Chapter 10

Early Winter, 3133, half-day east of Highbridge.

Carl Mitter Wycke took a moment to stretch his legs before re-mounting his horse. In his younger days, riding or walking long distances meant little more than wasted time to him. But now in his fifties, his legs, back, and rear end ached like he had been riding nonstop for a month- and all this after only three days.

"Let's be off!" he heard from ahead, "The Duke's heir awaits!"

Mitter tried to see through the shadows to find the man calling to them. A few feet ahead, he could see the dark shape of Carl Harald Frÿcke atop his horse. Frÿcke was a young man, who earned his title only five summers ago. He had been annoyingly energetic the entire journey, and his restlessness was beginning to take its toll on the older men.

"Braggart," mutter Mitter under his breath. He mounted his horse, easing his sore backside onto the saddle carefully. It had been many years since he rode so hard for several days. The first day out of Greywater Deep was cold and wet, but the roads were well kept around the city, so the travelling was easy. The second day, the roads became sloppy and muddy. The view of Highbridge and its warm, dry keep at day's end was as welcome a sight as he had seen in years. He stay was short, however, as the Duke and his Carls departed early, their numbers bolstered by five Carls sworn to House Orgreave who joined them at Highbridge. Thirty they were now. All of them titled Carls, along with Duke Orren Gendry himself.

The going was difficult east of the river. The heavy forest confused the lead riders, and they were often forced to double back when they mistakenly took the wrong paths. All the roads in the forest were unmarked, and many looked the same as others they had passed before. If not for Carl Jurich Hyrl, of House Orgreave, they would have been hopelessly lost in the first hour. Hyrl was a soldier-thane sworn to Clemond Orgreave. His home was located some eight miles into the forest east of the city of Highbridge, but word had reached him late that Lord Orgreave was riding for Maeden. He knew the lands fairly well, though even he was at times fooled by the wandering roads.

Duke Gendry had been noticeably quiet the entire ride. The last time Mitter Wycke had ridden to war with him, he had been signing, laughing, and drinking the entire time. Of course, that was fifteen summers ago, and his son was not missing then. Indeed, Mitter had noted a definite change in the Duke's demeanor since they reached Highbridge. Some of the men had spoken amongst themselves and most had agreed that the Duke had probably hoped to hear some news of his son and kinsman at the city, but Mitter knew it was more. The Duke had spent an hour alone with Elise, his son's new wife, and his face was drawn after speaking with her. Mitter knew that the Duke found it difficult to break such news to friends, let alone his new daughter.

Still, even Mitter, despite his usual pessimistic attitude, held out some hope that Marten was still in Maeden, and had been simply delayed. He could not envision the people of any town in Horwald turning on a man of House Gendry. The people of the Duchy revered the Duke's line as heroes out of legend. They sang songs about Harold, the first Gendry Duke, as if he were Oes himself. It was uncanny, the devotion these people had for their liege lords.

The trees slid slowly by on both sides, leaning over the narrow roadway, nearly creating a canopy of dark pine needles overhead. Mitter knew that further into the forest where the elevation was slightly lower there were stronger types of trees such as oak and maple. But he had never ridden so far into the forest, not had many men he knew personally.

All thirty men were aware that the tiny town of Maeden was less than an hour away even at the snail's pace they were travelling. So most men were slightly uneasy. The Duke had warned them to watch for trouble on the road. If something was amiss, and the townsfolk had turned against Marten and Clemond, then they would have to know that more fighting men would come from the west looking for them.

The track was just wide enough for two men to ride side by side. Unfortunately for Mitter, he had ridden next to Arian Clusswig then entire day. Arian was a southern Knight who had renounced his knighthood and received the title of Carl to serve Duke Gendry. He was in his mid thirties, short and stocky, and possessed the loudest, most obnoxious voice Carl Mitter Wycke had ever heard in his entire fifty-six summers. Even his whispers were overly loud and grating. To make matters worse, he was a poor fighter in the training yards. Just a week ago, he had been bested while training his squire! Mitter could neither accept him as a true Carl nor respect him as a man.

"Mitter!" the man whispered loud enough for the entire troop to hear. "What do you think we'll find in Maeden? Will they be up in arms? Will Marten be hung?"

Mitter rolled his eyes and adjusted himself in the saddle to relieve the pressure on his backside. He turned to the former knight and sternly but politely said "SSHHHH!"

"Sorry," whispered Arian in a slightly lower voice. "So? What will we find?"

"Since we have our information from the same source, my assumptions won't be any different than yours, Arian," said Mitter.

