Chapter 50

The Synergy of Love

With the heavy cavalry squadron Dax-Ur arranged for his prince, Kal-El found himself guarded by Bruce and fifty heavily armed horsemen as he went out to search for Lana. As soon as they left camp and headed back toward the morning's original front line, Bruce eyed Kal-El and said, "I don't say this easily, your Highness, but what you did back there with Zod was impressive."

Kal-El looked back at Bruce, not quite sure he'd heard the man correctly. "Thank you."

"I expected you to make use of your amulet, but the rest of what you did was inspired. I mean, after taking Kryptonian powers out of the equation, you taunted the guy and made him boiling mad, and then let him wear himself out in fruitless attacks. How did you think of all that?"

Kal-El kept his eyes forward, looking for any sign of Lana, even as he gave Bruce an explanation. "Swordplay is something I learned from Sir Emmerich, and from you, but winning is something I learned from my father. What I did to Zod was just a military application of my father's lessons in politics."

"Which was…?"

"Take every advantage you possibly can before finally making your attack." Kal-El paused, and then made an admission. "The truth of the matter is that I could have taken Zod captive once I got close enough for him to feel the effect of the amulet. That way, he could have been tried for high treason, in court, by my parents. But I felt that by coming to find me the way he did, he had made his choice about the way he wanted to die. And respecting that choice was the only way I had of honoring the many years of service he had given to the kingdom."

"You let him go out as a warrior instead of as a political prisoner." Bruce turned back to looking for Lana. "That's a choice I can respect."

Not long after that, Kal-El spotted the royal standard he had sent to the Langs not so long ago. As his excitement rose, Kal-El stood in his stirrups to get a better angle and then used his telescopic vision to zoom in on the area beneath the white and gold flag. There, sitting astride her strawberry roan horse, was the object of his desire. Kal-El slowed his horse, and then stopped to drink in the details.

Lana was dirty, sweaty, completely grubby in appearance, and yet…she had never looked more beautiful to Kal-El than she did at that moment. Just seeing her alive and unhurt was a thrill, but her face seemed to glow in the afternoon sun, and her purple and gold tabard, chain mail shirt and brown leather pants gave her a slightly wild appearance that made the blood boil in his veins. He couldn't wait to get his hands on her.

"Found her?" Bruce asked politely, even though the answer was plainly written on Kal-El's face; for not only was the prince smiling, but he was inadvertently licking his lips.

"Oh yeah. Let's get moving." A pace that had been a slow trot before spotting Lana turned into a full gallop, as the prince led his guards in a pell-mell race across the battlefield.

Lana had stayed on the hill where she had stopped to watch her troops sweep the King's Legion from the field. As her men had come in contact with Dax-Ur's army, they had become his to command, and then she had become nothing more than a highly interested spectator.

Once Zod's army collapsed, her father's captain-general made sure to send a suitably large force to form a defensive circle around his lady's hill. There was no way he was going to allow something to happen to her now.

Thinking ahead, Lana wondered where her former troops would camp for the evening. They'd either have to march back up into the pass, or else go up there, break camp, and return to the valley floor. Then, they'd have to march to the far side of Lord General Dax-Ur's camp, because the ground around her current position was littered with bloody bodies that were fouling the valley's one small river with their blood.

Thoughts of where she'd sleep became secondary as soon as wounded troops started making their way back toward her position. She knew then that camp would have to be down here, and sent word back up the pass to make ready. Lana was busy making preliminary plans when the first commander returned briefly to her well-defended hill. He was exultant over the crushing victory that had been won, but Lana's first words set him back. "As soon as I'm finished here, you will need to arrest me and take me to the prince, for I defied his direct order."

"What? It was thanks to you that the battle was won at all."

"That may be the truth, or not. Neither matters. The prince gave me a direct order, which I promptly defied. My punishment, or lack thereof, is up to him." Lana eyed the commander, who didn't seem to believe what he was hearing. "The other reason you need to arrest me is that the prince specifically ordered my commanders, a group to which you belong, to make that arrest. If you fail to arrest me, you will be just as guilty as I am."

"No, Milady…no. If the prince wants you arrested, he'll have to come here and do it himself." The commander brought his closed fist across his chest to thump against his heart in a salute, a rare gesture for soldier to make to anyone other than another soldier. "I know I speak for all my fellow nobles when I say we stand with you."

"Thank you, that's very touching," Lana said, and she meant it. "But if you won't arrest me, I'll just have to ride into their camp and turn myself in." She meant that, too. And once she had started the process of moving the camp down to the valley floor, she found someone else to oversee the process and then mounted her horse to turn herself in.

