Rider of the Crown

by Melissa McShane

  “It has something to do with him,” Areli pointed out.

  “Is someone going to explain what’s going on with Saevonna?” Revalan asked.

  “Please stop talking!” Imogen said. “It’s not about him. It’s about who I am. I was born to be a warrior and that’s all I was, and then I came here and I learned there are so many other things I can do, things I am, that I never would have guessed existed. And, Dorenna, those things are just as much me as fighting and riding are, so yes, it is a choice, and it’s not an easy one, and no one’s actually asked me to make it yet so I’m not sure why we’re even fighting over this!”

  Dorenna yanked Rapier’s reins away from Imogen’s hand. “We’re fighting,” she said, struggling to keep her composure, “because I don’t want you to throw your life away like Saevonna did. And I’m not going to sit silent and let you make the wrong decision. I may not have blue eyes and a chiseled jaw, but I care about you too.” She jerked on her reins and wheeled around to join the rear ranks.

  “What in the hell is wrong with Saevonna?” Revalan exploded.

  “I should go after her,” Kallum said, but Imogen held up her hand.

  “Let her be alone for a bit, Kallum,” she said. “Saevonna agreed to marry Marcus and stay in Aurilien with him. What with Lorcun and Maeva dead, and Kionnal being so wounded, I think she thinks our tiermatha is falling apart.”

  “She made it sound as if Saevonna had done something awful,” Revalan rumbled.

  “You don’t think she has?” Areli said. “She’s more or less abandoning us.”

  “No more than if she’d decided to marry and raise a family in the Eidestal. She’d have to leave the tiermatha for that, too,” he said. “So what if she chose to marry a foreigner instead?”

  “I—” Areli began, then shook her head. “It just feels wrong, that’s all.”

  “Your feelings shouldn’t be the basis for Saevonna’s life,” Revalan pointed out.

  “Is it wrong for me to wish the Ruskalder would just smash that gate in?” Kallum said. “Because that is just the kind of uncomplicated thing I could use right now.”

  As he spoke, something cracked into the gate from the other side with a hard, thudding noise. “Axes,” Imogen said. She turned Victory so she was facing the gate. “Stand ready!” she shouted.

  The rifle fire redoubled. The axes struck again, but more raggedly, as if some had dropped out of the chorus and the others had lost the beat. Peripherally, Imogen was aware of someone coming up beside her. “Do you think they’ll break through?” Dorenna asked.

  “Depends on if those riflemen can shoot straight down. I’m more worried about keeping the Ruskalder off the walls.” She was tempted to leap down and run up the stairs to see what the army looked like, but she curbed the impulse. It wasn’t as if she’d never seen the Ruskalder army before.

  “I told the third tiermatha to spread out. They were bunched up to one side.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Rapier’s feeling restive. I guess he needed to calm down some.”

  “I think Victory wishes she’d taken a walk, too.”

  “She looks good. Ready for battle.”

  “So does Rapier.”

  They waited silently, listening to the thud of axes and the screams of men shoved off the wall by its defenders. “I wish life could be more like a battle,” Dorenna said. “Everything’s so clear and unambiguous.”

  Imogen nodded. “No worries about maybes and mights. Just your saber in the other man’s belly.”

  “Exactly.”

  “Commander?” A young soldier ran toward them, breathing heavily. “Colonel Haverson says to take the west gate, it’s nearly clear.”

  The thud of the axes was joined by a tearing sound. “They’re breaking through,” Imogen said. “We’d better hurry. Form up, everyone, and follow me!” she shouted, maneuvering Victory through the horses and riders thronging the broad street. Behind her, the tearing sound grew louder. She wondered if the soldiers left to defend against the incursion would be demoralized by what looked like a retreat. No time to worry about that. She cleared the mob and nudged Victory into a trot, the fastest gait she was willing to risk on these slick cobbles. Behind her, the deserted buildings echoed with the sharp clack of iron-shod hooves on stone as seventy Kirkellan warriors fell into step behind her, drowning out the shouts of battle as they trotted through the streets toward the west gate. Citizens had fled their homes and businesses to shelter in the palace, which thanks to Diana’s assault was no guarantee of safety. Jeffrey was in there somewhere, as was the rest of the North family, all of them depending on the Army to stand fast. Depending on her.