"Yes, of course," stammered Arian uneasily. He was aware that other Carls considered him somewhat of a joke. Mitter noticed him turn slightly red in the face.

Carl Mitter stopped his horse for a moment and drew a long, deep drink of mead from his wineskin. He was thirsty, to be sure, but stopping also allowed a few moments for Arian Clusswig to move a bit ahead. The Mead was ice-cold when it touched his lips. He felt a bit less tired and sore when it settled into his stomach, spreading a feeling of wrath throughout his limbs. Most men traveled with wine, but Carl Mitter was a Northman through and through. As the old tune went Wine before sleeping, milk in the morn, water for cleansing and mead before war. Though the rest of the men rode seemingly confident, the growing feeling that a battle was approaching had been growing on Mitter's mind for the entire day. Battle was much easier to fight- indeed the aches of age were easier to forget- when one drank mead heavily first.

From behind now, he could make out the voice of Garrett Orgreave, who had joined them at Highbridge. The Orgreave heir was a fine young man by his estimation. He was tall, and lanky, but looked strong and healthy. He was at times overly brooding and the rumors said he was often depressed, but he seemed intelligent and capable. Carl Mitter had never spoken with the man's father, Lord Clemond Orgreave more than a few moments at a time, but it seemed from impressions that the younger Orgreave was everything his father was not. He was patient, where his father was hasty. He was quiet where his father was boisterous. He was careful where his father was impetuous. It seemed the only thing he inherited from Lord Orgreave was his sword arm. It seemed to Mitter strange that Clemond Orgreave had visited Greywater Keep numerous times over the years, but he had never spoken intimately with the man.

I should correct that mistake, he thought to himself.

Mitter decided he wished to speak with Garrett at greater length and urged his horse to the side of the narrow trail to allow the men between himself and Garrett to pass. He reined his horse, and directed it off the path, between two massive oaks that overshadowed the road. They were immense trees, probably hundreds of years old, and as big around as several men.

Mitter saw the men pass slowly before the gap between the trees. Their horses neighed and whinnied as they trudged over the tumbled branches and roots that covered the path.

From farther up ahead, one of the lead horses neighed loudly in pain. Mitter cursed tom himself at the sound. The horses had the worst of the going, catching their legs in hidden roots and throwing shoes more often in this particular journey than any Mitter had ever been on. No doubt this would be another delay of an hour or more while Frolin, the only man of the troop who re-shoed horses, tried to fix the problem.

The column stopped in front of the gap as more sounds came to Mitter's attention. Men mumbled and talked, Arian Clusswig could be easily heard above the din. "Where? Where?" he was shouting.

Mitter suddenly realized the sounds and shouts he was hearing were not the normal shouts he had heard throughout the journey in such circumstances- they were shouts of confusion. Some sounded angry.

"What the-" Mitter began. He stopped suddenly when the man on the path directly before him grabbed suddenly at a feathered shaft that protruded from his shoulder just under his neck. It was Carl Grunder, a long time friend of Duke Gendry.

Grunder's raised his hands before his eyes, and saw them covered with his own blood, and he slumped in the saddle.

The sound of swords being drawn and fighting were distinct now. Mitter reached for his sword, but was unable to draw it in the narrow place between the trees. Arrows whistled by the gap before him now, and two found their mark in the lifeless corpse of Carl Grunder. Grunder's horse stood firm, and Mitter's horse neighed loudly, trying desperately to turn in the small space. However, with the two massive trees on each side, and another smaller one behind, it was trapped. Nevertheless, the beast thrashed against the trees. Mitter felt his leg caught between the horse's body and the trees, the pain was strong, and he cried out.

Finally, Grunder's horse kicked, and the body fell from the saddle, its left foot caught in the stirrup. The horse panicked at the sudden movement on its back and bolted off into the tress on the far side of the path.

Mitter's horse was finally able to lunge ahead out of the alcove between the trees. Mitter gave a great cry and drew forth his own sword, holding it high in the air and looked for the attackers.

Instead, the sight before him was gruesome. Grunder's body lay beside the path. To his left, another body lay under a horse that was riddled with more than five arrows on one side. Mitter could not tell from the crumpled body who it was. From the trees across the path, a man leapt at him, a long spear in his hand.

If not for decades of training and fighting, Mitter would have been skewered on that spear. When Mitter first saw the leaping man, the point of the spear seemed to move in slow motion, right at the center of his chest, the man's eyes wild with hatred. Mitter's sword arm seemed to act on its own. He saw his own sword flash in a wide arc, the flat of the blade catching the shaft of the spear and turning it aside as it stabbed at his heart. In the same motion, he brought his sword back around and down upon the man's head as the spear sunk into the flank of his horse.

