable, gradual shuffle. From the sound of it, the Enorans had their blood up.
“Not only brave,” Sasha said tiredly. “It’s cost us the battle.”
The Isfayen nodded. “A pointless sacrifice is surrender cloaked as bravery. These serrin knew precisely for what cause they sacrificed their lives. Our centre collapses. I salute them.”
There were yells now as the Torovan infantry reserve steadied their line and prepared to push forward. The Isfayen turned their horses about and galloped out of the way. Soon another Isfayen rider came galloping, holding the reins of a fair looking, riderless warhorse. Sasha leaped onto its saddle, steadied the nervous animal, and realised from its lovely leather bridlework that it had belonged to a serrin. More of her Isfayen were regrouping amidst the masses of cavalry returning to their respective flanks. Sasha waited until she had as many of them about her as possible, then cast one final glance toward the advancing Torovans.
It was not possible that they could hold back the Steel. They were approaching the artillery zone now, and where Lenay infantry might sacrifice a tight formation for a fast sprint, Torovan infantry relied on that tight formation even more so than the Steel. If they arrived as a breathless rabble, they would need to re-form once in battle…nearly impossible against the Steel infantry. Yet if they marched forward in unison, the artillery would cut them to pieces on the way in.
Even as the command to ride came to her lips, she saw something that made her heart stop. Royal flags, galloping to the fore. A cluster of red cloaks ahorse, about a lone man in black astride a brilliant grey horse. And further, to the left, another cluster, red cloaks and noble banners, about another black-clad figure on a horse. King Torvaal Lenayin, and his son Prince Koenyg, riding to battle at the head of Torovan infantry. It raised a cheer from the Torovans, and through the shock Sasha could not help but consider the irony, that it was a king and prince of Lenayin who led them to war, while their own newly crowned king remained safely ensconced in Petrodor.
Sasha’s breath caught in her throat to watch them. She had thought the situation desperate, yet if Koenyg was committing himself and their father to the fight to rally the troops, it was surely well beyond that. Her heels urged to kick at her new mount’s sides, to race to Koenyg’s side and scream that he was being a fool, that even should the Army of Lenayin lose this battle, all was not lost, and they could regroup and live to fight again. The battle, after all, was diversionary, and designed merely to hold the Enoran Steel off the Larosans’ far larger, exposed flank. Why did Koenyg risk all in this one battle? Or had it not truly been his choice? Had their father ordered it, overruling his commander of armies on this one, singular point of strategy? Or was it honour?
About her, Isfayen men awaited her next command. She had never truly been her father’s daughter. He had certainly never regarded her as such…or at least, not since she was a little girl. Why now should she falter? Why should the sight of him at the head of five thousand Torovans fill her with such terror?
“Come now, lass,” said a nearby rider, grimly. “There is no greater burden than the honour of a king. A man must bear it alone.”
Te Torovans let out a roar, and began to run. Ahead of them, the parties about the two Lenay royals accelerated to a canter. From behind the Enoran line, black dots rose into the air like a swarm of bees, and behind them, fiery balls trailing black smoke.
Sasha turned her horse about, and rode with her Isfayen back toward the right flank. If the centre held, only for the flank to fold because she were distracted elsewhere, she would sacrifice everything for which her father risked and fought. She rode on, as fire erupted behind, and did not look back.
Andreyis awoke. He heard cheering, hysterical laughter, the celebrations of victorious warriors. “We’ve won,” he thought dreamily. Then he realised that he could not recognise any words the men spoke.
He lay on his back on the green grass of a Larosan field. His right arm hurt worse than anything he could remember, but at least it was still attached to his body. His head ached and when he put his left hand to his temple, it came away bloody. He recalled the horse bearing down on him, and realised it must have hit him. Better that than the serrin rider’s sword.
Thud, came more, nearby sounds. Thuds, and a whistling, fast fading. Another sound, a sharp crack, then a tortured, creaking rush, as a heavy mechanism of ropes and gears unwound. That would be a catapult firing. It sounded close.