  The west gate was a smaller version of the main gate, wide enough for two horses to pass abreast and blackened from a long-ago fire. It was also unnaturally still. Even the soldiers stationed on the wall were silent, without even the quiet sounds of armor shifting with its wearers’ movements.

  Imogen dismounted and ran up the wall to speak to the captain. She looked out over the nearby woods and across to the untrodden fields; not a sign of movement, enemy or otherwise.

  “You can see they haven’t bothered to come here,” said the captain, his head cocked as if listening. Imogen held still and heard the faint noise of battle drifting toward them.

  “It is the main gate they want,” she said.

  The captain turned to face her. “Heaven help them if they can’t hold out,” he said.

  “They will,” Imogen said, praying it was true. “We are ready if your soldiers will open the door for us.”

  He nodded. “Ready the gate,” he shouted, and said to Imogen, “Good luck, commander.”

  They exchanged salutes, and Imogen returned to her company. She mounted Victory, feeling a rising excitement her horse picked up on. The horse underneath you, the saber in your hand, a scream of defiance on your lips, these were things she understood.

  “Would you have believed, a year ago, that today we’d be leading a charge against a Ruskalder army from inside a Tremontanan city?” Kallum said, taking a position on her left.

  “It’s hard for me to believe any of the things that have happened to us since last summer,” Imogen said. The bars were clear and two teams stood ready in front of the doors. “But right now, right here, I know exactly who I am.”

  She waved at the teams, then raised her fist and shouted a command. The gates swung ponderously open, and the Kirkellan set out to find the enemy in a wild chorus of screams and a thunder of giant hooves.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  They cleared the woods that came nearly to the gate and spread out across the wide, green fields, grouped loosely by tiermathas, though most of them had so many members missing they couldn’t fall into standard formations. It took them nearly five minutes of cantering to come within sight of Hrovald’s army, at which point Imogen signaled the tiermathas to pull up and wait while she examined the field of battle.

  “The army’s smaller than it was when we fought them before,” Kallum said.

  Imogen nodded. “Still several thousand strong, but…look at that. Five banners.”

  “So?” Revalan said.

  “There were nine last time. Hrovald’s lost the support of some of his chiefs. Hah! I told him that would happen. I like being right.”

  “He’s still got enough warriors to overrun the city,” Kallum said. “And here we are just standing around.”

  “Right.” She scanned the field until she found what she wanted. “Left rear banner, the one with the…I don’t know what that is, it looks like a hand with seven fingers. Looks like he’s hanging back a bit. Let’s encourage him to flee. Running strikes on the diagonal, wait for the group ahead of you to get clear before going in—no point us stepping all over ourselves. Riders with javelins first, two passes, then sabers take three runs and back here to catch your breath. Any questions? Then forward, Kirkellan!”

  She shouted a command to Victory, who leaped to obey, her speed increasing
until they were flying over the ground toward the Ruskalder army. Every jolt sent a spike of pain through her side, and Imogen gritted her teeth and squeezed the hilt of her saber so hard she felt it should crumple under her hand. This was nothing. Barely worth noticing. She could give in to the pain later. Now was the time to pass that pain on to others.

  The air was filled with war cries and the screams of the dying. The great gate hung open awkwardly, one half dangling from a twisted iron hinge, the other flung wide, and the entire Ruskalder army pressed forward, every warrior intent on forcing his way through the gap. They had no idea the Kirkellan were upon them until the first hail of javelins flew. Men fell and died and were trampled by their panicking fellow warriors, who fell in turn under the second wave. Imogen swept in, saber raised, raked a man across the face with a short slash and drove her saber through another man’s heart. Two more strokes, and she was out and circling around for another pass. She laughed, throwing her head back and letting the sun warm her body, for the moment pain-free. She—

  --there had been another time, the sun on her face and loose strands of hair blowing in the wind, only she hadn’t been alone—

  --and she blinked the memory away. She was preparing to ride down more Ruskalder warriors, and that was the memory her pain-addled mind dredged up? She clenched her teeth against another spike of pain. Thinking of Jeffrey wouldn’t win this battle. She looked back over the battlefield and felt a moment’s dismay. There were so many of them, and so few defenders. From here she could barely see the highest tower of the palace, its old stone dark in the afternoon light. She swiped loose hair out of her face. It would not fall. She would not allow it.

