Richard held the spyglass against his eye. He adjusted the glass, trying to make sense of the movement happening down on the mud of the Frankish beach camp.
"Look at the right flank." Richard whispered, handing the spyglass back to the Iron King. "King Ragnar, what are they doing?"
"Hmm?" Ragnar grunted, snatching the brass tube and bringing it up to his eye.
The clear, magnified image of the southern vanguard came into focus.
Ragnar slowly swept his gaze across the trenches Lord Lothair had spent the last five days digging.
But Richard was right... something was wrong with the picture.
Instead of hiding behind their barricades, nearly two thousand heavily armored Frankish knights were mounting their warhorses.
They weren't forming up in a tight, glorious cavalry line to charge the open field. Instead, they were quietly and methodically breaking away from the main camp, disappearing into the pine forest on the far left side of the beach.
