“You will go out there alone with your sword and attack from this side? You mean you’ll get yourself killed,” Whelan picked up the argumentative tone he’d had the night before.
Remembering that he’d probably be surly himself if beaten and captured in battle, Alec tried to stay calm, tense as he felt. “I am a warrior ingenaire, and have the reflexes and capability to do what I plan to do. The cavalry has the ability to attack in a way the soldiers outside have never seen before. I am confident we will win.” He walked as far away from Whelan as was possible in the small confines of the tent and waited.
Alec stood still, growing tense. The increasing light in the tent indicated that the sun was now rising above the horizon. Still Alec waited, knowing that any second now the sounds of battle were going to begin, probably starting as surprise and injury, then turning to chaotic sounds of clashes and screams of death.
The tent began to grow slightly warmer as the sun’s rays hit the canvas wall fully, and some of the chill inside began to fade. Still no attack came, and Alec began to feel the tension inside himself give way to annoyance at Imelda for waiting too long to start the attack, and a few minutes later, growing alarm that perhaps something had gone wrong.
Forty five minutes after the sun’s rays had reached the tent’s walls, Alec knew that no attack was going to take place as planned.
“What do you do now?” Whelan came over to ask him.
“I wait,” Alec said simply. “What is the routine for you? Will they come and feed you breakfast soon?”
“They’ll call us out, line us up, and count us, probably in a few minutes, then let us go to the latrines, and give us breakfast back here in this tent after that,” Whelan explained.
“I don’t know that they’re necessarily going to notice your face being any different than Realed’s, but if they do, what is your plan for getting us all out of that problem, or do you just plan to see us all punished ?” Whelan asked.
“I don’t have a plan,” Alec admitted. “This isn’t the way it was supposed to happen. I don’t know if my men failed to get back to camp, or if Imelda failed to carry out the plan, or if something else disrupted things. We all need to try to stay as calm as possible and be prepared.”
“That’s comforting,” Whelan said sarcastically. “Let’s hope for the best. Good plan.”
Just then the tent flap opened abruptly and a guard stepped into the tent. “Line up for inspection. All prisoners, outside in line, now.”
Men started heading out the door, sneaking surreptitious sideways glances at Alec as they did so. Alec fell in with the last men and kept his head down as he passed the guard and then stood in line. A pair of guards walked down the line counting the prisoners off loudly as they went. Without raising his head, Alec observed their feet approaching his place in line. Alec crossed his arms in front of his stomach to feign an illness. He saw a third pair of boots join the other two sets, the third set a shiny set of expensive looking leather, and Alec realized that an officer was also present for the inspection.
“What’s wrong boy?” one of the guards asked him as the three sets of feet stopped in front of him.
“Just a stomach ache this morning, sir” Alec answered quietly.
“Look up when an officer is present,” a voice commanded, and Alec felt a sudden clutching in his stomach at that voice. He recognized it instantly, and realized that one of the officers present on this mission from the Oyster Bay junta was Branham, the junior son of a noble family in Oyster Bay, a man who belonged to the Palace Guard of the former king in Oyster Bay, and a man who Alec had beaten in a sword fight in front of a large crowd at the palace armory, humiliating Branham and costing him a large sum of money wagered on the fight.
Alec raised his head partially, so that his eyes could see the faces of the men who now held him captive. The face was indeed Branham.
“Look up all the way! You’re supposed to be a soldier, even if you are from that forsaken duchy in the countryside,” Branham snapped, not yet realizing who he faced. “You can be ashamed, but you still need to look your betters in the eye when ordered.”
Alec seethed with rage, and raised his head defiantly, knowing that if Branham recognized him for who he was, or if the two guards recognized him for who he wasn’t, there would be trouble right here and now.
He looked Branham in the eye. Nothing happened. “That’s better,” the officer said. The two Oyster Bay guards looked on complacently, watching their officer more than Alec, and he felt a wave of relief that he had passed a test.