Everything seemed distant to him- the sounds, the smells, the pain in his leg. He was in battle, and conscious thoughts were replaced by trained action. He barely felt the edges of his sword sink into the flesh of the man's shoulder where it joined the neck. It bit deep, and Mitter distantly felt the crush of steel on bone. Blood sprayed from the artery Mitter's sword has severed, and the attacker fell in a heap at the foot of his horse.

Mitter's horse fell to its knees from the wound in its flank. Mitter rolled instinctively off its back, throwing himself clear of the thrashing animal. He rolled onto his feet, his word held before him, and looked for his next target. Around him, two dying horses cried out in pain- one of them his own. But the fighting seemed to be over. A horse charged up before him, the rider on its back holding a sword high to strike at Mitter's head. But when the rider saw whom it was who stood sword in hand, he lowered his blade.

"Carl Wycke!" the rider called. "Mitter!"

Mitter snapped suddenly back to reality and looked around him. There were three dead bodies- two Carls and the attacker he had killed. Men atop their horses turned this way and that, looking for anyone they had missed in the melee, but finding no one.

"Mitter!" the rider called again.

Carl Mitter looked at the man, and recognized him as Garrett Orgreave.

"Are you unhurt?" Garrett was asking him.

Mitter looked down at himself, and saw no arrows or cuts in his chain mail shirt. The pain in his leg was dull and throbbing, but bearable for now. He loosened his grip on his sword hilt and lowered his blade.

"I am fine," he answered to the man at last. "What happened?"

"Ambush, it appears." Garrett said, shifting his gaze farther ahead. "I'll check ahead and see how the front riders fared."

With that, he spurred his horse and trotted past. Mitter leaned on his sword, and extended his right leg, feeling the pain in his right thigh where it had been pinned against the tree. He felt his leg through his breeches, felt no broken bones, and breathed a sigh of relief.

His horse lay on the ground just in front of him, its eyes wild and the whites showing. Its rear flank was covered with a slick coating of dark blood. It was shaking uncontrollably.

Mitter put his hand on the animal's neck, and felt the heartbeat fluttering wildly. The horse was suffering. He raised his sword again, placing the point against the beast's neck, and pushed toward the heart. When the animal had twitched its last, he sought out the others to assess the losses. The pain in his leg was a dull throb. It felt deeply bruised, but not seriously injured. He stooped to the ground and wiped the blood from his word, and limped further down the path.

He found Arian Clusswig sitting with his back against the tree about fifty yards away around a slight turn in the road. There was a small cut on his left cheek, and his right arm was bandaged, but he did not look to be in much pain. Several other men sat around, most with only minor cuts and bruises.

"Mitter!" cried Clusswig in his booming, grating voice. "Garrett told us you were injured! We didn’t realize the damage to your face was so severe!" The men around him laughed.

"You should have been the Duke's jester, Arian," laughed one of the Carls.

Carl Mitter generally was not a mirthful man, and being the butte of a joke from Arian Clusswig of all people was enough to make his blood boil.

"I see you've taken some bruising," Mitter said. "I suppose you fell off your horse trying to draw your sword?"

Several Carls looked shocked at Mitter's tone, and many looked to Arian to see if he took offense. But Arian Clusswig had been the target of many such japes at his fighting skill, and this one was not new. He simply shrugged his shoulders and smiled.

"Actually," he said with a smirk, "I fell asleep in the saddle before the fighting began and fell off. I slept through the whole thing!"

Mitter was the only man who did not even smile at the self-depreciation. If it had been anyone else but Carl Arian Clusswig, he would have laughed as well. But with this poor excuse for a soldier, he could not be entirely sure that it was a jest.

"How many?" he asked. The men became suddenly quiet. The mirthful post-battle jesting always ended the moment they had to assess their losses.

"Three killed, four wounded," said Carl Hagan Keal, another of Orgreave's men. "And six horses are dead, another's lame," he added.

"Add mine to that list." Said Mitter.

"Seven then," said Keal.

"Aye," agreed Carl Frÿcke, "and three Carls killed by nine peasants with bows and homemade spears." His usually smirking, confident face was serious, his countenance stern.

"Where is the Duke?" asked Mitter when he finally realized the man was absent from the group.

