Elliott, Kate - Crown of Stars 1 (72 page)

Henry was surrounded by his century of Lions. Hanna searched and found Karl's broad back among the ranks; if she craned her neck just right, she could see his profile. He did not notice her. With his fellows, he stared intently down the slope toward the restless mass of Sabella's army. The Lions were ready for battle.

Henry and Villam finished their consultation. Hathui rode away with a message intended for Theophanu, who had been left in charge of their supply train. Henry, ever cautious, had left the train and his noncombatants behind in the fortified town of Kassel.

Hanna was sent back behind the lines to the wood beyond. Henry had chosen this field to stand and fight because of the lay of the land. Guessing that Sabella would bring her supply train with her rather than leave it behind in Arconia, he had hidden some eighty mounted soldiers in the woods and put Sapientia
—with a veteran captain at her side for good measure—at their head. Concealed by the trees and by the skirmishing that prefaced any battle, they would sweep wide round Sabella's right flank and hit all the way back to the supply train, thus freeing Constance.

Or causing her to get killed,
thought Hanna, but she supposed Henry would rather see his sister die than remain a hostage. After all, as long as Constance remained
— alive—in Sabella's hands, she was a weapon to be used against the king.

That was how Hathui had explained it, at any rate. But Hathui had been raised in the harsh cauldron of the borderlands, which were in a state of constant war. There, as the hawk-nosed Eagle had said more than once, one killed one's children rather than let them fall into the hands of Quman raiders.

Sapientia looked like a greyhound being held on a tight leash: eager to run. She was small enough that Hanna was surprised Henry let her fight.

Of course every adult fought in the right circumstances, under conditions of siege or a raider's attack on a village; it would be foolish to waste any strong arm. But women
—blessed by the Lady with the gift of bearing life—did not often join the ranks of armed soldiers. Some, who dedicated their lives to St. Perpetua or St. Andrea— both soldiers for God—turned their hearts away from marriage and childbearing, as Hathui had done. Others by reason of unusual size or strength served a year or two in a lord's levy before returning to their holding and taking up their old lives.

But it was no shame for a noble lady to excuse herself from battle: that was what she had a husband and brothers for. Her first duties were to administer her lands and bear children to carry on her lineage. And Sapientia was particularly small, so that Hanna
—running messages to her retinue from Henry—had been aware of the trouble the king and his smiths had gone to, to outfit her in decent armor.

But Sapientia wanted to fight, to lead her own unit. And Henry allowed her to, because
—Hanna suspected— he had something to prove thereby. Something for her to prove to him, most likely. No person could become sovereign if he, or she, could not lead the great princes and their levies into battle.

"When will we go?" demanded Sapientia, and the old captain spoke to her soothingly, calming her down.

From the direction of the field, Hanna heard the soldiers raise their voices in a great shout: "Hai! For Henry!" That was the signal.

Sapientia lifted a hand and at the head of her troop of soldiers began to ride, circling through the trees. Hanna kept tight hold on her spear. She rode toward the back of the ranks, protected by them; no one expected an Eagle to fight unless they were overwhelmed. But she was still nervous. She stared through the trees, half starting every time new trees sprang into view. Luckily the soldiers next to her were too intent on what lay ahead to notice how jumpy she was. Possibly they were jumpy themselves, but she doubted it. For her first command Henry had given Sapientia experienced soldiers who had, most of them, spent time fighting in the east. After all, if this raid went well, they could
fold up Sabella's
right flank or even overtake and engulf her rear, thus preventing her from retreating.

Distantly, through the trees, Hanna heard a change in the echoing noise from the field. One of the soldiers beside her grunted: "They've engaged," he said to the man beside him.

They rode on, curving back to the right. A horrible shriek rose above the distant thunder of battle.

"What was that?" muttered one of the soldiers.

But then, at the fore of the company, the riders broke into a gallop. They had sighted their quarry. Their pennants whipped behind, streamers of red and gold.

