by Robert Ryan
The track led slightly downward now, and they moved into a valley. It was less farmed here, and there were more trees. A creek ran through it, and it was mostly about this that farms had been established. But in the middle stood a large wood.
Haldring pointed. “In those trees is where the Green Howe stands.”
Not long after, the trees were about them and the sound of men’s voices, hushed by the morning and the nature of the event in which they were a part, drifted to them.
The trunks of the trees formed a wall, but one moment the track wound tightly between trunk and root and overhanging branch, and the next they were in a large glade. The grass was green and short. The murmur of the creek came from somewhere close, but hidden.
Within the center of the glade stood the Green Howe. It was a barrow, a burial mound for the final resting place of a lord of old. It stood some forty feet long and was at least half as wide. Its rounded slopes, smooth with green turf, rose to a domed summit as tall as two men.
And there were men around it, and they gathered now as they saw the newcomers arrive. These were Duthenor warriors. Most were pale haired, some brown haired as was Brand, yet others dark-eyed with raven-black hair. All wore chainmail. Some had helms. Here and there were spears and bows and long-handled axes, but most carried swords in the plain scabbards hanging from their belts.
“There aren’t as many as I had thought,” Sighern said quietly from beside Brand. He had been given his own horse at Brand’s request.
His observation was correct. There were some three hundred of them, and many had the look of untested youths. But Brand smiled anyway. He had worried that there would be none.
“It is perhaps half of what the district could muster,” Haldring said. She offered no comment on why that was so.
“Yesterday we were four,” Brand said. “Now we are hundreds. It’s all a matter of perspective.”
“If we waited, more might yet join us,” Haldring suggested.
“No. There is no time to wait. We must be swift and gather momentum.” Brand handed his reins to Sighern and stepped a little way ahead of the others to meet the warriors.
They eyed him warily, as well they might. Many glances fell upon sword, ring and helm. They had heard the rightful chieftain had returned, but they wanted to see it for themselves.
“Warriors of the Duthenor!” he called. “You will have heard much. Most of it will have been rubbish. This I say to you now, as the truth. I am Brand. I have returned. When I went into exile, I was little more than a child, though one that had learned the ways of the world. But I return now as a man, tested in battle as a warrior. And also tested in battle as a leader of armies and a nation. I was victorious. I will be victorious again.”
He fell silent. The Duthenor studied him. One man, perhaps in his fifties but still hale, stepped forward.
“We hear you, Brand. We recognize you. You are the rightful heir, and tales of your deeds in faraway Cardoroth are told even in this land. We are brave men, and true. Too long have we endured Unferth, and we shall follow you. But we worry also for our families. We are too few to challenge the enemy. We are hundreds, but he has thousands at his command. We fear, though this army may grow, that we will always be too few. And when Unferth comes, he may not kill just us but ravage the land as well.”
Brand studied him. “What’s your name, warrior?”
The man spoke proudly. “I’m called Garamund. In my youth, I served your father.”
“Then hear me, Garamund. I know you speak for all these warriors.” He swept his arm out, gesturing at the gathered men. “Everything you say is true. I will not lie to you, even as my father did not lie to you. So this I say truly. Our first task is not to fight Unferth. That way lies disaster. That fight is for a later time. Now, our task is to bear a torch. We will hold it aloft, and it will be a beacon of hope. We shall sting Unferth, and then disappear. We shall sting him again, and vanish once more. All the while word of our deeds will spread. Our army will grow. When we are ready, then we shall strike him down.”
As always, when people saw a plan they felt inclined to follow it. And in the plan, sketchy as it was, they saw hope because it acknowledged the difficulties and provided a solution. Brand knew by their expressions he had won them over. But with that winning came responsibility. Now he felt the weight of trying to make reality conform to the words he had spoken. It would not be easy.
“Where is the closest supporter of Unferth?” Brand asked. Now that he had them, he must get them moving before they had a chance to change their mind.
“That would be lord Gingrel,” Garamund said. There were murmurs of agreement from the men, and Haldring gave a slight nod when he looked at her.
“And how far away is he?” Brand asked.
“He has a large hall,” Garamund answered, “only half a day away.”
“He’s one of the usurper’s own men, belonging to the Callenor, and he has many of that tribe with him,” Haldring added.
“Aye, those pigs like to lord it over us.” Garamund leaned forward and spat, accurately but not eloquently giving his opinion of Unferth’s tribe that now occupied the Duthgar.
“Then it is to there that we shall march.”
Brand had them now. He had given them a purpose, and through Garamund’s actions emotion had been invoked; they hated the Callenor. Purpose and emotion served as the basis for any military effort. The two went hand in hand, and one without the other soon dwindled into failure. It was probably so for any human endeavor.
He drew his sword slowly, allowing men to see the Halathrin-wrought blade. Then he pointed it at the Green Howe.
“In there sleeps a hero of old. I know not his name, nor his battles, but they are finished now. I know this, though. He was Duthenor. The dark will take us all, in the end, even as it took him. But our battles are not yet finished. For a while we stand, as warriors, in the light. Our deeds yet need doing.”