He half-rolled, and managed to look up. Sure enough, the Tracatan artillery was near, cart-mounted ballistas drawn by oxen, and a pair of enormous catapults, each behind four pairs of oxen, intricate and frightening to behold at this range. Men swarmed over them, perhaps a dozen to each, carefully lifting ammunition from the trailing cart as others, shirtless and powerful, wound fast at complex gears, creaking the huge throwing arms back into place with remarkable speed. An ammunition shot was loaded into the arm’s enormous “palm,” a flint struck, and suddenly the shot was aflame…yet it was strangely coloured-blue, and barely visible. Then, crack, as the release was pulled, and the arm uncoiled once more, hurling a flaming missile across the cloud-strewn sky.
Still the cheering. Andreyis sat up, his arm cradled as it screamed with pain, yet he did not cry out. He stared instead at the backs of the Enoran infantry, perhaps a hundred paces before their artillery. They were cheering, not fighting, swords waving in the air. Many leaned on their shields, utterly spent. Others dropped back to check on the fallen.
The fallen, Andreyis saw, were everywhere. There were frighteningly more Lenays than Enorans, on his patch of ground. They made a grisly carpet, still writhing and groaning in places, as though the dead themselves protested this fate.
Andreyis struggled to his feet. There was a rise of gentle hillside beyond, and up it, he could see men fleeing. Lenay men. The proudest warriors in all Rhodia, running for their lives as an Army of Lenayin had never run before. Into their midst fell a rain of ballista fire. Nearby, where catapult shots fell, there followed great eruptions of blue-tinged orange flame.
“Stop it!” Andreyis shouted at the nearest ballista crew. “Stop shooting!” Men turned to look at him. “Stop shooting, damn you! You’ve won! Let them go, have you no honour?”
They ignored him, shirtless, sweaty men winding fast, and placing more forearm length bolts in the empty breaches. More bolts sng skyward. Andreyis found that he was crying. He looked about for a sword, but before he could bend his injured body to fetch one, hooves thundered close, and an Enoran cavalryman dismounted before him, weapon brandished.
“You, shut it,” the Enoran demanded in Torovan.
“Tell them to stop killing a defeated opponent!” Andreyis shouted back. “You have no honour!”
The Enoran advanced, and laid his blade against Andreyis’s throat. His eyes were battle-wide and deadly. “You serve evil,” he said coldly. “Your masters would kill us all. Enoran mercy was stolen from us long ago.”
Andreyis brought his good arm down hard across the Enoran’s wrist, kicked at his knee, and twisted expertly. The man fell, and found himself staring up at his own weapon, levelled at his throat. “I am friend to Sashandra Lenayin and Kessligh Cronenverdt,” Andreyis hissed, “and I at least have honour! If Enorans do not, I shall teach it to you!”
He turned and ran, as best he could, at the nearest ballista cart. Men saw, and shouted warning, but then another horse blocked his path, and Andreyis found himself staring up at the bright, golden eyes of a serrin. He stopped, trying to imagine a way around this obstacle that might do some good instead of just dying immediately. The serrin shouted something, and waved his sword.
More shouts answered, and artillery fire ceased. A silence hung in the air, as the cheering had faded. It hung like a great emptiness over the fields. The serrin looked down at Andreyis. “You ask much of me,” he said grimly. “It has been long since Saalshen or Enora has faced an honourable opponent in battle. And longer still since we have been pressed so hard as this. Many of your countrymen live to attack us once more. I would rather it otherwise.”
Andreyis held the sword up before his face in salute. He then laid it on the ground before him. “I am bested,” he declared. “My life is yours. I ask only that my honour remain unstained.”
The serrin stared at him for a long moment. “Says he’s a friend to Sashandra Lenayin and Kessligh Cronenverdt,” said the cavalryman, climbing to his feet. “That was a nifty trick. Could be true.”
“Are you?” asked the serrin.
