“He is his own gift,” I replied, surprised by the thickness of my voice for this man had never truly been a friend. I had found the dead to be an oft distracted lot, their hold upon the living world precarious and prone to confusion. The spectre of Captain Albyrn Swain, however, displayed a fierce, even implacable focus, his hard gaze rich in knowledge of who and what he was, much as it had been in life. It made me strangely nostalgic.

  “Call that armour?” he went on, running a caustic eye over the mingling of Caerith and Albermaine-ish mail and plate that clad my form. “You look like a jackanapes.”

  “It serves well enough.” I coughed, seeing an accusation on his face, one that demanded an answer. “Ofihla,” I began, gaze straying to the mist beyond him, fearful of who might appear next. “She left me no choice—”

  “I know,” he cut in. “And worry not, Scribe, she died contented in her misjudgements.”

  “I should have stopped it,” I said, fixing on another reason for his presence. “In Couravel. I should have saved you…”

  “I should have saved myself, and so many others. I am not here to judge you, Scribe. I am here for my own atonement. I am here to pay for the lies I told myself, the weakness and cowardice of my inaction.”

  “So, you knew what she was? You knew Evadine served the Malecite, even before I did?”

  “I knew that the cause we had shared was a lie. I saw the increasing cruelty of the woman in whom I had invested all my faith. I saw the nature of the queen she would become. And I did nothing.”

  Uthren let out a discomfited snort as Swain took a step closer. I wondered whether the paelah could perceive the dead or if the great horse simply sensed my mounting dread. Still, he stayed put as the spectre came to my side, looking up at me with a mingling of raw need and grim reproach.

  “We both failed,” he said. “I because of my faith in her, you because of your love. You may indulge the delusion your love has died, Scribe, but I see it still burning. Such things are plain to the eyes of the dead. To end this, you must slay that part of you. No matter the cost. No matter that it may mean you will never love again.” He reached up to grasp my hand. His fingers slipped through my gauntlets, as insubstantial as smoke, yet I felt the icy caress of his touch. “You understand?”

  I tried to draw my hand away, but his grip held me as tight as any vice. Swain, it appeared, was as strong in death as he had been in life. The numbness imbued by his touch spread up my arm and into my chest, the terrible chill of it seeping into muscle and vein, reaching for my heart.

  “You understand?” Swain demanded.

  “Yes!” I grated, the word shuddering from between clenched teeth.

  Swain grunted and released me. Stepping back, he afforded me a final look of deep, careful appraisal before turning away. “Incidentally,” he said as he faded back into the fog. “You should see to your battle lines. Duke Viruhlis approaches, and he is very desirous of impressing his queen.” Then he was gone, lost to the swirling grey. Perhaps he wanders still, but, like Deckin, his business with me was forever concluded.

  I strained my ears for the thud of hooves or tramp of marching feet, hearing only the faint grumbling of Gilferd’s soldiers. Uthren, however, had far keener senses than I. The great horse let out a harsh, growling snort, rearing a little and tossing his head, nostrils flaring. It was enough to dispel any meagre doubts and we wheeled about, galloping back to Gilferd’s still disordered companies.

  “Sound battle order!” I told him. “Three ranks! Form your knights on the right flank!”

  The duke’s hesitation was brief, banished by the grim snap of my voice. He tugged his reins and began trotting the length of his command, barking orders that had veterans scrambling and new recruits floundering in confusion. The Dulsian and Cordwain companies were soon arrayed in their triple rank formation of pikes to the fore of the bill-men and halberdiers, with dagger men behind.

  “Trooper Spinner!” I called out, spying the juggler a few dozen paces off. “Ride to Lord Wilhum. Tell him we are about to be attacked. He is to take charge of the Crown Host and form line of battle. When you’ve done that, carry the warning to Lord Roulgarth and the princess regent.”

  Adlar replied with a tense, pale-faced nod and galloped away into the fog. Following his course, I could barely glimpse the closest Crown Host companies through the haze and judged the gap as worryingly broad. “You lot!” I shouted at the nearest gaggle of milling recruits. “Get your thumbs out of your arses and form line! NOW!” I added in a furious bark that managed to get some of them moving.

