Twenty paces from the trestles and the watching border-guards, Gawain leaned from the saddle, and the longsword swept down in a massive arc. Blood from the terrible wound the blade inflicted on the fleeing mercenary sprayed the track, almost to the trestles.
Gwyn came to an abrupt halt some five paces from the crossing, showering the border-guards with grit and dust and small pebbles. Gawain gazed down at them, blade held high and dripping blood. It was as though they weren't there, so cold and dismissive was the look they received.
Then the mighty horse and its awful rider had turned, and were charging back up the slope, towards the figure climbing shakily from the overturned sedan…
The emissary of Ramoth, a tall and gangling man with close-cropped hair, gazed at the carnage around him, the eye-amulet hanging from his neck wide open, as if mirroring the stunned expression on the man's face.
Recognition, when he saw Gawain, told the younger man everything he wanted to know. This emissary had come from the north, and yet knew Gawain's face. The dark wizardry in the eye-amulet was real, Tallbot of Jarn had been correct. The emissaries could communicate with one another.
"You!" The emissary sneered. "Ramoth sees you!"
"Tell him to prepare, scum. Tell him he will not wait long for my coming. I have a gift for him, and I am anxious to deliver it."
"He sees all, and hears all!" the man screamed, pointing an accusing finger. But the emissary's voice was shrill with fear and dread, and Gawain smiled.
The acolytes might be mindless, vacant followers, but the emissaries were not so vacuous. They valued their lives, unlike their followers. Terror, Gawain knew instinctively, would make for a valuable ally in this quest.
"Good," he replied, and Gwyn nodded. "Then this conversation is at an end."
The sword swung lazily, destroying both the emissary and the eye-amulet.
Gawain turned again, and Gwyn began walking slowly to the crossing. In the distance, he saw two Jurian riders galloping away across the plains, probably to the castletown itself. But already the Callodon guards were hastily dragging the heavy wooden trestles aside at his approach.
The Jurians, realising what their Callodon counterparts were doing, rushed to open their side of the track. All stood as far to the sides of the track as they could as Gawain ambled slowly past them, sheathing his blade and eyeing them disinterestedly.
A mile further down the track he allowed himself a faint grin. Word of his approach was spreading far ahead of him. In black towers all across the land, Ramoth emissaries would suffer. They would sleep fitfully, all of them, surrounded by their mercenaries. They would know fear. They would know that the mercenaries would make for poor bodyguards. They would take to their lofty towers, and hopefully stay there.
Which meant that the ordinary folk in these lands would be spared the constant cries of "make way" and "open your heart". Spared the jingling of loathsome bells in their market squares.
Yes, Gawain thought, fear and terror do indeed make for good allies in this quest. Not very noble, and certainly not honourable. But a lone warrior must make use of any weapon, any ally, and Gawain was certainly alone.
He reached the outskirts of the Jurian town of Bardin four days after crossing the border. It was here that Gawain decided to try a new tactic, to test the strength of his new allies. It was night when he reached the copse beside which the tower had been constructed. He and Gwyn slept lightly, waiting for the dawn.
After his remembrance, the first rays of sunshine warming his face, he ate a frugal breakfast, checked his weapons, and took to the saddle. When he rode out of the tree-line it was broad daylight, a glorious summer's morning.
The tower lay some three hundred paces from the trees, and he simply sat on his horse, motionless, staring at the tower and the guards at the palisade gate.
They saw him instantly he emerged from the trees, and he could hear their calls of alarm. Within moments, a dozen mercenaries were lined at the gate. Gawain simply sat there, and watched.
He could hear a muted chanting coming from the long huts flanking the tower, and half expected dark wizardry to assail him, but nothing happened. If Ramoth's followers were entreating their god to rid them of the unknown longsword warrior outside their gates, he was deaf to their pleas. If Morloch, the half man half mythical dark wizard were in league with Ramoth, then the whitebeard Allazar must be correct, and his powers all but spent after wreaking such total destruction on Raheen. No blast of fire, no thunderbolts, no dark magic blew Gawain from his saddle.
Nothing but the distant murmuring of futile chanting, and the stares of worried mercenaries to interrupt this otherwise fine morning.
Still Gawain remained motionless, idly watching the shadow he and Gwyn cast on the grass. A bumblebee, laden with pollen and struggling against the weight, droned by towards the trees behind the rider and his steed. Gawain admired its tenacity and strength of purpose. Few humans would labour so strenuously for their queen and their fellows without reward.
A few moments later, the Ramoth mercenaries let loose with bow and crossbow. Their optimism was little more than a sign of their desperation; all the shafts and bolts fell harmlessly a good fifty paces in front of Gawain. He sniffed the air, and Gwyn bobbed her head almost disparagingly.
A skylark twittered cheerfully somewhere above them, a much more pleasing sound on the ear than the twang of bowstrings and the irritating chanting from the long huts.
More arrows and bolts flew his way, and still they fell harmlessly short. Gawain smiled to himself, and Gwyn ambled slowly forward, almost to the line of spent arrows in the lush grass. There they stopped. And waited.
More time passed, and Gawain smiled again as more shafts fell harmlessly short. Then he drew his longsword, slowly and deliberately, allowing the sun to sparkle and glint on the blade.
It was too much for two of the mercenaries, who turned and ran into the compound, only to return moments later on horseback, charging through their former comrades and galloping off to the east, away from the tower, away from the solitary rider who sat so menacingly still, watching and waiting, longsword in hand.
It was enough. No sooner had the two riders become lost on the horizon in the glare of the morning sun than the sound of raised voices drifted to Gawain's ears on the gentle breeze. One of the mercenaries could be seen clutching at the tunics of the others as they bolted for the compound and their horses, until finally he stood alone. The man appeared to consider his prospects a moment longer, then he too hurried for his horse.
When last he saw them, the Ramoth mercenaries were charging towards the sun as fast as their steeds could carry them.
Gawain then eased his own horse forward, grim resolution etched on his features…
12. Allies
Three days north of the Jurian town of Bardin and the shattered remains of its Ramoth tower, Gwyn snorted anxiously. In the distance, a large party of riders were charging towards them at the gallop.
Here in the open plains there was no cover, nowhere to hide, nowhere to run. Gawain eyed the approaching throng and sighed. If they were enemy, it may not go well for him. He might fell a few with his arrows, and slay yet more with the sword, but one man against twenty is slim odds in a cavalry encounter. Not once did he consider fleeing. Instead, he strung an arrow, and waited.
The riders slowed when they neared, and formed a single broad line, light gleaming on their emblazoned tunics and metal helms. Jurian honour-guards, armed with cavalry swords and short lances. Not very good odds at all.