Sammāʾēl destroyed Etalus, aye, but those bastards Vinea and Forneus were the ones who truly slaughtered our people. While the Sun Eater nested in the ruins of the senate, it didn’t chase those who fled. Thousands of ships left Etalus, loaded with women and children, but the storms and the leviathan did them all in. We waited on the beaches for our families, but all we ever found were corpses and broken ships.
* The Life and Times of Legionary Titus Nasica
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8th Day of New Summer’s Moon, 297 AC
Trist found the King in a hurried conference with Baron Urien, who held command of the van, and General Ismet, who held command of the rear. Isdern, as Lionel’s new squire, was there, and Sir Guiron, in full armor and keeping watch over the King as Trist been doing just a short time before. Yaél rode along with him, but Henry had remained back with Clarisant’s carriage to care for his bow, which did not, to Trist’s understanding, much benefit from being used in a downpour.
“...armored all in plate of red metal,” Ismet was saying, as they pulled up and joined the group. “And helmed as well, though I could not tell if the helm was built around the horns, or the horns came through it, or if the horns were merely an ornament of the armor itself. The flesh was gray, like a skull, with a collapsed nose and horrible grinning teeth, and cruel red eyes. It fought with a blade in its right hand, and with the claws of its left, but the true danger was that it raised the spirit of every man it killed, like a kind of ghūl.”
Trist frowned. “More than one, General?” he asked.
“Indeed,” Ismet turned to him, her red veil plastered across the brigandine armor she wore, soaked through by the rain. “I counted four corpses risen, by the time I drove the daemon off. They swarmed me like flies on camel dung, and a sort of hole ripped open in the air behind the monster, through which it fled.”
“The same thing happened with the daemon Vinea, up on the hill,” Trist told the group, waving his arm in the general direction of his recent skirmish. “I had wounded the monster, but it fled through a tear in the world. I saw another daemon waiting for it - in fact, it seemed to be the one causing the opening.”
“Three daemons,” Urien muttered, shaking his head. “And two of the three we fought at the pass waiting in the winds. We don’t have enough Exarchs, Your Majesty.”
“I believe this is still within the bounds of what we expected, and planned for,” King Lionel said. “Trist has identified one of these monsters as the Stormbringer. Based on the descriptions, and on the notes compiled by Sir Trist and your daughter, Baron Urien, I think we can safely assume that it was the Duke of the Slain who assaulted our rear, and the Serpent of Gates who moved the other two from place to place.”
“There is more, Your Majesty,” Trist said. “That I judge relevant. Bathin was with columns of marching Kimmerian mercenaries. And Vinea said that he would see me again at my home, if I was fast enough.”
The King drummed his fingers against the leather of his courser’s saddle. “The washed out sections of road will delay us by at least a day, if not more, and we can’t leave our supply wagons behind. Our enemy has come to the same conclusion that I have: they do not need to defeat our army, only slow our march. In the meantime, they will take or burn Camaret-à-Arden, Havre de Paix, La Colline Isolé, and everything else on the way to investing Rocher de la Garde. They will deny us our supplies of Iebara wood, granite and food, and claim it all for their own forces. Your son Gareth will be prepared for a traditional siege, Urien, but he does not know that the Serpent of Gates can simply open a passage through his walls and into the heart of his defenses. Without Exarchs present to face down the daemons, Rocher de la Garde will fall before we ever arrive. The enemy will deny us any resupply, or access to your vaults, and then take us on the road.”
“So what do we do?” Urien growled, clearly frustrated. Trist understood what his father in law must be feeling: both of them were still too far away from their homes to protect the people they cared about. In Trist’s case, his father was threatened, and all the people of the village he’d grown up in; for Urien, it was his wife and eldest son.
“This simply moves up what I had already planned,” Lionel said, and turned to Trist. “I am dividing our cavalry. Sir Trist, you will take your cousin Sir Lucan, along with Sir Erec and Dame Etoile, from Baron Urien’s knights. You will also take Sir Florent, from Rive Ouest, with his knights Sir Carados and Dame Ettarre. You have your squire and your man, as well. That makes a party of nine, plus squires. Large enough to fight off an attack, especially with an Exarch at the head, but small enough to ride fast. Each of you will take a second horse. You have the command, though I recommend you take Sir Florent as your second and consult with him: he is well practiced in leading men, and has much to teach you. Your orders, I have already relayed to you, and I trust you recall them.”
“I do, Your Majesty,” Trist said, inclining his head. “Baron Urien, any message you have for Rocher de la Garde, I will carry it. You may trust that we will see to it the city holds until our main force arrives.”
“You had better,” Urien grumbled, but Trist told himself not to take offense. The man was under a great deal of strain. “How soon will you ride?”
You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.
“You have as long as it takes me to gather the knights and the spare horses,” Trist said. “Yaél.” He wheeled Cazador around to head back down the line of march to the carriage, and his squire caught up to ride alongside him. “Go find the banner of a setting sun on a blue field. That will be the men from the Barony du Rive Ouest. You remember the names?”
“Florent, Ettarre, and Caradoc,” Yaél repeated.