  “You bastards pledged to the Algathinet banner because you wanted vengeance,” I raged at the rest. “Well, now’s your chance!” I continued my obscenity-laden diatribe as they hurried into formation. “Stand straight, you shit-eater!” Uthren paused his trot, allowing me to growl a baleful command on a lanky youth shuffling into the first rank, his trembling hands leaving sweat stains on the haft of his pike. He gaped up at me with unblinking eyes, skin the sickly shade that indicated an imminent disgorgement of either bowels or belly. I quelled the impulse to further intimidation, instead leaning lower and placing a firm hand on his mail-covered shoulder.

  “Who did you lose?” I asked.

  “M-my mother and sister both, m’lord,” he said, a shameful grimace passing over his jaundiced features. “The Resurgents had them locked in their house and threw torches on the thatching. They were late to daily supplications, y’see.”

  I tightened my grip on his shoulder. “When you kill these fuckers, think of them.” The youth nodded and stood straighter. “Think on all you have lost!” I went on, raising my voice to the rest of his company. “All that has been stolen! All that has been murdered! Think on that and rejoice, for now you have the chance to extract full measure of payment, in blood!”

  There was no mistaking the resolve in their subsequent cheer, but their line was still too ragged, bowed into a crescent between the veteran Cordwainer company on the right and the Crown Host on the left. But at least the gap was filled and they stood firm. I could only hope their hatred would sustain them through what was coming.

  Uthren snorted again, louder than before, turning to face the fogbound emptiness to the west, his hooves digging sod from the ground. I heard them then, the steady rumble of many horses at the gallop. Apparently, Duke Viruhlis was keen on sweeping his queen’s enemies into the sea in one triumphant charge. Drawing my sword, I attempted to guide Uthren back to the line. The paelah, however, was not for moving. Instead, he dug more divots from the ground and tossed his head with increasing animation.

  “Steady,” I said, running a hand over the tense muscle of his neck. “This isn’t the best place to be.” I twisted my hips to urge him to the side. Instead, Uthren reared, letting out a loud challenging whinny. This had the effect of drawing another defiant cheer from the mass of novice soldiers to my rear.

  “We’re with you, Lord Scribe!” one called out, heralding a chorus of shouted agreement.

  I responded by simultaneously raising my sword above my head while tugging fruitlessly on Uthren’s reins. He, however, appeared utterly unaware of my growing distress at the prospect of facing an all-out cavalry charge single-handed. As the tumult of onrushing horseflesh and armour grew ever louder to my front, I was faced with the choice of remaining in the saddle or abandoning Uthren’s back for the safety of the battle line.

  It was here that I learned the essential truth of both cowardice and heroism, to wit: the line betwixt them is so thin as to be invisible. A hero’s legend arises mostly by happenstance, a confluence of events that leaves no avenue for retreat. So it was that the myth of the Scribe’s Charge at the Battle of the Bluffs was born, not from courage, but indecision. For, as Duke Viruhlis’s force swept ever closer, unseen but near deafening in their fury, I spent a second longer than I should have debating the merits of jumping from Uthren’s back for an undignified flight to comparative safety of the battle line. The short delay allowed him to make the choice for me.

  The manner in which I swayed in the saddle as the great horse spurred into a gallop must have made it appear as if I was waving my sword in a command to follow. The novices cheered even louder and I turned my head to see them surging in my wake. Thanks to Uthren, I had created a hole in the Crown Host line.

  “Stop, you idiot beast!” I railed as he bore me on. The great horse merely whinnied again and increased his pace. Hearing an upsurge in noise to my left, I divined Viruhlis’s charge had made contact with the centre of the Crown Host line, the familiar, ugly music of battle echoing through the fog. The cacophony of clashing flesh and metal, interspersed with the shouts and screams of combat, proved an irresistible lure for Uthren. Snorting, he swerved, sod rising in a black fountain before he resumed his unrestrained gallop. I expected to slam into a wall of opposing cavalry at any second, yet for the first fifty paces or so we encountered nothing. I began to entertain the notion that we might ride through this entire struggle unmolested, but then the silhouette of a mounted knight in full armour resolved out of the haze directly to our front.

  He rode a fine warhorse of impressive size, his lance straight and level as he charged. His visor was raised and I beheld the snarling face of a man primed for battle and fully intent on securing victory for the Ascendant Queen. So intent was he that he failed to notice Uthren’s approach until the last instant.

