Through Wolf's Eyes (73 page)

Derian refilled his mug, mostly to hide a shiver.

"And during those days," Race said, "they'll be
bringing in more supplies and maybe even build good defenses for what
they have. So, what King Tedric and Duke Allister have decided is that
at the same time the main armies are hitting each other out on the
field, a small group—one that could circle wide around the eastern
fringes of the Stonehold camp and come in where they'll only have
guards, not a whole army—that small group could come in and destroy as
many of the supplies as possible."

Derian nodded. "That makes sense. If the group could get through, they could do real damage."

"Right." Race nodded. "Now, the problem is that the king and the duke figure that there are spies in the main army."

"Our army?" Derian asked, a little shocked, even
though his common sense told him that this must be so. After all,
didn't Hawk Haven have spies around Stonehold's army?

"If the spies got wind of this flank maneuver," Race said, "they would certainly tell their chiefs and perimeter patrols
would
be beefed up. So the raiders are being drawn from people who have the
skills but aren't part of any regular units. Take me, for instance. I'm
with the scouts, but I haven't given up my primary allegiance to Earl
Kestrel. There's another scout—one who came with Earle Kite's
group—who's also semi-independent."

Derian could see where Race was heading. He decided to anticipate it.

"And me? I'm one of Earl Kestrel's people, too."

"Right." Race puffed his chest a bit. "I told my
commander that you'd learned a lot from me on the trip west— and more
from taking care of Firekeeper."

"Is Firekeeper part of this, too?" Derian asked,
momentarily dismayed that his true worth was actually as a watch on the
wolf-woman.

"Actually," Race seemed embarrassed, "she's not. They
discussed it and decided that Blind Seer would spook the Stonehold
animals. It's happened a time or two already, when Firekeeper's been
scouting for the king, but it hasn't mattered then because the two of
them just took off before the guards could be sure of anything."

"Whereas we need to stay," Derian said.

"Another reason is that Firekeeper," Race shrugged,
"just doesn't know how to pick a target. She wouldn't know how to
figure out what's valuable and what's not. She's also fairly reluctant
to kill people."

"A good thing," Derian said dryly, "given how good she is at killing game."

"True," Race agreed hastily, "but we can't have
someone distracted by needing to give her orders or clarify a target.
All the raiders need to be capable of initiative. King Tedric has
spoken with Firekeeper already and she's agreed to stay out."

"I hope she listens to him better than she does to
me," Derian said, recalling how Firekeeper had followed him and Doc
into town.

"I think she will," Race said. "I think this entire concept of war has her rather confused."

Valet added quietly, "I agree. She is most distressed."

"I hadn't noticed," Derian admitted, "mostly because
she's been away so much and I've been with the cavalry mounts where she
doesn't dare come—not with Blind Seer."

"Talk with her," Valet urged. "You will have time before our departure."

"Our?" Derian looked at him. "Are you going along on this raid, too?"

"Earl Kestrel," Valet said with a faint sigh, "has
requested I join, recalling how Race praised my woodcraft when we were
seeking Prince Barden."

Derian grinned, assured despite himself. It seemed impossible that anything could go wrong if Valet was taking part.

"Who else?" he asked. "Us three, the scout Race mentioned, and . . .?"

"About a dozen other people chosen for both their
skills and their certain loyalty," Race said. "It's not been easy to
find what we need, especially on short notice and with most of those
assigned to the army ruled out lest they be missed. Still, scouts are
harder to pin down and my commander has found clever ways to cover for
those we're taking. The other members are personal attendants on
various of the nobles who have arrived with their troops. You'll see
them all at a meeting tonight."

"Meeting?" Derian asked. "Won't that be risky?"

"We've a safe place," Race assured him. "Anyhow, it
would be more risky to go in without a chance to plan, practice, and
meet each other."

