“Somewhere in the North,” she replied. “Probably a journey of more than two weeks-and that if the enemy is oblivious to your passing.”
“If I go, and if this beast, Ancient Badden, is killed, I would have my freedom,” Bransen said. “Even if this assault does not end your war, as you hope. I would have my freedom with your blessing and imprimatur to return unhindered to the lands of southern Honce? And you will provide a ship to sail my family home.”
“You are in no position to bargain,” she said.
“And yet, bargain I do. Even if killing Ancient Badden does nothing to end this war, I will have my freedom.”
“You will not walk away,” Dame Gwydre said.
“If you believe that, then you have nothing to lose.”
“Agreed, then,” she said. “Bring me the head of Badden and I will have Dawson McKeege take you back to Chapel Abelle, along with my insistence that you be forgiven your past indiscretions, though I cannot guarantee that the Southern lairds and Church will heed that imprimatur.”
“Allow me to worry about that.”
Dame Gwydre stared at him a moment longer as she gathered her cloak up tight against her neck, and with a slight nod, she walked away.
Bransen stood there for a long while watching her go, and thinking that at least he had a direction before him now, a place to go with the hope that it might indeed end in the near future.
It did not occur to him that Ancient Badden would prove to be the most formidable foe he had ever faced.
SEVENTEEN
The Cost of Conscience
They repelled the assault but not without cost, for this last attack by the determined Alpinadorans had left several brothers seriously wounded, one critically. The cost to the Alpinadorans had been even more grievous, with many carried from the field.
“Fools, all!” Father De Guilbe scolded, shaking his fist at the departing horde. None of the monks around him dared utter a word in response, for never had they seen their leader so obviously flummoxed. “Will we kill you all? Is this the choice you force upon us, fool Teydru? If you are concerned for your flock, why do you throw it to the hungry wolves?”
By that point, almost all of the Alpinadorans were back at their beachfront encampment, and though De Guilbe was yelling at the top of his lungs, it was fairly obvious that they could not hear him well enough to make out his words. Still, he ranted for several minutes, his diatribe turning mostly against Teydru, before he at last turned to face his own brethren.
“Idiots!” he said with a snarl, and many brothers nodded their heads in agreement, and one whispered, “They will not break through our walls,” in support of the father’s general thesis.
Father De Guilbe took a deep breath then and settled back against the stone parapet, letting the tension drain from his battle-weary body. “We will be working the soul stones long into the night,” he said, mostly to Giavno. “Determine a rotation and be certain that our wounded brethren are tended dusk to dawn.”
“Of course,” Brother Giavno replied with a respectful bow.
“And if they come on again this day, conserve your magical powers,” De Guilbe told them all. “Let us ensure that we have the energy to heal our wounded. Repel the fools with stones and hot water.”
With that he took his leave, moving to the ladder that would take him to the courtyard. He had just started down when one of the brothers up high on the main keep yelled out, “They break camp!”
Father De Guilbe stood there for a moment looking up at the man, as did all the others, before they rushed wholesale to the wall to view the spectacle.
As the lookout had reported, they watched tents being struck, the distant barbarian encampment bustling with activity.
“Where are they moving their supplies?” Father De Guilbe yelled up to the lookout.
“To the boats!” he yelled back excitedly. “To the boats! They are taking to their boats!”
Father De Guilbe paused for a moment, then spun back to the wall to stare out at the distant camp. “Did we break their will at long last?” he quietly asked, and all of those around him murmured their hopeful agreement.
Soon after, all the brothers of Chapel Isle, save those already working the soul-stone magic on the wounded, gathered at the highest points on the southern battlements, staring out hopefully. Within an hour of the battle’s end, the first sails rose up on the Alpinadoran boats and the first paddles hit the warm waters of Mithranidoon, and a great cheer erupted across the chapel.
“Perhaps they are not as foolish as we believed,” Father De Guilbe said to Brother Giavno, both men smiling with the expectation that they had come through their dark trials.
That sense of victory was soon enough shattered, however, when a breathless young monk rushed into Father De Guilbe’s audience chambers.
“They are gone!” he stammered.
“They?” Brother Giavno asked before De Guilbe could.
“The barbarians!” the young man explained.
“Yes, we watched them break camp,” Giavno said.
“No, no,” the man stuttered, trying to catch his breath long enough to explain. “The barbarians in our dungeon. They are gone!”
“Gone?” This time it was Father De Guilbe asking.
“Out of their chamber and down the tunnel. The door to the pond was open and the grate has been dislodged,” the monk reported. “They are gone! Through the water and out, I am sure.”
De Guilbe and Giavno exchanged concerned looks.
“Now we understand why our enemies broke camp and departed,” Brother Giavno said.
Father De Guilbe was already moving, out to the hall and down the stairs. As they came out of the keep, rushing around to the entryway to the lower levels, Giavno spotted Brother Cormack and waved at him to join them.
“This is my fault,” Cormack said unexpectedly when they entered the now-empty dungeon.
The others turned to regard him.
“I should have recognized their ruse,” Cormack improvised. “Their unwillingness to eat.”
“What do you know of this?” Brother Giavno demanded.
“It was an enchantment, do you not see?” Cormack asked. “They were not starving themselves in protest, to die before converting to our ways. At their shaman’s instruction, they were starving themselves that he, or one of the others, could thin himself appropriately so that he could slip his bonds. Oh, but we should have guessed!”
“You babble!” Giavno said.
“Let him continue,” bade Father De Guilbe.
Cormack held up his arms and shook his head. “Their magic is tied to the natural way,” he tried to explain. “Perhaps-yes, I think it likely-their imposed starvation was merely so that they, their shaman, could enact some spell to further thin his wrists and hands.”
“Those bindings were tight,” another monk protested. “I tied them myself.”
“That was many days ago,” Cormack reminded. “The captives were far heavier then-all of them.”
“You cannot know,” Giavno said.
“Agreed,” said Cormack. “But somehow they managed to slip their bonds. It all makes sense now, I fear-their starvation, their confidence, their impudence. When first we encountered these people, before the lines of intransigence and battle were etched, I learned much of their ways, and I know their magic is tied to the natural. Their shamans have spells to make their warriors appear taller, to strike fear into their enemies. It is said that their greatest spiritualists can shape change into animal form, much like the great Samhaists of legend.”
“So you believe that their refusal to eat was a design to allow them escape?” Father De Guilbe asked.
To Cormack’s ears, the large man didn’t sound very convinced. Nor did Giavno, scowling at him from the side of the small dungeon, appear overly enthusiastic for Cormack’s improvised lie. But now Cormack had to carry it through, of course. “It makes sense in the context of what I know about their type of magic,” he said. “I should have guessed this ruse.”