  The paelah barely paused as he leaped and brought his massive fore hoof down on the head of the knight’s mount, smashing the skull and sending the beast into a spectacular tumble. Before Uthren charged on, I saw the knight fall, his neck bending at a fatal angle as it connected with the ground. Another figure loomed ahead, this one managing to turn and meet the charge before it closed. I leaned to the side to avoid the jabbing lance, making ready to slash at the wielder’s head, but Uthren’s bulk slammed both horse and rider aside with stunning force before I could deliver the blow.

  We sped on, the paelah crushing more horse skulls and unseating more riders as they emerged from the mist. I exchanged blows with only one knight, a tall fellow I vaguely recalled from Duke Viruhlis’s retinue in Stonebridge. A fine horseman, he managed to both halt his mount and compel it to dance aside, suffering only a glancing blow from Uthren’s flank.

  With a shout, the tall knight swung his mace at my head, the wrong choice of target for killing me would surely not save him from Uthren’s fury. In any event, I parried the blow, my longsword flashing up to catch his gauntleted wrist with sufficient force to dislodge the mace from his grip. I drew the sword back for a slash at his face, but Uthren whirled before I could deliver it, rearing up to hammer both fore hooves into the shoulders and neck of the opposing mount. Bones cracked and bloody foam erupted from the smaller horse’s mouth. The tall knight attempted to roll clear of the saddle, but Uthren’s hooves were too swift. Down they came again, crushing breastplate and helm and bearing both horse and rider to the earth. Undaunted, the paelah kept on, rearing and pounding until what remained of our foe was no more than a mass of twisted metal and sundered flesh.

  His battlelust momentarily sated, Uthren trotted away from the carnage, breath steaming from his snout in billowing clouds. I scanned the misted landscape for more enemies, seeing none while the din of combat continued to rage. Most of the noise came from the west, indicating the main weight of Viruhlis’s charge had impacted the centre of the Crown Host line. I could only ascribe this to the fog, for even one so lost to fanaticism as the Duke of Rhianvel would never be so foolish as to throw cavalry at an enemy’s strongest point.

  A discordant tramping of many boots drew my gaze to the rear, seeing an untidy mass of my novice soldiers. Off to their right, I glimpsed the far more disciplined Cordwainers wheeling into place. Further off, the shouts and trumpets of Duke Gilferd’s captains made it clear he had also brought the rest of his command forward. I could only laugh at the irony of my good fortune. Thanks to Uthren, I had succeeded in orchestrating a near perfect flank march which offered the prospect of trapping our enemy.

  “Form up!” I shouted to the novices. Watching them attempt to sort themselves into formation, I knew any order to wheel to their left would be wasted breath. “Hold here,” I told them instead, pointing my sword over my shoulder. “The enemy will come from there.” With that, I rode off towards the Cordwainers, calling out for their captain.

  “That’s your anchor,” I told him, pointing to the marginally neater ranks of the novices. “Wheel left and have at the enemy’s rear.”

  As they trooped off, I felt Uthren tense beneath me. Clearly, his appetite for mayhem hadn’t been fully assuaged and he sensed the possibility of more. I had intended to seek out Gilferd in order to organise cutting off the enemy’s line of retreat, but surrendered to the inevitable as Uthren once again spurred to a gallop. A few crossbow bolts, presumably launched by the Crown Host, buzzed the air as we sped through the fog, the jarring dissonance of a battle in full frenzy so loud now as to pain the ears. The haze was still too thick to discern the scope of the struggle that, all too soon, resolved out of the mist, my vision filled with a writhing mass of armoured figures and horses that had bent but not yet broken the Crown Host line. But it was only a momentary glance before Uthren plunged headlong into the melee.

  His hooves smashed another horse skull before he latched his teeth on to the raised arm of a knight, holding it long enough for me to hack my sword into the unprotected gap at the elbow. The knight’s scream was loud but soon swallowed as he disappeared under the shifting crush of bodies. I ducked a sword blade and replied with an overhead slash, denting a helm and causing its owner to slump half out of his saddle. Uthren reared, hooves flailing to carve a path before he bore me on through the fray. What followed remains a barely comprehended jumble in my memory, dimly recalled instances of savage combat, screaming men and horses brought low by the mighty beast I rode. For all the plaudits heaped upon me for that day, I feel no shame in the admission that, but for Uthren’s ferocity, I would surely have joined the ghosts that plagued me.

