Crown of Vengeance (Dragon Prophecy)

by James Mallory Mercedes Lackey

  That was the dream, and he had not been willing to let go of it. And so he had led his knights into battle as if this were a raiding party. It did not matter that there was no plan of battle to oversee, no order of battle for him to shape and direct, nor that his knights would have been thrown into even greater disorder if he had not led them himself. He had made a disastrous miscalculation—and Caerthalien would pay the price of it.

  Father wished me to bring back the army intact.…

  That was already impossible. But if he could slay Vieliessar, the act would redeem at least a part of his folly. He risked a glance at the larger force surrounding him. Yes. There. The standard of Oronviel. She would be beneath it.

  He began to fight his way toward it.

  * * *

  It had taken Vieliessar two days to reach her army, and two days more for her army to reach Caerthalien’s force. Lord Luthilion had announced his desire to fight at her side—audacious, for it would show Caerthalien Araphant’s disloyalty—and rather than subject the aged War Prince to the long and grueling ride to her western border, she’d told Celeharth to Send to her Lightborn and bring Lord Luthilion west by Mage Door. Then Vieliessar rode west as fast as she could. It was frustrating, for there was a Flower Forest half a day’s ride from Greenstone Tower, and she might have walked into it and out into Mornenamei in the same candlemark. But accompanied by her komen, she could not—she could not raise the matter of changing what the Lightborn were permitted to do at the same moment Caerthalien was invading in force.

  She left Sorodiarn behind at the first change of horses. The journey was not a matter of pleasant rides and soft beds, but of galloping from manor house to manor house, bringing word of the attack and leaving with fresh mounts. Messengers from Thoromarth, from Rithdeliel, from Gunedwaen met her on the road, and so she learned her army already marched to meet Caerthalien. Lord Thoromarth had put them underway the moment word had come to Oronviel Keep.

  Gunedwaen led her infantry in Thoromarth’s wake, but not to the battlefield. Gunedwaen’s place would be a day’s ride from Oronviel Keep, for Hawkwind’s sentries had not seen a supply train traveling with Caerthalien’s army, and if Caerthalien defeated Vieliessar’s army—or simply broke through it—the farmsteads of the Manorial Lands would be their target.

  Since the moment she became War Prince, Vieliessar had been accustoming her army to the idea that it was more important to win a battle than to adhere to the ceremonial Code of Battle designed to turn war into an eternal game. Once she reached her army, she reinforced that lesson one more time: The purpose of war is to win so no more battles need to be fought. To win a battle, you must hurt your enemy. Not in some agreed-upon way Healers can put right so his knights can attack you again—but hurt him so he will never want to face you again.

  In this battle, all her teaching, all her hopes, were to be tested. If they lost here, her army would go back to fighting in the ways it knew, and carry with it the seeds of their defeat. But when the enemy was in sight, her komen did everything in the way she had taught them. At her order, they attacked at once rather than allowing Caerthalien a night of rest and planning. When Caerthalien took the field with only a fraction of their own numbers, they did not attempt to break off the battle and offer the chance of a negotiated surrender.

  And when the enemy’s camp was within reach, Vieliessar’s komen didn’t pretend it wasn’t because it would be discourteous to spoil the enemy’s comfort.

  * * *

  Gwaenor reared, striking out at the enemy knight with steel-shod forehooves. The enemy knight’s destrier tried to escape, but there was nowhere to go in the press of warriors and horses. The armored figure toppled from the saddle. If he made any sound as he died, it was lost in the clangor of battle.

  Runacarendalur no longer knew how long he’d been fighting, nor if Caerthalien was winning. He only knew Oronviel’s standard was near, that the maddening figure in the blood-spattered silver armor was beneath it, and that he must see her slain if he was ever to know peace again. He roweled Gwaenor’s flanks mercilessly, asking the impossible from the great black stallion. Gwaenor snapped and kicked, forcing his way ever closer to Runacarendalur’s goal. Runacarendalur tightened the fingers of his free hand around his dagger, his eyes fixed upon Vieliessar. He could not stab her, but he could stab her mount. In the heat of battle destriers rarely noticed injuries, but a fatal blow—something that would bring the golden stallion to his knees—would fling Vieliessar to the ground to be trampled to death.…

  As if his thoughts were a shout she could hear, Vieliessar turned and stared directly at him. Even with her visor in place, Runacarendalur imagined he could see her eyes.