To lie was dishonourable. Sometimes, amongst Goeren-yai, that mattered little. But upon a field of battle, surrounded by dead and dying, honour was all. “Yes,” said Andreyis.
The serrin nodded. “Take him to custody,” he said. “With their king dead, Sashandra Lenayin may figure prominently in the transition of power.”
“She may be dead too,” the cavalryman cautioned.
“I’ve a team of artillery on the left flank who might say otherwise, could the dead speak,” the serrin replied. “She was alive that late in the fight, we shall assume she lives until we discover otherwise.”
Andreyis stared across the masses of fallen Lenay warriors. The king was dead. The Army of Lenayin had broken and fled before their foe. Surely there had never been a blacker day to be a Lenay than today.
A Rathynal circle was already assembling upon the field of battle as Sasha approached. There were too many dead on the field for riders to reach the place where the king had fallen, so Sasha dismounted two hundred paces distant, and walked. The Great Lord Markan of Isfayen walked at her side-a young man, bigger even than his father Faras, with a proud gait and flowing black hair. Faras was dead, struck through the eye by a serrin arrow in the concluding actions of battle, as the cavalry flank had sought to hold back their opposition’s thrusts into the retreating Lenay infantry, and prevent the retreat from becoming a total rout.
There had been an Isfayen ceremony for Faras, after the Enorans had granted truce for both sides to collect their dead and wounded. It had been brief, in the way of bloodwarriors at war, yet it had required Sasha’s presence, as she was now adopted Isfayen, for the duration of this war. Thankfully the ceremony had required nothing of her save her presence, while a spirit talker had appealed to the spirits to take Faras amongst them, and return him to the earth and the sky, and the world of living creatures between. Sasha wondered where a Lenay spirit would go, so far from home. Would he stay here, to rebirth among foreign plants and animals? Or would he wander the long journey home, in homesick longing for the highland mountains and forests?
The walk to the Rathynal circle was carpeted with dead, men and horses alike. Most were Torovan. Scattered amongst them were Royal Guardsmen. Occasionally, an Enoran, though those were being fast removed from the field. Carts stood near, and Enoran men in light armour, hauling their dead into the tray. Serrin too, with leather bags of medicines, and tourniquets and bandages, searching for wounded who could still be saved. Enoran and Lenay men passed each other in silence-the Enorans wary, as the Lenays were still armed. The serrin, however, seemed less wary. Sasha knew that the Steel rarely granted such truces to Bacosh armies, and would usually hold the field until they had collected all their own dead and wounded, then abandon the defeated foe to their dead, if they dared return. But the Lenay king was dead, and Sasha suspected it was the serrin who had granted this small mercy.
Sasha arrived at the circle as the priest gave incantations. Damon made room for her and Markan. He grasped her hand, and she squeezed back. Before them, Torvaal, the fourth King of Lenayin, lay on his back beneath a black cloak. The blackness of his beard only made his face seem shockingly pale. It did not seem real, that he could be dead. Several men had tears in their eyes. Sasha spied Myklas across from her, at the side of Great Lord Heryd of Hadryn, struggling to hold back sobs. Damon too seemed in difficulty. Sasha wished she could feel something. Anything at all.
It passed in a blur, the recitals, the removal of the Highland Ring from Torvaal’s finger and onto the finger of Koenyg. Then, finally, the crown-a thing much unseen in Lenayin, as the first king, Soros, had recognised that such an overt statement of superiority would arouse the displeasure of the proud lords of Lenayin. It was a simple band of metal, made from sword steel. The priest produced it from somewhere, and placed it on Koenyg’s head, and all about the circle knelt. Koenyg was grim and bloodspattered. From his posture, Sasha reckoned he bore a wound to his side, however he tried to hide it. It did not seem serious. He made perhaps the perfect image of a new Lenay king, battleworn and unsmiling, civilised yet frightening. The northern lords would be pleased to see Koenyg take full command. Most of the lords would. Yet nothing could hide the shame of an Army of Lenayin that had lost its king, then run away.