“All of you listen,” Branham began to speak, stepping back to the center of the line of prisoners to address them all. “We have set today for the deadline for the Prince of Bondell to meet our demands. If he complies with our request, you will remain here as our captives while we wait for your duke to pay for your ransom. If the prince does not meet our reasonable expectations, we will ship you all back to Oyster Bay while we bring more troops here to punish this squalid city. I do not want any resistance or trouble from any of you in the meantime, or we will summarily execute you one at a time.”
Suddenly Branham’s eyes flickered back to Alec’s face, and he turned pale. “Healer!” he shouted. “Guards! More guards here right now!” he ordered. “You two seize that prisoner,” he told the first two guards as a half dozen more arrived, and he drew his sword.
“Why was I not told this prisoner was here?” Branham shouted at a sergeant who had responded to his summons.
“We told you how many we had, and named the Lord Kelvin and Captain Whelan as the only ranking officials we held alive,” the sergeant reported stoically.
Branham punched Alec in the stomach without warning. Alec saw it coming and forced his warrior abilities to not reflexively protect him. He felt the blow knock the wind out of him and doubled over.
“There, you trumped up fencing healer, how do you like that?” Branham shouted. “You precious king is dead, your ingenairii are split between the sheep and the wolves, and you’re here where you can pay me back for the problems you caused!”
Alec stood slightly straighter and tried to look up at Branham. The officer’s shiny boot kicked him hard in the knee, and Alec fell to the ground.
“Sir, I must protest this treatment of a prisoner,” Lord Kelvin said loudly.
“Let’s see you protest this,” Branham said savagely, and he raised his sword to strike at Alec…
…who allowed his warrior abilities to explode in their fullest strength within him.
He rolled over, rose, and toppled Branham, seized his sword, and struck the sergeant dead, kicked Branham hard in the head, and sliced the sword through the necks of the two guards who had stood next to him.
“Grab those blades!” he shouted to the other men from Goldenfields as he struck at two more Oyster Bay guards who had arrived at Branham’s summons. Alec dispatched them and faced the next four men who were trying to position themselves to attack him. Their shouts were loudly screamed at the rest of the camp, and Alec knew that within seconds he was going to be surrounded by attackers. “Whelan, arm your men and head to the beach. Go north from there. Go man, go!” Alec screamed as he moved to attack the opponents. “I’ll cover your retreat!”
He killed the last of the four Oyster Bay fighters, and threw the bloody blade to one of the prisoners. “Take this, I’ll get my own sword from the tent.” Already five of the Goldenfields men had swords and were beginning to battle with attackers coming from the camp. Most who came were not yet armed, not anticipating such an assault from within their own boundaries, and the Goldenfields prisoners began to move towards the beach as Alec had ordered. He ran into the tent and pulled his sword from under the blanket, and ran towards the beach as well.
Suddenly he heard shouts coming from the far side of the camp. Alec fought his way to the beach, where the Goldenfields men were surrounded by two dozen attackers, and Alec charged into the rear of the right side, trying to cut a path for his men to flee t
owards the north. More shouts and noises, and now the sound of horses came from the other side of the camp, and Alec felt his hopes start to rise that perhaps the cavalry had come at last to save the day from the disaster it was turning into.
“Come to me, we’re going north!” Alec called to the Guards and Kelvin, who was protected in the middle of a pocket of Guards. A corridor stood open along the beach, without any opposition, and Alec ordered the men to run that direction while he hung back to help fight the rear guard action covering their retreat, certain now that his plans were going to succeed.
The attackers were hesitating to follow, both because of the devastation that Alec was wreaking on their numbers and because of the yells that were coming from behind them in their camp. Suddenly two things happened that caused Alec to swivel his head to try to see it all. Cavalry riders suddenly came out of the camp, appearing magically from among the tents, hacking at Oyster Bay soldiers in their way, and Alec saw Imelda leading them towards the suddenly surrounded opponents. At the same time his group of prisoners abruptly slammed to a stop as they ran into two unseen people, and Shaiss and Bethany unexpectedly became visible and tumbled to the ground as the Goldenfields soldiers ran into the formerly invisible pair.