  The Ruskalder recovered from their initial shock and were ready when the next wave of attacks came, and Imogen traded blows with one without doing more than wind both of them before she had to disengage. She was tiring already, damn Diana and her damned sword. Her vision was graying at the edges, but she continued her third pass, swept by without engaging anyone, and rode off in the direction of the rendezvous point, desperately clinging to her saddle. Victory, thank heaven, was smart enough to stop in the right place without being told. Imogen fumbled for her flask and drank deeply, wishing it were something a great deal stronger than water.

  “Imogen, go back to the city,” Areli said.

  “I’m fine.”

  “You think we didn’t notice that last pass of yours? You nearly fell off Victory.”

  “I did not. And I’m fine now.”

  “You said that. We don’t believe it,” said Revalan.

  “I’m not leaving this battle.”

  “The hell you aren’t,” Dorenna said. “You think you’re doing us any good, us watching all the time to see you don’t collapse and get yourself and Victory killed? I don’t know what you think you have to prove, but I’d go back if I were in your condition, so that ought to tell you something.”

  Imogen shook her head. “All right,” she said, “I won’t fight. But I can still command from here.”

  Kallum shrugged. He looked at the other three. “I think that’s the best compromise we’re going to get out of her. Don’t leave this spot, Imogen.”

  “I won’t. Falling into a Ruskalder horde and getting hacked to pieces isn’t how I want to end my days.” Imogen dried her saber on her trouser leg and sheathed it. “Five minutes’ breather, and then back in,” she called to the assembled Kirkellan. “Press harder this time, but be careful—they might pursue you when you retreat.”

  She and Victory went as close as they dared to the army for another look. The chief whose men they’d attacked wasn’t watching the main gate anymore. He was too distant for her to make out his expression, but she would bet he was considering turning his warriors loose on them. If he did, they’d have to flee to the gate and barricade it, because they couldn’t take on four or five hundred Ruskalder with only the seventy—she turned and quickly counted—yes, seventy riders, they hadn’t lost anyone yet. On the other hand, Hrovald didn’t like his chiefs to show initiative, and he might view the chief’s opportunism in the same light as desertion. Time to make this chief even more conflicted.

  “Ride, Kirkellan, ride!” Imogen shouted, and the riders flew out across the fields once more. No more javelins; now it was strictly saber work. The tiermathas came at the Ruskalder in groups, now, spaced out along the enemy’s line. A horse went down, its rider caught up by another Kirkellan. A rider took an unlucky blow to his sword arm and was pulled down by the Ruskalder who’d struck him; his horse reared up, struck, and the rider scurried dangerously beneath his mount’s hooves to safety. They were making inroads against the Ruskalder, and the chief stood up on his mount—a beautiful black Kirkellan stallion, they really should take it away from him—and waved his hands. If he shouted anything, it was lost in the noise of battle, but immediately there was a surge as the chief’s part of the Ruskalder army turned to attack the Kirkellan instead of pressing forward to the main gate.

  “Fall back!” Imogen screamed, but they didn’t need to be told. They ran toward her, chased by the Ruskalder, and Imogen, satisfied that they’d outrun the nearest pursuit, turned and led the retreat to the west gate.

  The soldiers had hauled open the doors for them before they arrived. Imogen pounded full-speed through the gate, skidding on the cobblestones, and got Victory turned around just in time to see the gate swing shut and the bars drop down to secure it. She trotted back to the gate and listened to the furious cries of the Ruskalder pounding at the door. “They do not have axes,” she observed to the captain.

  “Nor rams nor ladders nor grappling hooks,” he said. “You must have pissed them off royally. They’re mostly just screaming and beating their fists on the wood like a drunken husband come home late wanting his wife to open up.”

