Breca, on the other hand, was past strategy and morale, safe for now in another world I came to witness in the weeks that followed, in the tower and in the waiting. He was a swordsman, any thrust the same as any other, to be deflected or parried if he were still to call himself a swordsman. The snow settled on his helmet until I feared that soon it would cover him, cover him entirely in the face of his enemies, and then cover all of us — on foot, on horseback, on mule-back — until what remained was a pitiful series of drifts in the country of the enemy.
And the dragonsoldier called once more out of the vallenwoods. You aren't dressed well for such bravery, footman. even from here i can see the dents in the armor. i can tell where your breastplate is crumpled and useless, where my sword would do the most damage. Your feet are probably wrapped in rags. Though the snow is too heavy to tell for certain. Yet I suppose that such is the finery that knights issue their footmen.
And they retreated into the thick boles and branches of the woods, so that they probably did not hear Breca's retort, which we heard nonetheless, which the footmen heard, which rode in my ears with its flat and furious blessing as we approached the gates of the tower:
You think we dress up to kill hogs?
Inside the tower gates, dismounting, the breathing and steam from the horses misting the air, but not as densely as the snow had misted the air outside, I remember most of all my sense of relief. Of course we were to learn of the frailties later, that in its endurance without change and restoration the tower had become indefensible, but at the time the walls seemed tall and strong, the fortress unbreachable. I would imagine, Bayard, that you have heard the stories, and that in the hearing you have imagined walls of your own, more vividly than the ones I could describe, down to the stone upon stone, to the mortar and to the tightly arranged masonry that permits no mortar, and perhaps your walls are as accurate, as real as the ones I saw, because I knew no more of fortresses and their construction than I did the songs of birds.
Now we fight from defense, I thought. Now we fight at advantage. But more than that, we fight from warmth, on the leeward side of the walls. That warmth, that comfort, was most important then, and the chambers to which Heros and I were escorted, as damp and drafty as an old attic, were a palace, were more than enough. I am spoiled now in the hospital, for there is a fire here and curtains, curtains that for all I can tell may be sackcloth, a plain burlap, but nonetheless do what curtains were intended to do in that time before we saw fit to embroider and adorn them.
If Heros had known what I was thinking, he would have said I thought like a footman. He would have been right, for they were talking when I went to tend to the horses, most of them wrapped in blankets and standing, sitting, lying around the banked fires that spangled the dark inner courtyards, a few others, the older veterans, crouched and circled around Breca, who sat upon his helmet, cupping his enormous red hands as he lit his pipe, the glow arising from the bowl spreading over his face in a light both saintly and violent.
I nodded to Breca, receiving a nod in return as he singled me out from the darkness. He had what Heros called The Ingrained Politeness To His Betters, not as common as you might imagine among footmen, but a quality all were urged to adopt and cultivate. Still, I liked to think — and DO think — this initial politeness to me was something more, stood for something. After all, he remembered the boots on the trail to the tower, and perhaps in that soldier's mind used to self-preservation and necessity, small gestures of decency counted for more than the horse and elaborate armor. Then again, he may have thought only that I was foolish, or felt sorry for me because of my youth, or he may have thought all of these things and not have been wrong in the thinking.
His face glowed above the pipe like a signal fire, or it could have been from the reflected light of his audience. For there were twenty or thirty men around him, some of them Lord Alfred's age, several nearly as young as I, but most in between — as I have said, the veterans. All of them were like children in the presence of a storyteller, but instead of awaiting the tales of high deeds and magic we heard and you still hear in the spacious courts of Solamnia, they were questioning, all questions amounting to one: what chance do we have to hold this fort?
Nor did he coddle them, assure them, as the storytellers do at Mother's — so it is elves you want, young master? Then you shall hear of elves. None of that for footmen. Breca was honest, or pretended honesty in a way that came closer to the truth than simple honesty, which sometimes allows for dishonest imaginings.
I expect, he said, that a centaur designed this tower.I expect he done so after a celebration of victory, on account of the building speaks more of wine than of tactics. I count four gates in the fortress, which is three more than you need, four more than i'd fancy now that we've got inside.
And what is worse than four gates I will tell you is four wide gates, gates where a half a dozen centaurs might gallop in abreast. The dragonarmies don't mind spending men, and even seem to favor spending draconians, seeing as they have so many of them. What is more, they're liable to send dragons or some terrible machinery right through our doors. And he sat back, the smoke curling like snow or a morning fog, like the mist from the horses, around his enormous, ragged head. The footmen waited, not for the quick and easy answer, the inspiring speech that would tell them that despite all these things, we would win by tactics and by bravery, that one man in the service of Solamnia could defeat a dozen draconians. They awaited his judgment on the walls.
Which are not of your best material or design. I am not a stone mason, nor am I a betting man — this last drawing laughter from some of the older soldiers — but if I was, I would wager that a fat man at a healthy trot could cause structural damage to this mighty fortress.
More laughter followed, and I drew nearer the group, curry-comb in hand, the horses forgotten. If what he was saying were indeed true — and I had no cause to doubt him — we were cornered, backed into a shoddy and vulnerable place where the walls stood not between us and the dragonarmies, but between us and our own escape. And the footmen sat here joking and spinning stories.
Look around you, Breca muttered as the laughter died again, as some of the men looked up uneasily, skeptically, looking into the rose embroidered on my doublet as if it were an orb of prophecy, looking at me as though I were a messenger from another planet.
Look around you.Soon enough you'll see the birds no longer light here. The news has a way of spreading amongst the animals, and not just from kind to kind. Soon enough you'll see the rats leaving. The horses have the same instincts, but they're tethered and stabled and — he glanced at me, smiled briefly, and stared at his pipe — and curried. all that keeps any of us here is the knights, who think they can hold this place with honor alone. Honor is well and good, but it don't stop a spear, boys. Best it can do is leave a cleaner wound.
But don't fret, boys, he concluded, looking directly at me with those huge gray eyes that the folk tales say are the sign of marksmen or madmen, I forget which. don't fret, for at least you've found yourself a warm place to die.