  No.

  Some thought of Bonding as a gift, the greatest gift Queen Pelashia had given the children of the Fortunate Lands. Some thought of it as a curse, for it linked two souls together—no matter what heart and mind might wish—so tightly that if one half of a Bonding died, the other would soon follow. Still others, more cynical, thought of it as a myth, either lie or delusion or something crafted of both.

  Runacarendalur of Caerthalien looked into the eyes of Vieliessar, born of Farcarinon, now War Prince of Oronviel, and knew the Soulbond of Pelashia Celenthodiel for a curse and no delusion. He felt as if he’d been struck over the heart with a hammer and he knew with a certainty that transcended thought that Vieliessar was as furious, as horrified, as he was.

  It cannot be set aside, it cannot be undone—one may delay it, knowing what is to come—refuse it—and live all one’s years as a hungry ghost—but that is all.

  He could not even tell, in this single blinding moment of oneness, which of them was thinking.

  He’d been warned, seeing her in the distance as she led her army to battle. He hadn’t recognized the warning.

  Bonded.

  Soulbonded.

  Bonded forever.

  If he’d managed to kill Vieliessar before that horrifying flash of understanding, could he have kept this from happening?

  The moment was so terrible and all-consuming that Runacarendalur did something he’d hadn’t done since long before he won his spurs: he forgot he was in the middle of a battle surrounded by armed and armored knights who were using all of their considerable skill to try to kill him. He wasn’t sure how long his inattention lasted. All he knew was that someone was hitting him on the rerebrace that covered his upper arm—not to injure him, but to gain his attention. He started in surprise, turning in his seat, clutching his sword. He’d dropped his dagger.

  Helecanth pointed back toward the camp. She didn’t bother to speak; it would have been impossible to hear her. Hurry, she signaled, and Runacarendalur signed assent.

  Haste was a thing easier asked than provided, however. They moved away from the standards of Oronviel, Ivrithir, and Araphant in whatever direction offered them space to maneuver. But the farther they got from the tight cluster of knights, the more they drew the attention of the enemy, and the more often they had to stop to fight their way free. It was only when Runacarendalur realized he could barely tell Caerthalien’s green and gold from Ivrithir’s black and tawny that he realized they’d fought on past sunset. The false day of twilight would vanish swiftly and without warning, but Runacarendalur was no longer certain that darkness would bring an end to Oronviel’s attack.

  He was no longer certain about anything.

  His life was in the keeping of one whom everyone from the Astromancer to his mother wanted dead. More than anything, he wanted to ride back to her side. But what he’d do when he got there, Runacarendalur didn’t know.

  “You have to call the retreat!” Helecanth shouted when they had a moment’s breathing space.

  “They’ll call the night halt soon, and—” Even as he spoke, Runacarendalur realized his words were ridiculous. Was he actually suggesting that an army that attacked in mid-afternoon without stopping to announce the terms of battle would call off the fighting with nightfall simply because it was civil
ized and customary?

  “There’s no camp for us to go back to!” Helecanth shouted.

  The unbelievable statement shocked Runacarendalur’s mind from the last of its daze, and in a few brief sentences, Helecanth explained.

  When they’d struck the tuathal flank of Oronviel’s army, the army had pivoted in place to encircle Runacarendalur’s force. By that time, the rest of his knights were aware they were under attack and they took the field even though they had no clear plan of battle to guide them. In its absence, they’d done what seemed to be the most sensible thing: avoiding the center and the heavily reinforced right flank, they rode to attack the left.

  “—and Oronviel’s tuathal wing continued to retreat, pulling our army in after it, until eventually the whole of our force was engaged, and what had been elements of Oronviel’s rear guard were facing our camp.” Helecanth shrugged. “So they rode down into it.”