  “Does this wall-walk go all the way around? I want to see the army.”

  “It’s not in the best repair, but you might be able to walk far enough to get an eyeful.”

  Imogen dismounted. “Watch Victory,” she said, handing her reins to Kallum. “I’ll be back soon.”

  “Imogen—”

  “I’m fine, Areli. I’m just going to stroll along the wall and see how Hrovald reacted to his chief’s defection. No straining myself.” The pain had dulled to a throb, though tiny shooting pains still flared as she ran—no, better walk—up the steps to the wall-walk. She looked over the wall at the teeming mob of Ruskalder shouting below. One of them saw her and pointed; she waved, and the pointing turned into a much ruder gesture she returned cheerfully.

  She made it nearly a third of the way around the wall before she reached a gap she couldn’t cross, not without tearing something. She leaned out as far as she could and watched the distant battle. The army looked distinctly ragged, particularly on the side they’d assaulted. She wished she could see Hrovald’s face right now, and then put her saber through it.

  A light winked at her, far off under the afternoon sun. She shielded her eyes and squinted. Something was moving. Something big. Something that glinted with the light of the sun reflected off thousands of armor plates and hundreds of harnesses. The Army had come, and it had brought the Kirkellan with it.

  She ran, her hand pressed against her side, until she was almost back to the gate, then slowed her pace so her tiermatha wouldn’t yell at her. “The Army’s coming!” she shouted as soon as she was within earshot. “I saw horses with them. They’re almost here!”

  Cheers overwhelmed the sound of the Ruskalder beating impotently on the gate. “We can’t get out,” Revalan complained. “We’ll have to wait until the Ruskalder leave to rejoin the fight.”

  Imogen threw herself onto Victory’s back and stifled a grunt of pain. “I’m going to make sure the defenders at the main gate know about this,” she said. “They were hard pressed and I’m not sure anyone’s aware of anything beyond the fight at hand.”

  “We’ll come with you,” Dorenna said.

  “Why bother? This will keep me ou
t of the fight. Suppose the Ruskalder withdraw while I’m gone? You wouldn’t want to miss that.”

  Dorenna scowled. “This had better not be a clever plan to get yourself killed.”

  “If I were clever, would I have let that bitch inside my guard? I’ll be back.”

  The sound of fighting never disappeared as she crossed the city; the noise at the west gate faded and was replaced by a much harsher, higher-pitched chorus of fury and pain as she neared the main gate. She didn’t remember it had been breached until she turned a corner and found herself in the middle of a war. The Ruskalder had forced their way through the main gate and were being held in check only barely; dozens had made it past the choke point at the gate and were fighting, or lying dead, along the main road. Soldiers still battled along the wall, trying to keep the Ruskalder from breaking through that way. Far too many soldiers in blue and silver, or green and brown, lay crumpled in death at the gate or along the base of the wall.

  Imogen found Colonel Haverson standing halfway up the stairs on the right side of the gate. She shouted her news to him, but he shook his head indicating he couldn’t hear her and came down the stairs to meet her. She repeated herself, and he looked grim. “Might not matter unless they can get here in the next half hour. We won’t be able to hold them much longer. We should fall back to the palace while we can.”

  “But the palace gates are all destroyed. The Ruskalder will run over you and everyone there.” Elspeth, Owen. Alison. Saevonna and Kionnal. Jeffrey.

  “They’re about to overrun us here. Unless you have another suggestion?”

  “Please hold her,” Imogen said, sliding off Victory and thrusting her reins into the surprised colonel’s hand. She went up the stairs at a fast walk and found a place where she could watch the battlefield without getting in anyone’s way.

  The bright sun made it impossible for her to judge how distant the Army was, and she had no way of calculating how quickly they could bridge the distance to Aurilien. But it looked strange. Surely Tremontane’s Army wasn’t that large, even with the addition of the Kirkellan? And they were short the companies of soldiers here in the city. She shielded her eyes and stared until her eyes watered, but still couldn’t tell what was different.