When Ancar’s line hit Selenay’s with a clangor of metal on metal and cries of battle-rage and pain, most of their force was concentrated on the middle, where Selenay’s standard was. She waited, ignoring the sight and sound of her people killing and being killed, for several long moments—for she, not the Lord Marshal, was the field commander. Her Gift of Foresight was not a strong one, but it was an invaluable one, for it operated best on the battlefield. It would not tell her what was to happen, but given that there were plans already made, it would tell her when the exact instant occurred that those plans should be set into motion.

She waited, listening for that insistent inner prompting. Then—“Tell the left to pull in,” she said to Kyril.

He Mindsent, with a frown of concentration, and almost instantly the troops on the lefthand side of the standard began making their way toward the center.

As she’d hoped, Ancar sent his cavalry to the left, with foot following—supposing that he could encircle their line at that point, or even capture the supposed Heir.

“Wheel—” she told Kyril. And relayed by the Heralds with each group, the entire force pivoted on the center, with the leftmost end being on the very edge of the swamp, where some of Ancar’s cavalry were even now discovering the two and three feet of water and mud.

She waited another long moment, until all of Ancar’s forces were between her line and the woods on the left.

Then—“Now, Kyril! Call them in!”

And pouring from the woods came the troops that had hidden there all night—fresh, angry, and out for blood; the defectors from Alessandar’s army, and the Heralds that were their link to the command post. The defectors looked a little odd, for each of them had spent a few moments of his hours in waiting cutting away the sleeves of his uniform tunic so that the sleeves of the white, padded gambeson showed. There could now be no mistaking them on the battlefield for Ancar’s troopers.

Caught between two forces, with a morass in front of them, even Ancar’s seasoned veterans began to panic.

After that, it was a rout.

Griffon was the first to reach the Keep, half-blind with reaction-headache. He had stayed only long enough to assure himself that the victory was indeed Selenay’s, then pulled himself onto his Companion’s back and sought the Healers.

“We did it; we pulled it off,” he told Elspeth, downing a swallow of headache-potion with a grimace. “Those extra troops from Hardorn turned the tide. By now what’s left of Ancar’s army is probably being chased across the border with its tail between its legs.”

“What about Ancar himself?”