Bristling Wood (13 page)

“Horseshit and a pile of it,” Caradoc muttered. “We can’t wheel round the bastards without falling into the blasted river.”

Maddyn merely nodded, too choked for breath to answer. He was remembering the feel of metal biting deep into his side. Under him, his horse tossed its head and stamped as if it, too, were remembering their last charge. When Caradoc trotted off to confer with Maenoic, Aethan pulled up beside Maddyn; he’d already settled his shield over his left arm and drawn a javelin. While he followed the example, Maddyn had to work so hard to keep his horse steady that he suddenly realized that the poor beast did remember that last charge. He had a battle-shy horse under him and no time to change him.

The spearmen began calling out jeers and taunting the enemy for scum on horseback, screaming into the sunlight and the wind that blew the taunts into jagged, incomprehensible pieces of words. Some of Maenoic’s men shouted back, but Caradoc’s troop merely sat on their horses and waited until at last their captain left the lord’s side and jogged back, easy in his saddle, a javelin in his hand.

“All right, lads. We’re riding.”

There was a gust of laughter in the troop as they jogged forward to join him. Maenoic’s own men pulled in behind, but the rest of the army wheeled off, ready to charge the enemy riders positioned off to the side. With an odd jingling shuffle, like a load of metal wares jouncing in a cart, the army formed up. Caradoc turned in his saddle, saw Maddyn right next to him, and yelled at him over the noise.

“Get back! I want to hear our bard sing tonight. Get back in the last rank!”

Maddyn had never wanted to follow an order more in his life, but he fought with himself only a moment before he shouted back his answer.

“I can’t. If I don’t ride this charge, then I’ll never have the guts to ride another.”

Caradoc cocked his head to one side and considered him.

“Well and good, then, lad. We might all be doing our listening and singing in the Otherlands, anyway.”

Caradoc turned his horse, raised his javelin, then broke into a gallop straight for the enemy lines. With a howl of war cries, the troop burst after him, a ragged race of shrieking men across the meadow. Maddyn saw the waiting infantry shudder in a wave-ripple of fear, but they held.

“Follow my lead!” Aethan screamed. “Throw that javelin and wheel!”

Closer—a cloud of dust, kicked-up bits and clods of grass—the infantry shoving together behind the line of lime-white shields—then there was a shower of metal as Caradoc and his men hurled javelins into the spearmen. Shields flashed up, caught some of the darts, but there was cursing and screaming as the riders kept coming, throwing, wheeling, peeling off in a long, loose circle. Maddyn heard battle yells break out behind as the reserve troops charged into Pagwyl’s cavalry. Snorting, sweating, Maddyn’s horse fought for the bit and nearly carried them both into the river. Maddyn drew his sword, slapped the horse with the flat, and jerked its head around to spur it back to the troop.

The first rank of Maenoic’s men were milling blindly, waving swords and shouting, in front of the shield wall. Caradoc galloped among his troop, yelling out orders to re-form and try a charge from the flank. Maddyn could see that Maenoic’s allies had pushed Pagwyl’s cavalry back to expose the shield wall’s weakest spot. In a cloud and flurry of rearing horses, the troop pulled around and threw itself forward again. Maddyn lost track of Aethan, who was shoved off to the flank when Maenoic’s men, blindly pulling back to charge again, got themselves mixed up with the charging mercenaries. One or two horses went down, their riders thrown and trampled, before Caradoc sorted out the mess into some rough order. Maddyn found himself in Maenoic’s warband. For one brief moment he could see Caradoc, plunging at the flank of the shield wall with a mob behind him. Then his own unit rode forward for the charge.

On and on—the shield wall was trembling, turning toward its beleaguered flank, but it held tight directly ahead of Maddyn. From the men behind him javelins flew. Maddyn’s horse bucked and grabbed for the bit; he smacked it down and kicked it forward. A split-second battle—of nerve, not steel—Maddyn saw the slack-jawed face of a young lad, his hands shaking on his braced spear, his eyes suddenly meeting Maddyn’s as he galloped straight for him. With a shriek the lad dropped his spear and flung himself sideways. As the man next to him fell, cursing and flailing, Maddyn was in. Dimly he saw another horseman to his right. The shield wall was breaking. Swinging, howling with an unearthly laughter, Maddyn shoved his horse among the panicked spearmen. Ducking and bobbing in the saddle like a water bird, he slashed out and down, hardly seeing or caring whom or what he was hitting. A spearhead flashed his way. He caught it barely in time and heard his shield crack, then shoved it away as he twisted in the saddle to meet another flash of metal from the right. Always he laughed, the cold bubble of a berserker’s hysteria that he could never control in battle.

