Mage-Guard of Hamor (49 page)

“Yes, ser.”

As he rode back toward Third Company, Rahl had to wonder why Taryl had wanted to see him at all.

By the time Commander Shuchyl had completed mopping up the isolated rebel squads and companies, as well as organizing the captured wagons, collecting stray mounts and weapons, and dealing with the wounded, it had been close to sunset on fourday. Even so, the commander had the force ride another five kays southward to a hamlet called Feoyn. Taryl had taken half a company and ridden on to return to the main body of Second Army in Bhucyra.

The commander rousted out all the companies at dawn on fiveday, and by early afternoon Third Company was settled, in a fashion, in a stead with a large barn and several sheds on the outskirts of Bhucyra. Rahl did make arrangements with the woman of the stead to wash his bloody uniform. If they stayed more than a day, he might get the other one clean as well.

He'd spent some time, and effort, trying to speed the healing of several of the less severely wounded troopers, and was crossing the space between the shed where the wounded were quartered and the main barn when a trooper rode toward him.

“Majer! There's a courier out front for you.”

“Thank you.” Rahl wondered what else Taryl might want, for who else would be seeking him?

He turned and headed back to the front of the stead house.

The courier inclined his head politely and extended a folded sheet of paper. “From the overcommander, ser.”

“Thank you.”

“My pleasure, ser.” The trooper turned his mount. In moments, he was headed back toward the center of the town.

Rahl had definitely felt the shiver of fear in the man, along with a form of respect. He wanted to shake his head. He'd never wanted to be in a war, but it seemed like his only choice, given who and what he was, was to be good at it, and from what he could tell, if he had to live in Hamor, he'd rather live under the Emperor in a united realm than under the sort of people that gathered to Golyat.

He unfolded the paper—it was just a short note from Taryl.

That was all.

Rahl took one of the spare and captured mounts to ride into Bhucyra. His gelding needed a rest. The town was large enough that he had to ask for directions to the White Boar—a modest inn located two long blocks away from the square and overlooking the Awhut River.

After finding a stableboy, Rahl had to search for Taryl, then wait while the overcommander finished his meeting with several commanders. When they left the small side dining chamber, Taryl motioned for Rahl to join him. Rahl was careful to close the door firmly, and keep his personal order shields strong and tight.

Taryl sat down in one of the chairs and motioned for the younger mage-guard to do the same. Although Taryl had not been involved in any more battles, the overcommander still looked as worn and exhausted as he had right after the battle the previous day.

“Ser…begging your pardon…but you could use some rest.” Rahl turned the chair slightly to face Taryl directly.

“So could we all, Rahl.”

“Yes, ser, but you make the difference, and if you wear yourself out, there's no one to replace you.”

Taryl smiled faintly. “No man is indispensable, much as each of us would like to think so.”

“That may be true, ser, but there are levels of dispensability, and while no man is indispensable, the cost of dispensing with some men—or some women—is far greater than with others. Dispensing with you would be most costly for the Emperor.”

“I have some doubt that most in Cigoerne would agree with you.”

“That is why you are here, and they are there.”

“Keep practicing statements like that, Rahl, and you might yet survive in the Palace.”

Rahl doubted that Taryl's words were meant as an unalloyed compliment. “It will take more time than I have, ser, for that kind of practice.”

Taryl actually laughed, if briefly, and it was the first real laugh Rahl had seen in eightdays from the older mage-guard. After the laugh and smile faded, Taryl cleared his throat. “You've been very effective in the last several battles, Rahl, but, except for that one chaos-mage, Golyat's forces haven't used magery. That will change. I can't say whether it will be at Selyma or thereafter. Golyat has at least ten former mage-guards, and several are quite accomplished.”

“Do you know why they haven't used them?”

“No. I can surmise, however.” An ironic smile crossed the overcommander's lips. “Most mages, as strong as they may be, have only a few abilities with which they can exercise great strength and mastery. Revealing those abilities at times when it is not critical for success and victory could allow us to develop a tactic to counter them. Also, those with great power will resist hazarding themselves when it is not to their personal advantage, and…if they have great power, who could force them to do so?”

“A company of officers rather than troopers?” asked Rahl.

Taryl nodded. “That does not discount their potential effectiveness. For that reason, I would advise you against using anywhere near your full abilities early in any forthcoming battle. Those you may face will be more than patient, and most willing to sacrifice scores, if not thousands, of troopers to wear you out. You cannot protect Third Company at all costs, not when that cost might be your life and might prolong the rebellion.”