Hanna saw the line of wagons ahead, drawn up in twos to make a wall and a gap between where the noncombatants could take shelter. Amazingly, Sabella had left only a token force to guard her supply train. A few arrows cut through the sky, their whirring like a warning come too late.

Sapientia raised her voice in a shrill cry: "Hailililili!" and, with her soldiers fanning out, they hit the line of wagons and broke into a dozen small swirls of fighting, soon stilled.

Hanna hung back, watching. Hathui had drilled this into her over the last ten days as they had ridden west to meet Sabella.

"You are the king's eyes and ears. You watch and mark all that occurs. You are not meant for heroics. You are meant to live and bear witness."

But there were no heroics here. Sapientia's troops took over the supply train easily and began to herd their new prisoners together, searching for Biscop Constance.

A cry came from the woods on the opposite side of the line of wagons. Hanna rode closer, to investigate.

There! Among the trees she saw riders, but she could not identify them. Sapientia's captain took twenty soldiers and rode into the wood to head them off.

And at that moment, someone grabbed her reins and jerked down hard on them. She started and swung her spear around to point at
—

A frater.

She stared. He had a harsh face. One of his lips was bleeding.

"Give me your horse!" he demanded. This was no humble churchman. After almost twenty days in the king's progress, Hanna recognized a great lord's arrogance when she saw it.

But she hesitated. He was dressed as a simple frater, after all.

"Ai, Lady, grant me patience!" he said aloud. "Eagle! Dismount and give me this horse!"

"For what purpose?" she demanded in her turn. "You are in Sabella's train
— "I am Sabella's prisoner, not her ally." "How can I know—?"

Distantly, that awful shriek rose again on the wind, followed by a strange muttering, like calls of triumph and moans of defeat melded together, like a battle gone to rout.

The frater grunted in anger, grabbed her arm, and yanked her bodily off the horse. She hit the ground hard enough to jolt her and scatter her wits. The animal shied, but he jerked down on the reins and, while Hanna was trying to pick herself up, threw himself over the saddle and swung his leg over. Kicked the horse, hard, and with robes flapping up around his thighs, he rode at a gallop off toward the battle. Lady! He was barefoot!

Panting, Hanna heaved herself to her feet. In the woods, two forces had met and blended together: she caught sight of the red dragon of Saony. Friends, then, but as soon as she thought it, she heard shouting.

"Lavastine's riders are coming! Turn round! Turn round and face them!"

Ai, Lady! What had Hathui said? An unhorsed Eagle is a dead Eagle. The frater, and her horse, were long gone. Still clutching her spear, Hanna ran for the shelter of the wagons.

is what it had all meant, of course. Alain saw that now with a clarity obscured only by the screaming of men and the milling of soldiers lost, frightened, and running, or caught up in the brutal and numbing work of slaughter.

Henry's soldiers
—those caught by the
guivre's
glare— were like so many trussed pigs, throats slashed while they squealed. This was not battle of the kind sanctified by the Lord of Hosts, who did not falter when He was called upon to wield the Sword of Judgment. This was a massacre.

Alain knew it was wrong, knew it in his heart. The
guivre
screamed in rage, trying to break free, beating its wings frantically. Sabella's first rank of horsemen moved steadily up the hill, their progress slowed because it was so easy to kill Henry's soldiers, because they had to scramble over the dead and dying and over horses collapsed onto the grass. On the far right flank, a melee swirled, back and forth, but the standard of Fesse wavered and began to move backward.

Above, about half of the century of Lions had begun to march forward to meet Sabella's army. The rest either could not or would not march. And behind them Henry sat on his horse, unmoving. Was he waiting and watching? Or was he already caught in the
guivre's
eye?