His horse suddenly reared, screaming in agony. As they came closer the horse staggered, its knees buckling, but it couldn’t fall. All around was a press—panicked infantry, trapped cavalry, horses neighing and men shouting as they shoved blindly at one another. Desperately Maddyn swung out, cutting a spearman across the face as his dying horse staggered a few steps forward. All at once the line broke, a mob-panicked scuffle of men, throwing spears down, screaming, pushing their fellows aside as they tried to get away from the slashing horsemen. Maddyn’s mount went down. He had barely time to free his feet from the stirrups before they hit the ground hard, a tangle of man and horse. Maddyn’s shield fell over his face; he could neither see nor breathe, only scramble desperately to get up before a retreating spearman stuck him like a pig. On his knees at last, he flung up his shield barely in time to parry a random thrust. The force of the blow cracked the shield through and sent him reeling backward to his heels. He saw the spearman laugh as he raised the spear again, both hands tight on the shaft to drive it home for the kill; then a javelin flew into the press and caught the man full in the back. With a scream, he pitched forward, and the men around him ran.

Staggering, choking on dust and his own eerie laughter, Maddyn got to his feet. Around him the field was clearing as the horsemen charged the fleeing infantry and rode them down, slashing in blind rage at men who could no longer defend themselves. Maddyn heard someone yell his name and turned to see Aethan, riding for him at a jog.

“Did you throw that dart?” Maddyn called out.

“Who else? I’ve heard you laugh before, and I knew that cat’s squalling meant you were in trouble. Get up behind me. We’ve won this scrap.”

All at once, Maddyn’s battle fever deserted him. He felt pain, bad pain, cracked ribs burning like fire. Gasping for breath, he grabbed at Aethan’s stirrup to steady himself, but the movement made the pain stab him into crying out. With a foul oath, Aethan dismounted and caught him round the shoulders, a well-meant gesture that made Maddyn yelp again.

“Hard fall,” Maddyn gasped.

With Aethan shoving him from behind, Maddyn managed to scrabble his way onto the horse. He kept telling himself that riding was better than walking, but he hung on to the saddle peak, with both hands to brace himself against the motion as Aethan led the horse out of the death-strewn welter of the battlefield. As they went by, he saw some of Caradoc’s men looting the dead, friend and enemy alike.

Up the riverbank the chirurgeons and their apprentices were waiting for the wounded. Aethan took Maddyn over to Caudyr, then went back to the field to pull more wounded men out of the dead and dying. When he tried to walk to the chirurgeon’s wagon, Maddyn fell, then lay on the ground for an hour while Caudyr frantically worked on the men who were far worse off. At times Maddyn drowsed, only to wake with an oath for his burning ribs; the sun was hot, and he sweated copiously inside the mail he couldn’t remove by himself. All he could think about was water, but no one had time to bring him any until Aethan returned. He fetched him a drink, unlaced the mail and helped him slide it off, then sat down beside him.

“We’ve won good and proper for all the good it does us. Maenoic’s got Pagwyl’s body at his feet, and his allies are all suing for peace right now.”

“Is Caradoc alive?”

“He is, but not a lot of the godforsaken rest of us are. Maddo, we’re down to twelve men.”

“Ah. Can I have some more water?”

Aethan held the waterskin so he could drink again. Only then did he truly understand his friend’s words.

“Oh ye gods! Only twelve?”

“Just that.”

After another hour Caudyr came, his shirt blood-soaked down the front and up to his elbows. All he could do for Maddyn’s ribs was to bind them with a wet linen band. As it dried in the sun, it would tighten enough to let him sit up. Maddyn’s left shoulder was also a mass of bleeding, ring-shaped bruises: the mark of his own mail, pressed right down through his clothes when he’d fallen. Caudyr washed them down with a slop of mead from a wooden cup. Maddyn shrieked once, then bit his lower lip to keep from doing it again. Caudyr handed him the cup.

“Drink the rest of this,” Caudyr said. “I put some painkilling herbs in it, too. It’ll take the edge off.”

The stuff was bitter and stinking, but Maddyn got it down a few sips at a time. He was just finishing the cupful when Caradoc came over and half sat, half fell next to him. Caradoc’s sweaty face was spattered with some other man’s blood, and his eyes were dark and exhausted. With a long sigh he ran grimy hands through his hair.