“I can see that, ser.” Rahl didn't have to like it, but what Taryl said made an unfortunate kind of sense.

“For now, that is all I had. We'll be here tomorrow as well. So get some rest and eat as well as you can.”

“Yes, ser.”

“There is one thing more.” Taryl rose and handed an envelope to Rahl. “You look to be most fortunate. I presume this is from the healer.”

Rahl took the envelope, noting that it was addressed to Majer Rahl, Mage-Guard, in care of Third Company, Second Army of Hamor, Cigoerne, Hamor. “How—”

“The High Command makes an effort to assure any trooper or officer receives all letters,” Taryl replied. “Sometimes it takes eightdays for them to reach us, but few are ever lost. I thought you might like to have it.” Taryl smiled, an expression truly warm and yet wistful.

“Thank you, ser.”

“Don't thank me, Rahl. She's the one who wrote.”

Rahl couldn't help smiling as he inclined his head before stepping away.

Once he left Taryl, Rahl retreated to a corner of the front foyer of the White Boar and opened the letter. He wasn't about to wait until he rode back to Third Company. He forced himself to read it slowly.

The signature was a simple “Deybri.”

What decision was she considering? He didn't like the phrase, “whatever else may come,” because that was suggesting that she loved him but could not bring herself to commit to him. He took a deep breath, then smiled wryly. She had asked for patience, and she would have it. What else could he do? Besides, he had no options until the revolt was suppressed—if it could be.

Yet, as he rode back through the twilight, he thought about her words and wondered. He dared not hope.

On sevenday, Second Army moved southward under high thin gray clouds toward Selyma, a large town that straddled the Awhut River. Although the air was warmer than it had been farther inland, the grass remained green, and none of the trees sported the shriveled gray leaves of winter, to Rahl it
felt
raw and chill, doubtless because it was so damp. All the steads near the road were shuttered, and many had been abandoned by their holders, at least until they felt the fighting had passed.

Once more, Third Company was effectively the van, although Taryl had dispatched scouts ahead of the vanguard in all directions. Rahl could not sense any rebels—or any traps—but none of the holdings near the main road held any food or supplies, either, and he doubted that was solely the result of the holders' prudence.

He still didn't know what to make of Deybri's letter, and there was something else about it, something that indicated more than the words, but he couldn't exactly put a finger—or a thought—to whatever it was. Yet the words and even the feeling in the letters of her words showed that she cared. Rahl could almost feel the conflicts within her—that she did love him, but that she also felt tied to Nylan and what she did there. How would she resolve that? Could she? What could he do if she found she could not leave Recluce?

He shook his head. There was nothing he could do at the moment, except his best for Taryl and the Emperor. Perhaps, if he did well enough…perhaps he could work out something, as an envoy of a more lasting nature from Hamor to Nylan.

He laughed softly, humorously. As if anyone would agree to that—either in Cigoerne or Nylan.

After a time, Drakeyt rode forward to join Rahl, and Rahl dropped back so that the two officers trailed Alrydd and Shanyr by a good ten cubits.

“How do you figure it?” asked the older officer.

“I'd judge that we're about two kays from the staging area. We just passed the stone that indicated five kays from Selyma.”

“It figures that they'd make a stand at Selyma,” said Drakeyt, standing briefly in the stirrups to stretch his legs. “That's the only bridge in forty kays, and there are hills north of the town, and a lake to the northwest of the hills, and the river to the southeast. The hills command the road. If we want to cross the river, and we've got to do that to reach Nubyat, we either take Selyma or backtrack thirty kays or more and then take our chances on dirt lanes that sometimes connect and sort of follow the river on the other side. Or we try to ford a river that's close to two hundred cubits wide and at least ten deep, or find barges that the rebels have mostly kept in Nubyat.”

“Or we ride a hundred kays over paved roads and come back from the southeast on the road between Nubyat and Sastak?” suggested Rahl.

“None of those is a good idea.” Drakeyt shook his head. “Here we've got a clear supply line and a way to move quickly. Once we take Selyma, we're less than fifteen kays from Nubyat, and we'll hold access to the river and to the coastal highway north to Elmari and south to Sastak.”

If we take Selyma.
But Rahl nodded, recalling what Taryl had told him.