  When it came, the absence of violence was shocking in its suddenness. I recall dragging my sword point free of a knight’s visor, feeling the hot rush of his blood upon my face, then finding myself and Uthren alone with no one to fight. The paelah voiced another full-throated whinny as he wheeled about, while I recovered enough wit to realise that we were, in fact, surrounded. A gap of a few yards separated us from the enclosing mass of enemies. The ground was littered with fallen horses and knights, some still twitching or flailing about in vain attempts to rise despite awful wounds. Battle still raged somewhere behind. I assumed it to be the Cordwainers assaulting the stalled cavalry from the rear. Yet, in this one small corner of the field, for just a moment, silence reigned.

  I dragged air into my lungs, the strain of my recent exertions instilling an acute ache from chest to feet. I saw that Uthren had suffered cuts to his flanks, staining the foam that covered them a pale shade of red. He appeared unconcerned, however, tossing his head and snorting in challenge. Many of the knights around us flinched at his gesture, some drawing back. I also saw several glowering, hate-filled faces beneath raised visors. I hadn’t had the time to don my helm and many of this lot knew my face. Their combination of fear and detestation brought a perverse laugh to my lips.

  “You all swore to die for her!” I taunted them, flicking my sword to spatter the closest with blood. “You mad fuckers should be thanking me!”

  They shifted then, not in anger but in response to a shouted command. The sound of it drew me to the sight of a tall, armoured figure forcing his horse through the press. The rearing horse crest on his helm was unmistakable, as was the strident, hate-filled urgency of his voice.

  “Make way! The traitor is mine!”

  Duke Viruhlis Guhlmaine had come to administer justice on behalf of his queen.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  In consulting the various accounts of what transpired that day, I am repeatedly struck by the laziness and outright dishonesty evident in many talentless scribblers who pretend to the title of scholar. Most relate, with confident assurance and reference to supposed witnesses, the impressive clash of arms that occurred betwixt scribe and duke on those bloody bluffs. Every blow and counter-blow is described with varying degrees of absurdity. Some have it that, seeing the comparative size of our mounts, I nobly insisted on fighting Viruhlis on foot lest I enjoy too much of an advantage. Others will contest that I felled him with but a single blow. Both claims are ridiculous. I would happily have rejoiced at the sight of Uthren pounding that pestilent fanatic to ruin. Also, skilled as I was, I doubt one stroke of my sword would have sufficed to bring the bastard down. No, cherished reader, though it pains me to disappoint any unwarranted anticipation, the plain fact is that Duke Viruhlis and I did not fight at all that day. Although, I do so wish we had.

  I did indeed tense in readiness as Viruhlis continued to force his way through the crush, Uthren shifting eagerly beneath me. But, before he could get within sword reach, a great tumult erupted to his rear. I had heard this signature sound before and knew instantly that the overlapping chorus of thudding flesh and clashing metal meant the Rhianvelan rear had suffered the impact of a cavalry charge.

  Around us, the previously hesitant mass of knights degenerated into disorder as they struggled to reorientate their mounts. In the confusion, I lost sight of Viruhlis. A few of his banner men attempted to claim the honour of dispatching the Traitor Scribe, however, one coming at me with a raised axe only to be smashed aside when Uthren surged forward. Once again, my awareness became lost in the maelstrom of battle, the world transformed into a red-tinged nightmare of screaming, rage-filled faces and slashing blades.

  The sting of a cut to my forehead brought me back to full sensibility, by which time the enemies around me had thinned considerably. Bones crunched beneath Uthren’s hooves as he finished off a dismounted knight. The blade of my longsword was red from hilt to tip and my sword arm numb with strain. A sound like the ringing of a bell drew my gaze to the sight of Sir Ehlbert Bauldry hacking his sword into the helm and head of a Rhianvelan a dozen paces away. From the bodies left in his wake it was clear the King’s Champion had carved an impressively deadly path to my side. Beyond him, the fray continued, a dense knot of riders thrashing about in a fury that was bound to incite Uthren’s battle lust. However, before the paelah could charge again, the struggle abated, Rhianvelans pausing in mid-combat as if in response to some signal. Whatever it had been, it had plainly sapped the last reserves of their courage, for they all began to flee.