Derian thought fleetingly of Prince Newell's man Rook
and hoped he wasn't being included. The times their paths had
crossed—which hadn't been often—he had not liked the man any better
than he had liked his master. Derian decided not to ask. If Rook had
been ruled trustworthy, then it was not Derian's place to question.

Instead he looked out across the camp, watching the
glow of the campfires, listening to the rise and fall of voices, the
sound of weapons being sharpened, of meals being prepared. In the
middle distance, a clear baritone voice began a mournful song.

It's for real,
Derian thought.
I'm going to war.

He rose then and went to check his own armor and weapons. There wasn't any time to waste.

G
OOD CROSSING WAS THE WESTERNMOST
town in Bright Bay. The reason for this was that no one could live in
the Barren Lands. Out of the Barren Lands flowed the Barren River,
widening as soon as the waters reached less rocky land, like a
broad-shouldered man stretching after a day in a cramped coach.

Long ago, those rapid-flowing waters had carried
enormous boulders downstream. These, over even more time, had collected
other rocks, dirt, and detritus, becoming small islands that would one
day entice colonists to rest the supports for a bridge upon them.
Around the bridge a town would grow up and someday the bridge itself
would be a town.

Firekeeper found the ways and reasons for human
settlement astonishing. It was so unlike the roving ways of the wolves,
like but unlike the nesting of certain birds who would return to the
same tree or cliff edge year after year.

She thought about this as she stood with Derian on
the hills to the west of Good Crossing, hills that were themselves the
last remnants of the Barren Lands. Because the soil here was rocky,
these hills had never been cultivated. Because the trees that grew on
them were stunted and twisted, they had never been cut for lumber and
only rarely thinned for firewood. Since the soil east of the Barren
Lands had been enriched by the ash from the long-ago volcanic
eruptions, it produced not only good timber but good farming. So this
poor excuse for a forest had been left alone.

Surrounding Good Crossing there was a large, cleared
area. In happier days, this had provided public grazing for the town,
the place where market wagons clustered before the opening of the city
gates, and the home of the horse fair held once in the spring and once
in a autumn.

Until a few days ago, Firekeeper had crossed those
fields almost every night while gathering information for King Tedric.
Now she was amazed at how different the place seemed—transformed since
the almost impulsive Battle of the Banks into an acknowledged
battleground.

After that battle, Stonehold's forces had retreated
as far as the southern edge of the field, arraying themselves along the
field and spreading to either side of the broad north-south road that
would ultimately arrive at Mason's Bridge. The road had a grassy margin
along it, bordered here and there with saplings or by hedges protecting
farmers' fields or by orchards.

Firekeeper looked back and forth between the two
camps. In the camp outside of Good Crossing, the scarlet and white
shields borne by Hawk Haven's rank and file blended with the sea green
and yellow of Bright Bay. On the other side of that cleared area, which
to Firekeeper's eyes looked no different from any other patch of
cleared ground, neither scarlet and white nor green and yellow could be
seen, but only the triple chevronels of Stonehold—red, purple, and blue
on a field of white.

Even through the long glass that Derian had borrowed
from Race, the array of flags and pennons was confusing. Ever since
King Tedric had departed from Eagle's Nest to meet with Duke Allister,
Firekeeper had been studying various insignia, trying to learn how to
tell person from person by their signs, and occasionally regretting her
refusal to learn to read and write.

Her memory was good, far better than that of most
humans she had met, but it was schooled to recall scents and sounds
more than visual images. Notes would help her to remember, or at least
provide a better sense of how human symbols worked.

"I don't understand, still," the wolf-woman admitted to
Derian.
"The simplest, yes. Hawk Haven's soldiers bear the shield split side to
side on the slant: red and white. King Tedric's colors."

"Scarlet and silver are the preferred heraldic terms for those colors," Derian said teasingly, "but red and white will do."

"And those of Bright Bay carry shields of green and
yellow, split on a similar slant, but opposite," Firekeeper gestured,
miming a line that started high on the left and dropped to the right.