“You look doubtful. You're the mage-guard who can do anything. Why so cautious now?”

“Because…” Rahl paused for a moment. “Because we know that Golyat has a number of mage-guards, and we've encountered only one. That's going to change soon, and it could be at Selyma. If not there, it will certainly change when we move on Nubyat.”

“Can't you and the overcommander handle them?”

“There are two of us and something like six or eight other mage-guards in First and Second Army. There could be fifteen mages supporting Golyat.”

“How many are as good as you?”

“I don't know. The overcommander might, but he's not said much, except that there are more than a few. The former overcommander has to be strong, but beyond that…” Rahl shrugged. “I'm not expecting things to be as easy as before.”

“We've already lost the equivalent of two-thirds of a standard company, and you're saying that's easy?”

“No,” returned Rahl dryly, “just easier than what's ahead.” He grinned lopsidedly. “You know that. You just want me to say it.”

Drakeyt grinned back. “You did say it, Majer.”

“Yes, I did, Captain.”
And I hope I'm wrong, but I don't think we'll be that fortunate.

Even before dawn on eightday, the clouds hanging over Selyma were thick and gray, yet Rahl could sense that they did not hold all that much water, no more than enough for scattered showers. By the time the sun should have bathed the lowlands short of the town with the long light of dawn, the day remained as gray as it had been just before dawn, but First Army and Second Army began to move forward, the marshal's forces moving into position to assault the hilltop to the southeast of the highway, the overcommander's slightly smaller army advancing toward the low hills to the northwest. The highway itself was blocked with a crude and hastily constructed barricade of boulders and logs that ran two hundred cubits from the rock-and-mortar wall that lined the cut in one hillside to the other identically constructed wall in the opposite hillside.

Rahl rode beside Drakeyt at the head of Third Company on the left flank of Second Army, just west of the highway itself. There was a gap of less than fifty cubits between the troopers of first squad and those of Thirtieth-Seventh Company on the right flank of First Army. Through the gap in the hills through which the main road passed and over the top of the barricade, Rahl could glimpse a handful of the red-tile roofs of the taller buildings in Selyma. Farther to the northwest, from the western base of the hill that Second Army prepared to assault, stretched Lake Semayne, its waters dull gray under the sullen clouds. Farther to the northwest was a marsh that extended for several kays beyond the lake.

Rahl could certainly see why Golyat's forces had picked Selyma for a defense point. Except for the narrow gap in the hills for the road, there was no direct access to the town or the bridge across the Awhut River—and that blocked any direct Imperial access to Nubyat. What he didn't understand was why the Imperial forces were going to attack such a strongly defended point.

“You don't think there's another way to get to Nubyat without hazarding so many troopers?” Rahl finally asked Drakeyt.

“I'm most certain there is, Majer. I don't know what it might be, but there doubtless is such a way.”

Rahl concealed an internal wince. Much of the time when Drakeyt addressed him as “Majer,” Rahl had come to realize, it was a polite way of suggesting that Rahl hadn't thought matters through. Rather than ask another question revealing his ignorance, Rahl tried to consider the options facing Taryl and the marshal.

If they tried to avoid going through Selyma, then it would take more time and subject the armies to battles elsewhere—and they still might have to fight another pitched battle elsewhere, and later, with fewer supplies and troopers. It also might allow Golyat to bring more troopers and chaos-mages from elsewhere. But perhaps the most important consideration, Rahl thought, was that, if worse came to worst, Taryl and the marshal could lose, and, so long as they decimated the rebels, they gained, because they could draw on all of Hamor for replacements of men and supplies. In addition, if they won, the cost might well be less than that incurred by attempting to maneuver for better positions. He'd doubtless missed other considerations, but those would have to wait.

Rahl turned his attention to the terrain ahead, trying to sense where the rebels were—besides behind the highway barricade—but discovered that one or more of Golyat's mages were using something like a shifting chaos shield to obscure the positions of the defenders. Even so, he could sense a large number of troops just over the crest of the hills. Intermittent earthworks dotted the hilltop there. A smaller number of rebels were in position behind the log-and-stone barricade. A goodly portion of those on the back side of the hilltop, Rahl felt, were lancers. Given the even and gentle grassy slope down toward the Imperial position, that made sense. The lancers would have the advantage of attacking downhill, with the attendant momentum and greater visibility.