“Sir Carados,” Trist corrected her. “Bring them to the carriage, and ask Sir Florent to see to extra horses for nine-” Trist tried to count how many of the named knights had squires. “Make that twelve, if he would. Off you go.” Yaél kicked her horse into a canter - her riding had improved by leaps and bounds during the weeks of training at Falais - and Trist turned in toward the banner of Rocher de la Garde, a while sea shell on blue. “Cousin!” He called to Lucan. “I am to take you, Sir Erec and Dame Etoile. King’s orders.”
“Are we riding home, then?” Lucan asked, peeling off and waving two knights to follow him. Sir Erec had a broad, soft face, telling of a bit of extra weight, and a shock of hair so blonde it was almost white. Dame Etoile, on the other hand, had hair the color of wheat under a summer sky, cut to just below her chin but above her shoulders, which, if her armor was anything to judge by, were as broad as some men's. A boy of no more than ten, who Trist recognized as having sat across the table from Yaél, followed them.
“Aye,” Trist told the three other knights. “We are to take extra horses and ride hard to reinforce the city, to support Sir Gareth, and to carry messages from Baron Urien and from the King.”
“Good,” Etoile said. “It’s been maddening to keep to the pace of the wagons when we know our home is next to come under attack.”
Sir Florent indeed brought the extra horses, mostly rounceys, as well as two more knights and another two squires. Yaél came with him, and the entire assemblage gathered around Clarisant’s carriage, which had paused while half a dozen soldiers unloaded a wagon just ahead. Trist did not envy them the task of trying to get it across the broken stone and mudslide the rain had left in place of a good road.
“Thank you all for coming,” Trist said to the group. “The King has ordered us to ride hard for Rocher de la Garde. Our first task is to carry messages to Sir Gareth, who has command there, and to reinforce the city and hold it until the army arrives. Sir Florent, would you do me the honor of being my second for this command?”
Florent was a slim man, with a close cropped mustache and beard which must have gone first to salt and pepper, and then mostly to white, matching the spare hair on his head. “Aye,” he said. “An honor to ride with you, Exarch.”
Trist nodded. “Take a few moments to fill your saddlebags with anything you need,” he ordered. “Everyone bring enough food to last four days. Yaél, go pick up the letters.” His squire rode back up the line, and after a few conversations the other three squires peeled away, as well, to fetch travel rations.
“Henry,” Trist said, turning to the archer with a grin. “I regret to inform you that you are going to have to get off that carriage and back into a saddle.”
Henry rolled his eyes with an exaggerated groan. “You’d all get lost in the woods and starve without me,” he replied with good enough humor, and scrambled down to untie his horse from the back of the carriage.
With everything already in motion, Trist rode over to the carriage door and rapped against the wood with the knuckles of his gauntlet. “My lady?” he called inside, and could not help but be somewhat relieved when this time his wife’s maid did not slam the door in his face.
“My lord husband?” Clarisant leaned forward into the sunlight to look out at him.
“The King is sending us ahead,” he explained, “To ride hard for Rocher de la Garde and reinforce your brother there.”
“I see. Just a moment then; I’ll untie Tystie.” She slid out of the carriage and walked around behind to where her palfrey was tied, next to Henry’s gelding. “I see that I was correct to wear my riding clothes today.”
Trist swallowed. “I am not certain that the king meant for you to come with us,” he began.
“Did he forbid it? Or did my father?”
“No.” Trist shook his head.
Clarisant nodded. “I told you I would not be left behind again, and I meant it. Would you help me up into the saddle?”
“Aye.” Better this than her refusing to speak to him, Trist decided. He dismounted, pulled his gauntlets off, and handed them to his cousin Lucan. “Ready?” he asked, and at his wife’s nod, grasped her about the waist and lifted her up. She was a woman grown, but felt light as a child in his arms. Trist might never become as strong as a daemon, but he was more than capable of lifting his wife into her saddle. Once he’d settled her onto her palfrey, and Clarisant had her reins in hand, Trist set a foot in his own stirrup and pulled himself back up onto Cazador’s back.
Trist looked over the assembled group. The squires had returned, and were stuffing saddlebags with loaves of bread, wheels of cheese, apples from the hills beneath the Hauteurs Massif, and every other bit of food they could find on short notice. Yaél handed him two sealed letters, which Trist tucked away safely. The spare horses were secured with leads, and everything looked in order. He wished that he was able to use the Hunter’s Boon as well as Cern could: Trist was confident the Horned Hunter could have had this entire group riding through the night and at the gates of Rocher de la Garde by dawn. Unfortunately, they would have to make due without that advantage.
“We ride for Rocher de la Garde!” Trist shouted, turned Caz’s head west, and led them off the road and down the embankment, where they sped to a trot. To their left, the soldiers toiling with the wagons paused to cheer them as they passed.
As they approached the van, Clarisant, sitting side saddle, rode up alongside Trist on his right, putting him between her and the army.
“Worried that your father will see you?” he called to her, and her only response was a grin. King Lionel waved as they passed, and his squire Isdern next to him, and then Trist turned them back up the embankment onto the Etalan road toward the sea.