Arts of Dark and Light: Book 01 - A Throne of Bones (32 page)

Her father didn’t approve of the Red Prince’s idea of harrying and probing away at the enemy until a direct confrontation could be risked. While he agreed that the Savonders’ two thousand mounted and heavily armored men might be able to defeat up to five times their number in battle, his concern was that they didn’t know if the wolves had five hundred or twenty thousand warriors in the hills and valleys surrounding Raknarborg. Thus far, no overwhelming assault on the fortress had come, but every day they spied watchers keeping an eye on the main road as well as the lesser paths, and every night the great stone walls echoed with their bestial howls.

The first two days, only day patrols were sent out. The riders went out in groups of twenty, usually accompanied by one of the two mages. No signs of any massing aalvarg armies were found, although the second patrol did manage to ride down and kill three of the wolves caught unaware traversing the road near the bridge that spanned the Goldwater. Along with the return of one of the escorting longships, which had developed a potentially dangerous leak and come back to report that the combined Savoner-Dalarn fleet was safely crossing the sea without incident or catching sight of any wolfships, the three pelts greatly cheered the fortress’s mixed garrison. One was presented to the Red Prince, and one to each of the two battlemages.

Fjotra thought Patrice looked rather absurd in his new wolfskin cloak, but the breeze from the sea was cold and damp and he was rarely seen without it. The Red Prince too made a habit of wearing his, as he had sensibly decided to adopt the warmer Dalarn fashions, and if it were not for his olive skin and dark, sensual eyes, he could almost have passed for a reaver himself.

Despite herself, Fjotra found her heart fluttering a little bit each time the prince looked at her with his piercing, hawk-like eyes and called her “princess” or “your royal highness.” He was teasing her, she knew, but she didn’t mind. And she found, somewhat to her surprise, that she didn’t mind having to accompany him everywhere, translating for him. In fact, she began to feel a little bereft when he left her to meet with his captains, exercise his horse, or any other activity that didn’t require the Dalarn tongue.

Sometimes, when she found him looming over her, she wished he would simply grab her and…do something. Kiss her, perhaps? She wasn’t sure. All she knew was that she was beginning to grow jealous of the comtesse despite her absence, because she had become increasingly certain that the Lady Roheis was the prince’s mistress.

On the sixth day, a patrol spotted a sizable force of around five hundred wolves moving toward the fortress. Unsurprisingly, this sparked yet another argument between her father and Prince Karl. Skuli only wanted to keep watch over the enemy force, whereas the Red Prince urged an immediate attack on them before they could be reinforced.

“He says they don’t know our numbers and they are accustomed to fighting Dalarn, not armored knights. And he wishes to remind you that your men are taught to fight in raids and to skirmish, but his men are trained in fighting together, as a single piece. No, that’s not the word. As a single unit.”

“Every man we lose out there is one more man we don’t have to defend the walls when the attack comes,” Skuli growled.

Fjotra didn’t even need to translate that before knowing what the prince’s response would be. “Every wolf we kill out there is one more we don’t have to defend the walls against,” she said before the Savoner had even finished speaking. “And his horse warriors can’t use their horses fighting inside the walls.”

In the end, it was decided that three hundred Dalarn warriors would engage the aalvarg as they crossed a river that stood between them and Raknarborg, then fall back as if they were routed. There were two large hills that were just visible from the fortress, on the other side of which was a large and open field. Five hundred of the Prince’s cavalry would be hidden behind those hills, and they would ambush the wolves, who would be spread out and vulnerable as they pursued the retreating Dalarn.

It was also decided, after both the Prince and his battlemages insisted, that Fjotra would accompany the Savoner riders in order to reduce the chances of any messages being misunderstood. After a brief demonstration of Patrice’s ability to cloak her with a concealment spell, her father reluctantly agreed that she would be nearly as safe with the battlemages as she was behind the great black walls of Raknarborg, especially since the Savoners’ horses could easily outpace the wolves and there was no way to cut off their line of retreat without it being seen from the fortress.