Lana didn't tell anyone else, especially the knights of her bodyguard, where she was going or what she intended to do once she got there, for fear of them trying to talk her out of it. So she left her protected hill with her twenty knights, including her bannerman, and headed for the prince's camp. She didn't really believe she would be punished when she turned herself in, not once the prince learned about her role in the battle, but she felt she had to go through with the arrest to make sure the prince knew she took his commands and his authority seriously.

At that moment, Kal-El was thundering his way toward Lana's hill after spotting her a minute earlier. Lana had just left her hill when she saw a large mounted party flying the prince's black-trimmed royal standard heading directly toward her. Well, I guess he's making it easy on me, Lana thought, as she reined in her horse to wait for the prince. If he lets me go like I think he will, maybe he'll tell me where I can find Clark. After all, Clark is a knight in the prince's very own Borussian army.

Lana's mind was on happy thoughts like these, deliberately ignoring the chance that her Clark might already be dead, when she heard the pounding hooves of the prince's escort come to a stop. Looking up to see the prince's men not twenty yards distant, Lana began looking for the prince himself, but found her search interrupted by a warm voice that seemed to be right next to her stirrup.

She somehow couldn't make a lick of sense out of what was said, because her mind was overwhelmed by the sound of the voice that said it.

Clark!

Her head whipped around and down, and her eyes lit up with unrestrained joy as she saw her man. He was grimy and a little bit bloody, but his smile was as wide as could be. He was unmistakably her Clark.

In her haste to get to him, Lana caught her toe in a stirrup and fell off her saddle, only to feel two massive hands on her waist helping straighten her up and then lower her…but not to the ground. Lana found herself dangling in midair, with her lips at a point exactly across from his. She was fairly sure the rest of his face was there also, but she could only testify to the presence of his delicious, oh so soft lips.

Their lips brushed once, twice, and then came crashing together as Kal-El whirled Lana around him in a tight circle. Kisses fell like rain then, and were interspersed with single-word endearments like 'beloved,' 'honey,' and 'dearest.' The soldiers of both sides looked on bemusedly as their respective commanders tore into each other without restraint.

Kal-El might have gone on spinning Lana round and round, if she hadn't started getting dizzy. A quick request was all it took for him to bring her body to a stop, but her feet were still a foot off the ground, and their lips were still hungrily searching for the heart-filling sustenance that could only be given to them by the other. They kissed and whispered sweet nothings, riding a raging flood of unleashed emotions, until Lana finally had to pull back and take a few deep breaths.

As she gulped in a couple of deep breaths, they took their first long, close-up looks at each other, with their eyes devouring the sight as intensely as their lips had been kissing seconds before.

"Lana…" Clark managed to choke out, before he became too emotional to continue. It was only one word, only her first name, but Lana knew at that moment she'd never be able to explain the welter of emotions she felt when he said her name in the way that only he could.

"Oh, Clark! It's been so long…"

"…too long." Hearing Lana speak his other name, the only name she knew him by, brought the realities of their situation to the fore. As much as he'd dreamed about hearing her say his name once again, Kal-El knew he had to tell her about himself now, before she realized the truth herself.

"My name is not Clark. You know that already, but it's time I told you the truth."

Lana's ears perked up upon hearing that. She'd long wondered what Kryptonian family her Clark was a member of, mostly because she wondered what set of parents they would have to convince to allow them to marry, and because she wanted to know what married name she would have once they succeeded. But her months of speculation did nothing to prepare her for the truth.

Kal-El set Lana on her feet, and gazed into her hazel eyes with his sea green ones. "My name is Kal-El."

A cloud of confusion rolled across Lana's face. She took one step back and looked over at the prince's retinue, hoping to see the prince astride a horse, but instead, only saw a magnificent horse with an empty saddle. She then looked back at Clark…at Kal-El…and took in what he was wearing for the first time. A fancy gold-trimmed steel breastplate over the top of a thickly gold-brocaded uniform coat that just screamed power, but it was the green and gold of the coat that did the trick. Lana knew that green and gold were the colors of the Duke of Borussia, who was also the Crown Prince of Alemannia.

Lana's voice was shaky, as she said, "You're not…not just some second son of a middling noble. You're not just a humble lieutenant, you're the crown prince!" Forgetting she didn't have a dress on, Lana started to curtsey and then switched to an awkward bow once she remembered what she did have on. She bowed as low as she could manage, and each inch she went down drove Kal-El's spirits down also.

"Please don't do that to me," Kal-El pled.

"The daughters of barons always make obeisance to a prince of the realm." Kal-El couldn't tell whether Lana's attitude was stiff or sad, but it felt to him as if she was withdrawing from him emotionally.

