Alaric rode to his right, a high place of honor for a squire, but he had remained alive and near Aelor at Bronzegate when many more experienced knights had died.
In Aelor’s mind, the squire had earned it.
Ser Balman Byrch in his resplendent green armor rode to his left, his battle axe wielding brother Morgan beside him.
…
It took forever and no time at all to reach the first trench, which Aelor’s mount vaulted cleanly, doing the same to the second.
The dragonlord knew many of his men would be held up by the trenches, and some horses undoubtedly would trip in the shallow earthworks, breaking legs and being trampled by the men charging in behind.
It was losses he’d have to take; the shock of hundreds of armored knights smashing into the Stormlander lines would spook levies, as even now he could see some lose their nerve and turn to flee.
More did so when he lowered his lance, his knights doing the same, hundreds of sharpened steel points hurtling towards the wavering men of Tarth.
They crashed into the lines like an armored fist into a stomach.
Aelor impaled a man at arms on his lance, the momentum of his horse driving the shaft halfway through his gut.
Aelor dropped it and its cargo, unsheathing his sword and setting to the grisly work he so enjoyed.
His stallion had somehow managed to avoid the forest of spears on the Stormlander front lines, already having survived longer than his first did.
Many of his men’s horses weren’t so lucky, the bloodcurdling scream of dozens of dying coursers filling the air.
His own beast didn’t stop, driving through the thick conglomeration of enemy combatants, his rider’s sword rising and falling, dealing death with alarming speed.
Before the Dragon of Duskendale truly understood what was happening he had burst out the back of the first formation of Stormlanders and into the second, beheading the first man he came across and opening another’s throat only a second later.
His stallion again avoided the spears, and Aelor couldn’t help but say a prayer in the back of his mind that the beast made it through, as it never stopped it’s momentum until he was through that line as well.
Aelor wheeled around, finding that Ser Balman was no longer on his left, having been replaced by a knight in the blue and white of either Renfred or Lord Bywater—he couldn’t tell at the moment, and it wasn’t important—but that Alaric had against all odds stayed with him, wheeling his own gelding around with Aelor.
Even as he crashed into the already breaking men at arms, killing with each strike, Aelor’s mind was spinning.
Something isn’t right.
There are no knights solidifying these levies, no commanders holding firm.
His confusion was clarified in the next moment.
“My Prince,” the unnamed knight beside him yelled, pointing with a mace dripping of gore and brain matter.
“The infantry!” Aelor peered over the heads of the pigs for slaughter below him, seeing his foot soldiers pouring towards the melee he was currently involved in.
And hundreds of Stormlander knights, formed in a wedge of their own and flying the stag of Baratheon and quartered banner of House Tarth, smashing into their side.
“Dammit ,” Aelor growled, cursing himself for a fool.
It seems you’re not the only one who knows how to flank.
“The flank, the flank!” he bellowed as he rode, directing more and more of his knights to the actual threat.
The galleys behind him were forgotten, for the Stormlander knights despite their small numbers had wreaked havoc on his infantry, Aelor’s levies—just as inexperienced as the Stormlander’s—having done the same as Lord Tarth’s, turning and fleeing.
It took him much longer to navigate his way through the two Stormlander lines the second time than it had the first, the field full of bodies of dead men and horses, some of the still living ones still trying to kill him.
He galloped towards the new hotspot of the battle, seeing the field in front of him as if he was just an observer.
Lord Cleyton’s reserves of knights were already charging at the threat, his men at arms and braver levies turning to swarm at the mounted rebels.
The unnamed knight in white and blue was gone, Aelor having noticed in his peripheral the man’s horse go down, but Alaric Langward was still beside him as always.
There were other knights from the front lines both ahead and behind him, the men who had been at the rear already well on their way to counter the flanking action.
It was a suicide mission for the Stormlanders, but Aelor knew they had known it beforehand.
When he finally reached the flanking enemy he let his rage go, hacking a man in the yellow and orange of House Errol off of his horse with more force than Aelor even knew he possessed.
The Prince pulled his reins, his miraculously still living stallion begrudgingly coming to a halt, and the Dragon of Duskendale let out a roar worthy of the title as he chopped men left and right as more and more of his own soldiers converged on the threat.
A lance nearly took him in the helm but he dodged to the side at the last moment, instinctually wrapping his arms around it and yanking.
The knight it belonged to, unprepared for that , was pulled from his horse, where Aelor’s footmen swarmed him like buzzards on carrion.
It served to snapped Aelor out of his haze, and he realized the suicide knights had been washed away in an ocean of red and black Targaryen colors.
He turned his stallion towards the ocean and felt his heart drop when he saw that the galleys had pulled anchor and were even now pulling back into the sea.
The Stormlander’s had left hundreds dead on the field, but Aelor knew in his heart that Lord Tarth and his most vital vassals and knights were still aboard those ships pulling farther and farther away.
“Dammit!” The Dragon Prince roared.
“Dammit all!”
…
They found Morgan Byrch in the arms of his brother.
The youngest of the three Byrch brothers had been one of the first knights to counter Selwyn Tarth’s flanking maneuver, flying back from the slaughter field of the front to save the infantry.
He’d been unhorsed in the brief but fierce fight in the flank, continuing to fight on foot.
It had taken a dirk in the gap in his armor under the armpit to take him down, but even then he’d buried his battleaxe into the skull of the man that killed him.
His brother had found them there, the Tarth knight’s hand still on the dagger in Morgan’s side and Morgan’s hand still on the axe buried in his killer’s forehead. Get faster updates on novelping dot com.
Balman Byrch had lost his own mount to a levy spear, remaining in the vicinity of the Stormlander lines for the battle, but he had seen his baby brother race back to the infantry.
When Morgan didn’t come back, Balman had gone to find him.
Aelor wished it had been someone else who had come across the young knight, if only for Balman’s sake.
The middle Byrch was openly crying, caring not a whit if other men saw him as he cradled his brother’s lifeless body.
Lord Cleyton stood stony faced a few feet away.
The eldest hadn’t had the relationship with his youngest brother that Balman had, but blood was blood, and Aelor knew the man was suffering.
The Dragon Prince stood beside Ser Barristan and Alaric, watching the heart wrenching scene in front of him with his helm in his hands.
“It’s my fault.”
Barristan Selmy shook his head.
“Men die in war, Your Grace, friends and foes alike.”
“I rushed in like a fool and had my flank turned.
If Selwyn Tarth hadn’t have been outnumbered two to one, we’d all be dead now.”
Ser Barristan’s voice turned firm.
“This is not the time for self-pity, Your Grace.
We were outmaneuvered, but their losses are far greater than our own.”
“The important ones got away.”
“We annihilated hundreds of Robert Baratheon’s men.
That was our goal in marching here, and we achieved it.
Yes we were outflanked, but we learn from that and we move on.
”
Aelor was quiet a long moment before clapping his mentor on the shoulder.
“Thank you, my friend.” Aelor turned away from the harrowing scene in front of him, unable to bear Balman’s tears any longer.
If that was Rhaegar, would I do the same?
Would he for me?
Aelor didn’t know the answer, and that disturbed him more than he cared to admit.