The next morning was cold and grey. She forced herself to eat a little oatmeal, but her stomach was bound up in uncomfortable knots. If it were not for the knowledge that she would be at Prince Karl’s side, she didn’t think she would have had the courage to ride out with the Savoner horsemen. But her spirits rose when she saw the knights lined up in their ranks, their polished silver armor brighter than the faint rays of sun that occasionally broke through the mass of clouds above.

She herself wore a borrowed leather jerkin from a small squire whose knight was not in the ambushing force, and she’d even tucked an oversized dagger that would serve her as a sword into her belt. It wouldn’t be of much use against the powerful jaws and sharp claws of the wolves, but at least she would have the ability to avoid capture if need be. In fifty years of brutal struggle throughout the islands, no man, woman, or child had ever been known to escape aalvarg imprisonment, and it was widely believed that they devoured their captives rather than enslave them.

“You’re very brave to ride with us, Lady Fjotra,” Patrice told her as she climbed into the saddle. “But don’t you worry, Blais and I will keep you safe. We have very strict orders from the Red Prince that your survival and safe return to the castle is our paramount duty today.

She smiled at him. He was sweet. But she couldn’t take her eyes away from the commanding figure of his prince.

The Red Prince sat astride his giant warhorse as if he were a god. His shield was painted red, and he wore a long red plume set jauntily atop his visored helmet. White teeth flashed at her, and he raised a mailed fist to her in a royal salute before ordering his men to move out.

The Dalarns whose feigned retreat they would cover had departed at sunrise, but since the wolf people usually preferred to fight by night, her father was confident that they could launch a convincing attack on the aalvarg camp before falling back and drawing the enraged wolves onto ground where the Savoners could easily ride them down. It wasn’t a perfect plan, he had told her, but it had the advantage of being simple enough that not even the language barrier between their allied forces were likely to pose much of a problem.

They rode slowly in order to spare the horses, so it took them nearly an hour to reach their position. The Dalarn warriors led by Steinthor Strongbow were to begin their attack when the sun reached its zenith. So, after stationing scouts at the top of both hills, the prince allowed everyone to dismount and eat what Fjotra feared for some would be their last meal.

The combination of riding in the company of so many fearsome knights with the careless, confident chatter of Blais and Patrice was enough to keep her fear in check, and so she had little trouble eating the bread and cheese that was distributed to everyone.

Prince Karl, she noticed, broke off pieces of the same bread and helped himself to hunks of the same cheese that his men ate. The way they treated him as he walked among them was strange. It struck her more like the familiar affection a man might have for his older brother than the healthy mix of respect, fear, and awe that was due a chief or warleader.

“He is much-loved in the ranks,” Patrice commented as if he had read her thoughts.

“They’re not afraid of him the way the clans fear my father,” she said. “Is he not a true warrior, then?”

The battlemage laughed in disbelief. “The Red Prince? No, he is most certainly a warrior, and a valorous one at that. Battle is the sport for which he lives. I daresay that if your father had not given in to him, he’d have led us out here even without your men-at-arms. If we’re going to fight these ulfin, and it appears we may have to whether we want to fight them or not, then our officers have to engage them in order to learn how they make war. This little battle today, as small as it is, could very well lay the foundation for regaining the entire chain of islands for the king on behalf of your people. I have no doubt the wolves can be deadly. But then, I doubt they have ever seen the thundering fury of a royal cavalry charge. It is truly marvelous to behold!”

“This is what you call a small battle?” She looked around the huge mass of armored knights and their giant steeds, more than twice the size of the horses her people had ridden before the aalvarg had killed and eaten most of them. “Before my father bring together what is left of the tribes, I don’t think he ever bring more than one hundred men to war at the same time.”

“The king has more than one hundred royal battlemages alone at his disposal, my lady. Blais and I are but two of the younger and less skilled ones. And there are another fifty acolytes of varying abilities, as well as a number of elderly adepts who no longer take the field but are some of the most powerful sorcerers at L’Academie. And, as you can probably imagine, he has ten knights and a hundred men-at-arms for every mage. The scale on which the king makes war is several orders of magnitude greater than is the case with your people—or, we can hope, the wolf-people. Although I doubt that was always the case.”