  They cleared the edge of the battle and rode wide to avoid its outliers. In the dusk, neither destrier wished to gallop, and Runacarendalur thought dismally of what would happen if they went lame or broke a leg. But it wasn’t until they reached the place where Caerthalien had made camp only a few scant candlemarks before that Runacarendalur realized the full scope of his failure.

  No horses. No pavilions. No servants. Nothing, in fact, that he recognized as being the neatly organized camp with its pavilions of bright silk. Even the Lightborn were gone, and—

  “Ladyholder Glorthiachiel!” Runacarendalur said in horror. For just one instant, he forgot about being Soulbonded. “They’ve taken her prisoner!”

  “I don’t know,” Helecanth said, troubled. “I do know we need to retreat—if we can. I don’t think you were near any of them during the fighting, but— Did you see any knights on the field wearing Oronviel colors, but in brown armor?”

  “Mercenaries,” Runacarendalur said realizing what she meant. Few sellswords began their lives as komen of the Hundred Houses, and those who did were often fortunate to escape their former masters with their lives, let alone with armor, sword, and destrier. Mercenaries did not wear armor in the bright colors of the komen. They greased their armor lavishly and then roasted it carefully; the burned-on grease created a weatherproof coating that made them nearly invisible at night. “We knew she was taking them into her army.”

  “And adopting their tactics,” Helecanth said grimly. “Oh, they abide by the Code of Battle if they’re paid to. And if they’re paid to ignore it, they do that too.”

  “Sound the retreat,” Runacarendalur said. He’d never imagined a simple sentence could hurt so much to say. “We need to find our Lightborn. They’ll be able to find Mother.”

  Now that he stood looking down into the chasm of this disaster, Runacarendalur could see so very clearly all the steps that had led him here. Dismissing the lack of information from within Oronviel as unimportant. Dismissing the alliance between Oronviel and Ivrithir as meaningless. Believing Thoromarth still ruled Oronviel when every action Oronviel took was one Thoromarth would never have considered taking even if he’d managed to think of it. Riding heedlessly to the attack when Oronviel moved to engage, even though that was the final warning of how changed things were in Oronviel since Harvest.

  In the distance, Runacarendalur heard another warhorn take up the call to retreat. For a moment it was drowned out by a mocking volley from the enemy: No quarter—No quarter—No quarter—echoed across the battlefield like the sound of a scolding jackdaw. He’d thought riding under the red pennion would be a useful convention that would allow him to execute any prisoners he took without breaking with the Code of Battle. But once he’d displayed the red pennion, his enemy was not bound to show mercy any more than he was.

  His army would be slaughtered where it fell.

  “I must—” Runacarendalur began, about to urge Gwaenor forward.

  “You must not,” Helecanth said urgently, reaching out and placing her hand on his destrier’s rein. “We do not know how many we have lost. But if you are lost, Prince Runacarendalur, the army will have no leader. And all will be lost.”

  Wise as it was, Helecanth’s counsel was bitter to hear.

  And now there was nothing to do but wait.

  * * *

  Every Lightborn studied the Soulbond, for it was a riddle and a mystery: a thing of the Light—of Magery—that appeared among the Lightless. Without warning, without explanation. It behaved as if it were a spell, but unlike a spell, it could not be broken.

  She’d known what was happening. Trapped in the midst of the melee, there’d been nothing she could do. She was already Warded against the thoughts of the injured and dying. There were no more powerful Wards she could summon.

  It might have been delayed, even averted entirely, for all those who wrote of Soulbonding agreed that for the Bond to form, the two halves of the Bonding must be near each other. The scholars also spoke of desire, but the only desire she’d possessed was to win the battle.

  Perhaps that had been all that was needed.

  But those were things she thought of much later, when it was not necessary to spend every beat of her heart on surviving—and not merely surviving, but winning in the best way to further her need. The land’s need.

  She’d prepared her commanders carefully on the journey here, from those who commanded a twelve to those who commanded twelve times twelve, so each would know what must be done before they engaged the enemy. She was grateful she’d done so much, for once the battle began it was impossible to know what was going on more than a few feet away. Rithdeliel and Gunedwaen and even Thoromarth had spoken of battles into which a commander could send a messenger to order a meisne to withdraw and could direct the battle as the huntsman directed the hunting pack. But those were not the sort of battles she was fighting.

