Gwenhwyfar_ The White Spirit - Mercedes Lackey [90]
Of course, that was not going to happen here. Gwen would have thought that by this time the Saxons would have realized, the moment they saw forces forming the Square, that they were facing another force using the High King’s Roman tactics.
Perhaps they think it is a ruse. Or perhaps they are confident that this time they can induce us to fight their sort of battle.
The noise was making her horse dance and fidget in place; if this had been summer, she would have soothed him to keep him from wearing himself out. But it was winter, not summer, and all the prancing and stamping was keeping his muscles warm. This was all to the good.
She watched her men out of the corner of her eye. Their horses were as restive as hers, and they sat them as easily. They looked calm. She hoped she did. This would be her first major battle, the first where the armies of more than her father had joined together to face the foe.
There had only been one point of conflict between her and Lancelin. She had wanted to lead the scouts on their stinging attacks on the Saxon line. He had insisted that she ride somewhere in the middle of the skein. “You are almost the only woman in the army, lady,” he had pointed out. “It will not be hard to identify you as the White Phantom. This will make you a tempting target for all archers if you ride first. But if you are in the middle, the confusion you and your men will cause will ensure they do not even realize you are a woman.”
She didn’t like it, not at all, but she had to admit he was right. What was the point of creating the legend of the White Phantom if the feared creature went down under the first volley of arrows? Still. She didn’t have to like it, that he was right.
She watched the front line of the Square. It was Urien, not Lancelin, who would give the signal for her group to begin their assault. At least they would be doing something, not standing there chafing against the inactivity like the steady fellows who had formed the Square.
The noise rose and fell like the sound of waves on the rocks at Tintagel. The sun burned down on the white hillside, soon to be churned into an expanse of blood and mud. Things always grew well on a battlefield . . . as if the gods were saying, “Out of death comes life.” If the local farmers were not eager to plow and plant this expanse come spring, they would surely not hesitate to scythe down the lush grass that would spring from the blood that watered this land. It would only last a season, but that season would be a good one.
From the center of the Square, a pennon on the tip of a lance shot up. Urien’s forces released their pent impatience in a roar as Peder spurred his horse, leading the scouts in their gadfly charge.
She was third and had forsaken her usual gray clothing for ordinary leather armor with metal plates riveted inside, protecting breast and back. It obscured her shape, and her sex was further concealed by a half-helmet. All of the scouts looked reasonably alike, except for Gwen’s long braid of white-blonde flailing her back. She had tried coiling it up under the helm, but it wouldn’t stay. She needed a new and better helm.
Peder’s horse labored a little, galloping through the snow. This pass would be the hardest; as the horses tired, at least the snow would be easier to get through. The others pounded in his wake, snow clots flung up by their hooves. The Saxons watched them in astonishment. Evidently, they had not expected this.
It was not easy firing a bow from the back of a moving horse, and even Gwen’s men, who had practiced this with her against the day when they might be surprised and have to flee pursuit,