“Stop! They’re friends! Don’t attack! They’re from Goldenfields!” Alec screamed as he saw swords raised threateningly towards the stunned ingenairii.
Alec disengaged from his battle behind the group of guardsmen and raced to the beachfront battleground and dove at Whelan, who was swinging a sword at Shaiss on the ground. He deflected the blade from its path, though it still struck Shaiss in the leg, cutting deeply into the veins and muscle.
“Stop! Stop!” Alec screamed, rising from the inert Whelan. “These are our allies!” he shouted, standing protectively in front of them.
“You,” he shouted at a Guard. “Wrap your shirt around the leg and press tightly to stop the bleeding. Bethany, are you all right? Can you still control that ship?” he asked, pointing to the rocking vessel towards which a few Oyster Bay soldiers were swimming.
“I’ll get it Alec. Do you want it beached or just held still?” she asked as he helped her stand. Her face was pale, but she remained focused on her assignment, Alec proudly saw.
He kissed her quickly. “Run it up slightly onto the beach so they can’t use it now. We may be able to use it later,” he told her.
He looked away from the ship and back towards the camp. Goldenfields cavalry members were visible everywhere, and little apparent resistance was left. He spotted Imelda and waved her over, then knelt beside Shaiss to look at the wound.
Alec felt a welling of pride. He was proud of the cavalry’s performance, proud of Goldenfields’ success, and even secretly proud of himself, for having planned, and then successfully adjusted to the changed circumstances.
He looked down at his friend on the sandy beach. The sand was dark, and the bloody stain from Shaiss was not easy to distinguish. The light ingenaire was unconscious, and losing blood rapidly. Alec took a deep breath and called upon his healer powers without even bothering to cease his warrior energies, confident that his great abilities would solve this problem too and further enhance his reputation. A warning screamed in the back of his mind, but he ignored it as he prepared to heal the bloody wound his friend had suffered.
He felt immediately staggered by the weariness and pain caused by the high level of double energy he was using, and his vision grew dim, as his body began to tremble violently. Alec removed the shirt around Shaiss’s leg and focused his attention intently on the wound, placing his hands on it and praying out loud, then concentrating his last shreds of energy into the leg, knitting the muscles, repairing the skin, soothing the nerves that delivered the pain. Within himself Alec felt an explosive sensation – something that was more than pain -- wrack his body as the healing energies and warrior energies collided, mixed and repelled one another while he tried to master and exercise both simultaneously; the healer energies battled to subdue the violence and harm of the warrior imperative, which sought to slash at the opposing power within its host.
He stopped and looked at his patient. Shaiss was pale from loss of blood, and still unconscious, but stable now and no longer bleeding. Where the wound had been, Alec’s hasty and incomplete healing had left a visible red scar on the skin, but no other problems were left.
Alec looked up and dimly saw that Imelda had dismounted and come over to him. “Alec, I’m sorry, we didn’t get your message until after sunrise.”
Alec held up his hands and remained on his knees. “Secure the perimeter, get all our folks here, and help me to a bed. I’ve made a big mistake,” he gasped. His vision was dim and the fingers on his hands were curled tightly into his palms, as he fell over unconscious.
Chapter 16 – Recovery in Bondell
Kelvin, Imelda, and Bethany stood beside Alec’s bunk, where he lay unconscious. He’d not revived for more than twenty four hours since he’d fallen at the beach after healing Shaiss’s slashed leg.
“Bethany, you’re the ingenaire here. I’m just a Guard who plays at medic. What do we need to do?” Imelda asked.
“I don’t think we need to do anything. He must have used a tremendous amount of energy in battle, because I didn’t think that his healing of Shaiss appeared to be such a traumatic activity,” the water apprentice replied. “He switched abruptly from one form of ingenaire energy to another, so maybe that is the problem; I can’t tell you because I don’t know anyone else but Aristotle who has the ability to be a full ingenaire in two houses as he does.”
