And he had recovered his men from the panic charge they might have made. It was harder to go deliberately, to measure their advance, but he relied on his veteran companies, and had sent out messengers sternly advising the line to prepare a moderate advance… gods keep the peasant levies steady.
He gave the signal and led, keeping Kanwy tight-reined. Behind him, the veteran companies that were the stability of Ylesuin’s line held their horses to the pace he set, allowing the peasant line to keep up. He could see the center, Ryssand’s forces; and the right wing, Maudyn’s, stretched out to indistinction against an unkept woods which had already sent out an ambush. They advanced, keeping their ranks, never quickening the charge. It was a game of temptation: Tasmôrden tempted him to a mad rush downhilclass="underline" he had his own trap in mind.
“They aren’t facing untried boys!” Cefwyn shouted at Anwyll, with the Dragons, where a little too much enthusiasm from Anwyll’s lot crowded up. “Steady pace!”
Ryssand and Nelefreissan and Murandys to the center, the Dragons, Osanan and the Prince’s Guard in the left wing with him, while Maudyn commanded the right wing: Panys and Llymaryn, Carys and the other eastern provinces, with the Guelen Guard, as they had settled among themselves. At the very last, their heavy cavalry had to screen their far fewer pikemen, who would be slow as tomorrow getting to the fray, and in peasant order, which was to say, damned little order at all… likely to arrive only for the very last action if the cavalry once lost its good sense and plunged downslope.
Yet it was always Ylesuin’s habit to have the pikemen for support, and Cefwyn asked himself a last time was it folly on his part to have declined to summon the Guelen and Llymarish levies into this, not to have had the double line of pikes that had distinguished his grandfather’s successful assaults.
It was far too late now for second thoughts. Kanwy fought him for more rein and jolted under him like a mountain in motion, plate-sized feet descending a steep slope in deliberate, uncomfortable strides that made it clear Kanwy wanted to run.
For a guard at his back he had those who had defended him for years; and for a man at his right he had young Anwyll, lately from watch on the Lenúalim.
Where are you now, master crow? Taking account of this? On the ridge watching?
I know where all my enemies are. I’ve dealt with it, thank you, faithful crow. I could use your shield just now. Anwyll’s a fine young man. But he hasn’t your qualities.
The horizon flashed white, then dark, and the foot of the hill gave up a sudden movement of dark banners with a white device that shone like the lightning itself.
It was the heraldry of the Sihhë High Kings carried before him, in the lines of the enemy, the black banner of the Tower Crowned.
And before Ylesuin’s line, beside the red Dragon Banner of the Marhanen kings, shone the Tower and Checker of the Lady Regent, blue and white and gold, bright under the leaden sky.
“Hold!” Cefwyn said, and reined in, to allow his line to assume a better order: the wings had begun to stray a little behind. “Let’s see if they’ll climb to us!”
The line drew to a ragged stop, re-formed itself in an even, bristling row of lances.
He sorely missed the Lanfarnessemen, archers that would have taken full advantage of this height. From the right wing issued a thin gray sleet of arrows aloft, archers from Panys’ contingent, the best they had, and likely to do damage with the higher vantage.
Back came a flight from the other direction, uphill and short, a waste of shafts.
A solitary horseman rode out from the halted opposing line, rode back and forth, shouting something in which Cefwyn had no interest at all, except the mild hope that an arrow would do them a favor.
There, he said to himself, seeing the glint of gold encircling that helm, there was Tasmôrden at last, taunting them, wishing the king of Ylesuin to descend into the trap he had laid.
He would not shout back, would not give way to anger. He set Kanwy out to the fore at a mere amble, rode across the center and rode back again, gesture for gesture, leisurely as a ride through his capital. Arrows attempted the uphill shot with no better effect than before. Arrows came back down the hill, and the dull thump of impact below echoed off the rocks to their left, with satisfying outcries of anger from the enemy below.
In the same leisure Cefwyn rejoined his wing, rode to Anwyll’s side, and pointed to a stand of brush somewhat past Tasmôrden’s line. “When we do charge, we will meet Lord Maudyn there, behind his line. Bear somewhat left. We shan’t be in a hurry until the last.”
“Left, Your Majesty…”
“Left, I say. Out and around his flank. There may be trenches. But there we meet Lord Maudyn, and come back east again. No driving into Tasmôrden’s center, where I most think he’s fortified. That honor is Ryssand’s.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” There was grave doubt in Anwyll’s voice.
“Relay that to Captain Gwywyn.”
Anwyll rode off at a good clip, met with the captain of the Prince’s Guard, who stood in Idrys’ place in general command of the king’s forces, and came back again in haste toward him, to take his place as shieldman.
“Sound the advance!” Cefwyn cried to the trumpeter, and as the trumpets sounded, gave Kanwy rein to resume a measured advance.
Only when he was close enough to the foot of the long descent did he let the pace increase, and set himself not in the lead, as he had done in other wars, but back with the line: his guard was around him, the Dragons beside him, and the forest of ash wood lifted at the heavens now began to lower as the ranks closed.
He lowered his own visor, lowered the lance, took a good grip for the shock to come; and hoped to the gods the veteran Dragons evaded the brush where he wagered stakes were in place: they were too expert for such traps.
And his leading was not to ride full tilt into the lines that offered; they evaded the rows of brush that skirted the center and met the shock of heavy horse that swept out from the enemy’s line to prevent that flanking move—met it with a crack like a smith’s hammer. Horses went down, fewer of theirs than the enemy’s, and they slid by—doing nothing to attack the entrenched line of brush-hidden stakes and pikemen. They went past the flank of the cavalry, and the heavy horse of Tasmôrden’s center, seeing the gap they had left, charged past them, going uphill, unchecked.
Ryssand had buckled, had retreated.
And Tasmôrden’s riders plunged up and up into that pocket of retreating men, blind to the sweep from either wing that now turned behind them.
Cefwyn took down an opposing pikeman with the broken stub of his lance, sent Kanwy through a last curtain of infantry, and saw Maudyn’s banners coming toward him from the east, to meet him behind Tasmôrden’s line.
More, he saw Tasmôrden’s banners in the heart of the remaining pikemen, and saw the cluster of mounted heavy horse guards that betokened a lord’s defense, between him and Maudyn.
“With me!” he shouted at Anwyll and whatever of his own guard could keep up, and, sword in hand, he rode for that gold-crowned man in the heart of the enemy.
The pretender to the High Kingship failed to see his approach; he shouted in vain after his charging troops, who by now had chased halfway up the hill in pursuit of Ryssand’s retreat.
“Tasmôrden!” Cefwyn shouted, and the man turned his face toward him, a dark-bearded man in a crowned helm, in black armor, bearing the forbidden Tower Crowned on his coat and his shield.