The mounted soldiers opposite Lavastine's forces were trying to turn Lavastine's soldiers back so they could punch in to aid Henry's center. Alain ran, fought his way through the back ranks of archers and spearmen who had fallen back after the first skirmishing. He shoved, and Rage and Sorrow nipped and bit to make a passage for him, toward their sisters and brothers, the black hounds who attended Count Lavastine.

Alain reached the count, who was sitting back from the front lines, waiting and watching the progress of the battle, Alain grabbed his stirrup and pulled hard. Lavastine stared down at him. There was no sign in his eyes that he recognized Alain.

Desperate measures for desperate times. He prayed for strength to the Blessed Lady. Then he grabbed Lavastine's mail coat and tugged as hard as he could.

Because the count was not expecting it, he lost his seat. Alain shifted his grip to the count's arm and pulled him right out of the saddle. Lavastine fell hard and lay still.

And a spear pinched Alain between the shoulder blades. He dropped to his knees and fumbled at his neck as he turned his head to look up and behind.

It was Sergeant Fell. "You know me, Sergeant!" Alain cried. "You know the count is acting strangely. This is wrong! We shouldn't be here!"

Fell hesitated. Lavastine's captain fell back from the front lines, seeing the count unhorsed. All at once the hounds surrounded Alain, growling and driving everyone back. No one dared strike them. Alain found the rose and drew it out.

"I pray you, Lady of Battles, come to my aid," he breathed. And he brushed the petals of the rose over Lavastine's pale lips, just below the nasal of his helmet. Beyond, he heard the clash of battle. Here he was protected, caught in an eddy, surrounded by a black wall of hounds. Sorrow licked Lavastine's face, and the count opened his eyes. He blinked and passed a hand over his helmet as if feeling it there for the first time. Then he sat up. Alain grabbed him under the arms and the hounds parted to let Sergeant Fell through. Together, Alain and the sergeant pulled Lavastine to his feet.

"What is this?" demanded Lavastine, staring at the chaos around them, his front rank of fighters pressing against the fighters from Saony. Fesse's banner was retreating. In the center, Sabella's banner moved up and farther up and came against the banner of the Lions. The
guivre
shrieked. The Lion banner toppled and disappeared from view. Henry, surrounded now only by his personal guard, did not move.

The captain pressed his horse through the knot of hounds and men, who parted to let him through. Sergeant Fell let go of the count and grabbed his horse's reins before it could bolt. The
guivre
made all the horses nervous, and they shied at every harsh call and scream.

"We are marching with Sabella, against Henry," said the captain.

"We are not!" cried Lavastine. "All of my men, withdraw from the battle."

This command raced through the ranks like wildfire. Lavastine mounted his horse and pulled back, and step by embattled step his soldiers withdrew from the battle until the captains of Saony's line realized what was occurring and, at last, let them go.

But Henry's center was broken. Sabella was halfway through the Lions and still Henry had not moved. As Lavastine's soldiers cleared the field, Alain stood his ground and their retreat eddied around him and ebbed until he stood among the dead and watched Saony's cavalry wheel and turn to aid their king. He watched the
guivre
twist and turn, still battering against the wind and against its shackles, watched its baleful glare sweep across the ranks of Saony's soldiers. Watched as half of Sabella's company split off to strike at this new threat.

A few arrows and spears cut through the air from guivre's
scaly hide and fall to the ground. The grass was empty around the
guivre;
Sabella's soldiers, though protected against its gaze, gave it a wide berth. Not one soul had
king's dragon
come within reach of its claws, circumscribed by the length of the chain that fettered it to the iron cage.

Slowly, Henry's soldiers were cut down or retreated up the hill toward the king
—for their final stand.

The rose fell from Alain's suddenly nerveless fingers. He could not stand by and watch any more. He could not judge the Tightness of Sabella's grievance against Henry. But he knew it was not right that she win by these means, as horrible as they were. Lackling had been murdered to gain Lavastine's support. Henry's soldiers could not fight, so as to pit honest strength against honest strength, but were scythed down like wheat.