Lord of Lies (56 page)

'And what if he tries to stop and question us? What story would you have us tell him?'

'He won't try to stop you. So you won't have to lie to him. We'll take some blood, wrap a few of your men in bandages. The Duke will
want
to believe that the Sarni and the Valari can never ride together.'

'I see,' Sajagax said, nodding his head. 'Then the blood and bandages will lie for us.'

I said nothing to this remark as Sajagax barked out orders. The Sarni, when they are hungry and rations are scarce, sometimes open their horses' neck veins and drink their blood. Orox and Thadrak now came forward with knives and cut at the necks of two of the Kurmak's remounts. They caught the blood in their mouths, and then spat it onto some fresh bandages. These red-soaked cloths they wrapped around the heads and bare arms of three warriors, named Uldrak, Tringall, and Ragnax. Sar Kandjun, a fearless and clever knight from Pushku, then suggested a way to elaborate our ruse. I reluctantly agreed. And so he borrowed a few arrows from Orox. He forced the point of one of these down between his armor and his neck, leaving the feathered shaft sticking out. He called for more blood, which Orox smeared over him. Sar Jaldru and Sar Marjay volunteered to plant arrows about their bodies as well. Then they all lay down in the grass in awkward positions, playing dead.

'Do not,' I said to Sajagax, 'attack the Alonians unless they attack us first. We might yet be able to avoid a battle.'

Quickly, for Duke Malatam's men were drawing nearer, I led my knights forward across the steppe. And Sajagax and his warriors galloped off in the opposite direction.

After about a mile, we veered toward the west. The cloud of dust behind us grew larger as our pursuers gained on us. Now we could make out Duke Malatam's standard flapping at the front of the cloud: the red roses against the white field, like the blood against the bandages that bound three of my men. I no longer feared that the Duke's army would overtake us, but I did dread that they might trample Sar Kandjun and the other knights in their haste to waylay us.

Soon the terrain that I had seen in Atara's crystal came into sight Along the horizon, limned against the blue sky, a long sweep of bare rock topped with grass rose up before us. The rock looked like granite, for it showed streaks of pink and little silver flickers of various minerals. It was sheer, as if cut by the hand of man. In one place a huge notch, half a mile wide, was formed by the granite walls to either side of it. It seemed that it might once have been a quarry from which the ancient Alonians had cut the stones for the Long Wall. It seemed, as well, that it might be a break in the escarpment before us. I knew that it was not I led my columns of knights straight toward it.

And still Duke Malatam and his men gained on us. When I turned to look at them, I saw the Duke like a little bit of cloth and shining steel on top of a charging white horse, leading a mass of armored knights our way. We drew closer to the escarpment. Its curving heights would have prevented any easy retreat to our right or left. And so we continued on, riding into the mouth of the notch. Once, its ground must have been all bare rock, but now acres of sere grass grew over it. It was shaped like the wedge of a pie, its point pushing into the granite walls to either side of us. Now we could clearly see where it dead-ended only a few hundred yards farther on.

'Halt!' I cried out. I whirled my horse about and cupped my hands over my mouth. 'Change out horses, and lances ready!'

With Duke Malatam's force bearing down upon us, we again changed horses. I worked quickly to resaddle Altaru and mount him, as did my men with their best battle horses. Then I deployed a hundred and twenty of the Guardians in a single line two hundred yards long across the notch, anchoring our flanks by the sheer walls to either side of us. We all faced outward, toward the east where the Duke's retainers were thundering closer. Behira and Estrella, with Master Juwain, waited on their horses behind us, as did Baltasar and fifty other knights in reserve. One of them, Sar Juralad of Kaash, bore the Lightstone. I took my place at the center of our line. To my right, Maram sat on his horse gulping for air and muttering at the cruelty of life; to
his
right were Lord Raasharu, Lord Harsha, Skyshan of Ki and others. To the left of me, Atara calmly stroked her mare, Fire, whose mane fell about her long, lithe neck like a mass of flames. In Atara's sun-burned hand was clasped her deadly, double-curved bow. Karimah, likewise accoutered, sat close by her side, followed by Sunjay Naviru, Sar Kimball, Lord Noldru and nearly sixty others down the line: the finest knights in all the world. Their lances were all couched beneath their arms; the points formed a line of their own, drawn in triangular lengths of sharp, shining steel. Between their horses was a good spacing, not so much that Duke Malatam's men could easily force their way through, but enough for them to maneuver and swing their maces and long swords when the time came.