Rahl briefly shifted his attention farther east, where the marshal's forces were also advancing, but there the rebel forces were centered around a low stone structure on that shorter hilltop ridge, constructed recently, Rahl gathered, from the feel of the stones. He turned his attention back to the slope ahead, finally saying, “They've got lancers posted just over the top of the hill.”

“I would, too.”

Rahl decided not to say more, but watched closely as Third Company moved forward across the flat and began to move up the lower and gentler part of the slope toward the rebel positions.

Second Army had no more taken up positions behind a series of pole-and-stone pillar fences almost a kay from the crest of the hills than cannon positioned on the northeasternmost end of the hills and less than a quarter kay from the lake began to send shells down toward the troopers.

The first shells fell well short, but the grapeshot in them ripped large oval chunks out of the waist-high grasses. The shell impacts began to move toward the first ranks of Second Army, but then stopped.

To his left, Rahl could hear the cannon firing from the stone fort, but those, too, fell silent. An eerie silence followed, broken only by murmurs, the occasional whuff or chuff of a mount, or a cough.

Rahl continued to scan the field, and before long he could sense a small force circling out from the north side of Second Army, and then back along the lakeshore—and that force contained inchoate chaos amid it.

Several cannon up on the hill to Rahl's right began to fire again, this time toward the force on the shore almost directly below the cannon. The slope there was too steep to climb—or to mount a charge directly downhill. Several iron crossbow bolts arced from the Imperial force on the lake's edge up toward the cannon.

Then a line of chaos-flame—the thinnest line of chaos—flashed from a mage-guard on the lake's edge toward one of the iron quarrels arcing toward the cannon…and then directly toward the cannon. At the moment that chaos struck the first cannon, three firebolts flared down on the Imperial force…and the mage-guard.
Whssst! Whssst! Whssst!

The emptiness and void were enough to tell Rahl that both the troopers and the Imperial mage-guard were gone. Steam rose from the shore and the water at the lake's edge.

Thwump! Crumpt! Crumpt!
Flame and smoke flared from where the cannon had been firing, followed by another series of explosions. White-and-gray smoke wreathed the northwestern end of the hill closest to the lake, and Rahl could sense another wave of deaths, and several had been chaos-mages.

Another series of explosions continued across the back of the northwest corner of the hill as powder magazines and ammunition detonated.

Drakeyt looked to Rahl.

“I don't think there are any cannon left on that hill. Not any powder, either. We lost one mage,” Rahl said. “I think they lost two, maybe three.”

“That's got to hurt them,” said Drakeyt in a low voice.

“Not enough.” Rahl had the feeling that the loss of the cannon and the powder might be more of a blow to Golyat than the loss of a few mages—if Taryl had been right about how many mage-guards had defected to Golyat. That didn't count how many might have been sent from Fairhaven to help the prince.

As if to emphasize that point, spheres of chaos-flame began to arc off the top of the hillside down toward Second Army. The first exploded well in front of the middle of the line of troopers, but driblets of flame rolled downhill, leaving long lines of fire that subsided to a thin path of dark ash. A second arched to the west, landing in a company of troopers closer to the lake, and while the screams of their injured and dying mounts were faint, Rahl could easily sense the deaths.

Rahl watched carefully, and when one of the chaos-flares looked to be headed toward Third Company, he waited until the last moment before flashing a shield to deflect it into the grass in front of the company. The heat from the chaos-fire might even have been welcome except for the acrid odor of both chaos and burned grasses that accompanied the gust of warm air.

Several other firebolts—but certainly not all—were deflected, but whether by Taryl or one of the few Imperial mage-guards, Rahl couldn't tell. To his left, across the highway, he could also sense chaos-flame being thrown against the marshal's First Army, but there cannon also continued to fire at the Imperial troopers.

Rahl's attention was drawn back to his own force as a wave of lancers rode over the top of the hill and down the long and gentle slope toward the advancing Imperial troopers. Rather than charging forward, the Imperial forces remained in their traces, as if stopped dead.

Rahl winced. Against the long mirror lances, that was exactly the wrong tactic.

The lancers thundered closer, and close to half the Imperial troopers in the front ranks broke even before the lancers neared, and those remaining seemed to mill around aimlessly. Then, at the last moment, the remaining troopers wheeled to the sides, as if trying to outflank the lancers. Out of the grass rose other troopers—and they held long pikes, dug into the ground.