Looking around the circle, Sasha noted who was absent. Kumaryn of Valhanan. Arastyn of Tyree. Her nemesis, and Jaryd’s, both dead. She could not feel happy about it. Parabys of Neysh, too. Four of the eleven great lords fallen. Only the Isfayen had been fast enough in handing from father to son to attend these funeral rites. Some of the others, Sasha had heard, had left their sons in Lenayin to tend their estates. Temporary great lords would need to be found, for the purposes of command.
Rites complete, embraces were exchanged with the new king, siblings first. Then all stepped away while Royal Guardsmen came to take the king’s body, wrapped in its black cloak, onto a waiting cart. There would be no grieving over the corpse, not for Lenays in war. The great lords assembled behind Koenyg, who walked behind the cart, as it picked its way between the fallen. Sasha walked at Myklas’s side. For all his dried sweat and dirt, he seemed to have barely a scratch.
Men talked in low voices of the battle. Sasha risked a look at Great Lord Heryd, walking at Myklas’s other side. “I hear tales,” she said. “My little brother fought well, it seems.”
Heryd’s blue eyes were pale, nearly expressionless. “I have rarely seen such skill,” he said. “He was the best of us.”
Sasha blinked. Hatred between her and Heryd was mutual, yet she knew the Great Lord of Hadryn was no sycophant. Myklas said nothing, with eyes only for his father’s body on the tray of the cart ahead.
The cart continued beyond the battlefield, toward where the Army of Lenayin now camped, several hills beyond. The procession did not follow, abandoning that job to a gathering of lesser lords on horseback. Sasha turned back to where Isfayen were following behind with horses, and remounted.
She headed along the great swathe of fallen bodies toward where she figured the centre of the battle had been. Eventually she saw the stag-on-maroon flag of Valhanan, driven into the ground near some parties of men and carts. She left her horse with her two Isfayen guards, and walked to those attending the dead and wounded. Soon enough she found Byorn of the Baerlyn training hall, and embraced him hard. He seemed pale and shocked, his long hair matted with other people’s blood. Wordlessly, he escorted her past piled bodies and entangled, bloody limbs, until they reached the body of a large man with thick red hair, a fatal sword wound through his ribs.
Teriyan.
Sasha collapsed in tears, and sobbed onto his shoulder, as Byorn knelt with a hand on her back. This was how she should have grieved for her father, had her father permitted such a thing. But this man had been far more a father to her than her real father had. And he was the true father to one of her best friends.
“How am I going to tell Lynette?” she asked Byorn, helplessly between sobs. “Who’s going to tell poor Lynie?” And Byorn, from whom Sasha had never seen emotion in her life, struggled to hold back tears.
“I can’t find Andreyis,” he said in a low voice. “I’ll keep looking, I swear to you. But he’s not amongst the living or the dead.”
For the rest of the day, Sasha could not speak.
It was without question the strangest day of Sofy’s life. She sat at cam and attempted to keep herself occupied with mundane tasks, while beyond the next rise upon the Sonnai Plain, a hundred thousand men and more fought to the death. The wind was from the west, the wrong direction to assist the sound in carrying, yet the din assailed her ears all the same, rising like some unhappy spectre, with wails and cries to chill her bones.
The matrons of the Merciful Sisters insisted on prayer, and so Sofy, her maids, and the other ladies of the camp knelt in the communion tent and recited verse after the men had gone. Then had come needlework, and Sofy attended to some of Balthaar’s clothes in the manner of any good wife, gathered with the other ladies in the royal tent. Some had attempted gossip, forced and nervous, against the smothering din of war that lay over the camp. Several of the ladies, Sofy knew, feared for their position in Sherdaine should their husbands fall on the field. Most had returned to family castles, but a few had accompanied their husbands in camp with servants, and now readied to make a fast escape should news from the battle turn bad.