There was nothing to do now but wait, and wait we did. The blazing sun above us moved scarcely a hair's-breadth as the Duke's little army poured into the mouth of the notch and then ground to a halt before us. The Duke rode about on a brown gelding calling out commands in his high, nervous voice; in short order, he formed up his five hundred men in lines facing us. Then one of his heralds hoisted the white flag of parlay. The Duke, with the herald and his stout captain, Lord Chagnan, rode forward to offer us terms of surrender.

I did not go forth to greet him. This was an insult, implying as it did that I did not trust him to honor the peace of the parlay. I did not. But more importantly, I wished for all my knights and his to know that I did not consider him to be an honorable man.

'Lord Valashu!' he called out to me. He halted his horse twenty yards from our lines. His dusty, feral face turned toward Atara and Karimah as he eyed their bows and quivers of arrows slung on their backs. 'Let us talk as one lord to another, as men who could be friends!'

I waved my lance at the lines of Alonian knights facing us. On their hundreds of surcoats and shields were emblazoned their various charges: boars and bears, lions and dragons and crossed swords. I called out to the Duke, 'Is
this
the hospitality of a friend? Treachery, it is!'

Duke Malatam's face reddened, as if I had slapped it. And he shouted back to me, 'You speak of treachery, you who have claimed the Lightstone for himself?'

'Nothing has yet been claimed,' I told him. 'We only guard it.'

'So you say. But for
whom
do you guard it? You took a vow, in King Kiritan's hall, to seek the Lightstone for all of Ea. And it is to King Kiritan that you must surrender it.'

'How do you know that isn't much of our purpose for journeying to Tria?'

'Is it really? I must tell you that it is
my
purpose to see that the Lightstone is placed in King Kiritan's hands. I have searched my heart, and I know that my king would ask this of me.'

'You lie,' I said to him. 'It's written on your face.'

Duke Malatam unwittingly rubbed his hand across his bearded cheek as if trying to scrub away the stain of shame that burned there And then he shouted at me, 'You're the liar, Valashu Elahad! Surrender the Lightstone to
me,
now, or there will be battle between us!'

'Let there be battle, then!' I shouted, feeling my blood surging hot and wild inside me. Then I took three deep breaths and held the last one for a count of seven seconds as Master Juwain had taught me. In a softer voice I said, 'Or remember what is right and true, and let us pass in peace.'

'You shall not pass,' he said to me, 'so long as you keep the Lightstone. Surrender it, and you may keep your lives.'

'Surrender yourselves! Lay down your lances and swords - and
your
lives will be spared!'

Duke Malatam looked at me as if I had fallen mad. Then he shouted: 'You Valari! Your day has passed! You fight with everyone, even your Sarni scouts, who have abandoned youl Look at your knights, Lord Valashu! Look how you have betrayed them! You have ridden blindly into my domain, knowing nothing of it. And so you stupidly led your men into a trap.'

He paused to suck in a fresh breath of air, and he shook his fist at the walls of rock rising up behind us. 'You're caught between an anvil and a hammer. Look at
my
knights! We outnumber you three to one. We'll fall against you with a great weight of steel, and crush you like worms. No quarter will we give, no quarter! We'll slaughter all of you! We'll strip your bodies of your diamonds and sell them in Tria. And you.
You,
Lord Valashu. I'll cut off your ears and gut you! And feed your entrails to the wolves!'

Again he fought for breath as his small eyes fell upon Atara and then moved on to stare at Behira and Estrella behind us. He shouted, 'And I'll give your women to my men, the girl too, and they will...'

His voice died into the echoes of the rock walls about us as Lord Chagnan looked at him in horror. Duke Malatam seemed suddenly to remember that he was a lord of one of Alonia's greatest domains and not some ravishing brigand. He seemed to realize, too, that he had gone too far. And so he had. At his reference to Estrella, Atara whipped out an arrow and nocked it to her bowstring. Although she did not aim it at Duke Malatam, his face blanched with fear. He cringed and held up his hand as if to ward off a blow. He cursed and shouted out to me, 'All that comes is upon you!' Then he jerked his horse about and dug his spurs into its bloody sides. With Lord Chagnan and his herald, he galloped back to his lines.

'Well, that's one way to end a parlay,' Maram said to Atara. 'Would you really have shot him?'

