Urthryn opened his mouth to speak, but Andawyr’s hand came up to silence him.
‘With Dar Hastuin by his side, hurt though he was, not ten, fifty, a hundred times your forty squadrons would have prevailed against Creost if Cadmoryth hadn’t struck him down and given us the chance to tear the control of the islands from him. Atelon and I were almost spent when that happened. The fisherman and the bird tipped the balance and gave us the day.’
He leaned back in his seat and spread out his hands in a gesture of resignation. ‘And if you’d been with us, how would even your horses have fared when Dar Hastuin’s Viladrien was destroyed?’
Urthryn nodded reluctantly. The Muster’s only casualties had occurred in the panic that ensued when the sight and sound of that awful destruction had reached them. He stood silent for some time.
No one sought to speak.
‘Very well,’ he said eventually. ‘You’re right, Cad-wanwr, though the rightness quiets my head more than my belly. Perhaps time will attend to that.’ He turned to Hawklan. ‘I place myself and my riders at your com-mand. Those who come after must make their own decisions.’
Hawklan bowed. ‘Place them at the command of Loman,’ he said. ‘The army is his. My task is to find and waken the first of the Guardians, Ethriss.’
Urthryn gaped. ‘How…?’ he began.
‘I can answer none of your questions, Ffyrst,’ Hawk-lan said, before he could continue. ‘That would be to destroy us all. Our army will oppose His army, the Guardians and the Cadwanwr will oppose the Uhriel, but only Ethriss can oppose Sumeral and only I can find and waken him.’ He looked at Urthryn intently.
Urthryn turned to Loman who returned his gaze steadily.
‘Loman built this army, brought it through the mountains, fought this battle,’ Hawklan went on. ‘If you’d help us, then you must go with him to Fyorlund and join with the Lords to assault Derras Ustramel itself. If not, then perhaps you’d give us supplies to help us on our way-we’re already woefully short.’
Urthryn swayed, momentarily disorientated by the urgency and strangeness of Hawklan’s words set against the endless, pounding familiarity of his recent journey and the sight of the man-made carnage on the battle-field. Then other, stranger, scenes came to him: the colourful flotilla of empty boats eerily approaching the shore, and the great wave that swept away so many riders and divided the rest into squabbling bands; then the glaring brilliance and tumult of the dying Viladrien, and the fearful screaming of Usgreckan. In some way he could not fathom, he knew that all true choices were gone. And these people had saved his land.
He saluted Loman. ‘Together to Fyorlund and Der-ras Ustramel then,’ he said.
Loman smiled broadly and, standing up, wrapped the startled Riddinwr in a powerful embrace. There was some laughter after Urthryn disentangled himself and rubbed his ribs ruefully.
As though a cloud had moved from the sun, the atmosphere in the Command Tent relaxed and the discussion turned quickly to practical matters.
It transpired that the Orthlundyn’s supplies were indeed now dangerously low. Nor were the Muster much better placed, they also having come there in haste. Such food as was found in the remains of the Morlider camp had been destroyed either by fire in the Helyadin’s attack or by the Morlider themselves as they charged through all that stood in their way to reach their ships.
And there were prisoners, sick and well, to feed and to dispose of.
Hawklan cast an anxious glance at Urthryn as the topic arose, but the Ffyrst gave no sign of a return of his earlier rage. ‘We’ll tend to the prisoners fittingly,’ he said. ‘If the islands are truly gone then it may be a generation before they return but what we do now may determine what happens then.’
Andawyr and Hawklan exchanged glances. ‘What will you do with them?’ Hawklan asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Urthryn admitted. ‘For now we’ll have to make a camp for them of some kind, then slowly settle those that want to stay into different Houses.’
‘And those that don’t?’ Hawklan asked.
Urthryn blew out a noisy sigh. ‘Take them to the south or let them make their own boats and sail away.’ He shrugged. ‘Don’t worry. The smell of that beach and the noise in that hospital tent will be with me forever. We’ll do nothing that might have the seeds of such happenings in them for the future.’
‘And if the Moot has other ideas?’ Hawklan said.
‘The Moot only has authority over the Houses when the conduct of one threatens another in some way,’ Urthryn said off-handedly.
‘This is all we can do now, Hawklan,’ Dacu said, cutting across Hawklan’s next question. ‘We’ve more pressing problems to discuss, not the least of which, after supplies, is how we’re going to get the army and Urthryn’s squadrons up into Fyorlund.’
It was a timely point. The traditional route through the mountains from Riddin to Fyorlund, that taken by Sylvriss and Rgoric’s wedding party many years ago, entered the mountains far to the south and west of their present position. It would be a long dispiriting journey for the weary Orthlundyn.
‘The route we followed when we came through with the Queen could be used,’ Yengar volunteered. ‘It’s due north from here. It won’t be easy, but it’ll be a lot shorter. We have it detailed in our journals.’
The journals were produced and the meeting slipped easily into discussing the considerable logistical problems associated with moving the army and the Muster through the mountains.
Despite his concerns about the dismay amongst the Houses, Urthryn had no doubts about the willingness of the Riddinvolk to provide adequate supplies for the expedition and the ability of the Muster to carry them at least as far as the mountains, thereby considerably easing the Orthlundyn’s burden. It would be no easy task, he conceded, but it could be, and it would be, done.
The mountains, however, presented other problems.
‘This route might be manageable by your infantry and their few horses, but it’ll be too difficult for so much cavalry, especially as there’ll still be a lot of snow about when we get there,’ was Urthryn’s conclusion after Yengar’s notes had been carefully studied.
‘And it concerns me that we know nothing of what’s going on in Narsindal,’ he went on. ‘After what’s happened, we’ve no alternative but to assume that there’s a substantial army up there-or armies-and for all we know, they could be marching down the Pass of Elewart right now. Perhaps the Uhriel didn’t flee, perhaps they simply went for reinforcements.’
‘I doubt it,’ Andawyr said. ‘The Pass is being watched along almost its entire length. We’d have received news if anything untoward had happened.’
Urthryn looked at him paternally. ‘Always assuming that the… brother… carrying the message hasn’t got lost walking through the snow,’ he said. Andawyr pursed his lips and sniffed.
Urthryn beckoned Agreth forward. ‘Get two patrols out straight away. One to the Pass and the caves to find out whether anything’s happening and to establish a message line, the other to mark out the best route to the mountains for the army. And make a start on this supply problem right away.’
As Agreth departed, Urthryn shot a broad, concilia-tory smile at the slightly discomfited Andawyr. ‘Give the patrol whatever messages you need to send to your people,’ he said.
Then he sat back and stared pensively at the charts that had been produced during the discussion.
‘What do you want to do?’ Hawklan asked, knowing the answer.
‘"Want" isn’t the word I’d have chosen,’ Urthryn replied. ‘I don’t think we’ve any choice. We’ll have to go through the Pass and along the southern edge of Narsindal to the Tower to meet the Lords’ army.’
Hawklan agreed.
‘It’s a long journey, through territory that’s hostile enough without having an actual enemy in it,’ Dacu said. He indicated Yengar and Olvric. ‘One of us will have to go with you. We’re the only ones here who’ve ever ridden the Watch.’