"Very good. Sea green and gold—yellow in this case— are the colors of the royal house of Bright Bay," Derian said.

"And Stonehold soldiers," Firekeeper continued, "have
on their shields what looks like three skinny mountains against a snowy
sky, colored one each red and purple and blue."

"Yes."

"But some shields—no matter the color of the background—have something drawn on the middle of the shield. A star—or what
you
call a star—or a flower—though I have never seen such flowers—or animals."

Firekeeper's snort showed what she thought of these
last as representations of the true beasts and beside her Blind Seer
laughed.

"The basic shields," Derian explained with the
enthusiasm of a youth raised in the capital city for whom heraldry
meant not just symbols but real people—some of them heroes, "are
carried by the rank and file. The shields with a simple blazon—the star
or flower or animal—are carried by the officers."

Firekeeper nodded. "This so those they command may
know them when helmets are pulled low, but Earl Kestrel is an officer
and yet his shield is different yet more so. It bears the same blue and
red bands set side by side with the golden hunting horn that he shows
on his flag and even on his clothing."

"That's because he's heir to a Great House and
entitled to bear his own house's colors instead of those of the king,"
Derian said. "If you look to where Elise's father stands with his
archers you will see that his shield is different again:
white with an archer upon it shooting a scarlet arrow from his bow."

Derian pointed. "If you look you'll see that there
are others carrying Earl Kestrel's red and blue stripes. These are
troops raised from his lands, his local militia. There aren't many of
these because Norwood lands are all the way cross Hawk Haven—in the
area bordering New Kelvin. Most of his troops have stayed home to
patrol banks of the White Water River, just in case the New Kelvinese
get to wondering if we're watching our flanks. Still, there were some
based at the Kestrel Manse in Eagle's Nest and they've come along so
that Kestrel can demonstrate its support of the king."

Firekeeper nodded, noting that what Derian said of
the Kestrel colors was true of the other Great Houses as well. She
resigned herself to confusion, wondering how anyone could keep all of
this straight. In addition to those devices she had come to know there
were so many new ones: mostly devices designating military companies or
personal devices such as Sapphire's gem-blazoned shield.

"I have a new respect for heralds,"
she said to Blind Seer.
"When we were in at the castle they seemed stuffy, self-important sorts. Now I see how useful their knowledge is."

Blind Seer grunted agreement.
"I wonder what keeps one soldier from carrying another's shield or stealing a great noble's banner?"

"A good question."
She repeated it to Derian, who replied:

"In the heat of battle one soldier will often seize
another's shield, especially to replace one lost or damaged. However,
the imposture couldn't continue after helmets were removed."

"But deliberately change," Firekeeper pressed, "to make oneself more important."

Derian laughed. "That would be its own penalty, for
those with reputation enough to merit a personal coat of arms are
usually the target of many soldiers. Killing a common soldier is
useful, but killing an officer or a noble may strike fear in those who
depend on his or her commands."

"I see," Firekeeper frowned. "You speak lightly of killing and even laugh. Have you ever killed anyone?"

Derian sobered. "I have not. Honestly, I'm wondering
if I'm a great coward for being so glad that my place will be off the
main field."

"I don't think you're a coward," Firekeeper said,
looking out over that strip of empty land and thinking of the coming
battle as Derian had described it to her. "I think you show great good
sense. What will they fight for? How will they know who has won?"

"Our troops fight to defend their position and to
drive the others away," Derian explained. "Their troops fight to take
ground and make our soldiers lose heart."

"Then we will win," Firekeeper said confidently. "We
are here already and have nowhere to go. It is easier, too, for more of
King Tedric's troops to join this army here."

"True," Derian said, "as far as that goes. But the
damage done to land and property is all ours to take. If this war
stretches on, we are hurt by those damages."

"Long? I thought this war was to be this afternoon!"

"This battle," Derian said heavily. "Wars are made of many battles or sometimes of only one."