In answer, she pulled back the arrow, sighting on the Duke where he sat between Lord Chagnan and another knight. Her face was fell and cold as she suddenly loosed it. It burned through the air and crossed the two hundred yards separating our forces in the blink of an eye. But Lord Chagnan had covered his Duke with his shield, and the arrow glanced off it with a clack of steel against steel.

'Oh, Lord!' Maram cried out. 'Oh, Lord! Now there will surely be a battle!'

'There was no help for it,' Atara said.

'But what about your grandfather and his warriors?' Maram asked. 'Weren't they supposed to fall upon Duke Malatam's rear by now? And
discourage
him from giving battle? Wasn't that the whole point of our strategy?'

I looked off at the rolling, open steppe beyond the mouth of the notch behind the lines of Duke Malatam's men; so did Maram and a hundred and seventy of my knights. There was nothing to be seen there except miles of grass.

Where is Sajagax?
I wondered. To Maram, I said, 'Not quite the whole point. If fight we must, we hold a strong position here.'

'Strong,
you say? We're trapped, my friend, even as that filthy-mouthed duke has said! Truly we are. And three of them to every one of us, and. . .'

He suddenly fell silent as he noticed Lord Harsha, Lord Raasharu, Skyshan of Ki and Sar Kimball - and many others along our line -staring at him. He gulped and looked at me as he seemed to remember something. Then his deep voice boomed out: ' . . .and we're Valari knights, all of us! One Valari is a match for any three of them! Of course we are! Why did I forget this? Why must I mouth such faithless words when faith blazes so brightly inside me? Truly it does. So what if I'm afraid? Who isn't? But I grow tired of it. As you must grow tired of me. I'm tired of myself. Ah, Maram, my friend, you don't have to be
that
afraid. "Act as if you have courage, and courage you shall have" - so it says in the Book of Battles. All right, I will! I survived Khaisham and Argattha, and fought the Dragon himself. I've slain better men than these. And I fight with the best men of all! Valari! My friends, my brothers!'

Maram hadn't really meant to make a battle speech, but all at once Lord Harsha and Sar Kimball and all the other knights up and down the line and behind us let loose a great cheer as if they were of one mind and one heart: 'Valari!.Valari!' Maram looked astonished, at them, but at himself most of all. He sat up straighter on his horse. He gripped his lance with a steady hand and pointed it at Duke Malatam's men.

'It works!' he said, leaning closer to me. His brown eyes were full of fire. 'I'm not afraid any more!'

I smiled because I was no longer afraid for him. And then one of Duke Malatam's heralds blew a trumpet, and the five hundred knights facing us spurred their horses forward. They quickly built up speed to a full gallop. The Duke had massed his knights in two lines along his center and three deep on either wing. I knew that he planned to crash into our flanks and break them. The Duke himself rode in the second line, leading from the rear, as they say. It seemed a cowardly thing. But he needed the knights in the line ahead of him to act as a shield against Atara's and Karimah's arrows, for these two warrior women fired shaft after shaft as quickly as they could, at the target formed by the black cross over Duke Malatam's chest. It was a target, however, that they could scarcely sight on let alone hit. One of Atara's arrows pierced the gorget of the knight ahead of the Duke, and he fell off his horse even as another knight closed in to take his place. A moment later, Karimah's arrow struck the new knight's shoulder, but glanced off his mail. So it went as Duke Malatam's army thundered closer.

Where,
I wondered, looking at the plains beyond them, is
Sajagax?
It does not take a galloping horse very long to cover two hundred yards. And so Duke Malatam had little time to perceive the folly of his deployment and correct it. As his knights pushed down through the notch, its angled, rocky walls acted as a funnel driving both rider and horse closer together, packing them into an ungainly mass of snorting beasts and men furiously trying to maintain control of them. The five hundred knights drew nearer to us, and many of their horses collided with each other, in several places stumbling and breaking legs with sickening snaps as their riders flew into the ground and were trampled by the horses behind them. I gritted my teeth against the hideousness of jangling steel, crunching flesh and screams. Another of the Duke's miscalculations worsened this disaster. He had counted on the force of his greater numbers to break our line. But the weight of massed and heavy horse is mostly in the mind. Charging knights can break a wall of infantry - but only if the warriors with their shields and spears panic and flee. For horses are not stupid, and they will not willingly throw themselves onto spears or drive their bodies into anything that appears to them as solid. And so they are likewise loathe to crash straight into other horses.