“He was absolutely incredible in battle,” Kelvin told them. “He was defeating opponents in numbers and with an ease I couldn’t fathom when we were forced to try to fight our way out of the camp, just before your charge came. I believe that he would have succeeded in getting us out from a force four times our numbers even if he personally had to fight every soldier from Oyster Bay. I’ve heard about the value of having a warrior ingenaire at court, but Duke Toulon and his father before him were always satisfied with having the Guard serve as their protection. Now that I’ve seen a warrior ingenaire in action, I’m not sure the Guard is enough.”
“What you’ve seen is no ordinary warrior ingenaire,” Bethany told Kelvin. “Alec is so high above the abilities of others that there is no comparison, from what everyone else has told me. I believe he could be head of the warrior house if the time ever came to reunite us all, and if he chose to join that class.”
“What you saw was probably what we saw at the palace the day the rebels tried to seize control. Our cause was absolutely lost until he arrived and fought in through rebels to get us and the Duke then fought back out to save the Duke, then fought his way back in again,” Imelda added.
“While we were together Alec said that he had some new orders for me from the Duke, speaking of our leader,” Kelvin said. “Do either of you know where those are? I’d like to find out if there is something I should be doing to secure our mission here.”
Imelda and Bethany looked at one another for a moment. “I think we are justified in looking for those orders. We wouldn’t want to wait several days for the Commander to awaken when you could be carrying out a duty,” Imelda said. “Bethany, would you go look through his bags to see what he might have tucked away?”
“Yes, I will,” Bethany agreed after a slight pause of consideration. She left the tent to go find Alec’s bags and saddle for a search.
Minutes later she returned. “I found these in his saddle bags,” Bethany said, holding forth a heavily swathed sheath of papers. As Kelvin took them and unfolded them; he came to a thick parchment envelope sealed with ribbons and the Duke’s seal in wax.
“Ah,” he said delicately. “Please excuse me while I read these over,” and left to sit privately in the tent he had commandeered from its prior owner.
Imelda and Bethany stayed behind with Alec. “Are there any items you have that you could use to revive him?” Bethany asked Imelda.
“Did your medic training give you any ideas?”
“I’ve got ideas. I just don’t have my supply kit with me. I figured with Alec along there wasn’t any need for me to expect to have to heal anyone, especially when I thought I’d be busy commanding a cavalry unit in battle,” the Guard officer admitted.
Bethany walked over and knelt by Alec’s bunk. Placing her head by his she spoke softly in his ear. “Alec, can you hear me? We want to know that you’re going to recover,” she told him. “You were wonderful yesterday and we won the battle. All our people are in good shape too. We just need you to tell us what to do next.
“I hope you’re okay, and recovering your strength. If there is anything I can do for you, let me know. I’ll pray for you,” she said.
His head rose fractionally for a moment at her last words, then lay back still again. “Imelda,” Bethany said suddenly, feeling a flash of inspiration. “Send someone to the cathedral and get a priest, and bring him back here. Maybe prayers can hurry his healing along. He’s so devoted to God that I think it will make a difference for him,” she added, certain she had found a way to help Alec.
Imelda agreed and left to find a rider to go with her to the cathedral. Minutes after she left, Kelvin returned. “Is Imelda available?” he asked, looking around. “I would like to have an escort of her cavalry men to escort me to the Prince’s court to demonstrate our strength and to carry out the negotiations the Duke has asked me initiate. This will be rather extraordinary.”
“She’s just gone to the cathedral to get a priest to come pray for Alec,” Bethany answered.
Kelvin turned pale. “Good heavens! He’s not dying is he?”
“Oh no. No, no, no. We thought prayers for healing might help him recover his strength more quickly,” Bethany explained.
“Thank goodness! You gave me a scare,” Kelvin replied. “It’s only morning, so we have time to sit tight and wait. I would like to go see the Prince as quickly as possible. He will probably feel as relieved as we were by the defeat of these forces from Oyster Bay. Please notify me when she returns,” Kelvin asked, and left to return to his own tent.
The Loss of Power: Goldenfields and Bondell Page 21