“This is the worst scrap I’ve ever fought.” The captain’s voice was halfway between a growl and a whisper. “Well, what else did I expect? That’s what we’re for, this dishonored pack of dogs thrown out ahead of everyone. It’s going to happen again, lads. Again and again.”

Since the herbed mead was making Maddyn’s head swim, he had to bend all his will to understand what Caradoc was saying. Aethan put one arm around him and helped him sit up.

“It’s a fine short life we’re going to have,” the captain went on. “Ah, horseshit and a pile of it! Now listen, Maddo. I know you rode into that scrap with no guts for it, and I honor you. That’s enough. You’ve proved you’re not a coward, so stay out of it from now on. A bard’s too valuable a man to lose.”

“Can’t. What kind of honor would I have?”

“Honor?” Caradoc tossed his head back and howled with high-pitched laughter. “Honor! Listen to you! You don’t have any honor, you god-cursed little bastard! None of us do. Haven’t you listened to one piss-poor word I’ve been saying? No noble lord sends men with honor into a suicide charge, but they sent us, and I took it because I had to. We’ve got as much honor as a pack of whores: all that counts is how good we fuck. So stay out of it from now on.” He laughed, again, but the pitch was closer to his deep-voiced normal tone. “Listen, when my Wyrd takes me, I want to know that there’s a man still alive who can take over whatever’s left of the troop. You pack of whoreson bastards are the only thing I have in life, and blasted if I know why, but I want to know the rotten-assed troop will last longer than I do. From now on, bard, you’re my heir.”

Caradoc got up and strode away. Maddyn slumped back and felt the world spin around him.

“Do what he says,” Aethan growled.

Maddyn tried to answer but fainted instead.

By the time the army returned to Maenoic’s dun, another man in Caradoc’s troop had died. That left eleven, plus Caradoc himself, Otho, and Caudyr, to huddle dispiritedly in a corner of a barracks that had once housed nearly forty of them. The war over, Lord Maenoic turned generous, telling Caradoc that he was welcome to his shelter until his remaining wounded (Maddyn and Stevyc) were ready to ride. He also promptly paid over the negotiated wages and even added a couple of silver pieces as a bonus.

“Bastard,” Caradoc remarked. “If he hadn’t hired me to do it for him, he would have had to lead that charge himself, and his piss-proud noble lordship knows it.”

“He’d be dead, too,” Maddyn said. “He’s not half the man on the field that you are.”

“Don’t flatter the captain, you whelp of a bard, but as a cold, hard assessment, like, you’re right enough.”

After a day or two in bed, Maddyn was well enough to go down to the great hall for dinner. Caradoc and his men sat together as far away from the rest of the warband as they could, drank hard, and said next to nothing, not even each other. Occasionally Caradoc would try to joke with his demoralized pack, but it was a hard thing to smile in answer to him. When Maddyn grew too tired to sit up, the captain helped him back to the barracks. Otho was already there, twining the rings of a bit of shattered mail by lantern light.

“I’ve been thinking, smith,” Caradoc said. “Remember our jest about the silver daggers? We’ve got a good bit of extra coin. Is it enough to make us some?”

“Mayhap, but how am I going to work metal on the road?”

“We’ll be sheltering here for at least one week, and if Maddyn and Stevyc groan and moan like dying men, we can eke out another. There’s a forge here in the dun, and the blacksmith says it’s a good one.”

Otho considered, running gnarled fingers through his beard.

“You need somewhat to pick the lads up a bit,” the dwarf said at last.

“I do, and my own spirits could use a little raising, for that matter. A silver dagger—it’s a nice bit of jewelry for a man to wear.” Caradoc paused to stare into the hearth fire for a long moment. “I’m beginning to get an idea. Do you know this troop is going to survive? By being the rottenest pack of black-hearted bastards Eldidd has ever seen, by making it an honor to become a silver dagger, an honor to a certain kind of man, I mean. Someone like our Aethan. He’s as death-besotted and hard a man as I’ve ever seen. I wouldn’t cross him myself. Never wanted to die with a slit throat in a brawl.”

Maddyn was shocked to the heart. Caradoc was right about Aethan, he realized; his old friend would never again be the man who used to laugh and jest and solve all the little problems of the Cantrae warband. It hurt worse than his cracked ribs, thinking about it.