Joscelin made a strangled sound. I turned away.
"Watch," said the Master of the Straits, his voice remorseless.
It was a slaughter. It was swift, at least; the Skaldi are trained to kill efficiently, and Selig’s warriors especially. I watched them sing as they killed, blades reddened. Doubtless I’d heard the songs before. In the vague distance, I could make out the shining hawk banners of d’Aiglemort’s advance guard, beating a prudent retreat, unseen by the Skaldi invaders.
And then the bulk of the D’Angeline army swept onto the scene.
The fighting was too widespread to compass. We pieced it together, watching. Percy, Comte de Somerville rode at the head of the army, driving a wedge into the weak middle of the Skaldi masses. Ah, Elua, the bloodshed! It was dreadful to behold. I tried to number the banners in the D’Angeline army, and could not. Siovalese, Eisandine, L’Agnacites, Kusheline, Namarrane; no Azzallese, for they were ranged along the northern border, holding the Rhenus.
And no Camaeline, for they were with d’Aiglemort or dead.
I saw the gold lion of the Royal House of Aragon flying above a company of foot-soldiers, some thousand strong, who wore flared steel helms and fought with well-trained efficiency, using long spears to force back the Skaldi foot.
I saw, to my surprise, the Duc Barquiel L’Envers at the head of two hundred Akkadian-taught cavalry, harassing the right flank of the Skaldi with short-bows. Drustan mab Necthana leaned forward, alert with interest; I couldn’t blame him. The Duc grinned broadly as he rode, the ends of his burnouse trailing at the base of a conical steel helm, and his riders wheeled and turned like a flock of starlings, releasing a deadly shower of arrows. One took Kolbjorn of the Manni through the eye, and I wasn’t sorry to see it. I’d had my doubts of Barquiel L’Envers, who had been my lord Delaunay’s enemy for so long, but I was glad, now, he was on our side.
In the end, the Skaldi were simply too many. The Comte de Somerville’s wedge broke the Skaldi center, driving a dreadful swathe of carnage; the right flank was in disarray, breaking up in a surge to meet L’Envers' fleeting attacks.
But on the left, to the east, was Waldemar Selig. I watched, unable to look away, as Selig gathered his forces, roaring soundlessly, and brought them to bear on the D’Angeline army, closing in from behind on the rearguard of the Comte de Somerville’s driving wedge.
It was a rout. To de Somerville’s credit, it was an orderly one. I never fully understood, until then, how he’d come to the title of Royal Commander. I understood that day. A line of L’Agnacite archers, protected by the cavalry, took their positions, kneeling with longbows in hand. Faces grim, they held their position, firing volley after volley, holding the Skaldi at bay while the D’Angeline army retreated. Most of them would die, although Barquiel L’Envers' men, riding like Rousse’s ten thousand Akkadian devils, saved more than a few.
But the D’Angeline army’s flight was secured.
They fell back on Troyes-le-Mont, in the foothills of northern Namarre. Later, I learned, de Somerville had known it was likely; Troyes-le-Mont had been made ready for their retreat, stocked and garrisoned, fortifications in place.
Ysandre de la Courcel, who would stand or die with Terre d’Ange, was there.
It was the first thing we’d seen, in the waters of the Master of the Straits' bronze basin, and it was the last. The face of Ysandre de la Cource, the Queen of Terre d’Ange. Drustan drew a deep breath. Then the moving images faded from the surface of the water. In their place rose a map of Terre d’Ange.
"Do you understand?" the Master of the Straits asked, and pointed. "Here," he said, indicating the location of Troyes-le-Mont, "the D’Angeline army is besieged." His finger moved in a small circle. "All around, the Skaldi threaten." He traced the northern border of Azzalle. "Here, too, in lesser numbers, but enough to harry. Here, and here," he pointed at the lower passes, "the fighting is at a standstill. The numbers were too few. And here," he indicated the eastern edge of Eisande, that bordered on Caerdicca Unitas, "a force of the allied Caerdicci city-states holds, lest the Skaldi break through."
"Cowards," Quintilius Rousse muttered, his voice full of loathing. "The best they would offer, no doubt. My lord, can you tell me where my fleet lies?"
"They fly the swan?" the Master of the Straits asked; it surprised me, a little, that he did not know for a surety, although the faces on the water gave no names. Rousse affirmed it. "Here." The bone-white finger moved along the course of the Rhenus. "They hold the northern border with the Azzallese."
"Good lads," Rousse said gruffly.
"Then the Duc de Morbhan let them go," I mused. "Where’s de Morbhan, anyway? Did anyone see his banner?"
Heads shook. I pored over the basin, frowning. "Where is Isidore d’Aiglemort?" I asked the Master of the Straits, forgetting to be afraid of him. "He commands an army still, yes?"
"The silver-haired hawk of the north." The pointing finger hovered over an area along the upper border of Camlach and Namarre. "Here, today," the Master of the Straits said; his fingertip touched the surface of the water, and the map rippled and wavered. "Tomorrow, near. He has trapped himself in his folly."
"Good," I said bitterly, thinking of Baudoin’s Glory-Seekers, the hundreds of loyal Camaelines who’d died to pin him there. I touched the diamond around my throat. "Where is Melisande Shahrizai?"
The Master of the Straits hesitated, then shook his head. The sun, setting in the west, filled his mutable eyes with bloodred fire. Gildas and Tilian waited some feet away, agitated; it was time to descend the steps and refill the bronze basin. "Great events, I see reflected," said the Master of the Straits. "Small, I cannot see, unless the face is known to me."
"History hinges on small events," Quintilius Rousse said direly. Joscelin shifted, the sun at his back throwing the cruciform shadow of his sword-hilt across the bronze waters.
"There," Drustan mab Necthana breathed in Cruithne, ignoring us all. Leaning forward, he tapped the site of Troyes-le-Mont with one finger as had the Master of the Straits, marking the spot where Ysandre’s face had last been seen. Circular ripples spread outward, obliterating the map. When the waters stilled, it did not reform, but merely reflected sky and setting sun. "There is where we will go!"
He looked up at me, dark eyes gleaming in his blue masque. I glanced at Quintilius Rousse, the only one among us with military expertise, who looked to the Master of the Straits.
The tall, robed figure turned away, pacing to the far verge of the temple. "The Cruarch of Alba spoke truly when he said I did not play you fair. I will set your fleet where you will, where the shore touches sea. No more can I do. I have no mastery over land, to traverse it at will. First and Second Sisters I rule from the Third, though I may not leave her soil. No more can I do."
"My lord Admiral?" I held my gaze on Quintilius Rousse.
Rousse cleared his throat. "To the mouth of the Rhenus, then, Elder Brother, and as far up her shores as your wind may drive us." He scratched his chin and looked at the rest of us. "We’ll rendezvous with my fleet and Ghislain de Somerville’s forces and secure the northern border. Mayhap combined we can think of a way to break the siege on Troyes-le-Mont."
I translated this for Drustan, who nodded curtly. Young and lovesick he might be, but not such a fool as to throw away his people’s lives in a desperate charge.
"Tomorrow at dawn," the Master of the Straits spoke, turning round to face us, his face terrible and pale against the darkening skies. "The seas will carry you where you wish. Be ready."