"Maybe they do as a general case, but this baronial daughter marries the prince."

"How?" Lana asked. "The gulf that exists between royal and baron is, in many ways, wider than the one between baron and commoner. The king and queen must have dozens of eligible, high-ranking prospective brides with all sorts of powerful political connections just waiting to meet you…and what do I have to offer them?" Lana's impassioned voice became lower, softer, and sadder. "How can my love for you match that in their eyes? I'm just the second daughter of a relatively poor baron, whose best connections are with our neighboring barons, none of who have been to the capital in years."

Kal-El instinctively pulled Lana back into his arms. Nuzzling the top of her windblown hair as she nestled in close against him, he said quietly, "Your love for me is more than a match for all the connections in the world, Lana. It inspires me to fight for you, to insist that no one but you will do." Kal-El bent his neck to place a warm kiss on Lana's forehead. "Now…our relationship and its future difficulties can be gone over at our leisure some other time when no one else is around to hear us, but right now, we have some work to do to help our wounded, and after that, I expect we'll join in the celebrations that will last long into the night."

"My people are already in the process of moving our camp, including our hospital tents, down here to be closer to the men."

"Good. They can set up your camp on the far side of our camps. That way, your people will get the first shot at clean water, which is only fitting since they were responsible for turning the tide of battle today."

Lana basked for a moment in the reflected glory of Clark's compliment to her troops. She listened to her own thoughts and realized which name she had just used to ID him in her mind. Gah! It's going to take quite some time to get used to calling him, and thinking of him as, Kal-El. She figured to get lots of time to practice that night, as she fully intended to stay by his side no matter where he went or what he did.

When Kal-El and Lana went to where the wounded were being treated, he spent a long time using his limited experience with, and talent for, healing spells to pitch in, like the other Kryptonians in his army, and help a number of wounded men avoid a surgeon's bone saw.

Lana was right there by his side, comforting and encouraging the men she met, sometimes with sweetness, sometimes with irreverent cheek. They spent so much time together in the makeshift field hospital that their dinner was very late, and they ate it sitting side by side on little camp seats outside of his small complex of tents while they waited for her new camp to go up. The sun had long since gone down, and the only light was provided by a number of flickering torches set at regular intervals in front of Kal-El's tents.

"What now?" Lana asked, as she brushed the last crumbs of her meal from her hands.

"For us? Or for the army we have here?"

"For us, Cla…Kal-El. The army can wait 'til morning."

Kal-El reached across the small space between them, took Lana's hands into his, and began lightly rubbing the pads of his thumbs across the backs of her knuckles. "Now that you know my secret, and that we each know the other is safe, the next step is the big one: finding my parents and convincing them to allow us to marry."

"Where are they?"

"I think either they or my sister are holed up in the Duke of Salzerei's castle. It may not sound like much, but just by staying there, they tied up several thousand of Zod's troops in a fruitless siege."

Lana thought about how much of a difference just a few thousand more troops might have made. "I'd say they made an important contribution."

"But not," Kal-El began, "anything like the contributions made by Lady Lang." Lana politely raised her brows, pretending ignorance of what he was talking about. "While you were taking care of some personal business, Lana, I received a rather full report from Dax-Ur. In it, he told me that your troops had to face the King's Legion all by themselves. He told me how your troops fought, but eventually broke and ran. Then, despite a command from her prince to stay where she was, Lady Lang rode down to the valley floor. Full of fire and determination, she rallied her troops with her courageous example, saving the day and winning the battle." Kal-El leaned in close. "What do you think a contribution like that is worth, Lana? I've already cancelled the order to arrest Lady Lang for leaving her assigned spot on the ridge, but what else should I give this mysterious woman for saving my life and my father's throne?"

Kal-El was so close that Lana could feel the heat of his breath on her lips, so close that she could feel the pull of his body as they sat there only inches apart.

"Anything she wants," Lana whispered, "and right now, what she wants most is for your lips to come just a little bit closer. She's been away from you far too long for those few kisses out on the battlefield to last her through the night."

Kal-El stood, and used his hold on Lana's hands to pull her to her feet. Lana grunted in pain, as her legs were sore from being on her horse all day long. Kal-El released her hands, but only because he wanted to cup her face. His fingertips brushed against her earlobes and his thumbs traced the line of her cheekbones, as she placed her hands on his shoulders and rose up on her toes. And then they paused, just for the smallest instant, before their lips came together and disproved the mathematical axiom that 1+1=2.

Because whenever Kal-El and Lana Lang come together, the sum of her plus him is far more than two: it's a result called the synergy of love.