Gadolor

The Battle of Weddel Pass

Note: this contains spoilers for The Greater Love

A mountain blizzard’s howl mixed with the shouts of men and beasts as they clung to the perilous edge and fought. The soldier Lester sat astride his horse, willing himself not to look left down into the abyss of swirling snow and quivering with fresh fear whenever he did. His right boot had often bumped the cliff on the right, so near and sheer it was, allowing only a brutally narrow shelf for hooves and feet. This was the narrowest place of all, and that was not the only reason Lester wished to be anywhere else.

Another clash of metal stabbed the air ahead, slightly muffled by the snow as if it had sounded underground. Then a horse screamed. “Take him! Take him down, fools,” the captain bellowed from somewhere behind. Their lone enemy had taken his stand where only one could attack at a time, making useless the score of soldiers that had given chase from the valley. Lester tightened his gloved grip on his spear. The cold wind had long since chilled that hand. The cliff would limit the movement of his right hand, he knew, as it was just now limiting his comrade at the front. The fight had already gone on long enough for the white sky to begin turning gray and for Lester’s joints to stiffen from sitting still. He had inched his horse ahead gradually, grimly, taking up the space where his now dead or bleeding comrades had stood. At first there had been eight horses ahead of Lester. Now, only three stood between him and the raging swordsman and he wondered whether he would have to face the warrior after all.

“Astooor,” the shouting voice never stopped. “Esthenaaa,” it had gradually become clearer amid the howling wind as Lester’s horse inched closer. “For the beautiful northern plains. For my beautiful bride,” the last word was stretched out a little into an “Ahh,” and a different man shouted in victory. The warrior had been wounded. Lester could just see his blade now, curving around and up and down. It flashed up and the leading horse screamed again, rearing up as it lost its nerve. The beast slipped, toppled, and fell, its rider leaping from the saddle too late to grip the edge, his cry mingling with his mount’s as the two bodies fell into swallowing whiteness. Lester willed himself not to listen for the sound of flesh hitting rock far below, but he needn’t have worried because the wind and the pinging of hard snowflakes on his helmet dulled other noise.

A man named Sorn, the next soldier, thought better than to wait for the warrior to cut up his horse while dodging his useless spear. He spurred his mount forward. Ducking quickly, the warrior brought up the point of a fallen spear and the horse’s breast plunged onto it with an audible thump. It didn’t scream but thrashed and crumpled, pushing the warrior back a pace.

Sorn leaped backward off his horse when he saw it speared, fearing it would fall too, and landed heavily on his chain-armored rear. Rising, he flashed a fierce glance at the next man, the one just ahead of Lester, saying, “Help me on foot.” This had already been tried. Somehow the rider managed to dismount without falling off the ledge and tiptoed up to join Sorn while Sorn and the warrior faced off across the mass of warm yet motionless animal. The warrior was struggling to extract his spear from its chest, but the weapon had wedged in a crack in the rock and wouldn’t budge. Finally, the two armored spearmen faced the lone swordsman, who had been pushed back slightly from the narrowest place, meaning they could nearly attack him abreast. Blood stained the snow and rocks all around. Lester wondered if any of it was the warrior’s, then noted the way he pressed one elbow to his side but couldn’t find any pain or fear in the man’s wild face. “Come and fight Andel son of Torestin,” he dared them, his voice now slightly hoarse, “Come take her over my broken corpse.”

“Go help them,” said the man behind Lester in a nervous voice.

“Huh? You help them,” Lester shot back.

The captain was now close enough to see the battle in detail. “Lester! Dismount and help your comrades.”

“You help them,” grumbled Lester, the wind offering ample cover for his insubordination. He let his spear clatter to the rocks then dismounted with the luxury of a few good inches of rock at his horse’s left flank. The three fighters ahead were jabbing and sparing, unable for now to advance over the dead horse’s body. Lester passed a previous fighter who had been cut across the knee who was trying to stop the bleeding with his cloak, joining the two standing soldiers, poising his own spear with one chilled hand but not throwing it because the warrior was quick enough to block it. Was it the winter storm or loss of blood that made Andel’s cheeks appear so pale? The cunning glint in his eyes flared up, then faded as his shoulders slumped and his swordpoint drooped.

Sorn charged with a shout, jumping from rump to saddle and then through the air. Sorn had always won sprinting matches, and he moved quickly now—but too slowly to block the sword that flicked up again and skewered his chin. Pitching him aside like a farmer pitches hay, the warrior whipped his sword arm back, blocking the next soldier’s thrust, just before the soldier crashed into him. For all his storied strength, the warrior fell backward with the soldier atop him. Their weapon arms were tangled together. The warrior pulled a dagger and stabbed, puncturing mail and skin but no more. Lacking a second weapon, the soldier punched and elbowed and even angrily spat a tooth that the sword hilt had knocked out.

Lester suddenly jerked into action, stumbling forward. He meant to stab the unarmored man with a grand final strike but slipped in bloody snow and tripped on the dead horse’s legs, tipping forward and merely smacking the warrior’s face with the spearblade’s side. The spear shaft had collected ice; it slipped from Lester’s hand and gradually slid over the edge, disappearing. Lester grabbed his enemy’s boot helplessly.

The soldier’s punching arm went limp as the dagger found his armpit. Then the rest of him writhed as it widened the hole in his mail. Thinking briefly of the noose back home that waited for cowards, Lester crawled from the warrior’s boots up to his heaving chest, like a gruesome parody of some lover crawling into bed. The two men exchanged a long snarling gaze. The dagger was trapped in the other’s side, so for the moment no one had any weapons. With a flash of clarity Lester saw if he could only trap the warrior’s arms the fight would be won. So he set a knee in his enemy’s gut, extracting a pained grunt, and flopped bodily across the warrior’s upper half.

Lester had the misfortune of landing with his face half protruding from the precipice’s edge, giving him an unpretentious view of the chasm below. He had time to be amazed that he couldn’t see the bottom before a hand ripped off his helmet, which sailed off into the void, then pulled at his hair, trying to heave him off. He tucked his elbows into the rock in pure self-preservation, then became aware that new soldiers had joined the battle. They were grabbing the warrior’s legs, pulling at his arms, cheering victory. They had finally done it.

The Astoran warrior wouldn’t quit struggling. Finally after much shuffling along the narrow trail and dragging wounded men to a wider place, the captain came and clamped shackles on ankles and wrists, and Andel finally stilled. The fighting glint in his eyes faded again and Lester saw only a weary, bloody man. The captain glanced up. “What of the girl?”

“Gone, sir!” reported one, “There aren’t even snowprints.”

“The wind erased them, fool,” the captain answered, “There’s only one path. We go after her.”

“Sir, it’s getting dark. If we cross the Pass now we’ll never get back and Astor will hunt us down.” The captain considered it, staring at the prisoner, who gazed up the path with triumph evident on his gashed face. Cursing, the captain finally agreed to return home to Weddel town, and as daylight failed they began the troublesome business of turning the horses around.

The prisoner was wanted alive, but more than one blow found him as they dragged him along in chains. “You killed Sorn,” one cried, offering a booted kick. The prisoner hugged the ground. Lester didn’t see it, the captain didn’t see it, nor did any of the men—but Andel’s fingers groped the ground and prized a long shard of granite, which he hid in his fist. He would keep it hidden for three days. It was just the right size to pry open the rings that held his shackles in place.