There was a roar from the men. They had been compared to a hero of old, and at the same time challenged to live up to his standards. Brand felt the surge of pride ripple through them, and for a moment he wondered if he were doing the right thing. Was he manipulating them for his own purposes, or speaking as he felt himself? Or perhaps both?
He lifted his sword straight up into the air, the pattern-welded blade shimmering. “We are few!” he called. “But we are like the point of the blade – the most dangerous part!”
There was another roar of approval, greater than the first.
“The edge of the blade is yet to come, but it will as our army grows. Then we shall swell until there is point, blade and hilt – until the sword is complete!”
The crowd yelled and cheered, but Brand was not done. “And when we are a complete sword, we will strike Unferth down!”
He swept the blade in a killing stroke, flourished it in the air a moment, and then sheathed it swiftly all in one smooth motion.
The men drew their own blades, yelling and cheering and lifting their weapons high. “Brand!” they began to chant. “Brand of the Duthenor!”
Brand pointed behind him. “These are my generals. I trust them with my life. Shorty, Taingern and Haldring. They will not fail me, and I shall not fail you!”
There was a deafening roar, and many eyes glanced at the generals. Not least of all at Haldring. She stood tall, her blonde hair spilling free as she removed her helm so that the men could see her.
“The time of words is done,” Brand said more quietly. “Now is the time to march. Follow us, and believe that the journey we now take will be chanted by storytellers in times to come.”
He led his horse forward, his generals with him, and the three hundred warriors fell into a tight group, marching behind.
They had not gone far when Taingern leaned in and spoke to him quietly.
“So, what’s the plan?”
“It’s simple,” Brand answered. “Very simple.”
Shorty, who was walking his horse on the other
side, drew closer as well.
“Simple is always the best.”
“So it is,” Brand agreed. “In a nutshell, this is it. We need a win. It doesn’t have to be a big one. It can’t be a big one, yet. But that doesn’t matter. A win is a win, and that will encourage others to join us. Momentum is everything.”
Taingern seemed to expect this. “So far so good, but this lord we march on will have heard news of your coming by now. He’ll be expecting us. Maybe even had time to summon warriors.”
“Ah, that could be. But probably not. No doubt, he’ll have begun to take steps. But he won’t know for sure that I’m marching on him. There are other places I could go. And he’ll not think that I’ll march so soon. As was pointed out before, if I waited another day or two more people would join us. Most leaders would wait for those extra numbers.”
“I see,” Taingern replied. “Now all the better do I understand your reasoning for marching swiftly. Perhaps we will catch them by surprise.”
They moved ahead at a good pace. Brand allowed little time for rests, stopping only once every hour for a short while. Surprise would be needed, and speed was the foundation on which that depended.
The track led out of the valley and toward a forest. By the afternoon they had moved within the trees and the track had become a road. Some little while later they ceased their march, and looked down through the cover of trees at the hall situated many hundreds of feet away. It lay below them, on a slight slope of green grass. There was a village too, but this had grown up near a stream further down slope. The hall itself stood in the open, and a path of the road branched off and headed to it.
Brand and his generals slipped through the trees that formed the eaves of the wood for a closer look. They saw signs of activity. Even as they watched two riders hastened toward the wall. They had come across country rather than by road. Otherwise, Brand’s force would have detained them.
There were half a dozen guards at the hall entrance also. They looked alert.
“They’ve heard of our coming,” Haldring said. “What do we do now?”
14. Will You Surrender?
Brand considered the situation. What to do was no easy question.
“They’ve heard of my return, but they’re not ready yet. There are more warriors to come in, perhaps a lot more, I think.”
“Probably,” Haldring said. “So, will you attack then?”
Brand hesitated. “Some of the men down there will be Duthenor though, will they not?”
“Of course, but they’ll be in the minority. They might even turn to our side.”
“They’ll need time for that. Just taken unawares by warriors attacking, they’ll fight first.”
“Maybe. But I see no way around it.”
Brand knew he should attack. And he should do it swiftly. But it was not so easy as that.
“Duthenor killing Duthenor is no way to build an army. I must think not only of the battle at hand, but of what’s to follow.”
“But you do need a victory,” Shorty said.
“I need a victory, but I must do it without killing Duthenor. I’ll not do that unless I must. And here, just at the moment, I think we have the greater force. I’ll give the Duthenor a chance to see what’s happening and come to our side.”
They seemed uncertain of this course, but he had made up his mind. He gave signals. The warriors formed a tight group, and then swiftly they walked from the forest and toward the hall. They blew no horns, nor did they draw any blades. Brand would not provoke the enemy into a fight, but rather he would give them an opportunity to surrender.
The opposition would hold tight in the hall, being outnumbered. And should other forces arrive, they would likely come from outlying areas in small groups and be outnumbered too. But it was not a situation that could last. The longer it went on, the worse it would be for Brand. But he was glad he had resisted the temptation to attack. There was that side to him that was violent, and could justify the violence as necessary. It was a side to all men, but it must be resisted. All the more so because he had authority over others. As he acted, so would they be influenced.