Sofy wondered what the ladies truly feared the most-the defeat of the united Bacosh Army, or the shudder that such a calamity would surely send through their land. Many lords killed, lines of succession called into question, challenges from rivals, siblings, cousins or power-hungry neighbours, and a great rearrangement of feudal boundaries that might last for several years beyond the great defeat. She wondered if such a defeat might teach them, finally, the futility of attacking the Saalshen Bacosh. Such attacks had grown fewer and fewer in recent decades, and consisted mostly of boastful dukes and other, ambitious lordlings hoping to make a name for themselves by demonstrating their courage, and trying to take the Steel unawares. Some had succeeded, in surprise at least, and had penetrated small armies some short distance into Rhodaani or Enoran lands before beating a hasty retreat in the face of advancing Steel forces. Such daring men had gained great reward of prestige for their “successes,” thus tempting others to copy their methods. The Steel rarely gathered in full force, as its soldiers rotated back to their families, and others to training, leaving only smaller groups to guard the border. But most often, even such smaller formations had dealt these incursions a crushing blow.
Sofy had now come to suspect that some lords in this great army were happy to see the war not for religious or moral reasons, but simply for the opportunity it presented to grab available lands or claim titles, once so many of those previously in possession had been slain. “The great dice,” she’d heard men call it. The great gamble of throwing so many men into battle, and hoping that it was one’s rivals who would fall, and not oneself.
Occasionally a messenger would arrive and inform them of the battle’s progress. Such messengers never spoke in much detail, and Sofy was uncertain whether that was because they did not expect a group of women to understand, or because they simply didn’t know. But she knew the battle was progressing better for the Bacosh because by noon the fighting was still continuing. Both victory and defeat seemed equally precarious outcomes for her personally, and for those she loved. She did not know when the Army of Lenayin would fight its first battle to the south, or how long the word of its outcome would take to reach them. She merely concentrated on her needlework, one stitch at a time, as though by the correct placement of thread and steel, she could stitch all the fates into some more agreeable arrangement.
After noon, the sounds of battle slowly faded until there was only silence. Sofy could stand itlonger and walked out to the camp’s edge, accompanied by many guards, wary of marauding serrin behind the lines. Soon, across the fields of eastern Larosa, knights on horseback appeared, their formations ragged. Squires and servants rushed to help their masters from the saddle. Some were wounded and required assistance to walk. Others rode on lame or injured horses.
Then, from amidst the commotion, Balthaar appeared. Servants hurried to him, and assisted his weary, awkward dismount. He looked at Sofy, visor raised, and smiled wanly. Sofy walked to him, her heart pounding. She could not but be pleased that he lived, and was apparently unhurt. Beyond that, she was entirely uncertain of her feelings.
She took his gauntleted hands in hers. Balthaar just looked at her, sweaty and exhausted. His eyes, usually radiating such confidence, were now sunken and dull. Sofy recognised the look. She had seen it in the eyes of Lenay warriors on her march north, following grand scenes of carnage and pain. Balthaar stared at her, as though surprised that his eyes could once again regard something beautiful.
“My father is dead,” he murmured. “I am Bacosh Regent now.”
Sofy took a deep breath, her heart thudding. She curtseyed. “Yes, Your Highness.”
“We suffered grievously,” Balthaar continued, as though he hadn’t heard her. “Our dead carpet the fields in places so thickly that one could walk across entire paddocks without once touching the ground. I have seen men burned alive by the score, and entire lines of infantry cut down like wheat. The Rakani suffered terribly on the left flank, the serrin devils have taken nearly half their number. I fear many families have ended today, fathers, sons and cousins all slain without any one remaining to continue the line.”
“Your Highness,” said Sofy, trying to keep her voice from trembling. What did they do now? If they were to run for the safety of ancestral lands, surely they should leave immediately? “We have been defeated, then?”
Balthaar stared. His steel fingers clasped tightly upon her hands, causing Sofy to gasp in pain. “Defeated?” he rasped. “No, M’Lady.” He leaned forward, and his dull eyes came suddenly to a blaze, his lips twisting in a smile of vicious, righteous fury. “I bring you victory!”