"He's gone ahead with Hyrl and the Orgreave boy," said Frÿcke. "Hyrl said there is an old tumble-down farmstead in a clearing just ahead. They went to see if it was suitable for making camp tonight. And-" he paused, "for leaving the men who can't go on."

"Who else went with him?" demanded Mitter, suddenly alarmed that the Duke had gone off alone.

"Don't worry yourself, Mitter," said Arian, "They took six or seven others."

Mitter limped to the wide bas of one tree and slid down to the ground, stretching his aching leg. He surveyed the men around him. There were a few cuts and scrapes here and there, but it looked as if most of the men were fine other than the four more seriously injured men.

Carl Drosst, and older man of immense girth, lay nearby, and refused treatment for the gash on his leg. His breeches were covered with blood, and the bandages were already soaked through, but the man refused to admit even the slightest pain.

"Damn you!" he cried at the man trying to tend his wounds. "It's just a scratch, I've had worse bleeds from insect bites!" The man ignored him and continued to try to remove Drosst's self-administered bandage. "Go find someone with a belly wound, you lack-brained fool!" he cried again, "This is no more than a scratch! I was knocked from my horse and fell on my own dagger!"

Despite his protests, the other man continued removing the bandages.

A few more feet away, Carl Minnick Nore lay silent on his back. It was obvious that the bloody wound on his side was both painful and deep. Luckily, he looked as if he would live if he avoided infection.

Carl Huure's squire, Heinmann, was badly injured as well. His right arm had been stabbed clear through, and it hung limp at his side. His face was a pale, ashen color, and his shirt looked like he had already vomited on it from the pain more than once.

The worst of the bunch, however, was Jenkin Howe. Jenkin was not a Carl, nor was he a squire. He was an accomplished fighter of common birth who had been close friends with Marten Gendry for most of his life. He served in the city guard of Greywater Deep, and was known as one of the best swordsmen the guard had ever known. It was thought he would someday be given a title for his dedication to House Gendry and his skill. Jenkin had taken two arrows- one just under his right shoulder and the second in the gut. He was unconscious, and spitting up blood. Mitter had no doubt that he would be the fourth casualty in a matter of hours.

"Who was it?" Mitter asked, looking pitifully at the dying man.

"The attackers?" asked Hagan Keal, looking up from he sword he had been honing.

"There's four of them in the trees, all dead," he said. "We don't know yet how many more were killed back where you were, but they look like woodsmen, peasants with bows and wooden spears."

"There is at least one more back by my horse," Mitter began, "there may be more back that way, I didn't look."

"I'll wager then that we won't get a welcome reception in Maeden," said Keal.

"Maeden?" asked Arian, "Why should we even bother going on? It's obvious there will be no one alive when we get there."

Mitter's face turned red. No one alive? He rose to his feet suddenly. The man's grating, piercing voice was becoming too much to bear. He clenched his jaw and gripped his sword hilt so tightly that his knuckles turned white to keep his composure.

"Then go home!" he seethes between clenched teeth, taking a step toward the man, "If you are too frightened of the peasants and their bows, then leave. You are neither wanted nor needed here."

Arian looked visibly shaken, his face was pale and his hastily rose to his feet, flinching from Mitter's approach. "No! No!" he shouted, "Carl Mitter, my apologies! I meant no disrespect for the Duke's son! I was only…I was simply…"

"Sit down and be silent, Arian, and don't open your mouth without considering your words first!" commanded Hagan, who leapt to his feet as well and stood between Mitter and the cringing Carl, "and you, Mitter, sit down and be quiet! You should know better than to listen to anything that comes out of this man's mouth! We have a duty here, and it does not involve brawling amongst ourselves like common thugs!"

Mitter stared hard at Arian Clusswig for a several moments, his mind deciding whether or not to smash Clusswig's angular face, or to sit, and let his rage pass. His boiling blood seemed to cool somewhat as he weighed the options, and he felt his anger subside ever so slightly. After all, what more did he expect of Arian Clusswig? The man was a baffoon, the worst swordsman Mitter had ever met. He was worthless in counsel and worse in companionship. And he was a coward. Mitter collected himself and released the hilt of his sword. Clusswig breathed a visible sigh of relief. Mitter limped away from the rest of the men, and went further up the path to see the rest of the earlier battlefield while the last of his rage subsided.

"I certainly hope," said Clusswig to Hagan Keal in a shaky voice, "that next time he kills someone, it alleviates that man's obsessive need for violence!"

Carl Hagan placed his hand on Arian's chest and firmly shoved the man back to the ground against the tree. "Shut up," he said as he stalked away.