Makaralonga blinked through sodden strands of hair. “A grasslander!”
“Yield, and you shall be honestly treated.” Tol stepped back, drawing a deep breath into his aching chest.
Above, Tol’s charge had broken Makaralonga’s attack, and Caskan’s footmen broke the foresters’ latest attempt to storm the knoll. When Tol emerged from the ravine with Makaralonga at sword point before him, a wail went up from the foresters. Although they still outnumbered the Ergothians ten to one, they lost heart at the sight of their chief in the enemy’s hands. They began to back into the underbrush, but their retreat became a rout when Ergothian soldiers flung themselves on the horde’s surviving horses and charged after them. The log barricade was dragged down and horsemen thundered down the knoll. They sabered scores of fleeing tribesmen, following them into the trees in their eagerness to pay back their tormenters.
Tol prodded Makaralonga to the broken bulwark. Waiting there was Egrin. Wan and bloodied, he still sat proudly on Old Acorn.
“By the gods, Tol! How did you get here?” Egrin exclaimed.
Tol told him quickly of Felryn’s vision and how they’d mounted a rescue.
The warden looked over the scattered members of Tol’s little host. “Footmen? You entered the forest with two hundred footmen?”
“One hundred,” Tol corrected. “Half remained behind to guard the encampment.”
Egrin shook his head, but put aside his astonishment to stare at the man Tol had captured. On learning the fellow’s identity, the warden was amazed anew. “The chief of the Dom-shu!”
“I am,” said Makaralonga proudly. “I yielded to this warrior on the promise of my life.” He grimaced, clutching his shoulder where Tol’s sword had cut deeply. “You raise bold fighters in your country, horse-rider.”
“So it seems,” Egrin said, staring at his shilder. He was torn. He didn’t know whether to upbraid Tol for disobeying orders and entering the forest, or praise him for his astounding success. In the end, he simply ordered him to secure Makaralonga inside the bulwark, then had horns blown to recall his vengeful warriors from their pursuit of the fleeing tribesmen.
At the crest of the knoll, they found Lord Odovar. The foolhardy, courageous marshal had been laid beneath a broad elm tree, arms crossed reverently on his chest. His armor was deeply scarred,, and he bore many terrible wounds.
“He died fighting like a bull,” said a nearby warrior, badly wounded himself in an earlier fight. “The savages tried four times to capture him, wading out with nooses and nets, but hip-deep in water, Lord Odovar slew so many they drew back and rained arrows on him until they killed him.”
The hardened warrior put his head down and wept, and Tol grieved for the loss as well. So much had happened to him since that day in the onion field when he’d first met Lord Odovar. After the terrible head wound he’d received from Grane, the marshal had grown into a harsh and impatient man, yet he represented Tol’s first taste of a wider world, the world beyond the narrow confines of farm and family. Staring down at the still form, Tol silently thanked Odovar of Juramona for giving him the chance to make a better life for himself.
“A good death!” Makaralonga declared. “I would wish for the same.”
Tol blinked away his tears and looked up at the brawny chief. “Yet you surrendered. Why?” he asked.
The chief of the Dom-shu tribe, favoring his wounded shoulder, sat down heavily on a slab of sandstone.
“I could see you are a great warrior. There is no shame being beaten by a man like you.”
Later, when Makaralonga saw Tol scrubbed clean, the chief was surprised at his conqueror’s obvious youth, but showed no shame at having been captured by one so young. In fact, the knowledge only made him prouder.
“This one will be known to the gods some day,” Makaralonga declared. “And when they speak his name, they will say, ‘His first victory was over Makaralonga of the Dom-shu.’ ”
Chapter 10
Egrin and Pagas led the survivors of the Panther and Eagle hordes out of the Great Green. Collecting their people and baggage from Zivilyn’s Carpet, they rode back to Caergoth to report the death of Lord Odovar, their sighting of the traitor Morthur Dermount, and not least of all, their repulse by the surprisingly well-armed and well-led forest tribes.
The news they brought was not unexpected-nor warmly received. Elsewhere, too, the war was not going as Prince Amaltar and his advisers had anticipated. Wanthred, leading the Firebrands alongside the Corij Rangers, had been attacked on three sides at once. His men had to resort to setting part of the woods ablaze in order to stage a fighting withdrawal under cover of the flames. The pillar of smoke from the conflagration could be seen all the way back to Caergoth.
Further south, two hordes under the dashing Lord Tremond had fared better. They penetrated deeply into the wilderness, sacking a dozen small settlements and taking hundreds of prisoners. In the shadow of his success, blame for Odovar’s and Wanthred’s failures was laid squarely at the feet of those two commanders.
Tol was present when Egrin disputed this injustice before the prince. Lord Urakan, the general of all the armies of the empire, angrily dismissed Egrin’s explanations. Urakan, looking nearly as regal as the prince himself in the burgundy velvet robes he favored, berated the accomplished warrior as if Egrin were a blundering neophyte, using abusive language Tol had never heard before. Behind the enraged Urakan, Crown Prince Amaltar slouched silently on his high-backed throne.
When Egrin tried to point out the hidden dangers of the Great Green, Lord Urakan cut him off.
“You failed, that’s all that matters!” Urakan stormed, black brows drawn down in a ferocious scowl. “Odovar let the foresters hoodwink him into an obvious trap, and you failed to extricate him!”
“My lord. Your Highness,” Egrin said to the general and the prince, “it is true Lord Odovar did not take adequate precautions against ambush. He was a loyal and formidable warrior, but not a skilled tactician. However, it was because of one of Lord Odovar’s chosen men that we were able to fight our way back with valuable information and captives.”
With a bow to the prince, Urakan said dismissively, “A shield-bearer claims to have seen Lord Morthur Dermount in the forest. The prisoners Warden Egrin brought out of the forest, Highness, are hardly compensation for the shame of our losses!”
Egrin did something unprecedented; he bypassed Urakan, his superior, and spoke directly to the prince.
“Your Highness, our two captives are of considerable importance. One is the chief of a major tribe in the northern forest. The other is-well, he may have dynastic importance.”
“How dare you!” Urakan’s face went purple with rage at being disregarded. His hand reached for the hilt of his sword, but he was wearing no weapon in the presence of the prince. He declared, “I will have satisfaction for this insult!”
“You’ll have no such thing,” Prince Amaltar said, sounding bored. He gestured for the burly general to stand aside. “Warden, bring the prisoners to me, and I will judge for myself.”
“They await Your Highness’s pleasure,” Egrin said, bowing. He snapped his fingers, and the two captives were hustled in.
Makaralonga hobbled forward, weighted down with heavy chains on his wrists and ankles. Despite his disheveled appearance-his garments muddy and bloody-his expressive face and noble bearing were still impressive.
Slightly behind the forester chief was a second prisoner, likewise shackled, but with his head and shoulders covered by a canvas hood. Two guards guided the hooded captive, while a second pair kept an eye on Makaralonga.