  The orders she had given to Nadalforo as she set her company to ride in the army’s fantail had surprised the former mercenary commander but had not shocked her.

  “Loot the camp and take their horses?” she said, looking pleased. “Ah, Lord Vieliessar, you’re wasted as a War Prince!”

  “There will be Lightborn and servants in the camp,” Vieliessar said. “Harm none of them. Offer them sanctuary. Drive those who will not accept it far from the camp.”

  She did not know, in the press of the fighting, whether Nadalforo had been successful or not. Just as it became too dark to see, she heard the Caerthalien warhorns signaling retreat, and the flurry of mockery from her own knights-herald in reply.

  If Caerthalien retreats, it means I have won.

  “Disengage!” she shouted into Bethaerian’s ear. Bethaerian shoved back her visor and raised her warhorn to her lips. The signal echoed around the field: as it was received, her knights stopped pursuing the enemy.

  * * *

  There should have been bright, cheerful torches, servants offering cups of mulled wine or tall tankards of ale, cloudy globes of Silverlight shedding their eldritch radiance over the camp and the battlefield. Instead, there was cold and darkness and the screaming of wounded horses. At least the Oronviel forces were signaling to disengage. He could be grateful for that much.

  As more of Caerthalien’s knights rode to where the camp should have been—and wasn’t—Helecanth switched from sounding the retreat to sounding the call to muster. At last there came the welcome glow of Silverlight through the trees. Runacarendalur let out a long breath of relief. He had not thought his Lightborn would be harmed, but when he had seen what had happened to the camp …

  The tale the returning servants and Lightborn told was as grim as the battle itself. Knights in Oronviel colors rode down on the camp as soon as the last of the Caerthalien knights had entered the battle. They struck down the guards on the horselines, and as some gathered the livestock together, others ordered all who wished to live to run for their lives. Then they drove the horses and oxen through the camp. The pavilions and their contents were wrecked. The few wagons of supplies—mostly grain for the destriers—were carrie
d off.

  “And Ladyholder Glorthiachiel?” Runacarendalur asked, his mouth dry with fear.

  “Here.”

  Her voice was brittle with rage, but Runacarendalur had never heard any sound so welcome. She was riding the destrier of some slain knight, with Carangil Lightbrother leading it.

  “I think we can safely consider your betrothal to Oronviel at an end,” Ladyholder Glorthiachiel said waspishly. “Your betrothed is gone.”

  “She ran away?” He’d seen Princess Nanduil only a handful of times—including his betrothal ceremony—and could not imagine …

  “Had your witless komentai’a not ordered my guard to hold us both prisoner,” Ladyholder Glorthiachiel spat, “I might yet have preserved her for your wedding. But first we retreated—” the word was a vile curse in her mouth “—and then they died.”

  “They let you go,” he said, light-headed with relief. Oronviel would have taken no prisoners to ransom.

  “Yes!” she said. “If you can call it that when I was dragged from my own wagon and set afoot. They carried off the wagon and your annoying bride-to-be. And rather than await the next party of knights, Carangil and I made our way to the wood to await your victory and the return of my wagon. You do not seem to have brought me either.”

  “Be grateful they spared your life,” Runacarendalur answered, relief transmuted to cold fury by fear of what-might-have-been. “Do you see among us here any swordless knights who left the field under parole? We fought without quarter. I do not yet know how many dead there will be.”

  As the servants returned, he set them to picking through the wreckage of the camp to salvage what they could. There wasn’t much. Bedding had been trampled into muck, carpets and furniture were smashed and befouled, provisions were gone. He ordered Carangil Lightbrother to Call back their stolen livestock, only to be told such a use of the Light was not permitted, as it would constitute tactical aid to an army in battle. At least Carangil and the other Lightborn were willing to Call water, since the horses and their riders were thirsty, and fire, since there was no shortage of things to burn.