His warrior band strode forward. Ahead, the opposition saw them, hesitated and then moved inside the hall. There was yelling and shouting, and Brand had no doubt he would find the door to the hall closed and barred from the inside when he reached it.
So it proved. He set men to guard all sides of the hall so that they could not be taken by surprise nor anyone escape. And he set lookouts also, with an eye to any attack that might be launched from outside. The enemy would build out there somewhere in the surrounding countryside, but he guessed they would bide their time. It would take some while to find each other and join together. Only when there were enough of them, if their number reached that high at all, would they attack.
Brand himself hammered at the door three times. “Open!” he commanded. “I am Brand, rightful chieftain of the Duthgar. I would speak with the lord of this hall.”
There was muffled talk from inside, and a few moments later a voice answered, calm and aloof.
“Unferth reigns as king in the Duthgar, and I do not know you or recognize any authority. But if you wish, you may come inside. You alone.”
Brand smiled. He wondered how many steps he would take into that hall before a sword found his heart.
“I think not, Gingrel. But you will have men in there that know me. Duthenor men. Let some of them out so that they may see me.”
“No.” came the answer.
Brand expected that. “If you do not, then I will hold it against you when I come into my own and judge you. And I will come into my own, and when I judge you it will be harshly.”
That would give him something to think about. He would not surrender, for then he would fear having to answer to Unferth. But he could not be certain that Unferth would prevail, so he would also be wary of what would happen if Brand gained control of the Duthgar.
The silence grew. There was muttering on the other side of the door, and then at length Gingrel gave an answer.
“Very well. Stand back, well back.”
Brand gestured to those with him, and they walked well back from the door. Whatever conversation took place, he wanted to keep it private. But they drew their swords also, for Brand was not trusting. They could be attacked, but he did not think Gingrel had the nerve for that. If he attacked, he had nowhere to go but back in the hall. And that could be set to fire if he angered his opponents.
The door opened, and two men came out. They wore swords, but the blades remained sheathed. Men crowded behind the entrance they had come through, but there was no indication of bowmen.
Brand did not know the two men. They approached, slowly and cautiously, their gaze alert but not alarmed. They did not seem to distrust the warriors they faced, or Brand, and that indicated to him that they were Duthenor.
Very slowly, Brand drew his sword. “I am Brand. Rightful ruler of the Duthgar.” He spoke softly, and he did not think those in the hall could hear what was said.
Their gaze had gone first to the Helm of the Duthenor that he wore. Then the naked steel of his Halathrin-wrought blade. When they had studied it a moment, he sheathed the weapon and showed them the chieftain’s ring he wore.
They glanced at each other first, and then one spoke. “We know you, Brand. The tokens you bear are enough, but we know you also. We were young when we met, and it was but briefly. Our lord took us with him when he visited your father.”
“Then you will tell Gingrel, and all else inside, that I am who I say?”
“We will. There is no doubt.”
Brand spoke carefully. This was a delicate situation. “My return changes much. And I know a great deal has happened in my absence, but why do men of the Duthenor serve a foreign lord?”
The men looked uncomfortable. “Gingrel has supplied food for us, and our families. He need not have done so. Without that, we would have been reduced to poverty.”
“I see. And
I understand. I assume also that you, and the other Duthenor in the hall, have sworn oaths of loyalty to the new lord?”
“Yes,” they answered simply.
Brand had learned something valuable. There were more Duthenor in the hall. Now was come the time to play on that, and open old wounds.
“And what happened to the old Duthenor lord?”
“He was murdered.”
“By whom?”
“By the lord who now sits in the high chair,” the first man answered. There was no emotion in his voice, which served to show to Brand that great emotion existed, otherwise it would not need to be so severely restrained.
“How many of you are there?”
There was hesitation here, for the men saw where this must lead. The second answered eventually, though.
“We are thirty, but they are seventy.”
Brand hesitated himself, though it was deliberate. He would give them time to think on what had been said, for long suppressed emotions to bubble to the surface.
“Bring them out, and join me,” he said at last.
The first man slowly shook his head. “We have sworn oaths to Gingrel.”
“I see.” Brand knew this would have been the case. “I guessed you had, and I would not ask you to break an oath. But that does not mean you are not needed, you and men like you throughout the Duthgar. Unferth’s time of reckoning has come. And there is this too. What of the older oaths you would have sworn to your dead, and murdered lord? Which oath shall you keep, and which shall you not?”
The men did not look happy. “You put us in a hard place,” the first said.
Brand had sympathy for them, and all like them across the land. There had been no exile for them. It had been a case of serve, or suffer.
“I know I do. I do not wish to, but fate has so decreed it. This is all I ask – think on what we have said.”
The men returned inside after that. Brand waited until they were gone from view, and then he spoke to those who held the door.