The first two lines of lancers spitted themselves on the pikes, or found themselves entangled with those mounts who had struck the pikes full on, and the Imperial troopers turned back and began to cut down the lancers.

From the hilltop came quick lines of firebolts, spaced just far enough apart so that, when they struck, the chaos-fire flared and spread, turning troopers, pikes, and pikemen into writhing flames that soon became ashes. Even before those fires died away, another line of lancers charged over the hill and down toward the next ranks of advancing troopers.

Once more, if farther down the slope, at the last moment, the troopers turned, and pikes and pikemen appeared. This time, most of the rebel lancers turned, with only a few getting caught in the pikes, but the Imperial troopers were quicker and more than a few lancers went down.

From the hilltop came more firebolts, if fewer and less intense, and only a comparative handful struck the Imperial forces.

The lancers—greatly diminished—charged once more. This time a hail of arrows rose from behind the first line of Imperial troopers and poured down into the lancers' ranks. Even so, some of the lancers opened wide spaces in the Imperial formation before they retreated uphill under a hail of arrows.

Rahl hadn't realized that Taryl had brought or found so many archers, but then, from his limited experience, he doubted that archers were all that helpful in mounted fast-moving battles. But…in a set battle like the one unfolding before him, they were most useful—and deadly.

Again, for a time, neither force moved, but it was far from silent, not with the smoldering patches of grass and low vegetation that occasionally crackled, the moaning and low cries of wounded mounts and men, and the orders barked by various commanders. While he could not see the sun, shrouded as it was by the heavy clouds, Rahl knew that it was well past midmorning, and that it was going to be a very long day.

Abruptly, from the southeast, came a flare of chaos, and then a series of explosions. Rahl turned and glanced toward the stone fort. Part of the wall had been blown out, as if a powder magazine had exploded, but lancers poured downhill.

Rahl turned back to Drakeyt. “What next?”

“Whatever they think will hurt us worse and them less, and I have no idea what that will be, except that I don't think we'll like it.”

Abruptly a large chaos-bolt arched from somewhere in the Imperial forces up and over the top of the hill. Rahl could see the flash of fire splashing off a shield of some sort, but he could also sense that troopers around the shield had been injured, and some had died.

A flurry of smaller chaos-bolts flashed from the rebel forces, striking almost at random among the Imperial troopers and archers, but, between a less-than-perfect aim and a number of shields, Rahl could feel few injuries.

Just as Rahl was congratulating himself, a pair of chaos-bolts arrowed straight down the hillside, directly at Third Company.

Rahl threw up shields, and the chaos-fire flared past and over the company. Rahl released the shields, but for a moment, had a flash of light-headedness. This time, he didn't wait, but immediately dug out travel biscuits from his saddlebags.

“Eating, at a time like this?” asked Drakeyt.

“I don't keep eating,” replied Rahl through mouthfuls of very stale and exceeding dry biscuits, “and I can't keep using order.”

“Is that true of all mages?”

“So far as I know, but I don't know for sure about the white wizards of Fairhaven.”

Drakeyt nodded slowly. “That explains a lot.”

Rahl was about to ask what it explained when another wave of lancers, seemingly as numerous as those in the charge that had opened the battle for Selyma, rode over the crest of the hill and started down toward the Imperial forces.

Another flight of arrows rose toward the lancers, but this time a wall of chaos-flame flared downhill, incinerating the majority of the shafts before they could reach their targets. A second wave of arrows, larger than the first, followed. Only two chaos-bolts flew toward the arrows, and one missed completely but fell toward the center of the Imperial force, where it was smothered by an order shield, possibly projected by Taryl.

Rahl nodded as the second flight of arrows dropped amid the lancers. He could see the tactics being used by Taryl—or Commander Muyr. As the lancers struggled to regain order, four companies of mounted troopers charged uphill into the mass of rebels.

“Companies! Forward!” came the orders.

“Third Company! Forward!” repeated Drakeyt.

Using the Imperial charge as a form of cover, the remainder of the force advanced uphill at a measured ride so that the rebel chaos-mages could not fling chaos-flame indiscriminately without inflicting even greater casualties on their own lancers.

By the time the lancers broke free and withdrew, it was clear that the majority of the most recent casualties were among the lancers, and the Imperial forces were a good third of the way up the slope in good order.