“Why do you say that?” Even though she’d seen the wealth of Savonne and had travelled across nearly half of its extent, Fjotra was still a little shocked at the idea that the Savoner king had so much military might under his command. While it confirmed for her that they had done the right thing in appealing to him, for surely he had the ability to crush the cursed aalvarg if he so desired, she began to realize that subjugation to the throne of Savonne might only mean a slower and more gentle form of extinction for her people.

“That giant black monstrosity of a castle in which your father has been hosting us wasn’t built by one hundred men, or by men who feared an attack by a hundred, or even a thousand, men. I imagine it must have been a great redoubt during the time of the Witchkings. Many men fled their cruel rule, and those who crossed the White Sea would have been able to escape them. It’s not inconceivable that Raknarborg was built by men who later returned to settle down in Savondir.”

“But that would make your people the same as my people!” she protested. “That doesn’t make any sense. We don’t even speak the same language or look anything alike.”

The young battlemage didn’t respond to her. He was cocking his head to the side with a strange expression on his face. He glanced at the older mage, who nodded. “Come on, our orders are to climb to the top of that hill there. You’re to come with us. But don’t crest the summit. Once we get close to the peak, we’ll get down on our bellies and crawl. We don’t want to expose ourselves and give them the chance to see that we’re waiting for them.”

She hadn’t heard anything herself, but she had no doubt the mages knew what they were doing. Fjotra dutifully began following Patrice after first checking to make sure her horse’s reins were securely tied to the rope that was pegged to the ground. If this allied effort went awry and they had to retreat to the castle, she wanted to be sure she had a horse waiting for her.

On that terrible night’s flight from Garn, they had all learned the hard way about how fast the aalvarg could move when they were running down their prey. She belatedly realized that her father’s men had no chance of reaching the safety of the castle walls on their own. If the ambush were unsuccessful, or if the Red Prince’s courage failed him at the sight hundreds of great ravenous wolves rushing toward him, every single Dalarn warrior would die.

“You had better not abandon them, your Royal Highness,” she muttered to herself. “Or I swear by the All-Father’s crows that I’ll kill you myself.”

“What’s that?” Patrice looked back at her. He was clambering up the steep hill behind Blais, occasionally using his hands to help him manage the slope. A squad of archers followed the three of them. Another squad was just beginning to climb the other hill. Below them, the knights were putting on their helmets and sliding on their gauntlets, while their men-at-arms prepared their mounting stools.

“Nothing.” She winced as the uneven edges of the rock poking through the cold grass made her palms ache. Once, she caught her knee on an exposed stone, and the unexpected jolt of pain nearly took her breath away. But it faded after a brief pause, and after taking a deep breath to gather herself, she continued climbing after the others. It didn’t take them too long to reach the crest, but once they had crawled to the top and concealed themselves there, she was surprised to see there was nothing in either the valley below them or the treeline that followed the curve of the river. “Where are they?” she hissed.

“We started climbing when they began their attack,” Blais told her without bothering to whisper. “You needn’t keep your voice down, my lady, just your head. Ulfin ears may be keen, but they can’t hear us from here. We’re downwind. And they won’t scent us, or the horses either.”

The cold from the ground rapidly penetrated her body despite the leather armor she was wearing over a heavy wool tunic that belonged to one of her father’s men. She lay there, shivering in silence, for what seemed like an age.

Patrice finally nudged her with his elbow. “There,” he said, pointing toward the far end of the valley.

She could just make out some movement at the edge of the treeline. Then Patrice passed his hand in front of her face. She jerked her head back and stared at him, which drew a pleased smirk from him and a chuckle from Blais. She scowled and looked back at the strange circle which floated unsuspended in the air in front of her face. When she moved her face close to it and looked through it, it made the distant trees look much closer. Startled, she jerked her head back, then frowned and looked through it again.